And you, mamas, you must be stricter.
Don’t let your daughters out of sight.
Use your lorgnette, and hold it tight,
Or else… God save you… That’s the picture.
I tell you this since I can say
I do not sin like that today. 30
On various pleasures (some that hurt you)
Much of my life has gone to waste,
But, if they didn’t threaten virtue,
Balls still would have been to my taste.
I love the youthful dash and clamour,
The crush, the gaiety and glamour,
The ladies scrupulously dressed.
I love their tiny feet. At best,
In all our land you’ll scarce discover
Three pairs of lovely female feet.
But I know two that were so sweet…
And though I’m sad—my day is over—
I can’t forget them now, it seems;
They bring me heartache in my dreams. 31
So, where and when, in the out yonder,
Will you forget them, madman? How?
O tiny feet, where do you wander?
What green blooms do you trample now?
Spoilt by the east, you left no northern
Traces in snows where there is more than
Enough of sadness. Oh, the snug
Touch of an oriental rug!
The luxury! The soft entwinement!
For your sake I forgot the cause,
The thirst for glory and applause,
My homeland, where I knew confinement.
My happy youth was soon to pass,
Like your light traces on the grass. 32
Diana’s bosom, friends, is charming,
And Flora’s cheeks are, oh, so sweet,
Terpsichore is more disarming,
However, with her tiny feet.
That foot, a prophesy of pleasure,
A quite inestimable treasure
Of pure, symbolic beauty, stirs
A swarm of yearnings—to be hers.
I love the foot, my dear Elvina,
Beneath a tablecloth’s long swing,
Tracing a greensward in the spring
Or on cold winter hearths, still keener
If treading glass-like floors, or if
On beaches by a granite cliff. 33
Once, on a shore… A storm was brewing,
And I felt jealous of the waves
That rushed on her in raging ruin,
Collapsing at her feet, like slaves.
Oh, how I longed to know what bliss is
By covering those feet with kisses.
No, not once in the fiery blaze
Of my ebullient younger days
Did I in this way long and languish
To kiss a young Armida, or
Kiss burning pink cheeks and adore,
Or kiss a bosom racked with anguish.
No, never did a surge of lust
Assault my soul with such a thrust. 34
Another scene… Let me unfold it;
The cherished memory still stands…
A happy stirrup… There, I hold it,
Feeling a small foot in my hands.
This sets imagination seething—
That touch again, beyond believing,
New grief, new love. A surging flood
Inflames the fading heart with blood!
But let’s stop praising them, these snooty
Objects of my loquacious muse.
They’re worthless. Why do we enthuse,
Or sing of their inspiring beauty?
These sorceresses’ words and eyes
Are like their little feet—all lies. 35
Onegin? He looks none too brilliant,
Dozing his way home. Here he comes,
While Petersburg, ever resilient,
Awakens to the morning drum.
The dealer strides out, and the hawker,
The cabby to his stand (slow walker!);
An Okhta girl, her jug held close,
Crunches across the morning snows.
A morning rumble hums to wake her,
Shutters are down, from many a flue
Smoke climbs in a thin line of blue,
And there’s that fussy German baker,
Cotton-capped, who for some time has
Been busy at his was-ist-das. 36
But noisy ballrooms leave him weary;
He now turns midnight into morn,
Sleeping in shadow, blessed and bleary,
A man to wealth and pleasure born.
His life will be, when late he rises,
Spelt out for him with no surprises,
Coloured, but in the same old way,
Tomorrow being yesterday.
But was he, in this loose employment,
A happy young man, in his prime,
With brilliant conquests all the time,
With this quotidian enjoyment?
Heedless and healthy he would go
A-banqueting. Was this all show? 37
No. While still young he lost all feeling,
Finding the noisy world a bore
And lovely girls not so appealing,
Not so obsessive as before.
Betrayals left him sad and weary,
Both friends and friendship he found dreary.
You cannot keep on sluicing steaks
Or Strasburg pie with what it takes—
The best champagne! And it gets harder
To please the diners with bons mots
When headaches leave you feeling low.
Yevgeny, once a man of ardour,
Acknowledged that his love was dead
For conflict, sabres and the lead. 38
The malady that left him undone
(Of which we ought to know the cause)
Was like imported spleen from London,
Known as khandrá within our shores.
It gradually left him emptied,
Though, thank God, he was never tempted
To put a pistol to his head,
But still he seemed to be half-dead,
Childe Harold-like, with an impression
Of brooding gloom and nothing more,
And as for cards, or gossip, or
Fond looks, or sighs of indiscretion,
He found their impact less than slim,
For nothing registered with him. [39, 40, 41] 42
You weird and wonderful high ladies,
You were the first that he forswore.
Oh, yes, your bon ton, I’m afraid, is
Considered nowadays a bore.
Some of your kind think nature meant them
To hold forth on Jean Say and Bentham,
But by and large they are awash
With empty words and dreadful tosh,
And their high-mindedness is hideous,
They are so stately and so wise,
So predisposed to moralize,
So circumspect and so fastidious,
And when it comes to men, so mean,
The only thing they rouse is spleen. 43
And those young beauties of the fun set,
Who, in those carriages of theirs
Are swept along into the sunset
Down Petersburg’s fine thoroughfares,
Yevgeny learnt to put behind him,
With all such sport. Where would you find him?
Locked in at home, where he sat still,
Yawning as he took up the quill.
He tried to write, but soon was killed off
By the hard toil, so not a scrap
Emerged from this non-writing chap,
Who never made that busy guild of
People whom I judge not. Ahem!
I could not, being one of them. 44
Idle again (and we should mention
His weary emptiness of soul),
He sat back, turning his attention
To other minds—a noble goal.
With rows of books to put his hand on,
He read and read, but quite at random,
All dull, dishonest, rambling stuff,
Not virtuous or clear enough.
They were in every way constraining.
Old things came over as old hat,
And new as old, too. That was that:
Books were (like women) not Yevgeny,
So all things dusty of that ilk
Were curtained off with funeral silk. 45
Freed from convention, and its burden,
Like him I gave up vain pursuits.
Befriending this man, I was spurred on
By noticing his attributes:
A strong capacity for dreaming,
A style inimitable-seeming,
A sharp and chilly cast of mind.
I was embittered; he repined.
We’d both known passion, and life’s canker