Sanine by Mikhail Artsybashev (ebook pdf reader for pc .TXT) 📕

Burying her face in the pillows, she wept bitterly.

“Why am I weeping?” she thought, not knowing the reason for such tears, but feeling miserable, humiliated, and unhappy. She wept because she had yielded herself to Sarudine, because she was no longer a proud, pure maiden, and because of that insulting, horrible look in her brother’s eyes. Formerly he would never have looked at her like that. It was, so she thought, because she had fallen.

But the bitterest, most harassing thought of all was that she had now become a woman, and that as long as she was young, strong, and good-looking her best powers must be at the service of men and devoted to their gratification, while the greater the enjoyment she procured for them and for herself the more would they despise her.

“Why should they? Who gave them this right? Am I not free just as much as they are?” she asked herself, as she gazed into the dreary darkness of her room. “Shall I never get to know another, better life?”

Her whole youthful physique imperiously told her that she had a right to take from life all that was interesting, pleasurable and necessary to her; and that she had a right to do whatever she chose with her strong, beautiful body that belonged to her alone. But this idea was lost in a tangle of confused and conflicting thoughts.

For some time past Yourii Svarogitsch had been working at painting, of which he was fond, and to which he devoted all his spare time. It had once been his dream to become an artist, but want of money, in the first place, and also his political activity prevented this, so that now he painted occasionally, as a pastime, without any special end in view.

For this reason, indeed, and because he had no training, art gave him no pleasant satisfaction; it was a source of chagrin and of disenchantment. Whenever his work did not prove successful, he became irritable and depressed; if, on the other hand, it came out well, he fell into a sort of gloomy reverie, conscious of the futility of his efforts that brought him neither happiness nor success. Yourii had taken a great fancy to Sina Karsavina. He liked tall, well-formed young women with fine voices and romantic eyes. He thought her beauty and purity of soul were what attracted him, though really it was because she was handsome and desirable. However, he tried to persuade himself that, for him, her charm was a spiritual, not a physical one, this being, as he thought, a nobler, finer definition, though it was precisely this maidenly purity and innocence of hers which fired his blood and aroused desire. Ever since the evening when he first met her, he had felt a vague yet vehement longing to sully her innocence, a longing indeed that the presence of any handsome woman provoked.

And now that his thoughts were set on a comely girl, blithe, wholesome, and full of the joy of life, Yourii had an idea that he would paint Life. As most new ideas were wont to do, this one stirred him to enthusiasm, and on this occasion he believed that he would bring his task to a successful end.

Having prepared a huge canvas, he set to work with feverish haste, as if he dreaded delay. When he first touched the canvas with colour, producing a harmonious and pleasing effect, he felt a thrill of delight, and the picture that was to be stood clearly before him with all its details. As, however, the work progressed, so technical difficulties became more numerous, and with these Yourii felt unable to cope. All that in his imagination seemed luminous and beautiful and strong, became thin and feeble on the canvas. Details no longer fascinated him, but were annoying and depressing. In fact, he ignored them and began to paint in a broad, slapdash style. Thus, instead of a clear, powerful portrayal of life, the picture became ever more plain of a tawdry, slovenly female. There was nothing original or charming about such a dull stereotyped piece of work, so he thought; a veritable imitation of a Moukh drawing, banal in idea as in execution; and, as usual, Yourii became sad and gloomy.

Had it not for some reason or other seemed shameful to weep, he would have wept, hiding his face in the pillow, and sobbing aloud. He longed to complain to someone about something, but not about his own incompetence. Instead of this he gazed ruefully at the picture thinking that life generally was tedious and sad and feeble, containing nothing of interest to him, personally. It horrified him to look forward to living, as he would have to do, for many years in this little town.

“Why, it is simply death!” thought Yourii, as his brow grew cold as ice. Then he felt a desire to paint “Death.” Seizing a knife, he angrily began to scrape off his picture of “Life.” It vexed him that that which he had wrought with such enthusiasm should disappear with such difficulty. The colour did not come off easily; the knife slipped and twice cut the canvas. Then he found that chalk would make no mark on the oil paint. This greatly troubled him. With a brush he commenced to sketch in his subject in ochre, and then painted slowly, carelessly, in a spiritless, dejected way. His present work, however, did not lose, but gained by such slipshod methods and by the dull, heavy colour scheme. The original idea of “Death” soon disappeared of itself; and so Yourii proceeded to depict “Old Age” as a lean hag tottering along a rough road in the dusk. The sun had sunk, and against the livid sky sombre crosses were seen en silhouette. Beneath the weight of a heavy black coffin the woman’s bony shoulders were bent,