Li Gongming | Secretary of the Week: How Dostoevsky ..." Ignite People's Hearts"

Dostoevsky (Volume 5): The Pinnacle of Literature, 1871-1881, by Joseph Frank, translated by Dai Dahong, Guangxi Normal University Press, Shanghai Bebet, March 2022 edition, 1160 pp., 198.00 yuan

The Guangxi Normal University Press's "Literary Monuments" series (chaired by Wei Dong) published Joseph Frank's five-volume biography of Dostoevsky in 2014, the last volume being Dostoevsky: The Pinnacle of Literature, 1871-1881 (originally titled Dostoevsky: The Mantle of the Prophet, 1871-1881, 2002; translated by Dai Dahong, Guangxi Normal University Press, March 2022). It is no exaggeration to say that Dostoevsky's biography, which is five volumes and nearly four thousand pages in total, is the most magnificent monument in the "monument to literature", the deepest valley between literature and thought, ideals and beliefs, and its significance goes far beyond ordinary literary translation and publishing projects.

I remembered that this was the fourth book review I had written for this set of biographies, and reading a biography of a person and writing four book reviews was something I had never had before. In the process of continuous reading and writing, he often discussed with his wife and son. I was very impressed by madame's talk about reading The Brothers Calamazo before, and was particularly touched by Alyosha's words to a group of children at the end; my son discussed frank's set of Toshi biographies with me as the "Terminator" for a long time, and he himself bought the original English versions of Frank's five volumes. He said that frank's wealth of information and depth of exposition, and more importantly, the depth and breadth of literary analysis, Russian social history and intellectual history, cut from the life of the master, are probably difficult to surpass. I talked about the process of understanding and thinking about russia in the 1940s and 1960s from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s, when I went from Chernyshevsky to Dostoevsky, and from a political and literary point of view, I was still very simple in understanding the relationship between ideological debate and literary creation. Although I have read many treatises on the Soviet Revolution, thought, and literature since the nineties, and through reading several of Dostoevsky's great works, I have long established his place in my mind as a great writer in the history of world literature, but the complex relationship between his literary creation and life experience and changes in thought is still not well understood, and it is a late supplementary lesson to read Frank's profound biography of Tosto. More importantly, every time I read this biography of Dows and wrote a book review, I repeat the question: Mrs. Mandelstam regarded the sin of the Russian "intellectuals" for "surrendering all before the 'unified ideology of the victors' as "the rejection of Dostoevsky." (Memoirs of Mrs. Mandelstam, translated by Liu Wenfei, Guangxi Normal University Publishing House, September 2013, p. 28) This may be the reason why we must continue to read Dostoevsky—or, rather, no reason, never forget.

In the gap between four queues in seven days to do nucleic acid, I wrote a "secretary", revised a fifty-thousand-word paper, and then read the fifth volume of this more than 1,200-page biography, and from time to time I had to look through the war, the epidemic and all the touching information on my mobile phone, and it was in line in the square of April in the south, sometimes there were real hallucinations. It seems to see Dostoevsky and Belinsky arguing fiercely in our nucleic acid ranks, as if about the evaluation of Pushkin, and the staff coming up from time to time to kindly remind them to keep a meter away.

Since the last volume was written, some of Frank's statements in the "Preface" are quite general. For example, with regard to Dostoevsky's characters, it is impossible to understand Dostoevsky without understanding how they were deeply troubled by the socio-political ideology and problems of the time, without understanding the complex relationship between the psychology and ideology of these characters; in addition, it is impossible to understand how Dostoevsky raised those questions to the level of morality and philosophy, and presented them in the Russian way of his time and environment In those great novels the problems of Russian culture are epitomized, and the forms of problems were changed with his eschatological views and savior vision. So Frank is not making a false statement that he is actually writing a condensed history of nineteenth-century Russian culture centered on Dostoevsky. He believes that we need to clarify the significance of the reactions that Dostoevsky's vision and foresight provoked at that time, and this became even more important.

At the same time, the first chapter, "Introduction", is also retrospective. At the gatherings of the Petrasevsky Group, Dostoevsky, in his occasional speeches, "always with great indignation sternly condemned the intolerable injustices of the system which formed the basis of the Russian social order", and he never forgot this experience of his own: the meeting, the arrest, the imprisonment, the fake shooting, the exile to the siberian hard labor camp, through the painful personal experience, he discovered the great cultural and spiritual gap between classes, and discovered how important the human nature with a sense of individual freedom is, And how stupid it is to discover the idea that the power of reason can be harnessed and dominated by human life. (pp. 9-10) When Tsar Alexander II abolished serfdom in 1861, Dostoevsky, who had returned from exile, was even more convinced that Russia had no need to seek solutions to Europe's social problems, fearing that the incitement of the radicalism of the sixties, represented by Nikolai Chernyshevsky and H.A. Dubrov, would delay or even hinder the reforms being carried out by the Liberator Tsar not only of serfs but also of the army, the judicial system, and other branches of government. On 8 July 1871, on the day Dostoevsky returned to the Russian capital from abroad, a public trial of the members of Nechayev's group was under way, and the Call of the Revolutionaries, written by Mikhail Bakunin or Sergey Nechaev, was released to the public with a ruthless Machiavellian Catechism and some important documents. The incident was caused by the murder of a member of a secret team led by Nechayev, reportedly in fear of informing. Trials of political prisoners are usually conducted in secret, and the Government's decision to try and publish the documents in public is intended to show the public how unscrupulous and cruel radicals are to achieve their ends. The result is, on the one hand, the stirring speeches of defence lawyers and some of the accused in the name of freedom and justice in the court, which have had an effect on young students that the government does not want to see, and on the other hand, the insidious and evil details of Nechayev's methods that arouse great disgust, even those who agree with his goals. This event led Dostoevsky to compose The Devil.

The author recalls this to illustrate that after the completion of The Flock of Demons, Dostoevsky's intellectual and artistic career began to enter a new phase, when he found a change in Russian radicalism and was willing to recognize the legitimacy of Christian moral values. Dostoevsky's work of the seventies was clearly influenced by this change, which even led him to a brief alliance with left populists to publish his work in their magazine Chronicle of the Fatherland, and to give him the status of prophet. "From this we begin the narrative of this volume, entering into the astonishing final decade of Dostoevsky's life, reaching its peak not only through personal success, but also through The Brothers Karamazov, his genius's response in art form to all the anxieties that tormented his life." (16 pages)

From the point of view of ideological tendencies and political standpoints, Dostoevsky in this period was full of contradictions, he always maintained a conservative attitude towards the Russian monarchy, supported Alexander II's reforms, and believed that these reforms were essential for maintaining stability within Russia, regardless of the shortcomings in the implementation process. (p. 49) "He was considered a man who, despite his loyalty to the Tsar, succeeded in transcending narrow factional strife; over time, over time, when the once-calm and moderate, politically distant populists turned to terror out of despair, he tried to use this position to prevent the catastrophe that was gradually looming in his country." (p. 111) The writer's diary, a well-received op-ed published when he was editor-in-chief of Citizen, in which he discussed a wide range of social issues, from rural and urban poverty to family and children's issues, from the church to the institutions of the judiciary, from Western Europe to the future of Russia, making him an opinion guide for public opinion. Some of these views are quite unique and are important sources of thought for his literary creations in this period. For example, alexander II's reform of the jury system, which enabled peasant jurors to rule that many criminals who were explicitly found guilty would be treated lightly or even exempt from criminal punishment, has one view that this shows that the Russian people are ashamed to use the power they have acquired, and are afraid of this power as a gift, and that "if we happen to be in the same situation, we may even do worse things", so they are always lenient. Dostoevsky, on the one hand, found these views "comforting", but he insisted that the "environmental theory" was contrary to Christian doctrine and would degrade the moral standards of the population, so he insisted that criminal acts should be punished. (pp. 122-125) These ideas are also reflected in the Brothers Karamazov. Nikon Mikhailovsky noted that Dostoevsky was adamantly opposed to the tendency of the jury to acquit as many persons as possible and demanded "severe punishment, imprisonment and hard labour"; (p. 954) It is worth studying Dostoevsky's advocacy of severe punishment.

In this period, it is impossible not to mention Dostoevsky's relationship with the royal family. He was overjoyed when he heard that Crown Prince Alexander was interested in his Diary of a Writer, and immediately wrote to the Crown Prince explaining the reasons for not presenting the publication from the outset, and some of the words in the letter were hard to hear: "The immense energy of the epoch contained in Russian history has been energized with unimaginable vitality, raising the spirit and inner world of the Russians to new heights, enabling them to understand many things which were previously incomprehensible, and making the sacred Russian idea clearer and clearer in our consciousness than before." I cannot but react with undivided attention to everything that happens and arises on the land of the continent and among the righteous and extraordinary people of the continent... I [also] have long considered and dreamed of having the privilege of presenting my humble work to His Highness. Frank said he had every reason to be grateful to the Royal Family of the Romanov dynasty: Nicholas I commuted his sentence and granted him citizenship; Alexander II approved his request for promotion to officer; and three years earlier the Crown Prince had given him money to help him through a difficult period. (p. 317) One day in February 1878, the governesses of Alexander II's two younger sons visited in the name of the Tsar and invited Dostoevsky to meet with his students. Frank said that Dostoevsky's sentiments were entirely conceivable—that criminals and hard-laborers who had been convicted of treason against the state were now invited as distinguished guests to the noblest and most exclusive court as mentors and advisers to those to whom Russia's future would eventually be entrusted! "He found himself in a very special capacity, where not only the younger generation of radicals, but also the young members of the ruling family, regarded him as a worthy adviser. Therefore, if he feels that fate (or God) has given him a mission at this decisive moment in The history of Russia, then he must also have every objective reason to believe that this great mission should fall upon him. Indeed, a quick review of his life shows with clarity that since his return from Siberia in 1860 he has been trying to play the role he now plays—the arbiter and mediator between dissident intellectuals and Russian society as a whole. (pp. 522-523) However, the secret police still monitored him as a former political prisoner, and Dostoevsky decided to use the powerful figures he now befriended to solve the problem. His efforts were reciprocated, promising that there would be no more problems and that only a formal application would be made by himself. In his application, Dostoevsky wrote: "I have demonstrated, and continue to demonstrate, my political convictions and religious beliefs through hundreds of pages of essays. I hope that these beliefs and beliefs do not provide a reason to doubt my political morality. His name was finally crossed out from the list of the watched in the Third Hall, but there were only two years left for his freedom. (567 pages)

It was also during this period that the political struggle in Russia became more and more intense, and the moral ideals and sacrificial spirit of the radicals became more and more contagious and appealing. In 1877, the government brought populists to court three times, the second of which became known as the "Fifty Man" trial, which left a particularly deep and indelible impression on radical intellectuals. "The fact that the dignified defendants are a powerful proof that they have to endure unbearable conditions of detention has left more and more humane and educated citizens directly confronted with the harsh reality of authoritarian rule." The trial shocked the public that these young people were held in extremely unjustly long prison sentences before they were tried, and that the 'crimes' that led them to heavy sentences were entirely benign and lawful acts, often charitable acts. (p. 343) Even more touching is that when the so-called "Trial of Fifty" exposed the willing self-sacrifice of young ladies to spread the "gospel" of socialism, Dostoevsky's friend, the poet Yakov Polonsky, who had no radical ideas, wrote a poem entitled "The Female Prisoner" that began: "Who is she?" Not a wife, not a lover / She's not my daughter either, / But why is her damn fate / Keep me hanging on day and night? (pp. 344-345) With regard to these struggles in the spirit of sacrifice, "Dostoevsky's greatest desire was to influence the populist youth, who were often likened to the martyrs of the early days of Christianity, to follow the path of Alyosha rather than their own." (345 pages)

In the horrific societies of political and class oppression, "beating people" often becomes a symbol of slavery and resistance. Dostoevsky vividly recalled in his January 1876 issue Of the Writer's Diary when he was on a trip to Petersburg with his father and brother, and on the way to a stop saw a government messenger punching the back of his peasant coachman's head like a routine, and the coachman immediately whipped his horse. "This abhorrent scene remains in my memory for the rest of my life" because "it became a symbol of the habitually cruel and barbaric Russian social order". Later, he thought that if he wanted to start a political group one day, he would have to engrave the carriage on the group's badge "as a symbol and a warning." (365 pages)

Another "beating" incident was that the radical young woman Vera Zasulich heard that the mayor of St. Petersburg, General Fyodor Trepov, had ordered the flogging of a populist political prisoner who refused to take off his hat in front of him, so she calmly went into the general's office and shot him under the pretext of formally asking for a meeting, but the general was only slightly injured. As a result, in her public trial, the defendant was acquitted because the defense presented detailed evidence of the cruelty of flogging the prisoners, and "the courtroom, packed with senior government officials and the dignitaries of Petersburg high society, resounded with stormy applause." (p. 512) Dostoevsky abhorred the flogging of prisoners and therefore had some sympathy for Zasulich, who fought tooth for tat. But he believed that either convicting or acquitting her was not the best solution. "If she is found guilty, she will become a martyr; if she is acquitted, her actions will be given some kind of legitimacy, and the state authority of Russia will be undermined." The subsequent situation also confirmed his fears. As she walked out of the courtroom, a celebratory crowd held her aloft over her shoulders, and the radicals' jubilation sparked a demonstration that ended with police shooting one to death. "In this complex situation, many Russians suddenly find themselves caught up in the dilemma between enduring an increasingly unbearable regime and resorting to violence to resist." (p. 513) "But Dostoevsky did not want to blame the purely blooded Russian youth who were willing to make self-sacrifices, he wanted to lead them down other paths." (p. 515) Incidentally, the so-called purity of blood also exposed his anti-Semitic ideas and positions.

Although Dostoevsky paid great attention to social and political issues, and also closely linked these concerns and thoughts to his literary creation, he was also extremely vigilant and opposed to the domination of literary and artistic creation by political concepts. In his article publishing art reviews, he objected to the tendency of some painters to create paintings according to a certain "ideological tendency" and to "allow their inspiration to be dominated by radical utilitarian ideas, using art first and foremost as a weapon in the struggle for social justice." ...... Dostoevsky insisted that, while literature and art undoubtedly played an important socio-cultural role, the best way to make a difference in literature and art could only be to allow artists to create completely autonomously according to their talents. Otherwise, the artist will eventually put on the 'uniform'..." He talks about a detail in Nekrasov's most recent poem: the wife of a husband who came to Siberia to accompany her in prison first kissed the shackles her husband was wearing when they met, and embraced him only after completing this gesture of civic protest; it showed that "we, the citizen poet, are definitely putting the uniform on our body now". (p. 144) I think this detailed example can be discussed, but his vigilance and opposition to literary "uniforms" is still outdated. His advice to young writers was: "Never sell your soul." ...... Never because of the fee... And forced to write. (p. 565)

The Brothers Karamazov is Dostoevsky's masterpiece, and his "Song of the Swans" is the "pinnacle of literature" that Frank uses as the title of the book, which is also the central theme of this fifth volume. Due to the length of the article, it is not possible to continue to talk about this novel here. At the end of the book "The Brothers Karamazov", Alyosha's words to the children can be regarded as the most touching expression of Dostoevsky's thoughts on what love and kindness are, and I even think that his spirit in heaven said to us when he saw that there are so many evil people in the world today, so many low-level indifference and atrocities. Alyosha's mind seemed to be shaken by something, and in the face of a group of children, whom he affectionately called "little pigeons," he said solemnly and solemnly: "We may later become evil people, and even powerless to restrain ourselves from doing bad things, laughing at the tears of the people, making fun of those who shout, as Coria just did: 'I will suffer for all mankind'—maybe we will mock these people viciously." But in any case, no matter how bad we are, just thinking about how we buried Ilyusha, how we loved him in the last days of his life, how we talked intimately next to this stone, then we are the cruelest and most ridiculed among us—if we were to become such people in the future, we would never dare to laugh in our hearts at the fact that he was so kind at this moment! Not only that, but perhaps it was this one memory that would prevent him from doing the greatest bad thing, causing him to meditate and say, 'Yes, I was kind, brave, and honest at the time.' It doesn't matter if he wants to laugh at himself, man often makes fun of good and good things; it is only because he is frivolous and shallow; but I will tell you, gentlemen, as soon as he laughs, he will say in his heart, 'No, it is very bad for me to laugh at this, because this is not to be laughed at!' The children were very excited to hear this, and wanted to say something, but they held back and continued to listen to Alyosha say, "I say this because I am afraid that we will become bad people in the future," Alyosha continued, "but why do we have to be bad people, folks?" The most important thing is that we should first be kind, secondly honest, and secondly, never forget each other in the future. I'm going to repeat that. Folks, I swear to you... We should never forget him.... The children all shouted excitedly in loud voices, "Yes, yes, forever, forever!" Alyosha continued, "Children, dear little ones, do not be afraid of life! How wonderful life is when you do something good, when you do something righteous! "Yes, yes," the children echoed with joy. (The Dostoevsky Anthology, 14 volumes, The Brothers Karamazov (Part 2), translated by Geng Jizhi, Qin Shui and Wu Junxie, People's Literature Publishing House, 2018, pp. 916-918)

Dostoevsky admonished the world: even when doing evil, we must maintain a little last conscience in our hearts, and do not be so cruel in the face of women and children in suffering; do not think that the dust of the times will never fall on your head, even if you do not intend for yourself, you must think of the retribution that your family may receive- in Toth's novel, the individual and the family, this life and the other world are always connected. In the past, in some literary reviews, these ideas of Toshi would have been regarded as "preaching to the reader in succession about love and goodness", but in the dust of the times, this is not preaching, but the highest prayer. In a letter dated 14 February 1881 to Pa mi Treyakov, the Russian painter I. Ni Kramskoy said that Dostoevsky "has played a great role in the life of every man, so long as life is not a joy for this man, but a profound tragedy." He also said that when he was reading The Brothers Karamazov, he "looked around in horror several times and wondered that everything was still the same, and that the world had not turned over on its own axis." It seems that after the family meeting of The Father and Son of Karamazov in the monastery of Elder Zosima, after the 'Lord Of Religion', people are still plundering others, the political circles are still openly propagating hypocrisy, and the senior monks are still comfortable believing that Christ's cause is on its own, and that the actual life is on its own—all this is in a way simply prophetic, hot and apocalyptic, and it makes people feel that they can no longer stay in the old place where we stayed yesterday. We can no longer cling to our old feelings, and we can no longer think nothing but terrible doomsday judgments. I say this just to say to you, presumably, that people like you and me are by no means an isolated phenomenon. There must be many souls and hearts that feel uneasy... Dostoevsky is indeed the conscience of our society." (ibid., p. 956)

One of Dostoevsky's favorite poems was Pushkin's The Prophet, which he often recited aloud: "Walk the sea and the earth, / Ignite the human heart in my language." "He's exactly that.