No More Learning

. . But don't let us say any
more about that," Nastenka broke off, breathless with emotion, "I only
wanted to tell you . . . I wanted to tell you that if, although I love him
(no, did love him), if, in spite of this you still say. . . . If you feel
that your love is so great that it may at last drive from my heart my
old feeling--if you will have pity on me--if you do not want to leave me
alone to my fate, without hope, without consolation--if you are ready to
love me always as you do now--I swear to you that gratitude . . . that my
love will be at last worthy of your love. . . . Will you take my hand? "

"Nastenka! " I cried breathless with sobs. "Nastenka, oh Nastenka! "

"Enough, enough! Well, now it's quite enough," she said, hardly able to
control herself. "Well, now all has been said, hasn't it! Hasn't it? You
are happy--I am happy too. Not another word about it, wait; spare me . . .
talk of something else, for God's sake. "

"Yes, Nastenka, yes! Enough about that, now I am happy. I---- Yes,
Nastenka, yes, let us talk of other things, let us make haste and talk.
Yes! I am ready. "

And we did not know what to say: we laughed, we wept, we said thousands
of things meaningless and incoherent; at one moment we walked along the
pavement, then suddenly turned back and crossed the road; then we
stopped and went back again to the embankment; we were like children.

"I am living alone now, Nastenka," I began, "but to-morrow! Of course
you know, Nastenka, I am poor, I have only got twelve hundred roubles,
but that doesn't matter. "

"Of course not, and granny has her pension, so she will be no burden. We
must take granny. "

"Of course we must take granny. But there's Matrona. "

"Yes, and we've got Fyokla too! "

"Matrona is a good woman, but she has one fault: she has no imagination,
Nastenka, absolutely none; but that doesn't matter. "

"That's all right--they can live together; only you must move to us
to-morrow. "

"To you? How so? All right, I am ready. "

"Yes, hire a room from us. We have a top floor, it's empty. We had an
old lady lodging there, but she has gone away; and I know granny would
like to have a young man. I said to her, 'Why a young man? ' And she
said, 'Oh, because I am old; only don't you fancy, Nastenka, that I want
him as a husband for you. ' So I guessed it was with that idea. "

"Oh, Nastenka! "

And we both laughed.

"Come, that's enough, that's enough. But where do you live? I've
forgotten. "

"Over that way, near X bridge, Barannikov's Buildings. "

"It's that big house? "

"Yes, that big house. "

"Oh, I know, a nice house; only you know you had better give it up and
come to us as soon as possible. "

"To-morrow, Nastenka, to-morrow; I owe a little for my rent there but
that doesn't matter. I shall soon get my salary. "

"And do you know I will perhaps give lessons; I will learn something
myself and then give lessons. "

"Capital! And I shall soon get a bonus. "

"So by to-morrow you will be my lodger. "

"And we will go to _The Barber of Seville_, for they are soon going to
give it again. "

"Yes, we'll go," said Nastenka, "but better see something else and not
_The Barber of Seville_. "

"Very well, something else. Of course that will be better, I did not
think----"

As we talked like this we walked along in a sort of delirium, a sort of
intoxication, as though we did not know what was happening to us. At one
moment we stopped and talked for a long time at the same place; then we
went on again, and goodness knows where we went; and again tears and
again laughter. All of a sudden Nastenka would want to go home, and I
would not dare to detain her but would want to see her to the house; we
set off, and in a quarter of an hour found ourselves at the embankment
by our seat. Then she would sigh, and tears would come into her eyes
again; I would turn chill with dismay. . . . But she would press my hand
and force me to walk, to talk, to chatter as before.

"It's time I was home at last; I think it must be very late," Nastenka
said at last. "We must give over being childish. "

"Yes, Nastenka, only I shan't sleep to-night; I am not going home. "

"I don't think I shall sleep either; only see me home. "

"I should think so! "

"Only this time we really must get to the house. "

"We must, we must. "

"Honour bright? For you know one must go home some time! "

"Honour bright," I answered laughing.

"Well, come along! "

"Come along! Look at the sky, Nastenka. Look! To-morrow it will be a
lovely day; what a blue sky, what a moon! Look; that yellow cloud is
covering it now, look, look! No, it has passed by. Look, look! "

But Nastenka did not look at the cloud; she stood mute as though turned
to stone; a minute later she huddled timidly close up to me. Her hand
trembled in my hand; I looked at her. She pressed still more closely to
me.

At that moment a young man passed by us. He suddenly stopped, looked at
us intently, and then again took a few steps on. My heart began
throbbing.

"Who is it, Nastenka? " I said in an undertone.

"It's he," she answered in a whisper, huddling up to me, still more
closely, still more tremulously. . . . I could hardly stand on my feet.

"Nastenka, Nastenka! It's you! " I heard a voice behind us and at the
same moment the young man took several steps towards us.

My God, how she cried out! How she started! How she tore herself out of
my arms and rushed to meet him! I stood and looked at them, utterly
crushed. But she had hardly given him her hand, had hardly flung herself
into his arms, when she turned to me again, was beside me again in a
flash, and before I knew where I was she threw both arms round my neck
and gave me a warm, tender kiss. Then, without saying a word to me, she
rushed back to him again, took his hand, and drew him after her.

I stood a long time looking after them. At last the two vanished from my
sight.


MORNING

My night ended with the morning. It was a wet day. The rain was falling
and beating disconsolately upon my window pane; it was dark in the room
and grey outside. My head ached and I was giddy; fever was stealing over
my limbs.

"There's a letter for you, sir; the postman brought it," Matrona said
stooping over me.

"A letter? From whom? " I cried jumping up from my chair.

"I don't know, sir, better look--maybe it is written there whom it is
from. "

I broke the seal. It was from her!

* * * * *

"Oh, forgive me, forgive me! I beg you on my knees to forgive me! I
deceived you and myself. It was a dream, a mirage. . . . My heart aches for
you to-day; forgive me, forgive me!

"Don't blame me, for I have not changed to you in the least. I told you
that I would love you, I love you now, I more than love you. Oh, my God!
If only I could love you both at once! Oh, if only you were he! "

["Oh, if only he were you," echoed in my mind. I remembered your words,
Nastenka! ]

"God knows what I would do for you now! I know that you are sad and
dreary. I have wounded you, but you know when one loves a wrong is soon
forgotten. And you love me.

"Thank you, yes, thank you for that love! For it will live in my memory
like a sweet dream which lingers long after awakening; for I shall
remember for ever that instant when you opened your heart to me like a
brother and so generously accepted the gift of my shattered heart to
care for it, nurse it, and heal it. . . . If you forgive me, the memory of
you will be exalted by a feeling of everlasting gratitude which will
never be effaced from my soul. . . . I will treasure that memory: I will be
true to it, I will not betray it, I will not betray my heart: it is too
constant. It returned so quickly yesterday to him to whom it has always
belonged.

"We shall meet, you will come to us, you will not leave us, you will be
for ever a friend, a brother to me. And when you see me you will give me
your hand . . . yes? You will give it to me, you have forgiven me, haven't
you? You love me _as before_?

"Oh, love me, do not forsake me, because I love you so at this moment,
because I am worthy of your love, because I will deserve it . . . my dear!
Next week I am to be married to him. He has come back in love, he has
never forgotten me. You will not be angry at my writing about him. But I
want to come and see you with him; you will like him, won't you?

"Forgive me, remember and love your
"NASTENKA. "

* * * * *

I read that letter over and over again for a long time; tears gushed to
my eyes. At last it fell from my hands and I hid my face.

"Dearie! I say, dearie----" Matrona began.

"What is it, Matrona? "

"I have taken all the cobwebs off the ceiling; you can have a wedding or
give a party. "

I looked at Matrona. She was still a hearty, _youngish_ old woman, but I
don't know why all at once I suddenly pictured her with lustreless eyes,
a wrinkled face, bent, decrepit. . . . I don't know why I suddenly pictured
my room grown old like Matrona. The walls and the floors looked
discoloured, everything seemed dingy; the spiders' webs were thicker
than ever. I don't know why, but when I looked out of the window it
seemed to me that the house opposite had grown old and dingy too, that
the stucco on the columns was peeling off and crumbling, that the
cornices were cracked and blackened, and that the walls, of a vivid deep
yellow, were patchy.

Either the sunbeams suddenly peeping out from the clouds for a moment
were hidden again behind a veil of rain, and everything had grown dingy
again before my eyes; or perhaps the whole vista of my future flashed
before me so sad and forbidding, and I saw myself just as I was now,
fifteen years hence, older, in the same room, just as solitary, with the
same Matrona grown no cleverer for those fifteen years.

But to imagine that I should bear you a grudge, Nastenka! That I should
cast a dark cloud over your serene, untroubled happiness; that by my
bitter reproaches I should cause distress to your heart, should poison
it with secret remorse and should force it to throb with anguish at the
moment of bliss; that I should crush a single one of those tender
blossoms which you have twined in your dark tresses when you go with him
to the altar. . . . Oh never, never! May your sky be clear, may your sweet
smile be bright and untroubled, and may you be blessed for that moment
of blissful happiness which you gave to another, lonely and grateful
heart!
My God, a whole moment of happiness! Is that too little for the whole of
a man's life?




NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND[1]
A NOVEL

PART I
UNDERGROUND


I

I am a sick man. . . . I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I
believe my liver is diseased. However, I know nothing at all about my
disease, and do not know for certain what ails me. I don't consult a
doctor for it, and never have, though I have a respect for medicine and
doctors. Besides, I am extremely superstitious, sufficiently so to
respect medicine, anyway (I am well-educated enough not to be
superstitious, but I am superstitious). No, I refuse to consult a doctor
from spite. That you probably will not understand. Well, I understand
it, though. Of course, I can't explain who it is precisely that I am
mortifying in this case by my spite: I am perfectly well aware that I
cannot "pay out" the doctors by not consulting them; I know better than
any one that by all this I am only injuring myself and no one else. But
still, if I don't consult a doctor it is from spite. My liver is bad,
well--let it get worse!

[Footnote 1: The author of the diary and the diary itself
are, of course, imaginary. Nevertheless it is clear that
such persons as the writer of these notes not only may, but
positively must, exist in our society, when we consider the
circumstances in the midst of which our society is formed. I
have tried to expose to the view of the public more
distinctly than is commonly done, one of the characters of
the recent past. He is one of the representatives of a
generation still living. In this fragment, entitled
"Underground," this person introduces himself and his views,
and, as it were, tries to explain the causes owing to which
he has made his appearance and was bound to make his
appearance in our midst. In the second fragment there are
added the actual notes of this person concerning certain
events in his life. --AUTHOR'S NOTE. ]

I have been going on like that for a long time--twenty years. Now I am
forty. I used to be in the government service, but am no longer. I was a
spiteful official. I was rude and took pleasure in being so. I did not
take bribes, you see, so I was bound to find a recompense in that, at
least. (A poor jest, but I will not scratch it out. I wrote it thinking
it would sound very witty; but now that I have seen myself that I only
wanted to show off in a despicable way, I will not scratch it out on
purpose! )

When petitioners used to come for information to the table at which I
sat, I used to grind my teeth at them, and felt intense enjoyment when I
succeeded in making anybody unhappy. I almost always did succeed. For
the most part they were all timid people--of course, they were
petitioners. But of the uppish ones there was one officer in particular
I could not endure. He simply would not be humble, and clanked his sword
in a disgusting way. I carried on a feud with him for eighteen months
over that sword. At last I got the better of him. He left off clanking
it. That happened in my youth, though.

But do you know, gentlemen, what was the chief point about my spite?
Why, the whole point, the real sting of it lay in the fact that
continually, even in the moment of the acutest spleen, I was inwardly
conscious with shame that I was not only not a spiteful but not even an
embittered man, that I was simply scaring sparrows at random and amusing
myself by it. I might foam at the mouth, but bring me a doll to play
with, give me a cup of tea with sugar in it, and maybe I should be
appeased. I might even be genuinely touched, though probably I should
grind my teeth at myself afterwards and lie awake at night with shame
for months after. That was my way.

I was lying when I said just now that I was a spiteful official. I was
lying from spite. I was simply amusing myself with the petitioners and
with the officer, and in reality I never could become spiteful. I was
conscious every moment in myself of many, very many elements absolutely
opposite to that. I felt them positively swarming in me, these opposite
elements. I knew that they had been swarming in me all my life and
craving some outlet from me, but I would not let them, would not let
them, purposely would not let them come out. They tormented me till I
was ashamed: they drove me to convulsions and--sickened me, at last, how
they sickened me! Now, are not you fancying, gentlemen, that I am
expressing remorse for something now, that I am asking your forgiveness
for something? I am sure you are fancying that. . . . However, I assure you
I do not care if you are. . . .

It was not only that I could not become spiteful, I did not know how to
become anything: neither spiteful nor kind, neither a rascal nor an
honest man, neither a hero nor an insect. Now, I am living out my life
in my corner, taunting myself with the spiteful and useless consolation
that an intelligent man cannot become anything seriously, and it is only
the fool who becomes anything. Yes, a man in the nineteenth century must
and morally ought to be pre-eminently a characterless creature; a man of
character, an active man is pre-eminently a limited creature. That is my
conviction of forty years. I am forty years old now, and you know forty
years is a whole life-time; you know it is extreme old age. To live
longer than forty years is bad manners, is vulgar, immoral. Who does
live beyond forty? Answer that, sincerely and honestly. I will tell you
who do: fools and worthless fellows. I tell all old men that to their
face, all these venerable old men, all these silver-haired and reverend
seniors! I tell the whole world that to its face! I have a right to say
so, for I shall go on living to sixty myself. To seventy! To eighty! . . .
Stay, let me take breath. . . .

You imagine no doubt, gentlemen, that I want to amuse you. You are
mistaken in that, too. I am by no means such a mirthful person as you
imagine, or as you may imagine; however, irritated by all this babble
(and I feel that you are irritated) you think fit to ask me who am
I--then my answer is, I am a collegiate assessor. I was in the service
that I might have something to eat (and solely for that reason), and
when last year a distant relation left me six thousand roubles in his
will I immediately retired from the service and settled down in my
corner. I used to live in this corner before, but now I have settled
down in it. My room is a wretched, horrid one in the outskirts of the
town. My servant is an old country-woman, ill-natured from stupidity,
and, moreover, there is always a nasty smell about her. I am told that
the Petersburg climate is bad for me, and that with my small means it is
very expensive to live in Petersburg. I know all that better than all
these sage and experienced counsellors and monitors. . . . But I am
remaining in Petersburg; I am not going away from Petersburg! I am not
going away because . . . ech! Why, it is absolutely no matter whether I am
going away or not going away.

But what can a decent man speak of with most pleasure?

Answer: Of himself.

Well, so I will talk about myself.


II

I want now to tell you, gentlemen, whether you care to hear it or not,
why I could not even become an insect. I tell you solemnly, that I have
many times tried to become an insect. But I was not equal even to that.
I swear, gentlemen, that to be too conscious is an illness--a real
thorough-going illness. For man's everyday needs, it would have been
quite enough to have the ordinary human consciousness, that is, half or
a quarter of the amount which falls to the lot of a cultivated man of
our unhappy nineteenth century, especially one who has the fatal
ill-luck to inhabit Petersburg, the most theoretical and intentional
town on the whole terrestrial globe. (There are intentional and
unintentional towns. ) It would have been quite enough, for instance, to
have the consciousness by which all so-called direct persons and men of
action live. I bet you think I am writing all this from affectation, to
be witty at the expense of men of action; and what is more, that from
ill-bred affectation, I am clanking a sword like my officer. But,
gentlemen, whoever can pride himself on his diseases and even swagger
over them?

Though, after all, every one does do that; people do pride themselves on
their diseases, and I do, may be, more than any one. We will not dispute
it; my contention was absurd. But yet I am firmly persuaded that a great
deal of consciousness, every sort of consciousness, in fact, is a
disease. I stick to that. Let us leave that, too, for a minute. Tell me
this: why does it happen that at the very, yes, at the very moments when
I am most capable of feeling every refinement of all that is "good and
beautiful," as they used to say at one time, it would, as though of
design, happen to me not only to feel but to do such ugly things, such
that. . . . Well, in short, actions that all, perhaps, commit; but which,
as though purposely, occurred to me at the very time when I was most
conscious that they ought not to be committed. The more conscious I was
of goodness and of all that was "good and beautiful," the more deeply I
sank into my mire and the more ready I was to sink in it altogether. But
the chief point was that all this was, as it were, not accidental in me,
but as though it were bound to be so. It was as though it were my most
normal condition, and not in the least disease or depravity, so that at
last all desire in me to struggle against this depravity passed. It
ended by my almost believing (perhaps actually believing) that this was
perhaps my normal condition. But at first, in the beginning, what
agonies I endured in that struggle! I did not believe it was the same
with other people, and all my life I hid this fact about myself as a
secret. I was ashamed (even now, perhaps, I am ashamed): I got to the
point of feeling a sort of secret abnormal, despicable enjoyment in
returning home to my corner on some disgusting Petersburg night, acutely
conscious that that day I had committed a loathsome action again, that
what was done could never be undone, and secretly, inwardly gnawing,
gnawing at myself for it, tearing and consuming myself till at last the
bitterness turned into a sort of shameful accursed sweetness, and at
last--into positive real enjoyment! Yes, into enjoyment, into enjoyment!
I insist upon that. I have spoken of this because I keep wanting to know
for a fact whether other people feel such enjoyment? I will explain; the
enjoyment was just from the too intense consciousness of one's own
degradation; it was from feeling oneself that one had reached the last
barrier, that it was horrible, but that it could not be otherwise; that
there was no escape for you; that you never could become a different
man; that even if time and faith were still left you to change into
something different you would most likely not wish to change; or if you
did wish to, even then you would do nothing; because perhaps in reality
there was nothing for you to change into.

And the worst of it was, and the root of it all, that it was all in
accord with the normal fundamental laws of over-acute consciousness, and
with the inertia that was the direct result of those laws, and that
consequently one was not only unable to change but could do absolutely
nothing. Thus it would follow, as the result of acute consciousness,
that one is not to blame in being a scoundrel; as though that were any
consolation to the scoundrel once he has come to realize that he
actually is a scoundrel. But enough. . . . Ech, I have talked a lot of
nonsense, but what have I explained? How is enjoyment in this to be
explained? But I will explain it. I will get to the bottom of it! That
is why I have taken up my pen. . . .

I, for instance, have a great deal of _amour propre_. I am as suspicious
and prone to take offence as a humpback or a dwarf. But upon my word I
sometimes have had moments when if I had happened to be slapped in the
face I should, perhaps, have been positively glad of it. I say, in
earnest, that I should probably have been able to discover even in that
a peculiar sort of enjoyment--the enjoyment, of course, of despair; but
in despair there are the most intense enjoyments, especially when one is
very acutely conscious of the hopelessness of one's position. And when
one is slapped in the face--why then the consciousness of being rubbed
into a pulp would positively overwhelm one. The worst of it is, look at
it which way one will, it still turns out that I was always the most to
blame in everything. And what is most humiliating of all, to blame for
no fault of my own but, so to say, through the laws of nature. In the
first place, to blame because I am cleverer than any of the people
surrounding me. (I have always considered myself cleverer than any of
the people surrounding me, and sometimes, would you believe it, have
been positively ashamed of it. At any rate, I have all my life, as it
were, turned my eyes away and never could look people straight in the
face. ) To blame, finally, because even if I had had magnanimity, I
should only have had more suffering from the sense of its uselessness. I
should certainly have never been able to do anything from being
magnanimous--neither to forgive, for my assailant would perhaps have
slapped me from the laws of nature, and one cannot forgive the laws of
nature; nor to forget, for even if it were owing to the laws of nature,
it is insulting all the same. Finally, even if I had wanted to be
anything but magnanimous, had desired on the contrary to revenge myself
on my assailant, I could not have revenged myself on any one for
anything because I should certainly never have made up my mind to do
anything, even if I had been able to. Why should I not have made up my
mind? About that in particular I want to say a few words.


III

With people who know how to revenge themselves and to stand up for
themselves in general, how is it done? Why, when they are possessed, let
us suppose, by the feeling of revenge, then for the time there is
nothing else but that feeling left in their whole being. Such a
gentleman simply dashes straight for his object like an infuriated bull
with its horns down, and nothing but a wall will stop him. (By the way:
facing the wall, such gentlemen--that is, the "direct" persons and men
of action--are genuinely nonplussed. For them a wall is not an evasion,
as for us people who think and consequently do nothing; it is not an
excuse for turning aside, an excuse for which we are always very glad,
though we scarcely believe in it ourselves, as a rule. No, they are
nonplussed in all sincerity. The wall has for them something
tranquillizing, morally soothing, final--maybe even something mysterious
. . . but of the wall later. )

Well, such a direct person I regard as the real normal man, as his
tender mother nature wished to see him when she graciously brought him
into being on the earth. I envy such a man till I am green in the face.
He is stupid. I am not disputing that, but perhaps the normal man should
be stupid, how do you know? Perhaps it is very beautiful, in fact. And I
am the more persuaded of that suspicion, if one can call it so, by the
fact that if you take, for instance, the antithesis of the normal man,
that is, the man of acute consciousness, who has come, of course, not
out of the lap of nature but out of a retort (this is almost mysticism,
gentlemen, but I suspect this, too), this retort-made man is sometimes
so nonplussed in the presence of his antithesis that with all his
exaggerated consciousness he genuinely thinks of himself as a mouse and
not a man. It may be an acutely conscious mouse, yet it is a mouse,
while the other is a man, and therefore, et cætera, et cætera. And the
worst of it is, he himself, his very own self, looks on himself as a
mouse; no one asks him to do so; and that is an important point. Now let
us look at this mouse in action. Let us suppose, for instance, that it
feels insulted, too (and it almost always does feel insulted), and wants
to revenge itself, too. There may even be a greater accumulation of
spite in it than in _l'homme de la nature et de la vérité_. The base and
nasty desire to vent that spite on its assailant rankles perhaps even
more nastily in it than in _l'homme de la nature et de la vérité_. For
through his innate stupidity the latter looks upon his revenge as
justice pure and simple; while in consequence of his acute consciousness
the mouse does not believe in the justice of it. To come at last to the
deed itself, to the very act of revenge. Apart from the one fundamental
nastiness the luckless mouse succeeds in creating around it so many
other nastinesses in the form of doubts and questions, adds to the one
question so many unsettled questions that there inevitably works up
around it a sort of fatal brew, a stinking mess, made up of its doubts,
emotions, and of the contempt spat upon it by the direct men of action
who stand solemnly about it as judges and arbitrators, laughing at it
till their healthy sides ache. Of course the only thing left for it is
to dismiss all that with a wave of its paw, and, with a smile of assumed
contempt in which it does not even itself believe, creep ignominiously
into its mouse-hole. There in its nasty, stinking, underground home our
insulted, crushed and ridiculed mouse promptly becomes absorbed in cold,
malignant and, above all, everlasting spite. For forty years together it
will remember its injury down to the smallest, most ignominious details,
and every time will add, of itself, details still more ignominious,
spitefully teasing and tormenting itself with its own imagination. It
will itself be ashamed of its imaginings, but yet it will recall it all,
it will go over and over every detail, it will invent unheard of things
against itself, pretending that those things might happen, and will
forgive nothing. Maybe it will begin to revenge itself, too, but, as it
were, piecemeal, in trivial ways, from behind the stove, incognito,
without believing either in its own right to vengeance, or in the
success of its revenge, knowing that from all its efforts at revenge it
will suffer a hundred times more than he on whom it revenges itself,
while he, I daresay, will not even scratch himself. On its deathbed it
will recall it all over again, with interest accumulated over all the
years and. . . .

But it is just in that cold, abominable half despair, half belief, in
that conscious burying oneself alive for grief in the underworld for
forty years, in that acutely recognized and yet partly doubtful
hopelessness of one's position, in that hell of unsatisfied desires
turned inward, in that fever of oscillations, of resolutions determined
for ever and repented of again a minute later--that the savour of that
strange enjoyment of which I have spoken lies. It is so subtle, so
difficult of analysis, that persons who are a little limited, or even
simply persons of strong nerves, will not understand a single atom of
it. "Possibly," you will add on your own account with a grin, "people
will not understand it either who have never received a slap in the
face," and in that way you will politely hint to me that I, too,
perhaps, have had the experience of a slap in the face in my life, and
so I speak as one who knows.