Nadya paced the room for a long time, listening to her grandmother’s weeping, then picked up the telegram and read it. It said that on the previous morning, in Saratov, there died of consumption Alexander Timofeich, or simply Sasha.
The grandmother and Nina Ivanovna went to church to order a panikhida, but Nadya still paced the rooms for a long time, thinking. She realized clearly that her life had been turned around, as Sasha had wanted, that here she was lonely, alien, not needed, and that she needed nothing here, that all former things had been torn from her and had vanished, as if they had been burned and their ashes scattered on the wind. She went into Sasha’s room and stood there for a while.
“Farewell, dear Sasha!” she thought, and pictured before her a new, expansive, spacious life, and that life, still unclear, full of mysteries, lured and beckoned to her.
She went to her room upstairs to pack, and the next morning said good-bye to her family and, alive, cheerful, left town—as she thought, forever.
DECEMBER 1903
NOTES
THE DEATH OF A CLERK
1. The name Cherviakov comes from the Russian word cherviak (“worm”).
2. A popular operetta by French composer Robert Planquette (1843–1903).
3. The name Brizzhalov suggests a combination of bryzgat’ (“to spray”) and briuzzhat’ (“to grumble”).
SMALL FRY
1. The name Nevyrazimov comes from nevyrazimy (“inexpressible”), also used as a euphemism for men’s long underwear (nevyrazimye, i.e., unmentionables).
2. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, Easter Sunday and the days of the week following Easter are called “bright” days.
3. In Russia windows are double-glazed and sealed for the winter, but one pane can be opened for ventilation.
4. Easter is preceded by the forty-day fast known as the Great Lent, which continues through Holy Week and ends with a feast on Easter Day.
5. A kulich is a dense, sweet yeast bread that is traditionally eaten at Easter; the loaves are brought to church to be blessed.
6. Titular councillor was ninth of the fourteen ranks of the Russian imperial civil service established by Peter the Great, immortalized by Nikolai Gogol in the figure of the poor clerk Akaky Akakievich, hero of “The Overcoat.”
7. The Order of St. Stanislas, a Polish civil order founded in 1792, began to be awarded in Russia in 1831; its decoration was in the form of a star.
PANIKHIDA
1. The church is named for a famous iconographic type of the Mother of God which Byzantine tradition traces back to an image painted by Saint Luke. There is no agreement among scholars on the origin and meaning of the word “Hodigitria.”
2. An iconostasis is an icon-bearing partition with three doors that spans the width of an Orthodox church, separating the body of the church from the sanctuary.
3. A prosphora is a small, round loaf of leavened bread used for communion in the Orthodox Church. Prosphoras are sent in to the sanctuary by each of the faithful with a list of names of people to be commemorated during the offering, and are sent out again for distribution at the end of the liturgy.
4. The proskomedia is the office of preparation of the bread and wine for the sacrament of communion.
5. The forgiving of the harlot is recounted in John 8:3–11. Mary of Egypt, a fifth-century saint greatly venerated in Orthodoxy, was a prostitute who converted to Christianity and spent forty-seven years in the desert in prayer and repentance.
6. A panikhida, which gives the story its title, is an Orthodox prayer service in commemoration of the dead.
7. Kolivo, also known as kutya, is a special dish made of grain (wheat or rice) mixed with nuts, raisins, and honey, served in the church on occasions of commemoration of the dead.
8. Esau’s selling of his birthright “for a mess of pottage” is told in Genesis 27:1–46, the punishment of Sodom in Genesis 18:20–19:29, and the account of Joseph in Genesis 37.
EASTER NIGHT
1. The exclamation “Christ is risen!” is heard during the Orthodox Easter service, and is also used as a greeting among Orthodox Christians during the forty days between Easter and the Ascension.
2. The words are from the first hymn (troparion) of Canticle IX of the Easter matins (Service Book of the Holy Orthodox-Catholic Apostolic Church, trans. by Isabel F. Hapgood, fifth edition, Englewood, N.J., 1975, p. 232).
3. An akathist (from the Greek “standing up”) is a special canticle sung in honor of Christ, the Mother of God, or one of the saints.
4. An archimandrite is the Orthodox equivalent of an abbot, the superior of a monastery or superintendent of several monasteries.
5. Saint Nicholas, fourth-century bishop of Myra in Lycia (Asia Minor), is one of the most highly venerated saints in all Christendom.
6. The church is emptied and the people and clergy process around it with candles before going back in to begin the Easter service.
7. See note 5 to “Small Fry.”
8. The royal doors are the central doors in the iconostasis (see note 2 to “Panikhida”); a large church would have several side chapels with their own iconostasis and royal doors; they are all left open throughout the Easter service, signifying that the Kingdom of Heaven is now open to all.
9. From the first hymn of Canticle VIII of the Easter matins (Hapgood, p. 231).
10. See note 4 to “Small Fry.”
VANKA
1. Watchmen patrolled their territory at night rapping out the hours on an iron or wooden bar.
2. A village Christmas custom, commemorating the wise men’s journey to Bethlehem (Matthew 2:1–12).
3. In a village church anyone who wanted to could sing in the choir; the choirs in large city churches could be more selective.
A BORING STORY
1. See note 2 to “Panikhida.” The iconostasis of a large church may be hung with a great many icons, large and small, often in gold or silver casings.
2. N. I. Pirogov (1810–81) was a great Russian surgeon and anatomist, active in questions of popular education. K. D. Kavelin (1818–85) was a liberal journalist and social activist. N. A. Nekrasov (1821–78) was a poet and liberal social critic, editor of the influential journal The Contemporary.
3. The reference is to the eminent Russian writer Ivan Turgenev (1818–83); we are unable to identify the heroine Nikolai Stepanovich has in mind.
4. A novel by the German writer Friedrich Spielhagen (1829–1911).
5. “History of the illness” (Latin), the heading on the blank page to be filled in by the doctor.
6. V. L. Gruber (1814–85) was a Russian anatomist. A. I. Babukhin (1835–91) was a histologist and physiologist.
7. M. D. Skobelev (1843–82) was a Russian general prominent at the time of the Russo-Turkish war of 1877–78.
8. Professor V. G. Perov (1833–82), Russian artist, was head of the Russian Academy of Art in Petersburg.