Shipwreck Read Online Free PDF Page B

supposed to drink it, you know, that’s the whole thing about German water—(
to Belinsky
) You didn’t waste your time in Salzbrunn dabbing it behind your ears, I hope. Turgenev! (
He draws Turgenev aside
.) This is the last thing I’ll ever ask of you.
    TURGENEV    No.
    BELINSKY    Is it time to go?
    HERZEN    Plenty of time.
    BAKUNIN    Belinsky!—Herzen says your letter to Gogol is a work of genius, he calls it your testament.
    BELINSKY    That doesn’t sound too hopeful.
    BAKUNIN    Listen, why go back to Russia? The Third Section’s got a cell all ready for you.
    NATALIE    Stop it!
    BAKUNIN    Bring your wife and daughter to Paris. Think of it—you could publish free of censorship.
    BELINSKY    That’s enough to put anyone off.
    BAKUNIN    What are you talking about? You could publish your letter to Gogol, and everyone would read it.
    BELINSKY    It wouldn’t mean anything … in this din of hacks and famous names … filling their columns every day with their bellowing and bleating and honking … it’s like a zoo where the seals throw fish to the public. None of it seems serious. At home the public look to writers as their real leaders. The title of poet or novelist really counts with us. Writers here, they think they’re enjoying success. They don’t know what success is. You have to be a writer in Russia, even one without much talent, even a critic … My articles get cut by the censor, but a week before the
Contemporary
comes out, students hang around Smirdin’s bookshop asking if it’s arrived yet … and then they pick up every echo the censor missed, and discuss it half the night and pass copies around … If the writers here only knew, they’d pack their bags for Moscow and St Petersburg.
    He is met with silence. Then Bakunin embraces him, and Herzen, mopping his eyes, does likewise.
    EMMA    
Sprecht Deutsch, bitte!
[Speak German, please!]
    Herzen, still moved, raises his glass to the room. The Russians soberly raise their glasses, toasting.
    HERZEN    Russia. We know. They don’t. But they’ll find out.
    The Russians drink the toast.
    BAKUNIN    And I never said goodbye to you when I left.
    BELINSKY    We weren’t speaking.
    BAKUNIN    Ah—philosophy! Great days!
    NATALIE    (
to Belinsky
) Now, what about your wife?
    BELINSKY    Cambric handkerchiefs.
    NATALIE    That’s not very romantic.
    BELINSKY    Well, she’s not.
    NATALIE    Shame on you.
    BELINSKY    She’s a schoolteacher.
    NATALIE    What’s that got to do with it?
    BELINSKY    Nothing.
    BAKUNIN    (
to Belinsky
) Well, I’ll see you soon in St Petersburg.
    HERZEN    How can you go home? You’ve been sentenced in absentia for
not
going home when they summoned you.
    BAKUNIN YOU    forget about the revolution.
    HERZEN    What revolution?
    BAKUNIN    The Russian revolution.
    HERZEN    I’m sorry, I haven’t seen a paper today.
    BAKUNIN    The Tsar and all his works will be gone within a year, or two at the most.
    SAZONOV    (
emotionally
) We were children of the Decembrists. (
to Herzen
) When you were arrested, by some miracle they overlooked me and Ketscher.
    HERZEN    This is not a sensible conversation. There will have to be a European revolution first, and there’s no sign of it. There’s no movement among the people here. The opposition has no faith in itself. Six months ago meeting Ledru-Rollin or Louis Blanc in a café felt like being a cadet talking to veterans. Their superior condescension to a Russian seemed only proper. What had we got to offer? Belinsky’s articles and Granovsky’s lectures on