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Tynianov’s scholarly convictions are embodied in his actual imaginative writing and, although there are many places in Pushkinwhere history is brought alive, there can be few more striking examples of literary art probing the shadowy corners of history than the chapter in which he explores the emergence of the concept of the Imperial Lycée in the minds of the Emperor Alexander, and of his Secretary of State, Mikhail Speransky, who has been described by historians as ‘probably the most brilliant Russian statesman of the nineteenth century’,457and as ‘perhaps the most brilliant bureaucrat that ever served a Tsar’.458 Tynianov draws us more intimately into the lives of both characters – his novel ‘taking over where history ends’ – and succeeds in generating both a greater excitement and deeper understanding. Speransky, whose first biographer was Pushkin’s Lycée fellow-student Modest Korff,459and whose best biographer in the conventional sense of the word has been Marc Raeff,460 has in fact found his greatest ‘human’ interpreter in Iurii Tynianov.461

Speransky is nearly forty years of age when Tynianov introduces him into the novel. The son of a village priest, he himself graduated from a seminary, entered the civil service and quickly rose to power, soon becoming the Tsar’s advisor and Secretary of State. The first view the reader gains of him in the novel features his ‘huge stooped back’, an angle achieved by allowing us to look at him through the eyes of his German secretary, who is peeping through the door of the study at the figure of the Minister, absorbed in writing his report. There is the faint suggestion here of the profile of a person who is not quite human, the massive anonymity of the back conveying an image of the apparent inscrutability of officialdom – or of this particular mysterious official at least. Such ideas are strengthened by the associated image of the ‘automaton’ – which is how he writes, ‘without halt or hesitation… cover[ing] page after page with his rounded regular handwriting’ (197), and by the almost unnatural quietness in which he works.

This inscrutability is an illusion, however, since, by studying his back the secretary can tell whom he is writing to. His body language reveals the addressee to be the Tsar. By adopting the secretary’s viewpoint, the reader is thus put into the privileged position of a lawful spy, and for a moment the reader becomes himself the omniscient narrator. Tynianov makes a splendid

457

Chubarov, A.The Fragile Empire: A History of Imperial Russia(NY, 1999), 50.

458

Seton-Watson, H.The Russian Empire 1801-1917(Oxford, 1967), 102.

459

Korff, M.Zhizn’ gr. Speranskogo(St Petersburg, 1861).

460

See hisMichael Speransky: Statesman of Imperial Russia 1772-1839(The Hague, 1969).

461

Tynianov was by no means the first or the only novelist to apply himself to the task, following in the famous footsteps of Tolstoy, L. (War and Peace), D. Merezhkovsky, Aleksandr Pervyi, 2 vols. (1911-1913) and Tynianov’s contemporary, the émigré author I. Nazhivin,Vo dni Pushkina(1930).

attempt to soften the remote figure of Speransky and give bureaucracy a human face. The allusion to the large English clock and the old English housekeeper, Mistress Stephens (in actual fact, Speransky’s mother-in-law), who ‘moved angrily about the house in her soft shoes’(197), has the sudden effect of personalising the situation, bringing it into the sphere of human relationships and opening a window into Speransky’s tragic past:

Десять лет назад, когда он был экспедитором, незначительным чиновником, умерла после родов его жена-англичанка. Не взглянув на ребенка, он ушел из дому и пропадал две недели. Он не был на погребении жены, и все считали его погибшим. Вернулся он домой в виде истерзанном, мокрый и грязный. Глаза его блуждали. Из всех живых существ он замечал только свою дочь. Он молчал с месяц, а потом стал ходить в должность. Он никогда не заходил в комнату покойной. Сердце его было разбито, и жизнь, казалось, кончена. В действительности она только начиналась (197-8).

This is the man who now, Tynianov reminds us, shoulders the responsibility for the entire state, the Tsar having virtually ‘leased the state to him’ (203). Consequently, ‘his power was enormous and its boundaries blurred’(198), with the inevitable result that he had many enemies: he is damned by the nobility, cursed by the clerks, despised by the courtiers. Tynianov builds up the picture of a man capable of powerful feelings who has been forced by circumstances to retreat into himself, leading a life of austerity and unlikely to be bribed. The avoidance of society, the refusal to entertain guests, the simple but cosy house, the smallness of the study, in spite of such vast power, and the life of a Spartan – all this, is suggested by the detail.

The entire profile is that of a man who has substituted work for life, his inner self having been damaged. Paradoxically, however, the outer world of political power is presented as a joyless façade, a view which Tynianov once again enforces by making the reader look out from the study window, this time through Speransky’s eyes, at the architectural symbols of power, ‘the desolate frozen Tauride Gardens’ and behind the trees ‘Prince Potemkin’s squat palace… its windows barred… snowed up, like an empty theatre after the performance is over and the travelling actors have left’(198).

Possibly with Viazemsky’s apt remark in mind (‘Petersburg is the stage, and the spectators are in Moscow; the former performs, the latter judges’),462Tynianov implies here that politics are performance, power an empty act, the state a theatre. Tynianov hints proleptically at the motif of mighty favourites falling out of favour, Speransky’s own future fate.463 Was Tynianov thinking here in terms of ‘subjunctive history’ of what might have happened if Speransky’s reforms had succeeded? The Decembrists (a theme that fascinated and obsessed

462

Quoted in Martin, Op. cit., 58.

463

The similarities between the two statesmen are striking as regards their organizational and administrative genius, their visionary and utopian qualities, their exalted piety and admiration for Hellenistic culture, all inspired by the challenging projects which lay before them. (See Zorin, Op. cit., 38, 130.) Speransky however differs from Potemkin in his indifference to luxury and dislike of ‘hyperbolically lavish ceremonies’.

Tynianov throughout his creative life) might then never have been. One could follow this line of thought as far as the 1917 Revolution – which again might never have taken place, had Speransky’s programme of gradual liberal reforms been allowed to proceed along the route of the Napoleonic Rechtsstaat governed by a meritocratic bureaucracy under the rule of an enlightened monarch.464 There is no telling how Russian history might have developed had his policies succeeded, but the sense of Aleksandr I missing an opportunity which presented itself so urgently is palpable in the novel at this point.

Pursuing his cinematic handling of the scene, Tynianov allows us proper sight of the Minister only when he stops writing and rises from the desk, which he does ‘at once’, emphasising once again the idea of his machine-like efficiency:

Он был высок ростом, с длинными руками, ширококостый. Лицо его было белое, лоб покатый, а глаза полузакрытые, китайские (198).

Apart from the ‘damp smile’ that he gives his secretary, ‘baring the gums with the firm yellow teeth’ (199), this is all we ever learn of Speransky’s physical exterior. True to his method, the author is far more interested in the inner man. We learn, for example, how ‘he hated the chaos of war’ because ‘it was like some vast accident with unforeseen consequences’ (200), disturbing his carefully conceived designs and taking absolute control out of his hands. Tynianov employs a visual metaphor to illuminate this notion. Speransky has just thrown into the fire a letter naming Karamzin as the author of the latest petition to the Emperor about the oppression of the nobles. He takes the tongs and pokes the fire with his usual efficiency, ‘neatly … arranging the coals and watching them slowly turn to ashes’. His fear of losing power is then expressed in a stream of consciousness metaphor, which has been transformed from the fireplace to his mind:

Война путала все планы и нарушала размеры. Он был человек статский: произойди война, и система его - уголь и прах. Война предстояла решительная, и он не сомневался в поражении и гибели всего (200).

This is typically Tynianovian, a simple and telling stroke: external and internal are held together, the disintegrating coals and Speransky’s thoughts about disintegrating power portrayed in parallel, perfectly logically: looking into the fire, this is what the man naturally thinks, his thoughts influenced by what he actually sees.

The scene ends with an unexpected touch when Speransky takesDon Quixotefrom the shelf, opens it entirely at random, the action revealing how often he has read it. This uncharacteristic choice of favourite reading matter reflects a deeper truth: Cervantes’ famous novel is about an idealist and his futile desire to change reality. Speransky’s own most recent

quixotic scheme is ‘a special Lycée for all classes’. Speransky who attaches huge importance to his ‘special’ relationship with the Tsar also finds a certain parallel between himself and the hero of the novel:

Дружба толстого Панса с сухопарым дворянином была самой высокой поэзией, какую он знавал (200).

Employing montage, Tynianov intercuts the scene with a companion portrait of the Tsar, before flashing back to the Minister’s study, where he is shown receiving guests, not socially but on business: Illichevskii, his former fellow-seminarian whom he has just appointed Governor of Tomsk; old Samborskii, the Tsar’s former confessor, and his son-in-law Malinovskii. Illichevskii’s son will be a pupil at the new Lycée; Malinovskii will be its headmaster. The characters, major and minor, from tsar to schoolboy, are introduced and assembled in their natural settings, creating the illusion of complete plausibility, as Tynianov shows here his continuing fondness for combining the roles of dramatist and camera-man, along with his more conventional novelistic role as narrator.465

Withdrawn from society and remaining ‘a lonely wolf in the jungle of the court and government’,466 Speransky is portrayed by Tynianov as someone who actuallylikedto associate with old friends even though this may have been because of his constant need to be reassured, admired and respected by his social inferiors, his need to feel superior and in control.

Ironically, Illichevskii, characterised as a grasper, is about to take up his post in Tomsk where, as if to emphasise the impossible nature of the task, part of his mandate will be to eradicate bribery and corruption. Tynianov had clearly brought Illichevskii into the scene as a representation of the old Russian vice of which the next generation will be purged through a proper education.

The Tsar’s brothers, in Speransky’s idealistic opinion, should provide an example to the nobility by entering a special college where they would not be allowed access to the court, with its corrupting sycophancy. Their classmates, selected from all classes, would become a new breed of civil servants who would work selflessly for the good of their country. A new ‘race’ of people will thus be created, free of ‘bribery and corruption, laziness and opportunism’ (Ibid).

465

Tynianov might with ample justification have applied to himself the lineI am a Camera, which was the title given to John Von Druten’s dramatization of Christopher Isherwood’sGoodbye to Berlin(1939). Isherwood, whose early literary influences like stream of consciousness overlapped with Tynianov’s, lived in Berlin from 1929 to 1933. Tynianov was in Berlin in 1928 to consult the doctors at the same time as Nabokov, who was also in Berlin around this time. (His novellaSogliadatai, meaning ‘the watcher’ or ‘spy’ is set in Berlin in late 1920’s, employs a number of ‘voyeuristic techniques’ or ‘mirror reflections’ and explores the notion of arriving at a picture of a conclusive identity). The ‘camera’ analogy between Isherwood and Tynianov is, however, only partially valid. In the opening of his book Isherwood writes: ‘I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking.’ Goodbye to Berlin, (Penguin, 1973), 7. By contrast, Tynianov’s use of his photographic technique is always thought-through and executed withactiveprecision.

Illichevskii, senior and junior, are a concrete example of both problem and solution, the rationale and justification for the entire project. The new breed would be separated from their families, treated equally themselves and treating each other as equals, just as they did at the original Lycée in ancient Greece.

С разумом ясным и открытым, лишенные косных привычек их отцов, выходили из этой школы для служения государству и отечеству молодые люди, умные и прямые, угадывающие его мысли (my italics); они окружали его, стареющего. Главные места заполнялись ими (Ibid).

The grand irony behind Speransky’s idealism is that he is aiming for purity and freedom from nepotism, and yet the winners of the high posts will all behischildren, the Lycéehisbrainchild.

We shall never know whether Tynianov’s window into the workings of Speransky’s mind is a ‘true’ view of that particular mentality but what is certain is that Tynianov’s portrait carries the authenticity and conviction of literary truth: the entire scene, characters and surroundings, are almost tangible in their immediacy and detailed credibility: the Minister’s clothes (‘a smoke-coloured tailcoat and white stockings in the English fashion’(206)); the locked bureau containing the plan for a didactic novel; Illichevskii’s greedy fingers unconsciously stroking the base of one of the silver candlesticks and the Minister’s knowing smile of observance; Speransky pacing the study alone, the only one awake, ‘in his great soundless steps’(214); the frozen darkness outside where some shadow lurks, darts briefly and disappears – drunkard, thief or spy; and the symbolically dead palace of Potemkin, whom Speransky addresses enigmatically at the end of the scene. All this is accompanied by an impressive appeal to the senses – textures and colours, shapes and styles, odours and sounds (the muffled clock, Speransky cracking his knuckles) giving the reader a vivid sense of actuallybeingthere.

A warning note of Speransky’s fall is already sounded in this section. No matter how much the Emperor seems to be persuaded by Speransky’s eloquence, ‘no sooner had the Minister left than his logic crumbled into ashes’ (209), -- the imagery of ashes being a verbal echo of the fire-poking episode in the earlier scene. We next hear of him in Kunitsyn’s Journal, looking ‘paler, thinner, icier’ (265), and shortly afterwards ‘arrested as a criminal [and] taken to an unknown destination’ (287). His political views and his personal aspirations were little understood and considered suspect. According to Razumovskii’s inconsistent assertions referred to in the novel, he was a Jacobin who aspired to ascend the throne. The logic of this claim appears particularly warped since the incessant search for enemies and conspiracies was precisely a Jacobin practice.467 And although he was generally referred to as a republican, the

truth was that Speransky’s reforms threatened many of the vested interests of his conservative opponents.

Tynianov sustains the fire imagery:

Мать нашего лицейского, госпожа Бакунина, говорила при свидании сыну, что близ [Сперанского] всегда ей казалось, что она слышит серный запах, а в его глазах видела синеву адского пламени (288).468

The imagery takes a diabolical twist with the allusion to Lucifer or Mephistopheles – after all, it was widely believed that Speransky was favoured by the arch-devil himself, Bonaparte. On the day of Speransky’s fall the staff at the Lycée were thunderstruck, and behaved abnormally, pale, taciturn, distressed, each according to his personality:

Только дядьки по-прежнему растапливали печи, отдирая с треском бересту и ворча: печи дымили (312).

This kind of comic parody of a visual metaphor that has been consistently attached to one character in particular is easy to miss in a novel. The sophisticated reader of Tynianov, alert to his filmic mentality, learns to be aware of such touches: Speransky has figuratively gone up in smoke.469

Much of what is known historically of Speransky has been unobtrusively mediated to us in this portrait. Tynianov never makes the reader feel that he is being historically ‘informed’, however; he makes general information an integral part of each individual story. So, for example, Vigel’ records that Speransky had the expression d’un veau expirant,470 and this unflattering and indeed repulsive metaphor is matched by what Tynianov says about his pale face with its half-shut oriental eyes (198), the wet grin, the yellow teeth, the bared gums (199).

Many found Speransky’s reforming measures equally unattractive but, as a modern historian has pointed out, this was due to a ‘generalized opposition to him as an agent of social change, rather than specific criticism of individual policies’.471Speransky was summarily sacked and banished from the capital after an audience with the Emperor on 17th March 1812. This did not spell the end of his career, but it put an end to his period of power and to his reforms. After the March meeting the Tsar reportedly said, in his characteristically melodramatic fashion: ‘Last

468

These words actually belong to F. Vigel’ who hated Speransky. He saw him as a ‘secret enemy of Orthodoxy, autocracy and Russia, and within it, one class especially – the nobles’: ‘I always thought that I could smell a sulphuric odour and that in his blue eyes I could see the greenish flame of the underworld.’ Wiegel, F.Zapiski(Moscow, 1928), 154-7. For Bakunina’s memoir see ‘Dvenadtsatyi god v zapiskakh V. Iv. Bakuninoi’ inRusskaia starina(1885), No. 9).

469

The parodistic technique seen at work here is similar to that used by Ch. Marlowe inDr Faustus, a work in which power is also associated with ‘the reek of sulphur’. At the conclusion of the drama Faustus, the power-seeker, quite literally disappears in smoke and sulphur. Even if Tynianov had not been aware of the parallel to Marlowe, he could have known it from Goethe’s

Faust. The major point of difference would be that Speransky’s power was directed to liberal rather than to selfish ends. Nonetheless, Tynianov’s portrait is that of a man who clearly relishes his power because, like Faust, his life has become empty, and it is power which fills the vacuum, or so he likes to imagine.

470

Vigel’, a sharp commentator mirroring the general mood of the times, accused Speransky of indifference, insincerity and hypocrisy.