Chapter IX

EPILOGUE AND GENERAL CONCLUSIONS

ON THE

DEVELOPMENT

AND CHARACTER OF A CRITIC

Although by the summer of 1831, Chaadaev had completed all eight of his Philosophical Letters, he was still in a melancholy mood and apparently had by no means fully recovered from the illness that had overtaken him in 1828. However, it was at this time that, according to Zhikharev, Professor Al'fonskii, the Rector of Moscow University, suggested to Petr that he begin to spend his afternoons at the English Club, one of the most select social gathering spots in Moscow. Chaadaev followed this suggestion and by the end of the summer of 1831, he had fully rejoined Moscow society. His spirits soared and, in a letter written to Pushkin at this time, he seemed to be genuinely happy for the first time in many years. "I have recently been guess where--at the English Club," he confided. "You told me that you used to visit it. I would like to meet you there in that fine place among those Greek columns in the shade of those wonderful trees . . . ."

Even before Petr had completed his Philosophical Letters, they began to circulate in manuscript form. At a very early date, he gave a copy of the First Letter to Matvei Iakovlevich Mudrov, a physician and Professor of Medicine at the University of Moscow. In a letter to Chaadaev dated January 24, 1830, Mudrov apologized for the long time it had taken him to offer an opinion regarding the former's "composition" which he found to be "good, new, just, instructive . . . and useful." Pushkin and Mikhail Pogodin seemed to have acquired copies, for in the later part of June, 1830 Pushkin wrote to Pogodin and asked: "How does the Letter of Chaadaev strike you?" Petr also sent a manuscript of his Letter to A. I. Turgenev.

By the summer of 1831, Chaadaev had decided that he would like to publish some of his Philosophical Letters. With this in mind, he had sent to Pushkin the manuscripts of Letters Six and Seven which he had recently read to gatherings at the home of E. A. Sverbeeva. In one of the three letters which he wrote to Pushkin at this time, he admitted that by publication of some of his Letters, he did hope "to emerge a little from [his] anonymity." However, Petr also declared that his main purpose was to spread his ideas in the hope that they would be useful to others.

Pushkin and Chaadaev hoped to gain the assistance of Count Dmitrii Nikolaevich Bludov, an old friend of the former's, in steering the Letters through the censorship and then to have them published by F. M. Bellizard. However, Pushkin wrote to Petr on July 6, 1831, that he had not even been able to see either Bludov or Bellizard and late in that same month, he returned the manuscripts to Chaadaev. During 1832, Petr attempted to have these same Letters published in Moscow. But, on January 31, 1833, they were rejected by the Moscow censorship which, in a written report, pointed out that Letter Six contained many "ideas contrary to the true teachings of the Orthodox Church" and that Letter Seven saw Moses "not as a man sent from God but only as a giver of laws."

In September 1833, having become very close to Katerina Levasheva, a cousin of his close friend, Ivan Iakushkin, Chaadaev moved into one of the wings of the Levashev home on Novaia Basmannaia Street. Katerina Levasheva may have been the first person to conceive the idea of publishing Chaadaev's First Philosophical Letter in Russia. In a letter to Petr, written in late 1835 or early 1836, she suggested a strategy:

I could not help but complain with bitterness that this letter would never see the light of day, and that the truths presented therein with such heat and energy should be destined to stay buried . . . . Yes, Monsieur, this letter must be published . . . . Do you wish for this letter to be published without your knowledge? We will make a little preface and there we will say that this letter was the author's draft and was published without his authorization, in this way you will not be responsible . . . . I ask of you only one thing--do not say anything about this project to your numerous friends.

Nothing further is known about Levasheva's project; however, when Chaadaev's First Philosophical Letter was published in the Telescope about a year later, it was done under the very shrouds of anonymity that Levasheva had suggested. Meanwhile, as he pondered Levasheva's letter, Chaadaev entered into negotiations with the editor of the Moscow Observer (Moskovskii nabliudatel') regarding publication of his First, Sixth and Seventh Letters. However, when he was told that he would have to replace all references to "Russia" and to "we" with the words "certain peoples," he refused and abruptly ceased his discussions.

Chaadaev had first met Nikolai Ivanovich Nadezhdin at the English Club in 1832 where, according to Nadezhdin, Petr had introduced himself as the author of the series of anonymous aphorisms that Nadezhdin had recently obtained from an unknown source and published in his Telescope. Not long after their meeting at the English Club Nadezhdin paid a visit to Chaadaev's apartment where he chatted with Petr, whom he found to be a "very serious and stuffy person."

It is possible that Chaadaev gave Nadezhdin a manuscript of his First Philosophical Letter during this visit; if not, Nadezhdin did acquire a copy by the summer of 1836 at the very latest. By that time the circulation of the Telescope had declined, and its publisher was looking for an item which would reawaken public interest in his journal. Suddenly Petr's First Philosophical Letter seemed to be the ideal answer to this problem. Nadezhdin consulted with Chaadaev who, while he thought that his Letter would never pass the censorship, apparently did not try to dissuade Nadezhdin.

Petr did not count on Nadezhdin's resourcefulness. The editor of the Telescope took Chaadaev's letter to Aleksei Vasil'evich Boldyrev who, in addition to his duties as censor, was both Rector of the University of Moscow and a Professor there. Giving the Letter only a cursory glance, Boldyrev approved it, and, in the last days of September 1836, Chaadaev's First Philosophical Letter appeared as part of the fifteenth issue of the Telescope for that year.

The storm which broke over the heads of Nadezhdin and Chaadaev took both men by surprise. On October 21, 1836, F. F. Vigel', who once had been a member of the same Masonic lodge as Petr, but by 1836 had become a very conservative member of the bureaucracy, wrote to the Metropolitan of St. Petersburg a vitriolic letter in which he expressed his outrage against what he consldered to be the insults hurled at Russia in the Letter which the Telescope had just published. On October 27, Metropolitan Serafim wrote to Count Benkendorf, the head of the Third Section, and expressed his displeasure. Although the case had taken some time to reach the upper levels of the bureaucracy, Count Uvarov, now Minister of Education and Benkendorf were already aware of it and by the time that the latter received Seraphim's letter, the nature of Chaadaev's punishment had been decided and orders detailing its execution were on their way to Moscow.

The government's response had begun to take shape at least as early as October 15 when the Chairman of the Moscow Censorship Committee, Count Stroganov, had written an angry letter to Uvarov:

I want to speak-about the publication of an article printed in the fifteenth number of the Telescope--"The Philosophical Letters." The piece is from the fool Chaadaev and demonstrates all the traits of madness . . . . I ask you to permit me to relieve the Rector from his post of . . . censor and to suppress the Telescope.

On October 19 Uvarov scheduled a session of the St. Petersburg censorship committee to discuss the question of Chaadaev's Letter. The following day, he presented to Nicholas I a report suggesting that the Telescope be closed down and that Chaadaev, Nadezhdin and Boldyrev be punished. The Tsar emphatically concurred with these suggestions and on October 22 gave his approval to a letter of instruction from Benkendorf to Prince D. V. Golitsyn, the governor-general of Moscow. In the letter that decided Chaadaev's fate Benkendorf piously declared:

. . . . The inhabitants of our ancient capital . . . filled with the feeling of the dignity of the Russian people have at once understood that such an article could not have been written by a compatriot of theirs who was fully in possession of his mind, and therefore not only have they not turned their indignation against Mr. Cheodaev, [Benkendorf managed consistently to misspell Chaadaev's name] but, to the contrary, they sincerely express their sorrow for the distraction of intellect he has suffered--which alone could be the reason for his writing such stupidities . . . . Your Excellency should . . . take all measures necessary to provide Mr. Cheodaev with all possible medical attention and care. His Majesty orders that you commission to his cure a capable doctor, obliging the latter to visit Mr. Cheodaev constantly every morning, and in order that Mr. Cheodaev not expose himself to the influence of the damp cold hereabouts, in order that all means be taken to restore him to his health, it pleases the Sovereign Emperor that your Excellency report to His Majesty monthly concerning Mr. Cheodaev's condition.

Only six days after the Tsar approved this prescription for the "ailing citizen" of Moscow, news of the government's benevolent intentions reached its intended recipient.

On October 28, 1836, Chaadaev's quarters were entered and searched. His papers and many books were confiscated and he was informed that since he had, in the view of the government, taken leave of his senses, he would be confined to his living quarters for an indefinite amount of time. He would be allowed one walk per day and would be visited daily by a doctor. Nadezhdin and Boldyrev were brought to St. Petersburg and interrogated. Boldyrev was relieved of all his duties and permitted to retire. Nadezhdin was to be exiled to "one of the provincial cities of Russia under police surveillance and be forbidden in the future to return to either capital," and, in February 1837, he left Moscow for Vologda.

The events of October 28, 1836 were a severe shock to Petr. On November 3, A. I. Turgenev wrote to Prince Viazemskii and remarked that "the doctor- comes to treat [Chaadaev's] official illness." Four days later, Turgenev added "The doctor visits Chaadaev daily. The latter never leaves the house. I am afraid that he may indeed go mad."

On November 8, Petr wrote a letter to Count S. G. Stroganov, the head of the Moscow Censorship Committee, in which he asserted that his Letter did not contain his "profession of faith, but [was] only an expression of bitter feeling long ago exhausted." This is not the place to analyze Chaadaev's attitude toward his Philosophical Letter. He had modified some of his former ideas by late 1836, but it was only in his letters and comments to government officials during this period of humiliation and stress that he ever expressed anything approaching a complete repudiation of his First Philosophical Letter. His remark to Count Stroganov should be understood in this light.

At this time Chaadaev also told Stroganov that Nadezhdin had begun the process of publishing the Philosophical Letter without his knowledge and that he had discovered that his Letter would be published only after Boldyrev had already approved it and the proofs were already printed. Nadezhdin had contested this testimony and on November 17, 1836 Chaadaev was required to give written answers to questions about the Telescope "affair." But Petr only reaffirmed his original assertion that his Letter had not been printed at his request.

While Chaadaev's fate was certainly no laughing matter, for Ekaterina Panova the events that followed the publication of the Philosophical Letter were tragic. According to Lemke: "On December 17, 1836, the Moscow provincial government (pravlenie) examined the mental abilities of Ekaterina Dmitrievna Panova . . . at the request of her husband who wished to place his wife in the medical institution of Sabler." As a result of her replies to questions asked during the examination, and especially owing to her admission that she had prayed for the Poles in 1831 because "they were fighting for freedom," the government recognized in her "the destruction of her mental abilities" and placed her in a home for the insane.

In January 1837 Chaadaev, still suffering from the wounds of his ''official illness," wrote to Mikhail a detailed description of what had recently happened to him. With pathos and a touch of ironic humor, Petr laid bare his feelings.

My disease took place on the 28th of October; thus I have already been insane for three months. The publisher has been relieved of his position, and I continue my insanity. Now I think it will be abundantly clear to you that everything was carried out in a lawful manner and that there is no need to say anything more about it.

I must [now] be satisfied with one walk a day and must be seen by the doctors who visit me every day ex officio. One of them, a certain drunken staff officer, swore at me in the most insolent way, but now his visits have ceased, probably on the orders of the officials. My friends visit me quite often and some of them have acted with rare nobility; but most comforting of all for me is the friendship of my dear landlords [Ekaterina Levasheva and her family]. My papers have not been returned and I feel this most of all because in them are found my whole life's work and everything that constitutes its aim. For the present, I cannot predict the outcome of this affair and I admit that I do not understand what kind of outcome there can be. To tell a man "you are insane" is not difficult, but how do you tell him that he is completely sane?"

Eventually his books and most of his papers were returned, and on October 30, 1837, his punishment of confinement and visits from a doctor ceased. Gradually he began to return to society; he widened his circle of acquaintances and began to participate in the salon life of Moscow. During the rest of his life he continued to write both essays and lengthy letters, but he never published again. The ideas generated by his Philosophical Letters became a strong force in the intellectual fermentation that took place among the new generation of the intelligentsia during the late 1830s and the 40s, but the level of his participation remained out of the sight of the general public. The observation of an unidentified acquaintance aptly characterizes the way in which he passed much of the remainder of his life.

On Fridays, we gather at the Sverbeevs, on Sundays at the,Kireevskis sometimes on Thursdays at the Koshelevs, and from time to time at the Bariatynskiis. Two or three times a week we all gather together. The ladies are indispensable participants in our talks, and we could not have had a gayer time. Khomiakov argues, Kireevskii instructs, Koshelev narrates, Bariatynskii poetizes, Chaadaev preaches or turns his eyes to the sky. Gerke [the musician] makes a fool of himself, Meshcherskii keeps quiet, the rest of us listen . . . .

Having traced the development of Petr Chaadaev as a social critic, some final observations of the conflicting ideas and attitudes that shaped this development may be grasped by comparing some of the traits of his character to those of the hero in Pushkin's greatest work, Eugene Onegin. This work is filled with events involving its hero and descriptions of Onegin's character that point to Pushkin's early friendship with Chaadaev. The most obvious of these is Pushkin's description of Onegin in stanza 25 of chapter one as "Chaadaev-like." Quénet, in his study of Chaadaev, has observed Pushkin's description of Onegin as a young man tired of social competition invaded by spleen, no longer interested in life, surrounded by books, and prepared to visit foreign countries before fate separated him from the narrator for a long time. These traits of character and interests belonged to Chaadaev as well as to Onegin, and they are all apparent from the first chapter of Pushkin's work. In the remaining chapters there are some further similarities between Onegin and Chaadaev, although saying this is not meant to obscure the fact there are many traits of Onegin's character as well as many developments in the narrative of the "novel in verse" that bear no relation to the life or character of Chaadaev.

The great Russian historian V. O. Kliuchevskii made a discovery that was more important than these superficial similarities between the character of Chaadaev and that of Onegin. Kliuchevskii realized that Eugene Onegin represented not the character traits of an isolated individual, but those of a whole generation of the Russian nobility, a generation of which Chaadaev was a prominent representative. As Kliuchevskii characterized Onegin:

He was alienated from the society in which he moved . . . . An 18-year-old philosophe with a satiated mind and a burned-out heart, he began to live, that is, to consume life when he should have learned about it; he began to learn about it only when others had already begun their careers. He became tired even before he began to work. He fussed and loafed in the capital, and lethargically loafed in the countryside. From self-conceit, he did not know how to fall in love when he needed to . . . and without any purpose, he traveled about [the world].

Some of Kliuchevskii's comments about the father of an "Onegin" are also applicable to Chaadaev. "Having thought all his life about 'European custom' and about the education of society, he tried to become an individual among aliens and became instead an alien among his own people. In Europe, he was only a Tatar in European dress, while . . . in Russia he had grown up as a Frenchman." Although his "manners, customs, sympathies, understandings, his very language were alien," and although "he had no organic ties with his surroundings and no kind of serious goals," Chaadaev did not become aware of these facts until he participated in the campaign against Napoleon. Then suddenly-before him and the other "Onegins" of his generation there

occurred those great events which decided the fate of nations and in which they themselves participated. Returning home they felt that they had left their elders "a hundred years behind." [Then] . . . they made two important discoveries. With regret they learned that Russia was the only country in which the highest and most educated class neglected its native tongue and all that concerned its native land. Then, with still more regret, it became convinced that in the Russian nation there wasted away powerful forces . . . and that in these forces there was hidden an intellectual and moral treasure that needed cultivation. They saw that without this everything would wither, spoil, and perhaps soon be lost without producing any kind of fruit in the moral world.

They knew and understood . . . that they had to learn anew and to reeducate themselves. But this understanding marked the end not only of the strengths on which their activities heretofore had depended, but also of the beliefs that had supported their reality. The cause of this end, this downfall were the discoveries: That it was not possible for them to escape their alien knowledge and experience; that if it was stupid to invent again a machine that had already been invented, it was even more stupid for an inhabitant of the north to borrow the clothes of a southerner; [in short] that it was necessary to conform to their surroundings. But for this, it was necessary to study their environment and furthermore to reshape it, if they proved uncomfortable in it. These discoveries destroyed a whole world outlook.

At the time when many of these discoveries were being made by the other "Onegins" of Chaadaev's generation, Petr was only beginning to travel on those paths which had already been trodden by others of his generation. However, as he traveled, he began to acquire the sense of self-fulfillment that had been a central theme of the plays of Schiller which he had read before he went abroad. Eventually, in realizing his alienation from Russian society he achieved both the state of self-cultivation which he had begun to seek in Europe, and a sense of identity as a social critic.

Of course this is not to say that, when Chaadaev became aware of his alienation and realized that this awareness had destroyed his "whole world outlook," his reaction was the same as that of Onegin. The environment which produced what, by 1850 would be known in Russian literature as the "superfluous man" was also the environment which affected Chaadaev at the time when he wrote his Philosophical Letters. But this environment produced among Russian youth at least two different reactions. The first reaction: one of skepticism, atheism, alienation, bitterness toward Russian society was that of Onegin and later of Pechorin, the principal character of Lermontov's A Hero of our Time; it was also to some extent the reaction of Mikhail Bakunin, Vissarion Belinskii and Aleksandr Herzen. However, for Chaadaev and, to some degree for men like Ivan Kireevskii and Aleksei Khomiakov, there was a different reaction--one filled with a searching for religious truth. This reaction also left them bitter but, perhaps, because of their religious faith, they, in contrast to Belinskii, Bakunin and Herzen, learned to live with their bitterness.

Yet it has not been the reaction to these discoveries but rather an analysis of the events which led to them that has been the focal point of this study. It is to the insights produced by these events that its concluding sentences must turn. Thus, although Chaadaev had arrived at these discoveries more slowly than some; once there, he analyzed the implications of what others had concluded and provided in his First and Seventh Philosophical Letters both an indictment of Russia's cultural dilemma and a suggestion for its future development that was more stunning than any of the insights previously arrived at by members of his generation. More so than any other "discovery it was Chaadaev's "that destroyed a whole world outlook" and left to the next generation the task of formulating new paths for future Russian development.