Professor David Peimer
Alexander Pushkin: 1799-1837

Professor David Peimer | Alexander Pushkin 1799-1837 | 05.21.22

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- And hi to everybody. Hope you are well, everywhere. And wonderful as always to be with you to share. So today we’re going to look at this remarkable young poet, essayist, novelist, playwright, Alexander Pushkin. Remarkable life, remarkably brief life as you can see, 38 years and he was dead. And what he achieved in this short amount of time is quite phenomenal. And there’s a sense of, in terms of framing this overall talk today, for me, it’s not only about, you know, how much he achieved, obviously in a short life, but if we imagine his times for a moment, living under the tsars, Alexander and Nicholas, living under the absolute authoritarian rule of the tsars. Living imbued with the ideals of the French Revolution and the dreams and hope of the Enlightenment era and the Enlightenment writers, ‘cause this is the time that he’s living, which is exactly, you know, on the cusp of all these eras. So imbued with the dreams, the values of the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, and yet living under despotic tsarist rule, Alexander and Nicholas.

So how does he position himself and find a way to express his own story and his life, given the times that he’s living in? And in addition, trying to take the Russian language, a whole step forward into, let’s say, the beginning of a modernity with the sheer use of words in Russian, of language, of literature, in poetry in particular, in, let’s call it poetry slash pamphlet, writing the “Ode to Liberty” we look at, and also with theatre, obviously. So he is regarded in a way as, well, many people around the world, not only in Russia, consider him to be the greatest Russian poet and the founder of modern Russian literature. In addition to those two epochs that I mentioned, he’s also fundamentally, in a way, part of the romantic era in poetry and in literature. And this is important because there is an idealistic streak, which is imbued with a longing, a yearning, along the enlightenment trajectory of a universal humanist approach in trying to have a social impact for the betterment of society. Of justice, freedom, liberty, human rights, and so on. So all of these are really, you know, ingredients cooking at the time that he’s living. We can see the dates here. And he’s filled with this, if you like, dream and idealism.

Not only his youth, but it’s in the literary, the artistic, and philosophical zeitgeist of his own times. What he achieved in a short life, which I’m going to go into today, is I think quite remarkable. And the sheer amount of work that he did, how prolific he was, how politically engaged, and socially engaged. And of course then, with the sheer craft and art of putting words together in the Russian language. So he’s a poet of the Enlightenment. He’s a product and a poet. He’s not only a product, he’s also contributing to the furtherment of the Enlightenment, the dream at least of it. And the French Revolution, the liberal values. He’s actually impeccably against monarchy, despotism, and for the values of liberty, equality and so on. Now interestingly, he’s born into Russian nobility and his father belonged to a very old noble Russian family, going back centuries. So he’s born and he lives, you know, as part of the cream, the cream of the crop in his society. Now, what’s fascinating, and I’m going to show this picture right now, you can see on the left, that’s his father, who was a major in the Russian army, in the tsar’s army. And then on the right, is his mother.

They are clearly, as you can see from these images, they are are part of the Russian nobility, aristocracy. Now the top middle is a very interesting character. And this guy is his great-grandfather. And what’s interesting about him, his name was Major General Abram Petrovich Gannibal. And that’s the image of him at the top, in the middle, and underneath is a statue of this Gannibal figure. And what’s interesting about him is that not only is he Pushkin’s great-grandfather, but Gannibal was a Russian military engineer, a major general in the tsar’s army, a nobleman. Born in sub-Saharan Africa, in what today would be near Cameroon. He was kidnapped as a child by the Ottomans. Traded to Russia, presented as a gift to Peter the Great. He was freed by Peter the Great and adopted by the emperor, and raised in the court household as Peter the Great’s godson. An extraordinary life, an extraordinary journey for someone coming from slavery and those origins, and look where he ends up, and you can see, you know, the very costume, you know, what he’s wearing.

Gannibal became a prominent member of the Imperial Court. He had 11 children and most of them became members of the Russian nobility under the various tsars. The great-grandfather to the poet Pushkin. And at the bottom right, you can see a person who became known as Lady Tatiana Mountbatten. Who married David Mountbatten, the third marquise of Milford Haven in England. And this is Pushkin’s granddaughter on the bottom right. So we get a sense here of Pushkin’s origins in terms of the family, which of course, is symbolic of the much bigger picture that I mentioned earlier. So this mixture from sub-Sahara, from near Cameroon, sub-Saharan Africa, the great-grandfather, his own parents in nobility, his own granddaughter. We get a sense of him living cream of the crop. And of course, all access to the privilege, education, and knowledge that he can have access to in his own times. So Alexander, is of course, the main tsar and then later, Nicholas. And of course, this is also Napoleonic era. So we have thrown into the French Revolution, the Enlightenment, we have the Napoleonic era as well. Which is all crucial in this mix of Pushkin.

If we try to imagine ourselves living in this time and coming from Moscow, even if we are part of this nobility of a family, and yet imbued, not only with these values, but to write poetry, to write plays, to take literature much further, we still, you know, Gutenberg’s press is still, you know, developing itself and its own, you know, and creating access for further knowledge, reading, and education vitally. So there’s the Napoleonic era as well. All of this happening at this time, if we imagine ourselves on the stage of history at this moment. And of course, the tsar is against Napoleon. So of course, he’s also against Pushkin to a large degree because Pushkin is encouraging these values I mentioned earlier. You know, as symbolised in a way by the Napoleonic period. While under strict surveillance of the tsar’s political police, he was unable to publish often. And he had run-ins with the tsar. And what’s fascinating to me is that young Pushkin is constantly up against the tsar himself. Not only his political police, not only sort of lower ranking soldiers and others, but the tsar himself took an interest in Pushkin, recognised this remarkable talent and this remarkable brilliance in terms of writing and thinking.

So the tsar himself was often directly involved in decisions about whether to ban him, his work, or whether to arrest him or not, et cetera. So he’s living this extraordinary short life, caught up in so many of these extraordinary forces. He publishes his first poem at the age of 15 and his great controversial poem, the “Ode to Liberty,” which we’ll look at shortly, is also obviously part of this, and we’re going to read a bit of that in a little while. And that poem, the “Ode to Liberty” led to being exiled by Tsar Alexander. Then, he’s under, as I said, under surveillance pretty much all the time. Pushkin is unable to publish for a while under the tsar. He writes his most famous play, “Boris Godunov,” the poem, “Eugene Onegin,” excuse my pronunciation. Which is regarded as probably the most famous love poem in Russian literature. Long, but we’ll look at a brief bit of it. And then lastly, he is involved in a duel with a lover of his wife, which I’ll come to, which basically leads to the end of his life. This, on the bottom right hand side, you can see a picture of Natalia Goncharova and that’s his wife. And she and him together, when she is only 16 years old. She’s very sceptical, she’s unsure, she’s young, she’s not sure and so on.

She’s regarded as one of the great beauties of the Moscow Imperial or the Imperial Court in Russia. Anyway, it’s two years and he manages to get together with her, and marry, and so on. The bottom left is their daughter that they have. And I just wanted to show it to get a sense of this family and the sense of extended family life that he’s living and what he’s, you know, doing on a personal and political level. He’s born in Moscow, Pushkin, and he has, pardon me. Pardon me. And he has various nursemaids. He has French tutors. 'Cause of course, French being one of the most popular languages of the time for the aristocrats to learn. He has a nanny who he loves dearly, possibly it’s debated more than his mother and so on. At the Lyceum where he studied, he was a student of David Mara, who was the younger brother of the French revolutionary, Jean-Paul Marat. I’m sure we all know him, Marat, Danton, Robespierre, the three great revolutionary leaders of the French Revolution. And he’s studying under the brother of Jean-Paul Marat, so we get the influence. At school and after school, Pushkin plunges into the intellectual and youth culture of his times, which is all of what I mentioned earlier. And it’s in St. Petersburg, which was in the capital of the Russian Empire.

He immersed himself in particular, not only in the Enlightenment, the French Enlightenment specifically, especially Voltaire. And he made this phrase, he came up with this phrase about Voltaire being the lamp of philosophy, brought into the dark archives of history, committed to social reform. He’s becomes a spokesman for literary radicals, liberalism, universality of human rights, liberty, freedom, social justice, and so on. Of course, this angers the tsarist government. And he, in 1820, he’s transferred from the capital, from St. Petersburg, to the Caucasus, and then Crimea. Then we have a picture here, over here. This is his, he also has a lover, Anna Petrovna. And we don’t know much about this relationship, but we do know that he had a lover. It’s important because a lot of people think that he wrote the great poem, “Eugene Onegin,” you know, in thinking of her primarily. Can’t be sure, but that’s what’s surmised a lot. Anyways, he has a lover, she is married, and the thought, the rumour, is that the great love poem he writes in Russian is for her. Then in addition, what this guy does, let’s go back to a bit of Pushkin.

Here, he joins Eteria, which is a secret organisation. The aim is to overthrow the Ottoman rule in Greece. And he starts getting involved in revolutionary activities, political activities, and obviously, producing literature all the time. 1823, Pushkin moves to live in Odessa. And again, he clashed with the government and they sent him into exile again. So the tsar never really arrested him seriously or banned, they banned him a bit, didn’t actually ever torture or harm him physically. But he’s constantly, his works are being banned, he’s constantly under, let’s say harassment, and he’s constantly under the threat of being arrested. But more what they do is they keep banishing and sending him to exile. 1825, he is summoned finally to Moscow after his poem “Ode to Liberty,” which is one of the great revolutionary poetic pieces of all time, not only Russian literature. Because the “Ode to Liberty” was found in the clothing and the backpacks, what we call today backpacks, of the rebels of the Decembrist uprising.

And what they were, they were a bunch of officers from the tsar’s army, the Russian army, a group of officers who had about three to four, maybe 5,000 soldiers behind them, and they were hell bent on a coup against Tsarist Russia. And they were arrested, and imprisoned, and all the rest of it, tortured, and they found copies of Pushkin’s poem, the “Ode to Liberty,” on their clothing, on the soldiers’ clothing, and the officers, and in their backpacks. But they couldn’t prove, of course, that Pushkin had actually given it to them. But it shows the link between art and politics, art and revolution happening in this extraordinary era in European and Russian history. Of politics, of revolution, and art, and poetry. And these individual poets caught up in doing revolution activities, not only, you know, sort of ivory tower writers. He gets his release from exile, he gets a job with the tsar afterwards, he becomes what’s called, the Titular Counsel of the National Archives. And he’s pretty furious, ‘cause he regards this as a terrible job and demotion, and he’s not happy. But the tsar remain, but he’s got a job at least.

The tsar remains, keeps strict control of everything that Pushkin publishes. And he’s banned often and he’s banned from travelling wherever he wants. So they, in today’s phrase, we probably use the word harass all the time and keep the tabs on where the guy’s going. In 1825, he writes the great play, “Boris Godunov,” which is one of the great plays of tyranny and despotism, of a divine right of king, or a tsar, a despot, who believes he has the absolute right to rule and what to do about the ordinary people trying to stand up to the despot. One of the great plays of Russian and global literature. Pushkin wrote of his own play, which is very influenced by Shakespeare and he acknowledges it, especially “Richard III” and “Macbeth.” There’s scenes where, you know, directly linked to it. Pushkin wrote, “the study of Shakespeare and our old Russian chronicles gave me the idea of putting in dramatic form, one of the most dramatic eras of our history. Not disturbed by any other influence, I imitated Shakespeare in his broad and free depictions of character. The simple and careless combination of Shakespeare’s plots. I tried to guess the way of thinking and guess the language of the time from the chronicles. Rich sources, indeed. Whether I was able to make the best use of them, I don’t know, but at least my labours were zealous and conscientious.”

And those two words really capture him for me, “zealous and conscientious,” and make the best use of what he’s got. And that’s classic for writers of the time, and of our own time, and many, many times. Zealous, conscientious, and make the best use of what he can. Using stories, he also used, he originated a lot of using stories to fictionalise historical icons, historical characters and events. He tried to use colloquial, so-called ordinary language of people in Russia. He combined bitter satire together with a certain lyricism in Russian literature. All of these things, one young guy is pulling together in his writing. And constantly in and out of exile, constantly in and out of being, his works banned, he’s stopped from travelling, he’s limited with this and that, all the rest of it. And he’s mixing with rebels and he’s trying to help ferment, you know, uprisings everywhere. Okay, this is a picture on the top left. This is the statue of Pushkin in St. Petersburg, one of the classic statues. That’s the picture of Pushkin, obviously, there. The bottom left is his drawing of himself and the bottom right is a statue from 2016 in Kiev, in today’s Ukraine as we all know.

Pushkin there, 'cause of course, he was in Odessa and elsewhere. So you get a sense, I hope, a bit of the broad spectrum geographically as well of this guy’s life. This is an image here of him speaking, reciting one of his poems in the Russian court. And you get the sense of this young, fevered, and passionate, and brilliant mind, and ability to command a presence. You know, I think he was imbued with a bit of, you know, perhaps, you know, some of the great young geniuses of all time, Mozart and the others. He wrote a piece called “Mozart and Salieri,” which Peter Shaffer took as the main idea when he wrote his play “Amadeus”. Which of course, made his form and then, you know, adapted into the film. So anyway, this, you get just a sense of the image and how not only he sees himself, but how Russian artists at the time might have seen him in the Imperial Court reciting one of his poems. So they saw him as this great figure in literature and this great, brilliant mind. So the question is how they dealt with it, and how it echoes through art history, and through art cultures all over the world.

You know, what do I do with this turbulent priest? Do I ban him? Do I imprison? Do I execute? Do I chop off the head? Do I let the poets write? Do I, whatever, all the different things, the link between tyranny and power and the individual who is imbued with the ideals of liberty, equality, social justice, human rights. Okay, I want to go straight onto the “Ode to Liberty” because this has got some for me, remarkable language. And let’s remember, he’s trying to combine poetry with political. And very often, as we know only too well, it can become boring, didactic, and tedious, and imminently, you know, sleep material. But look what Pushkin tries to do. And of course, this is in a contemporary translation.

“Listless princess, sing no more. Begone out of my view! But you, great scourge of tsar and king, proud muse of freedom, where are you? Come rip my laurels off. Bring stones and crush this coddled lyre. Let me sing to the world of liberty and shame the scum that sit on thrones. Let me sing to the world of liberty and shame the scum that sit on thrones. Tremble, O tyrants of the earth! But you, take heed now, know your worth and rise as men, O fallen slaves! I cannot cast my gaze but see a body flayed, an ankle chained, the useless tears of slavery.” What an amazing line, “useless tears of slavery.” “The law perverted and profaned. Yea, everywhere iniquitous. Power in the fog of superstition ascends. And slavery’s gruesome genius. Heavy on every sovereign head there lies a people’s misery.”

To go on. “To smite transgression from on high with one blow, righteously severe in fingers uncorrupted by ravenous avarice or fear. O monarchs, you are crowned by will and law of man, not nature’s hand. Though you above the people stand, eternal law stands higher still. King Louis to his death ascends in sight of hushed posterity. His crownless, beaten head he bends. Blood for the block of perfidy. The law stands mute, the people too. And down the criminal axe-blade flies. And lo! A ghastly purple lies upon a Gaul enslaved anew. You autocratic psychopath. You and your throne do I despise! I watch your doom, your children’s death with hateful, jubilating eyes. The poet, roused with intellect, sees the lone tyrant’s statue loom. Grimly asleep amid the gloom, the palace now a derelict. Behind those awesome walls of power. Vivid before his sight appears the foul Caligula’s last hour. In stars he espies assassins drunk with wine and spite. Approaching, furtive in the night with wolfish hearts and brazen eyes. The gate in dark of night unbarred. O shame! O terror of our time! Beasts burst in, the criminal sovereign is slaughtered by unholy crime. O Tsars, henceforward learn ye well. Then peoples’ life and liberty, furthermore, shall guard your throne.”

I wanted to read a bit of it, I mean, it’s much longer obviously, but it’s an extraordinary piece of writing for me. Where you feel the restless passion. You feel the blood in the veins, you feel the yearning for something better. Naive, idealistic, over romantic, sentimental even, historically immature, who knows. But the sheer momentum of this literature, of the rhythm of the language, the sheer use of images and the writing, it has a momentum which is restless. You know, it really reminds me of, to go back to last week, the steps of the “Battleship Potemkin,” in Eisenstein’s film. There’s a restlessness. There’s a constant never stopping, never ending. A momentum has begun in history. And I think this is what Pushkin feels. French Revolution era, Napoleonic era. The Enlightenment. It feels there’s a restless march of history, and liberty, and freedom, you know, all of this is coming. Of course, you know, the return of tyrants, and others, and so on. But there is a certain drive that he feels, I think, is unstoppable. And I think it does strike a chord, deep in the human heart, where people strive for freedom or liberty on a very small personal level or on a big macro level wherever this kind of poetry is read. In terms of sheer language, he’s bringing poetics and aesthetics into what is often dull political jargon.

It’s not just a call to arms, it’s a call, to quote Kafka, “to take an axe to the frozen heart and unleash the power of pure passion for the dream that he’s hoping,” you know? I’m getting a bit carried away here. I’m really imbued with a bit of Pushkin’s stuff, but you can’t help it when you get into this guy’s writing. You know, you’ve go into the mind and the heart of the beating core of this urge. And you get a sense, we get a sense I think, of so many of the writers and poets who felt similarly writing in this time, at this confluence of such extraordinary events happening, you know, on their continent. So I hope, and then every now and then, there’s just a phrase which just, you know, completely stands out and stuns us. The one other thing I’d say with Pushkin, is that the remarkable German playwright and poet, Buchner, who died much younger when he was 24, who wrote the three remarkable plays, “Danton’s Death,” “Woyzeck,” and so on. And in “Danton’s Death,” Buchner in Germany, he has a similar life. He’s a revolutionary, he’s involved in revolutionary activities, university. Shakespeare’s a huge influence and he’s writing, and he’s regarded as the father of modern theatre. Because everyday language, brevity, concise, extraordinary scripts that he writes, you know, in those three short plays, and he dies at the age of 24, of TB.

But with Buchner, he is already feeling the disillusion of the idealism of the French Revolution. He sees Napoleon more as emerging as a tyrant and he sees the reemergence of tyranny, despotism, and other things, and militarism. Buchner in “Danton’s Death” and some of his other writings, talks more about the disillusion of the ideals. So to study the two in contrast is amazing ‘cause they are two of the greatest writers, certainly of this whole period, if not of European literature. And in the end, Buchner has the great phrase, you know, “on the wave of history, do we ride the firm or do we ride the wave?” Of the wave of history, which is in, I’m adapting it from the play, “Danton’s Death.”

Okay, so to move on. To the play, “Boris Godunov.” This on the top left is from the film by one of the great Russian filmmakers, Tarkovsky, who made it a film of the “Boris Godunov” play. And these are some of the images here from various productions. So you can see more contemporary or some of them trying to deal more with Russian folklore in history. Tarkovsky is trying to almost realistically set it in the period. In the play, and the play is set around the time of Ivan the Terrible and after. And just don’t want to go into all the details of the plot, but the essence is that Ivan has a son and the killing of the son, who will become the next tsar is observed by Boris Godunov. So he in a way is complicit in the killing of Ivan the Terrible, of his son. And yet Boris Godunov will become, you know, the next tsar, et cetera. How did he get into power, and what does he do with that knowledge, and how gets into power and so on. So we get a link between Ivan the Terrible, the tsar, the role of power, corruption, murder, do ends justifies the means, anything to become the next ruler king.

You know, I’m just giving you the essence of not all the story of the play, of “Boris Godunov”, but it’s become, it is one of the classics of tyranny and despotism in today’s, I suppose the word would be totalitarianism and despotic rule. And the rise of the ordinary people. But what to do? And Boris in the play has some of Macbeth’s anxiety and guilt, but also the drive of Richard III, to be the villain and to take and conquer. And Pushkin refers exactly to those two plays of Shakespeare’s in some of his own notes for the play, “Boris Godunov.” One of the critics wrote about a fairly recent production. This was the production, here you can see. “From ballrooms to battles, Pushkin’s lyrical masterpiece.” This is a critic, the production was done in London. “Pushkin’s lyrical masterpiece is a compelling expose of the seductive appeal of power and the price that is paid for it. Money, corruption, sex, and blood thicken this radical, sinuous play inspired by Shakespeare’s histories and tragedies.”

This critic goes on. This was done in Stratford, this production. “Any production of Pushkin’s 1825 play is haunted by gigantic shadows. Shakespeare, "Macbeth,” “Richard,” which Pushkin invokes. Then of course, you know, there is the great opera, which we all know. The play is a subversive political parable with satiric comedy.“ Now that’s how we would see it today. In its own time, I think they would see the satire as well. The critic goes on. "We are back in Russia in 1858 to 1605. And Boris is a confidant of Ivan the Terrible, the ruling tsar. He has accepted the title with a show of reluctance. But Boris gains power by murdering Ivan’s youngest son in the production. Capitalising on the public’s gullibility, a young monk called Gregory, then poses as the reborn prince, and with the aide of the Polish and Lithuanian troops, marches on Moscow to overthrow the butching, murderous tyrant that Boris has become.” So in that summary by the critic of the Stratford production, I think we get a sense of the play and it’s pretty obvious to me that, and I’m sure to everybody, the metaphor for our own times and the 20th century, and we can go on and on. It’s a comment. And what’s interesting is that this debate was raised by the Stratford production. And quite a few people wrote in to discuss it at the time, “is it about Russia’s continuous appetite for autocracy?” That’s a question which the critic refers to.

You know, because the critic is referring to some of the discussions. Is there an appetite for autocracy in Russia? Is there an appetite for autocracy elsewhere? Not only in Russia. Questions thrown out. The links to today are obvious. “Boris wears a Vladimir Putin-type business suit.” Now this production’s before everything that’s happened recently. “Boris wears a Putin-type business suit in the production. Then he dawns the golden robes of Sodom, like in an Eisenstein movie.” And we saw some of the images last week. “Because the courtiers sport 19th century costume, but the guards have modern rifles. Boris in the production is a mixture of calculating politician and tyrant who does have anxiety.” So I think it’s fascinating 'cause this is a very contemporary, but pre-Ukraine crisis production and a very contemporary way of seeing the tyrant and the murderous butchering tsar from a theatrical point of view in terms of these historical icons through Pushkin’s great play, of course.

Okay, so the link to Nicholas and Alexander, the tsars, the autocrats, all of these things are pretty clear. And of course, he’s obsessed himself with thinking, “how do I as a writer function in these,” you know, “dark times?” Which of course, writers throughout history are always trying to deal with. From Apartheid South Africa to so many parts of the world in our own contemporary times, obviously. The Tarkovsky production, you see the image on the top left, now that is obsessed with, you know, if you like, the motherland history, the history of Russia. Because Tarkovsky, for me, an extraordinary Russian filmmaker, imbued with Russian history, with the land, with aristocrats, peasants, with all the ideas and inside the history of Russia. A little aside, which is a theatrical bit of gossip. Tarkovsky, of course, couldn’t speak English. And the actors and the singers couldn’t speak Russian. So somehow they, you can imagine how they try to have the production, and directing, and translators, and so on, which can happen quite often with productions.

So a year after directing this production of “Boris Godunov,” Tarkovsky, the, for me, a remarkable, fairly contemporary Russian filmmaker, renounced his Soviet citizenship because the Soviet authorities refused to give him a passport. So I don’t think he tried to echo Pushkin’s life, but he himself is subject at a certain stage to all these vagaries of the role of the artist, the role of the writer, in times of tyranny or despotism, in our words, totalitarianism. It’s the historical sweep that Pushkin brings into literature. It’s the bitter satire, it’s the parody and metaphor of historical icons and political, the transference of power, and corruption, and murder a la Shakespeare, that Pushkin tries to bring into Russian literature and succeeds. And this begins the trajectory of Pasternak, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, so many of the others to come. Nabokov much later translated some of his works as well and many, many others. So we get a sense of his position in the great, remarkable tradition of Russian literature. Okay, to go on to, here’s also a little bit of, this is of the Stratford production, not the Tarkovsky.

You can see, I mean, it’s almost extraordinary. That these soldiers are dressed like we see every night on TV, the images of this production has performed. So it’s, you know, this is part of the Stratford production here. And there was another remarkable production done by a fantastic British company called Cheek by Jowl. Which is a very physical, visceral company where they do beautiful productions with language, and space, and light. And this is an example from Cheek by Jowl’s production here. And another image, you know, this is that image of the Putin-esque Boris Godunov character. There’s the crown, but dressed in that suit and all the rest of it, a very contemporary production here. And you can see more images of it from this production, which speaks to us today from this very contemporary. So there’s three productions, there’s the Tarkovsky I’m showing you, you know, down in Covent Garden, there’s the Stratford and the other one. Okay, then what’s also interesting, just to go back a little bit to his life.

To this gentleman’s life, I want to go back to a picture of his wife. Okay, so Natalia, they marry, he’s utterly obsessed, he’s utterly in love, but obviously writing his love poem to Anna, we think, anyway. She’s very young and she has an affair with a French guy, who claims he’s part of the legacy of the French Revolution that he really was part, et cetera, et cetera. The reality is we’re not totally sure, we don’t think so. And what happens is that Pushkin is, of course, jealous and furious, and challenges this French guy to a duel. And what happens in the duel, they have to choose what kind of duel they’re going to have. And the kind of duel chosen is where the two adversaries have a pistol and they stand far apart, they turn, and they start walking towards each other. And either can fire first, but then whoever fires first, the wounded one, if the bullet goes in, then can take as long as he wants before firing at the other one. So the one who shoots first has to stand still and can’t move, and present their body. The one who’s been shot at can then take their time to shoot back.

Let’s call it the nuances, the vagaries, the madnesses, the craziness, the remark, whatever, of duels. And what happens is that the French guy shoots first and wounds Pushkin. A bullet to the abdomen, seriously wounded, he falls, all that, et cetera. The French guy has to stand still, according to the rules of the duel. Pushkin manages to get off, and he’s not exactly a military guy, he manages to get off a bullet from the pistol, and it hardly grazes the French guy. Two days later, Pushkin dies of his wounds from this duel at the age of 37. That’s how this remarkable character, who’s involved in so much of what I’ve described historically, revolution wise, literature, poetry, plays, everything, falls prey to jealousy over his beautiful wife having an affair with a French, let’s say, semi-dilettante. And that’s it, he’s toast, end of his life. So the epilogue, this is almost surreal to me of what happens and to give you the final, if you like, cherry on the top of this whole little story is that this French guy becomes a baron, Georges de Heeckeren, who dies at the grand old age of 1895, surrounded by children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and a familiar figure in the Paris salons and the Paris aristocratic, or Paris elite, let’s say, of his times. So, and Natalia, as you can see, dies in 1863.

Okay, that’s a little bit of the story, which is actually true. It sounds like a farce but real. Okay, I want to read a little bit of the great love poem, “Eugene,” and forgive my pronunciation here, “Eugene Onegin.” And this, as I said earlier, regarded as one of the great, if not the greatest love poem in Russian literature. Just to give you an idea of some of the, again, the way that he’s putting together the relishing of language in such a contemporary, modern way. Of brevity of words, a certain rhythm and momentum in the language, which for me is so modern and speaks to us now. “Indifferent to the world’s delight, seeking the pleasure of my friends. I only wish the words are right, might have been turned to better ends.” Irony, the wit, all the time. “The casual, the idealistic, the fruit of carefree hours, unplanned insomnia, pale inspiration, unripe powers or fading art, the intellect, cold observation, the bitter record of the heart. My uncle, what a worthy man, falling ill like that and dying. It summons up respect, one can admire it as if he were trying. But God, what tedium to sample, that’s sitting by his dying bed all day. All night, barely a foot away. And the hypocrisy demeaning of cosseting one who’s half alive. Puffing the pillows, you contrived to bring his medicine unsmiling. Thinking with a mournful sigh, "why the devil can’t you die?”

His father had a fine career and finely he lived a life of debt. And died with all he owed unmet. But fate took young Eugene by the hand, you understand. A pleasant natured lad but wild. He ducked the moralising sermons. His uncle taught him everything by whim. A mild rebuke, a sharp remark, then off to ramble in the park and play. Now when Eugene reached the age of restless youth’s tumultuous passion, those years of hope and tender rage, and my Eugene was free at last. A London dandy safely classed. His hair cut neatly, into society he rode. French he spoke and wrote with ease. Dance the mezurka deftly too, bow to each acquaintance new, did all that was required to please. I agreed that here was wit and charm indeed. We’ve all acquired some education. What is our education been that we have acquired? A bit of this and a bit of that. Onegin, he was deemed by many, a well-read and opinionated wild young lad. His education, a bit of this and a bit of that. He had the gift of easy chatter, touching lightly on each theme. He lacked the passion and desire to give his life for poetry.

Adam Smith, “The World’s Wealth of Nations,” was more his tome. We deepened all things economic, “The Wealth of Nations” was his true topic. Was it the science of tender passion or not? From the first, he spread confusion. He would conceal his hopes and feign jealousy, gain the trust or cause pure disillusion. He would seem to pine, be sad or gloomy, sometimes proud, sometimes humble. He played the crowd beautifully. He played the room like a master. But he was so young. Sometimes proud, sometimes humble, all attentive or just a mumble. How language was his reticence. How passionate his eloquence, how swift his letters from the heart. Breathing one thing, loving one thing. Did he mean it or was he playing his part? How skillfully he’d feign the new and daze the eyes of innocence that gazed upon him. Did he frighten with a glance or two? Despair? Did he burn flattery’s incense? Catch the first flush of emotion, overcome with wit and passion? Did he burn flattery’s incense? Did the crowd even know?“ I just share this a little bit because this is young Pushkin writing a love poem, beginning to create a character who is in love, and falling in love, and questioning all the things, which is not necessarily about revolution and politics, such as the "Ode to Liberty.” It’s not about the drama inspired by Shakespeare, “Boris Godunov.”

It’s a love poem and has gone down in Russian and global literature as one of the great love poems. And I feel the character is so modern. The writing, the brevity, the images, the language, is so modern. That slightly sardonic, ironic twist of tone and language. Beautiful. Okay. Then, and the poem goes on and on of course, and is much longer. So to come back finally to his short life. This is what we see here. 1820, banished, exiled, new tsar comes. He’s associated with the uprising as said, where they had copies of his poem in their backpacks, on their clothes. 1826, 1831, the play “Boris Godunov.” He completes his remarkable piece of literature on Mozart and Salieri, which I mentioned. 1833, “Eugene Onegin,” you know, the great love poem. It was a panoramic of Russian life. He writes “The Queen of Spades” in 1834, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, dies in a duel. This is just a few of the highlights of his literary and revolutionary life, of this guy. It’s ultimately an extraordinary, you know, achievement. It’s an extraordinary life. And I guess in the end I’m faced with a question, is he a romantic? Is he a romantic who is subverting the ideals of romanticism in poetry because of that constant satire and ironic wit? Is he a more of a revolutionary poet? Is he more of trying to be an activist?

He’s so imbued with the ideals of the French Revolution, the Enlightenment, and yet the history of himself. And yet, he’s also engaging the tsar himself, is constantly trying to figure out what to do with his turbulent poet priest. This restless energy, the contribution to language and literature that he’s giving is extraordinary. So I don’t want you, this I think is a bit of maybe a bit of a romantic portrayal today, but I think we are more, we are poorer, for not having these kind of figures. Who stride the world, or at least stride their own country, or city even, nearly as much today. I think that, you know, in celebrity culture and so much of the other nonsense, and Twitter, and everything else, et cetera, that we all, you know, that that’s part of the addiction of our times. To me, these characters, they become iconic for contemporary eyes because they lived, they did things. I think Pushkin is, you know, he’s all of those things that I mentioned. I don’t think just one or the other, maybe in the end ultimately more of a poet than anything else. More of very semi-romantic poet, and yet subverting romanticism as well.

But I feel the barrenness to a certain degree of today. How many of these kind of figures and how can we help to maybe groom or maybe help nurture some figures like this at least, who engage in so many ways. Not about right or wrong, but you know, anyway, I feel this is what this iconic figure can be seen as in our times today. That we can take something of this and look not only in our own hearts, but maybe in others to find where can these figures arise? Where can there be a space? And of course, there’s the internet, there’s Twitter, it’s everything. But in this noise obsessed, to quote Daniel Kahneman, the great Israeli psychologist, he talks about the noise of today’s life. And Daniel Kahneman talks about how we are storytellers fundamentally. Storytellers and yet, the storyteller’s up against the noise of life all the time. Well, what are characters like this, you know, inspire in us as we discover them, you know, going back in literary history?

Okay, I’m going to hold it there and thank you very much to everybody. I think in the end he’s simultaneously romantic and subverts romanticism in literature and poetry as well.

• [Host] Thank you so much, David. Do you have a little time to take some questions?

Q&A and Comments

• Yeah, of course, sure. Okay.

Q: “Can you please put the name of,” Gail, “of Pushkin’s great-grandfather in the chat?” A: His name was, going to get it right, Abram Petrovich Gannibal. G-A-N-N-I-B-A-L. Gannibal. Who was the great-grandfather of Pushkin.

From Alfred and Yerna, “note that the Russian language does not have a native sound equivalent for the English H. Russian replaces H with Gs. So Gannibal is Hannibal.” Of course, the link here. “Continuing the military thread, exemplirised by the name Alexander the Great.” Great, thanks for that Alfred and Yerna. Rimmer. “You mentioned that Pushkin was fiercely anti-monarchist. However, his works show that he is dualist in his attitude towards the great monarch, for example, the epic poem, "The Bronze Horseman.”“ Yes, I agree. There is a certain dualism there, but I suppose the works which have really lasted in impact, "Boris Godunov,” and the “Ode to Liberty,” and the love poem, are much more, which have, I guess I’m just saying, my opinion, is that they’ve lasted more strongly and you know, more a greater influence globally, which is less dualist. Natasha, “there’s a statue also in Kishinev where my father was born.” That’s amazing, Natasha. Thank you so much for that.

Ena. “With all his anti-tsar feelings, he was against Polish uprising, supported the Russian invasion of Poland.” Yep, “and is practically a persona non grata in Poland. I don’t think there are any monuments to him in Poland.” Spot on, agreed. Thank you for that. Feyna and Rafael. “On the painting, Pushkin recites a poem, not at the court, but at the graduation.” Yes, sorry, that was the graduation at the elite, last year for the boys. Theodore, thank you. “The poem slides show numbered notes.” Yeah, I took a couple of stanzas, it’s a long poem, hell of a lot. So I took a couple of stanzas 'cause I wanted to show different aspects of the poem, from the language to the political, to the revolutionary way of writing. To give us a slightly broader sample rather than just, you know, a couple of stanzas which follow sequentially. Rosa, thank you, thanks for your comment. Helene.

Q: “I’m told there’s a connection between Pushkin’s granddaughter in one of the tsar’s family. Mentioned Mountbatten, wouldn’t it have been Battenberg?” A: Yes, but she became known as Lady Tatiana Mountbatten, having married David Mountbatten. That’s according to the research.

Okay, Gene. “Pushkin’s demise is a lot like Alexander Hamilton. We Americans lost an incredible mind too soon as well.” Yep, that’s a really interesting, fascinating connection. Margaret. “For all the duel standards, challenging his wife’s lover to a duel when he also had a lover. He was also married.” Yes. Well, what can we say? These are the times, let’s never forget, he’s part of the aristocracy. He’s born into it, he’s got nannies, he’s got nursemaids, he’s got French tutors, et cetera, et cetera. And he’s born in and is part of the aristocracy. So that’s part of his world of, to put it mildly, incestuous and everyone’s having affairs, and yeah, lovers and all the rest of it. Pushkin’s daughter who, thank you, Karen, separate whole story. But not a particularly significant life, fairly ordinary, but still part of nobility.

Q: David, “what was the attitude Jewish people in his views of liberty?” A: I’ve left it out for the moment, David. I think that would require another whole session or at least part of it.

Eileen, thanks. Thanks for your comments, Debbie. Thank you, thank you, Avron, thank you. Mona. Thank you, Jennifer. Thanks. Okay, from Hertfordshire. Okay, Inna, “the most beloved by all of us of all Pushkin’s poems about love was to Anna Kern.” Yep, that was the lady that I showed in the image. Okay, Sharon, thank you for your comment. Okay, I think that’s it.

So thank you very much everybody. Hope you have a wonderful Saturday, Saturday evening, everywhere. And take care and have fun.