And how many
odd and nightmare-like misunderstandings were engendered by the
poisonous mist in which we all wandered, both friends and foes, and in
which the outlines of the plainest objects and feelings assumed the
dismal grotesqueness of phantoms. I cannot help recalling here the
case of E.A. Chirikov, which at the time excited much comment: the
noble and fervent champion of the persecuted race, the author of the
drama "Jews," which has more than any other Russian drama contributed
to the dispersion of the evil prejudice,--this man was suddenly, in a
most absurd manner, without a shadow of foundation, insulted by the
accusation of anti-Semitism; and--to think of it!--it was necessary to
furnish _proofs_ that the accusation was false. What a painful, what a
wholly disgraceful absurdity!
"Who needs all this? Who does not know it?" wearily thought every one
of us, again and again realising the harrowing necessity of convincing
some unbeliever, that two and two is four ... nothing but four!
And abroad? "What an injustice!"--thought I, when the cultured West,
having separated me from Tolstoy, as if I had stolen him, handed me on
the spot, a bill for the "excesses" known the world over, at the same
time frowning unambiguously upon my eternal hump.
Pages:
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52