"LITERATURE IS

"LITERATURE IS A TRIBUTE": MAXIM GORKY AND THE KLAVDIA GROSS STORY

DONALD RAYFIELD

At tbe end of June 1899, from his summer dacha on the Volga, Maxim Gorky wrote to his friend Anton Chekhov, now terminally ill, and settling in the Crimea. (Te two men, so diferent in character, origin, political views, and literary talent, had taken an instant liking to one another: Chekhov tried to teach Gorky to write better, and Gorky helped Chekhov extract more money from his publishers.) Tis time Gorky was ofering Chekhov human material:

Please forgive me: I have sent a certain Klavdia Gross, a young “fallen woman,” to see you in Moscow. When I sent her I didn’t yet know that you stroll up and down Tverskoy Boulevard [in Moscow] chatting to those

“fallen women.” She’s an interesting character and I think that I did the right thing by sending her to see you. She will bring you the story of her life, written in her own words. She is decent, speaks foreign languages, and overall she’s a fne girl, even if she is a prostitute. I think she’ll be more use to you than to me.

Chekhov never met Klavdia Gross, and he would not have used her anyway as a prototype for a story: his story “Peasants” had just been deprived by the censor of its fnal chapter, in which the young heroine is forced to return to Moscow from her native village with no alternative but to prostitute herself. In the 1880s, the censors used to pass stories about prostitution — Chekhov’s own “An Attack of Nerves” describes a brothel crawl by three students, one of whom is so distraught at what he sees that the other two have him treated by a psychiatrist. Chekhov himself at the time boasted of being “a great specialist in that department” and was at his happiest in 1890 in a Japanesestafed brothel in the Far East of Russia; yet at the same time he railed at his friend and publisher Aleksey Suvorin because Suvorin’s newspaper, New Times, was not denouncing prostitution as a major social evil, but instead condoning it with advertisements on the back page for “dermatologists” (who treated syphilis) and “French ladies in search of a position.”

In the 1870s, a novelist like Dostoyevsky could make a prostitute the heroine of at least three of his major novels. In the 1900s, the censorship relaxed again, and Alexander Kuprin was able to publish Te Pit, a novel about the horrors of Russian brothels, while G. B. Shaw’s Mrs Warren’s Profession had 200 performances in Saint Petersburg. Te medical journals had long been free of censorship: they discussed the issue of prostitution almost every week. Russian doctors were frustrated by the country’s endemic syphilis — 11 percent of army recruits were infected — and its ineradicable sources, not just brothels and streetwalkers (who were subject to regular police inspection), but wet nurses, who caught and transmitted congenital syphilis, and peasant households with no running water and no clean linen, where a migrant worker could bring back the disease and infect a whole village.

Despite Chekhov’s lack of response, Gorky took up Klavdia Gross’s case. In October 1899, he gave a speech in Petersburg, About Prostitutes (probably the same as his introduction and afterword to Klavdia’s story when it was printed), to an illegal radical student gathering, which was broken up by police. Gorky ofered the story to the main newspapers, who refused to print it. Finally, a new newspaper, Te Northern Courier, founded by Prince Vladimir Bariatinsky, the second husband of Chekhov’s old fame, the actress Lydia Yavorskaya, courageously ran the piece as a feuilleton (a story on pages two and three, running along the bottom third of the paper) on the 13th, 14th, and 15th of November 1899. Te Northern Courier was then closed down for several months, not only because of Klavdia Gross, but for political liberalism; when it began publishing again in spring 1900 it lasted only until the end of the year. Few copies survive, even in Russian libraries, which is why Gross’s story is still largely unknown.

From the story we gather that Klavdia attempted suicide and was therefore to be tried by an ecclesiastical court. She

was also accused (but acquitted) of theft (possibly over non-payment of a Singer sewing machine bought on hire-purchase, the traditional path to salvation ofered to prostitutes all over Europe). Gorky did his best for her: he secured 50 rubles in payment for her story, and he then employed her in his house in Nizhny Novgorod. Tis soon ended disastrously: frst of all, while Gorky was in Petersburg, his wife reported that a police detective had called to see Klavdia. At the beginning of December 1899, Gorky wrote to Chekhov:

Yesterday the most absurd melodrama was performed in my house. We had a prostitute whom I had been “saving” … She was staying and it was all right. She was looking after my wife’s sister’s baby who was born 12 days ago and squawks non-stop for days on end. She’s a hardworking, good woman, but a hysteric. Suddenly it turned out she had been spreading rumors that she was sharing not just my house, but my bed. I found out and carried out a little interrogation, which convinced me that she really was the source of the gossip. Well, what was I to do with her? She’s pitiful. Of course, my wife was very upset, so was her mother. What a bore! It’s just as well my wife’s a wonderful woman. But all the same I had to throw the woman I was “saving” out on the street. All this has tired me out.

Klavdia Gross then disappears from the record. All we have is what was printed in Te Northern Courier:

A Story

Te newspaper Te Northern District reports a grim drama that was recently played out in one of Kostroma’s police stations. An educated, good-looking girl from out of town turned up at the station, asking to be issued a Yellow Ticket [a streetwalker’s license, recording medical inspections, etc.] Te police ofcer spent some time trying to dissuade the girl from doing what she intended, but she insisted. She was charged 10 kopecks for the Ticket.

“Let me work tonight, then I’ll pay you,” she responded.

She was issued the booklet with her details. Ten, distressed by some mysterious event that had happened earlier and by the whole scene of the booklet being issued, the girl could hold out no more: there and then, in the police station, she died from a heart attack.

Te story I now ofer is not “literature”: it is something more valuable and important. It is the authentic statement of someone who has sufered from the absurd and disgraceful conditions of life in Russia.

Te origin of the story is as follows:

Not long ago a girl came to see me. Her face was jaundiced and haggard; her eyes were frightened, constantly twitching, her manner was both tense and casual. She was shaking from head to toe, shrugging, and she impressed me as someone who had been hounded. It seemed that she had

just been chased down the street by people who were shouting at her, throwing mud at her, and now, trying to get away from the chase, she had burst through the frst door she came across, seen a man whom she didn’t know, and was standing in front of him, breathing heavily, frightened, exhausted, not knowing who he was. Was this another enemy? What was he going to do to her? Was he going to mistreat her like everyone else?

“What have you got to say?” I asked

her.

She smiled such an exhausted, bewildered smile. Ten she fung her arms apart apologetically and hurriedly, but quietly, started talking in a strained, quivering voice.

“You see, I’m … a prostitute. Not in the full sense, but now … all the same now … I … poisoned myself recently … I drank smelling salts … I’ve been in hospital…”

In her broken speech the words somehow jumped over one another and her eyes also jerked from side to side. Looking at her and listening to her, I couldn’t help thinking about her heart. I imagined it was compressed by fear into a little lump, covered with sores, scratched and barely able to take a deep breath.

“I’ve recovered…” the girl said, apologetically lowering her head. She added quietly: “I’m going to be taken to court for doing this…”

She wasn’t quite right: she was going to be taken to court for attempted suicide, not for recovering (that is not the law in Russia).

We got talking. It turned out she had drunk 20 kopecks’ worth of smelling salts and was being prosecuted by the ecclesiastical courts. I asked her to tell me what drove her to kill herself. She started telling me, while I listened and thought:

“Nowadays Leo Tolstoy, the Lion of Russian literature, is roaring loudly so the whole world can hear about the life and suferings of his heroine Katya Maslova [a prostitute tried for murder in Tolstoy’s 1899 novel Resurrection], and the public is enjoying listening to the prophet’s words … If one of Maslova’s fellow workers were to tell her life story in her own words, might that not heighten the public’s interest in these doomed human beings, these women whom the public needs so badly, but who for some reason are despised and treated so cruelly? Tey work without complaining … Might not someone’s deadened conscience be brought to life by the sounds of these words from life’s lower depths, life’s thickest dirt? Even people who were born deaf listen to the words of a genius about a prostitute, so let them hear out one more story, that of the prostitute herself, something straight from her lips … If her story is to be just a bitter belch of the kisses which we, drunk and slobbering, have awarded her for years on end, even that is no bad thing! Perhaps, someone will feel self-revulsion … will be ashamed … perhaps the feeling of shame will be a lever for some people and that lever will set other, more creative feelings — love, wrath, revenge — in motion. For oppression of a fellow human being requires vengeance.

Te girl turned out to be literate, and I suggested that she should write the story of her life, telling us how her thinking led her to the idea that she had to die …

At frst she only laughed: she didn’t believe me when I said that there would be people who would read what she wrote. Finally I persuaded her, and about two days later she brought me a few sheets of paper covered in writing. She wrote her tale in a fairly literate and coherent way. I

Demián Flores, América Tropikal, mural in vinyl, 2021. Created for exhibition Ser Todo Es Ser Parte/To Be Whole Is To Be Part at LACE. Courtesy of the artist. Photo by Ray Barrera.

didn’t instruct her how she should write, I didn’t correct her narrative, I only inserted a few words to connect separate phrases and these I have put in italics.

I WAS BORN on a general’s estate in the village of Baranovka, in Saratov Province, Atkarsky District. My grandfather was the general’s estate manager, and when S. died, the estate passed to my grandfather. After a few months, grandfather suddenly died; this was around Christmas in the winter of 1871. At the time I was 15 months old. My grandfather’s wife, my grandmother, immediately sent a telegram to Saint Petersburg, summoning my father, her son, the senior male in the family, who therefore had to take over the running of the estate and help his mother who was now a widow with two grownup daughters on her hands, and fve sons, the youngest of whom was eight years old. My grandmother was as kind as an angel, she loved her children and everyone around her equally, so that all her own people, as well as strangers, called her “Mama.” She died as peacefully as she lived — God grant her the Kingdom of Heaven! She was a woman and a housekeeper who never allowed any quarrels or disorder in the house, she kept an eye on everything and on everybody. It was an enormous household, a house and estates on a lordly scale, a great number of servants, but there was never any disorder in the house or estate as long as she was alive. I grew up, spoiled by my grandmother, my godmother, father, and everyone around me; I was fve when my three older brothers and a sister died. My brother and I were the only survivors. Like my brother, I wasn’t loved by my mother: she already had another son, her spitting image, and at the time he was just two months old; although he was handed over to a wet nurse and a nanny, he was the favorite and had more afection from our mother. I was still small, but all this grieved me and my breast seethed with hatred for my little brother and my mother, whom I was afraid of, shaking at every word she spoke, but at the same time I hated her and tried to do as much as I could to annoy her. I was capricious and stubborn, so I drove her to fury, and sometimes I was beaten several times in one day, but I still had my defenders, my grandmothers, and other family members.

Suddenly, however, my much-loved grandmother sensed that she would die soon and divided up all her possessions while she was still alive, although she had never had a single day’s sickness, not a single minute’s. Yet she was dying. It wasn’t death so much as going to sleep, she fell asleep and didn’t wake up. After dinner she had cofee, lay down to rest and never got up again. I shall never forget that minute, or the expression on her face: she was sleeping, and a kindly smile remained on her lips. I couldn’t tear myself away, she meant everything to me, she was frst to teach me the alphabet, although she spoke Russian badly, yet she tried to teach me everything: she was so pleased when I burbled German poetry. I was six years old and, when she died, I buried my childish burbling and became far too serious for my age. Games and amusements no longer interested me, I saw no more love or afection, my father was busy and I still did not feel any attachment to anyone, and so I would huddle in a corner in the nursery or the garden and ruminate over everything, sitting alone with my thoughts for days on end, crying bitterly. My character

changed, I became secretive, taciturn, and my mother took against me permanently. Of course I had plenty to eat, I was very well dressed, but that wasn’t for my sake, but for outsiders to see. Tat was how I lived and sufered until I went to boarding school. We went to the town of Saratov and I entered the second form, was a good pupil, the favorite of teachers, male and female; I had no time to be bored, and I spent more time at school than at home. I saw my mother for fve or 10 minutes a day and got even less used to her. My father set of on business to Moscow to sort out his afairs; he would send for us and then, abandoning once more everything I treasured and loved, I had to travel with my mother. Where to? Why? What was waiting for me there? I never stopped asking myself those questions.

When we got to Moscow, where my father had already rented an apartment, our family settled down and I went to grammar school, as did my brothers, but after a few months our situation changed, our schooling stopped and we were taken back home. I had to do the servants’ work in the house, the washing, sewing for my father, mother, and little brothers. I soon got used to my position and although I found it difcult at frst, I was sorry for my father, who had no job, and I also was fond of my elder brother, so I did everything to the best of my strength. I was growing up, I had developed early for my age, although I still wore short dresses and I was only 11. Finally father got a job and left for the town of B.; from there he was transferred to Voronezh and, fnally, back to Moscow again. All this happened in the course of one year: there was nothing special happening that year, the whole family was in a state of fux, while I got on with housework as at the start of the year, after I left the grammar school. Once again, father lost his job, but happened to fnd another one and, gathering up his family, left for the estate of Prince Lobanov-Rostovsky. We settled in very well, again I was a young lady, we had servants, and I didn’t have anything to do. I spent my time like this: getting up at frst light, setting of for the felds to look at the peasants working, visiting the threshing machine, then the bathing pool, calling on the cattle shed for a jug of milk. I spent whole days in the garden or the copse, lying on the grass, and the things I thought about, the castles in Spain I built! Or I’d raft down the river and drift without thinking where or why. I had no girl friends, I didn’t like to share my thoughts with my brothers, and I spent whole days with nature; but once, when I was strolling in the copse, I saw a young man who was so pensive that it was some time before he noticed my presence. Tere were books strewn around him and I was interested in them; I picked one up and my movement roused him from his thoughts. After our frst exchange of greetings I learnt that he had come from Petersburg, that he was a student who had graduated from the medical faculty, and was attending the wife of Prince L. From that day on we were inseparable, he was my comrade in all my expeditions and enterprises, I grew fond of him, or so attached to him that I couldn’t do without him for a single minute. I could recognize his footsteps at a distance, my heart always predicted where he would be waiting for me. But the time came for a fnal meeting: he had to leave. As usual, we set of for the felds, we strolled, we went everywhere, as we always did. And we said goodbye, exchanging a chaste kiss. Tat was my frst kiss, but it didn’t lead us to sin. But I was so emotional that I fainted,

and in my mother’s eyes I was irredeemably lost. I was a fallen young woman and that was the only thing to call me, but it was a lie — I was a virgin until I was 20 years and a half.

He had left. Very soon my father quarreled with the prince for some reason and was dismissed. Life changed sharply again and we were living once more in Moscow. My father used his last capital to open a laundry, then left on business, leaving my mother in charge of everything. But, spoiled by a life of luxury and by a variety of servants, she was unable to run things or even to cope with the people. Laundry maids are very diferent from servants, and things got worse when they should have improved, while I, an eternal thorn in my mother’s fesh, had to endure a lot of grief because my mother had become a laundress even though she had never worked at any job in her life. Punishments every day, and a laundress’s hard work, together with the other workers, reduced me to such a state that, when my mother tried to sell the laundry and did so, she told me that I had to fnd myself a position. She fung my papers at me and told me to go of and look for one. I was now free. I was 13 and beginning to live an independent life.

I took the frst position I found: it turned out to be very good, and I calmed down and got so used to my employers’ little children that I couldn’t bear to part from them, their babbling gave me great pleasure, they loved me more than they loved their mother (the eldest one was getting on for four, the youngest was six months old, there were three of them). Te parents were seldom at home, since they were performers at the Bolshoi Teatre in Moscow, and the father also gave dancing and music lessons. Tanks to the attention of the young couple I was quite happy, I was liked, I was not hindered in any way. On the contrary they tried to teach me useful work, sewing, embroidery, and other handicrafts. For my part, I tried to study and learn, I helped my employer’s brothers and sisters, who lived in the same house, to do their homework. But my little empire soon ended, and I had to part from them — the reason was that I was now 16 and I had no documents allowing me to live there, and nobody knew where my parents lived. What was I to do, where could I go? My employer gave me money to deal with the problem, but whatever I did, whomever I turned to, it was all useless …

One has to live somewhere, to fnd shelter for the night. But my employer was strictly forbidden to keep me, on the grounds that I might have left my home without my parents’ permission and, if I had no papers, I would have to be sent to my place of birth. You have to realize how horrible my situation was: no resources, the salary I received was spent on clothes and linen, and without papers I could fnd neither accommodation nor a position. What was I to do, where was I to go? I could walk about in the day, but what about the night? How many sleepless nights I spent, walking from one street to another, praying to God for day to break, and when day broke, you prayed for night to fall. How much agony and hunger I endured during that time. But I couldn’t fnd the courage to ask for help from my rich aunt who had refused to help me at a moment when I was in need. I swore never to turn to her ever again, even if I was dying of hunger. I don’t want to describe my aunt, I’ll just say she probably never was able to do good and two or three months spent with her proved to me that it is far

easier to live with strangers than with a rich aunt and be her maid of all work, her skivvy, yardman and dairymaid, all that without receiving a penny in wages.

But I did have one kind, good family, the I.-s, who loved me and were ready to share their last crust of bread with me, but I couldn’t and didn’t want to force myself on them. Tey were kind, but terribly poor, and they had six children, of whom two were marriageable girls my age. And I was unable to confess that, although I had rich relatives, I didn’t have a crust of bread or a place to lay my head. I wasn’t proud or egotistical, but it pained me and it was bitter to be aware that there were people with no soul or heart, and those were people related to me. Finally, fate took pity on me, and I had the prospect of a position. I arrived to fnd out all the details and it turned out that it was no place at all for a decent girl. One glance was enough to tell me what this was, which is how I escaped the fate that I was threatened with. Fate had a joke at my expense, but, still, I was saved for the time being. Finally, exhausted, worn out, I went to see my kind family to recover my spirits and I learnt to my joy that they had managed to get papers for me. I don’t know who did this, but I had papers and I think I must be grateful all my life to whoever got them for me, because I had decided that day to put an end to my life. Once again providence had saved me. But I continue: I had papers in my hand, but I was badly dressed! You are hired for the way you dress, I couldn’t show myself for any decent position, so I ended up as a cook in a box factory. Family and employees amounted to 35 people, masses of work. After spending three months there I fell ill, and seriously, too. I spent about two months in hospital before I recovered and immediately took a position about 12 miles outside Moscow. It was a small family, and I felt at home with them; my health was restored; my depressed state came to an end; I wanted to live; my dreams carried me a long, long way of, I was waiting and looking for something. For afection, love, that was what I was waiting for. Life can’t all be labor and work; I wanted to rest, to talk, to share my thoughts with somebody about what I had been through. It would soon be summer. Our neighbor’s son was coming home from the academy.

Our acquaintance began by him helping me get water from the well, which had a very difcult pump. From that day on, he tried in any way he could to make my position as a servant easier, by doing all the heavy work for me. We were soon inseparable, spending all our free time together, walking, dreaming, reading, trying to please one another. Sometimes we sat in silence for hours on end, each plunged into our own dreams, there were no words of love pronounced between us, but we loved one another. Our eyes told us that … Again, an unforeseen event: my employer’s wife was dying. I had to go back to Moscow. Tere was a position awaiting me. Te student, when he found out, decided to talk to his parents and tell them that he wanted to marry me, but they refused permission outright, all the more because he had another year’s study left. I had a premonition that this would result in something bad. And, daring to take a risky step, I set of to the gazebo where he studied and rested. One minute later, he would have been dead, my coming made him drop the revolver that he was about to shatter his jaw with. I don’t remember what happened to me, but when I regained consciousness, I summoned up all my willpower to distract him from this

Wendy Red Star, Catalogue Number 1949.73, 2019, pigment print on archival paper, 18 x 28 inches. Courtesy the artist and Sargent's Daughters.

idea. To persuade him, I spoke as if I were a kind sister and made him swear to me that he would not commit suicide. After talking to him and calming him, I began packing for Moscow. He was not allowed even to come with me, but we couldn’t part like that, without saying farewell to one another. Pure love always fnds a way! Before my departure, his parents sent him to Moscow to buy things, but the family with which he was to stay was one I knew too: it was a family where I was godmother to the daughter. Our unexpected meeting nearly killed both of us. It was almost impossible to pull us apart. To know that we are in love but cannot belong to one another, just because I was a servant! Was I born to be a servant? Whose fault was it all? God forbid what was happening in my soul, but I didn’t want seem selfsh, and out of pity for him I tried with all my strength to calm him and to have hopes for the future.

It was time: we had to part. He was going back to Voronezh, and I was staying in Moscow. At frst we corresponded a lot, he was going mad, but I answered with cold, moralizing letters to make him understand that we were not social equals and, even more, that it was impossible to go against his parents’ wishes. We stopped writing to each other, but my heart had a worm in it that gnawed at me constantly. I was madly in love, and at the same time I hated my beloved’s parents and their stupid prejudices that were destroying their children and pushing them into a slough of despair. At least that our love observed boundaries and, despite our passionate impulses, we managed to hold back from temptation. But I digress. I had a position, I was getting a decent salary, dressing very well, and I had managed gradually to take control of the household, but there was something else: my position was with a major catering company where there was a mass of people, so that I had quite a few admirers. I was still very shy, since I’d jumped from an isolated life into a sort of chaos. But you can get used to anything, and so I did. I was neatly dressed, as dark-skinned as a gypsy, as curly-haired as a Jewess, always cheerful to see such a number of admirers around me, I was turning their heads, I could respond to sarcasms and rude remarks, I laughed at cynical outbursts, but at the same time I could hurt people to the quick to stop any repetitions. Some men loved me, others respected me, others ofered me their bed and their wealth, and the rest hated me for my sharp stings and the truth that I always told everyone to their faces. But at the same time I wanted a life, I avenged myself on all of them for my precious love that I could not forget. Just as earlier I had sought solitude, now I began to go everywhere — to parties, to excursions, to picnics. All the same I knew that I was working and was not being paid 15 rubles to do nothing, even though the elderly boss would have paid as much as 100 a month, but I was not willing to give myself, to sell myself for money, not love. I took pleasure in looking at my band of cavaliers, each one of them trying to outdo the others in entertaining me. Of course, I didn’t let on that I understood what was going on, I behaved extremely freely and merrily, never refusing champagne and wine. I went everywhere that a woman, but not necessarily a decent woman, could go. I kept such good control of myself that I never allowed any efusions and could stop my gentlemen cavaliers in time from any extravagant behavior. But how I loathed them and what fun I made of them! I was a servant now, but a diferent kind.

Before nobody paid any attention to me, now they were happy to kiss my hand and carry me about; even my mother changed her opinion, although she never stopped considering me a fallen woman. Even the rich aunt paid attention to me, but so far I still wasn’t a lost woman. I hadn’t forgotten my love. And I was still living here, tormenting my cavaliers, working, busy with the housework, helping the old man cope with his commercial business, doing all the book work, the monthly and the annual accounts, and I had a wild good time, even though at heart I sufered for my poor unhappy brother, who turned out to be more of a coward than me and took to drink because of love. Poor brother, I have tried my best to help him, but he was recruited into the military and left. I began to see my mother more often and stopped being afraid of this aristocratic woman, I was no longer afraid of being embarrassed by being treated as a servant, but nevertheless at heart I felt the full bitterness caused by my crippled childhood and the destruction of my love.

I was 20, still living the same way, but it was spring, and summer was approaching, and this was a time of major changes. Tanks to the nagging of my elderly boss, I was forced, regrettably, to resign from my job, but when we settled up it turned out that I was not going to be paid anything, since I had, out of love for my brother, taken my salary in advance. On the contrary, it turned out that I owed my employer about 25 rubles. Not knowing what to do and how to repay him, so as not to owe him anything, I left all my things behind, since I didn’t want to be his concubine.

I left. But where could I go? I didn’t have a penny in my pocket, and I hadn’t taken any unneeded things I could pawn or sell. I went to my mother’s. I spent a day with her, stayed the night and told her the full story. She listened very seriously, but declared in the morning that I could not stay any longer than one day, otherwise she would lose her position — she was living there as a governess or music teacher, or something like a companion for the landlady, a young widow (none of this made sense). It must also be noted that my mother, once she sold the laundry and abandoned her children, had separated from her husband. Of course, when I got up in the morning, I said goodbye to my mother and left. It never occurred to my mother’s heart or mind to ask where I would go, and I didn’t raise the question. I went — I didn’t know where I was going, and got as far as the Garden Ring or the boulevard. I sat down without thinking and cried bitterly. Of course, as always happens, one man, then another passed — some laughed, some said something sarcastic, and one man just gave his frank opinion, that I had been beaten up or was drunk. My tearful outburst passed and I started thinking about my situation. Although it was July, night would still fall and I had to fnd somewhere to spend it, so I went to look for quarters. I found something, handed over my passport in lieu of a deposit and said I came from out of town and didn’t have any money on me. I spent the day at my friends I. and in the evening I set of to my quarters and, oh horror! it turns out that I was in the hands of a madame, or whatever such women are called … Where could I escape to? It was night, so, being afraid to lose my selfcontrol, and to keep my nerve, I took some laurel drops, something I’d been taking recently. Te evening passed all right, nothing remarkable happened. People tried not to let me know where I was, but it took just

one look at my surroundings and company that evening to tell me everything; moreover, the most colorful of my admirers, a man I hated with every fber of my being, was here. Finally, everyone went to their homes and I was calm, because nothing had happened and I could go to sleep. A week or so passed like this, nothing special happened, but one evening my new landlady began insisting that I should join in a party, which apparently was laid on for a bride and groom. I agreed; the evening was merry, there was a lot of dancing, but in the end they decided to take a cab to the Zoological Gardens. Te whole company set of, including my admirer, who was treating the ladies in the gardens, me included, to oranges; that orange was my ruin. 1 I was ruined, and thanks to a man whom I heartily loathed. What had happened to me! How I cursed myself for my impulsiveness. But it was too late to retrieve what was lost, they had planned this earlier. Te next day I could hardly stagger home, I was ill, destroyed. Although there was nobody in my room when I got up, I knew my tormentor had been there. Once I got home, I tried to leave the quarters for good, but my landlady wouldn’t let me go, she gave me a bill that showed I owed her a lot. Ten she refused outright to hand back my papers. What could I do? My head was spinning, so reluctantly I set of to ask advice from I.’s family, without, naturally, letting them see that I was no longer a young lady — I just told them about the business with my landlady. When he heard me out, my friend’s husband wrote a document and told me to hand it to the magistrate, which I did. Te landlady was summoned to court and, of course, handed over my papers, but she said such things about me that my hair stood on end. Finally it was all over. I was alone, on the street again, without means, with nowhere to sleep, and just now my health was badly shattered, so that I could hardly even walk. I decided on a desperate act: I went to the police station to beg them to issue me a ticket so I could travel to Ryazan, where I had a cousin once removed who was enormously rich. Of course, they refused to give me a ticket at state expense, but they sent me with a convoy of criminals, although I was in a separate carriage with the ofcer on duty, who turned out to be such a decent person that he didn’t take advantage of my helpless situation: on the contrary, he tried to relieve my situation. We spent more than a week traveling … but I didn’t have a penny to my name, and over the last week I had become very emaciated thanks to hunger and other unpleasant experiences.

Finally, we were in the town of Ryazan. Te ofcer was so kind as to tell me where things were and added that if I couldn’t manage to sort out my life, then I shouldn’t hesitate to come and see him at his quarters which were next to the prison building. As he had foreseen, that’s what happened. I found my aunt’s house, but I wasn’t received, because she herself was in Petersburg and as her lady friend and the manager didn’t know me, they dared not risk taking me in. So, like it or not, I had to go back to see the ofcer. It turned out that he was a family man, his wife was a nice lady, and he had already told her my situation. She showed me great hospitality, asked me not to feel awkward and to live with them until I could arrange

1 If they want to possess a woman, various rogues often resort to oranges. Tis is how they do it: they inject the orange with some drug that is sexually arousing, or with sedative drops. [Maxim Gorky]

something for myself. I rested that day, and the next day, with letters provided by my protector, I set of where he told me to go. As I am considered a resident of Ryazan, it was easy for me to get into the reception center or, as it’s called, the workhouse. I was taken in, given a room, linen, food, government clothes, and in exchange I had to work. I thanked my new acquaintances and settled into the workhouse, but I didn’t have to work. I had become very ill with a fever; from July when I left my job and until I arrived in Ryazan I underwent a lot of sufering, and I didn’t get out of bed until the end of December. Finally, just before Christmas, my aunt came to fetch me and took me with her; I didn’t want to go, I didn’t like her face, which I was seeing for the frst time. An old maid, as gnarled as bark, her face was a mask of egotism, but I had to submit.

I was in her house, wealth all around, luxurious furnishings, but all the rest was such meanness, such false piety that it was revolting! Tere was a housekeeper, and she was a dirty servant; as for the manager, he was also the handyman and janitor, the flth was impossible, I was often hungry, but I’d never lived in such flth, the whole house teemed with cats and dogs, and for them nothing was too much. Suddenly, here I was, the owner’s niece, and not just a blood relative, but a sick woman! Every day the doctor came, that was ruinously expensive, but the opinion of society had to be considered, so I wasn’t shown the door. But every minute I myself was thinking that when I fnally got my health back I should no longer be a burden on my aunt. But you can’t live as you like, you live as God ordains — one illness followed another, and I staggered on from Christmas until early May. In May, my aunt suggested I should go back to Moscow, although I asked, even insisted on staying in Ryazan, if not with her, then wherever I found a job. She refused outright and soon I was packed and ready to go, with a railway ticket bought. I was back in Moscow, without means, anywhere to stay, or a job. But I failed to remember that I did have the poor family of the I–s, whom I had forgotten. Unfortunately, they’d gone to Petersburg to collect a small portion of an inheritance. I had to look at least for temporary accommodation; I found a small room with a Jewish family: terrible poverty, three tiny children, all infants, the father was a tailor, but no customers, since he didn’t have a shop sign. In a word, it was an awful situation, and mine was no better. I registered with a job center, and in two days I became a nanny for a fve-year-old boy. I had a monthly salary of 12 rubles and I was helping the poor Jewish children, then I went to the country. Tat was when I received a letter from someone I didn’t expect to hear from, a letter from my frst love, whom I had saved from death. It turned out he was alive, happy, married with a son, but when he found out about me and my life he asked me to accept from him, as a brother’s gift, 300 rubles. I was very grateful to him, I accepted the money, not refusing, all the more because I wanted to help the poor Jews. Although they were Jews, I thought they were good people; I gave them some money, and he passed his examination as a professional tailor with top marks and his business improved, which made me very happy. I also helped a poor woman to get a trading license, and she paid me interest every day in fresh fruit or early berries. All this was good, but fate was persecuting me again. My admirer, after disgracing me, found

Wendy Red Star, Catalogue Number 1950.76, 2019, pigment print on archival paper, 28 x 18 inches. Courtesy the artist and Sargent's Daughters.

out I was in Moscow, sought me out, and began visiting me, pretending to be a brother, every day. I didn’t want him now or before, but he threatened me with a scene, so I had to receive him. I didn’t want to lose my job. He abused his rights, and also spread gossip that reached my employer’s ear, so I was forced to leave. But I did have money, so I set of to my Jews, took one of their rooms, hoping to rest for a while. But no, my pest of a lover, his cronies, and their drinking sessions gave me no peace. It was now October, he had to go to the town of Nizhny Novgorod and insisted that I come too. For a long time I couldn’t make up my mind to go, but in the end I decided that I would. I hoped that another city would make my life easier. All the more because I found Moscow terribly loathsome, I’d seen so much grief there, and several times been reduced to destitution, and decided to kill myself. I didn’t believe a word he said, I hated and despised him at heart, while I carried out the duties of a housekeeper and wife or mistress. I was traveling to forget things, to distract myself: another city, another view, but what would I fnd there! I didn’t try to guess, what did I care? After all I was no longer a young lady, and if life got too bad I could always sell myself. Oh, how I tormented myself when I imagined all the horror of my irretrievable fall.

When I arrived in Nizhny I found myself quarters and lived there for a month or two, perfectly aware that my illicit better half had no means, and was living on my last means, which I was too goodnatured to refuse him. Tings got so bad that I took a position as the sole servant in a small family, being glad to be rid of him. But that was not what happened, he went on visiting me and, having no means of his own, got money from me. Suddenly my life completely changed: in Moscow he had a mother, a sister, and a brother; his sitter was getting married and he was required to go back immediately. At the same time, my employers got a telegram announcing the death of a father and they also left for Moscow. I was again left on my own, in a strange town. I spent in total 10 months there, living on the job; I didn’t go anywhere, I didn’t know anyone, so I set of to the quarters where I’d lived before getting the position and asked where the job center was and registered again. But while I waited for a job, I had to fnd nourishment, so I did whatever came up, namely washing linen, sewing, and all the hard graft. Tat still didn’t matter, but life in this room became unbearable for me, I was being tormented, mocked for my poverty, told that I was healthy, young, and could live in luxury, like a rich woman, not in such poverty, all the more since I was a girl from out of town and there would be a lot of takers, so there was no need to be hungry and cold. God alone knows what I went through, how many tears of blood I shed, but I didn’t allow myself to be debauched, although I was in horrible agony. On the one hand, there was a tempting life, on the other hand I had hunger, cold. O God, how depressing it is to recall how things were! Tough my present situation is not an enviable one. I gathered up my last belongings and asked the landlady to sell them, so as to settle up with her and go back to Moscow. She sold my things, but I didn’t get a single penny; in fact, she made me leave my quarters and I had to join other tenants in the same house. I went for a fnal time to the job center to see if there was a position. Te answer came that there wasn’t. I was so upset and felt so helpless and angry that I burst out crying, I wandered aimlessly, it didn’t

occur me to go home, and why would I? Just to hear what had been repeated to me a thousand times? I was myself tormented by my situation, so why torment me still more and remind me every minute about it? I had been enduring such agony — it’s easier to have a knife in your heart, one can’t live like this! A thought occurred to me. I’d met an old man who was sympathetic and asked about my situation; I couldn’t give an answer, only tears; he begged me to calm down and explain everything to him, and so that it would be convenient to talk he suggested we should go somewhere for tea. I agreed, because I hadn’t eaten or drunk all day.

We set of; I calmed down and told him in detail about my stay in the town of Nizhny. He promised to do everything he could for me, as long as I loved him. On one hand, I found that annoying, on the other, ridiculous, so I couldn’t help smiling. Of course, he ofered to rent a room for me from some elderly people, so that there’d be no young men about, and all the rest he’d take care of. I replied that I would think about it, and promised to give him a reply in a week’s time … I agreed, and the reason was that in my situation I needed support. Rather than publicly collapse, I wanted to live for a while, to recover, not in a material sense, but at least buy a few clothes, and later leave for Moscow. After fnding a room, I moved, and he brought some furniture, though it was old. Our life began. But call it a life! He was mean, although he loved me, while for my part, I never asked for anything, so his expenditure wasn’t increased. In any case, I wasn’t able, I didn’t know how to address him, I felt ashamed of him as an elderly person, I found talking to him embarrassing, but he demanded afection, love that I could not give him. I was unable to pretend and always told him the truth to his face: that I was living with him so as to recover. From day to day our relationship began to change, and I became more demanding, and he became more jealous: he followed my every step, he made snide remarks, reproached me for my poverty, said that he had taken me in when I was a beggar and for that I should be eternally grateful to him and, above all, love him. When the old man spoke about love, I responded by laughing out loud and told him that he could love me as much as he liked, because I was cheerful and young, even if I wasn’t all that good-looking, whereas he was a wreck, so why should I love him? But I could have respected him if he had spoiled me, even if just a little, but yet again I didn’t own even basic necessities. I was soon fed up with this and I changed tactics. I wanted freedom, I was gasping for air, whatever I asked for, I was refused. I asked him to buy me a sewing machine so that I’d have some pennies of my own, but he wouldn’t hand me the money, and I couldn’t keep on asking: surely he himself should understand that a woman should have something for her own personal expenditure. But his endless talk that I was hiding under his protection a young man whom I probably loved, while I was robbing him, an old man, angered me to the core. But I held my tongue, made the efort to get a sewing machine, got some work, and now I had my own pennies in my pocket. I began to dress more neatly, which made the jealousy and the insults worse. He didn’t like me working, becoming independent. He was afraid that I would desert him, so he began trying to win me over with presents, but he didn’t actually give them to me, he merely showed me them, which irritated me even more. I wouldn’t have asked, I wouldn’t

have made demands if I’d known that he didn’t have the means, but this old man was well of, and his behavior made me indignant. To live with a wreck, not loving him, to give oneself to him, just for a piece of bread and a corner to sleep in: I was ready to kill myself for that humiliation, I grew to hate him, I pushed him away, but I couldn’t get rid of him, he was an imperturbable old man! I said various outrageous things to his face, but that didn’t bother him; in a word, I insisted on doing everything my own way, but it was all no use. Finally, in that same house I got to know a family which was cheerful: there were grown-up children, a brother arrived from Petersburg and we began walking, going out, skating together. Tis enraged the old man, but he still couldn’t provide me with any sort of pleasure. I was having my vengeance for a year’s imprisonment that he had imposed on me; I wasn’t lying when I told him that I hated him, and he heard this from me a thousand times. In short, I decided to end it all with him with a fnal blow. I was carried away by the handsome young man, but anyone will understand what it is like to spend a year without leaving four walls and in the company of a specimen like my old man!

We went out uninhibitedly to the same places that the old man went to. But more than that, I invited my lover home, so as to convince the old man once and forever that I didn’t need him or his support. No sooner said than done. We parted, but not without a fght. I was free, in the embraces of another man, a young, handsome fop. I had no means, but I loved him, was madly jealous, I followed his every step, tormenting myself and my own heart, but when he was there, not a sigh. He liked my dress sense, my hairstyle, and everything was right for him, except the source of my money: that he never asked about. I was so blinded by jealousy that I neglected my morals. For example, he might tell me that a dress or a hat would suit me better, and two or three days later I had it. Just as I hadn’t wanted to sell myself for a piece of bread, now I would sell myself just to satisfy his whim. What blindness and what madness! I soon realized that. He lost interest in me, no longer had any free time for me, and spent his time with other young ladies of various classes. In my fury of jealousy I spent a long time torturing myself, but once we had a scene in which I asked him to remove himself, and do it forever. I wasn’t sorry for him, but for myself, for having destroyed my honor for a fop like him. I was now living again in peace, alone, working, I became godmother to the daughters in two families. One was the daughter of illegitimate parents and had become a wet nurse, while I took it upon myself to bring up her own daughter. I became so used to the child that nobody could believe she wasn’t my own. I found time to work and act like a mother, looking after the baby. I lived four months like this: the baby fell ill and — was dying! For all of 12 days I didn’t sleep a wink, neither doctor, nor medicine, nothing helped. Te little girl died, I spent my last pennies in order to bury her, I scattered all the fowers I could fnd in the conservatory — her body was surrounded with fowers, as if she was alive … I buried her — and again I was alone: I didn’t love my other goddaughter, and still don’t. If I do anything, it’s because of my obligations as a godmother. My quarters are decent, I’ve taken on a tenant, frstly to make things easier, secondly, more cheerful. I found a woman who is lively and cheerful; she’s a dressmaker, but her situation isn’t enviable, either, although she used to be kept by a rich man.

She gets a lot of work, but has nothing to work with, while I had a sewing machine but was sitting with nothing to do. At the time I did have work: embroidery. So I handed her my sewing machine and sewing work, and we worked in tandem. Nothing disturbed our peace except visits by her friend, sometimes with a whole company of his comrades. I was a lonely fgure in their circle, none of them could make any impression on me. Sometimes, talking to my friend, we agreed that I seemed to have lost any purpose in life and was unable to love anyone. Could that be possible? I put the question several times. Ten whom had I loved? Yes, I had loved as an innocent young girl, but never with a woman’s passion. I was waiting for that, waiting for something pleasant that would make my heart beat more heatedly, but I couldn’t see that happening in my circle. I was equally welcoming, cheerful to all of them, but I had no feelings. And there were minutes when I was annoyed with my girlfriend: why this crowd of people, stopping me working and dreaming? Once a new personality appeared with this idle mob: his facial features interested me at once. His way of walking and talking reminded me of my fancé, the one who was now a happy family man. After chatting for an hour or two, we became close, as if we’d known each other for ages. He began to visit us every day. As I knew the time he would come, I waited for his arrival with impatience. And now what I had been expecting happened: I was 24, I was living with him. For the frst months I didn’t love him, but day by day I got so attached to him that I couldn’t bear not to see him. But all the same I understood that he had an ofcial job, I knew when he was free, and I worried if he wasn’t home at the time, I lived like a family member, I tried to make sure he didn’t lose money, I worked and did all I could to please him. We both turned out to have a similar, impulsive nature, but we were able to stop in time, I had to change a lot of my stupid impulsive urges. In the same way, he too tried to do everything possible for me, but he was two years younger than me, although he had also experienced a lot in his life. We lived together for just over a year, and then another disaster occurred. Gossip, vicious people, family circumstances, forced him to get married; he began to drink, thinking that would put me of him; he began to swear at me, to curse me and his life. Sometimes he wept like a child. Finally he suggested that the two of us should take poison. Imagine my reaction! He wouldn’t listen to my words of consolation, he drove me to tears and hysterical attacks with his groans and drunkenness. I had asked him not to get married, I’d begged him, kissed his hands. But later, reconciling myself to the thought that he would marry and had to marry for his family’s sake, concealing my grief behind a mask of calm, I advised him to go ahead, if his fancée was a good young lady and would be a good wife and would make him happy when she replaced me. She knew that I was living with him, and she used her money to take him away from me, but I’m not a malicious person, he was so dear to me that I would have done anything to make him happy. So I didn’t try to stop him in any way, even though I said various nonsensical things, such as that I’d stop the marriage. I didn’t; I had no more tears to cry. I moved to new quarters so that nothing would remind me of the past. But on the eve of his wedding he came to say goodbye to me. Tat was September 27, 1897. I will never forget that day: I thought that either I or he would go mad, I’d never seen him like this:

Wendy Red Star, Catalogue Number 1949.67.a,b, 2019, pigment print on archival paper, 28 x 18 inches. Courtesy the artist and Sargent's Daughters.

it was, in a word, like an attack of rabies: he kissed me, he cursed me, and he was ready to sufocate me in his embraces. But everything passes, and it was over: he left. I didn’t weep, I couldn’t, but I drank two glasses of vodka so as to drown my grief or all my innards, so great was the pain and anguish I felt.

I wasn’t drunk, but I can’t explain what came over me. I was in a state of paralysis that hit me. Te night fnally passed. I knew where and when the wedding would be, but I didn’t go, in case I lost control and did something stupid. A day of agony passed, and in the evening I went to see my friends to distract myself a little. We sat and chatted, and then came out to see me home. Te state I was in worried them very much: just before I reached my quarters, I came across him and his young wife: I shrieked and fell unconscious. After that I was ill in bed for almost three months. When I recovered I somehow avoided people, above all I was afraid of meeting him, I neglected myself, I paid myself no attention. Earlier I had tried to obtain things; now I was giving away my last possessions, although before then I was straightforward and used to help people, whereas now it was as if I was giving things away before I died. In a word, I didn’t understand what I was doing. Liver disease and excessive bile afected my body, and I became highly strung and irritable. I had attacks of merriment during which I had no idea what I was doing and several times could have perished. But I didn’t perish, I merely fell into the hands of a young con man who managed to entangle me so cleverly that within one month all that was left of my decent quarters and furniture were bare walls and debts. He himself vanished, of course. It was my own fault: you shouldn’t trust people. I didn’t complain to the police: what was the point? Does it matter whether I have something or don’t, whom should I live for, what purpose?

I have no faith in people. Can a person live without faith? No! So — this thought had long been obsessing me — I should kill myself! I had sufered all I could in childhood, getting no afection from my mother. Beaten down, worn out by hard work, my love killed of, and no hope for the future. As for the unpleasantnesses, the nasty words, the poverty, the humiliation, what can that do to a person, to a woman? True, I may have a weak character, but, with a life like this, it’s impossible to have a strong one. Did I spend much of my life for myself? Never, not a single calm minute. You’re always afraid of something, expecting something, and memories might not last, but they might have been pleasant. No, it isn’t worth living! Tere was one response in my heart, but no decision was yet taken.

Yes, once again I was left without any means, thanks to that con man, and just before Easter. What was I to do? My position was utterly hopeless. Of course I was quickly ofered a position in a brothel, but I wouldn’t agree. Opposite me, two women had been dragged out of it. Well, I wasn’t an obvious prostitute, but still that’s what I was, since I had to pay my debts somehow, and there was no other job for me. But once you sink into that mire, you’re unlikely to get out of it. I spent less than a year in that life, and even so only occasionally, and I didn’t give up my work. I used my frst earnings to buy a sewing machine, but my labor didn’t give me enough to pay my debts, I only got more entangled. As for prostitution, I had little luck, frstly because I was no longer young, and secondly, because I wasn’t brazen enough

and I still had a conscience. I was cheated; some men gave me respect, but they were rare. Everyone was ready to make fun of a woman. Tey would insult you, destroy your last drop of faith in goodness, every one of them was ready, under the guise of moralizing, giving advice, or help, to push you even deeper into the flth, and who of them would sincerely help anyone, without demanding a woman’s soul, heart and body as payment? No, only one in a thousand would have a soul; the rest live exclusively for themselves and their desires, which they conceal with a mask of beauty and eloquence, and shove a thousand women into the abyss. Where a defenseless girl should be protected, they debauch her and so, I, as a woman, undergoing everything, even the flth of prostitution, would not blame a single girl if she ends up on that path. Not all of us can struggle with poverty, hunger, and destitution. Some endure these things from their parents, some because of themselves, or also thanks to their fancés, husbands, and cavaliers. Men seduce a girl without thinking of the consequences, while girls perish, cursing these men, trying to drown their sorrow with spirits and mad orgies, singing songs to forget their existence. Listen to the laughter: doesn’t it bring tears to your eyes? A girl might not have eaten for 24 hours, but she amuses you with chat, even intelligent chat, because she is expecting a snack; you listen, you take an interest, but she has tears in her eyes: she’s hungry. You don’t believe it: she’s so decently dressed that this cannot be so. I personally have experienced all this from you, so don’t try and deny it. Tat’s not all: you visit an apartment, you’re mistreated in every way, not a day passes without insults and outrages. You’re treated worse than a dog, even though you do everything for them and nothing for yourself … No, I couldn’t stand even a year of this life. It doesn’t matter that I have nothing but poverty: my health is ruined. Live, and live such a disorderly life: I can’t take it anymore! I found everything loathsome, I was fed up — I had nobody, not a girl friend, not a boyfriend, and I didn’t fnd anyone among the people surrounding me who would help or give me even a helping hand, or even good advice. I was only wanted when I had something extra, or could satisfy someone’s lust. But there was no advice to be had, and nobody’s hand to hold me back from suicide. I took poison. Who among you can condemn me and women like me?

THE STORY IS written better than it needed to be. Tat’s a pity, since this fact lessens its worth. Such things have to be written about more coarsely, so that every word penetrates the reader’s heart, like a nail in a tree, deep and frmly. If so, we could hope for a stronger reaction. Because a person shouts most sincerely and loudly when he feels pain.

Look how this girl loved children … And how sincere she is: she didn’t love one of her goddaughters, she didn’t have to talk about that. But she does — simply and directly. Tis story echoes sincerity everywhere. And yet there is one mendacious bit in it. I consider it to be the scene with the academy student and the revolver in the gazebo. I think that this never happened. Presumably, the girl has invented all this, but now, possibly, sincerely believes it happened. Her lie is a good lie. Tis is the kind of lie that my late comrade Sasha Konovalov had in mind when he said, “Sometimes lying is better than truth at explaining a person.”

Te source of this lie is a passionate desire, more or less vital to every person, whoever they may be, to have something noble, heroic, truly human about themselves. Such a thing is rare in life’s accursed conditions, in which a person is fettered and his creative spirit has no freedom. Te good is something that has to be invented, for all the links of the chain that fetters it are equally heavy and all of them abrade the body to the point of wounding it. And if it were only the body!

Female human shame is also alive in this girl who sells herself. Telling us about her journey in a railway carriage with an ofcer, she writes, “A decent person … he didn’t take advantage of my helpless situation … We spent more than a week traveling,” she says, and then puts a full stop. You must realize that these full stops are tears of shame, bitter tears of hurt.

“A decent person … he didn’t take advantage of my helpless situation … But I didn’t have a penny to my name … I had become very emaciated thanks to hunger…” Tat man didn’t have the sense to feed a hungry girl and, clearly, enough shame or conscience to refuse her body, her payment, ofered to him in exchange for a ruble that she needed to buy bread.

Here, she sells herself because of hunger, afterward she trades her body to satisfy her lover’s lusts … Of course, she was selling herself just casually, without having to. Sometimes that happens out of recklessness, sometimes because of a shortlived fancy for some handsome mug.

But more often than not, I know this, she fell into the dirt “because of the dreariness of life.” “Te dreariness of life” is a terrible, dark force, which only has to breathe to cripple a weak person for the rest of their life. Tat force makes people take to drink, go mad, it drives them to debauchery, to murder … It can arise in the depth of any soul, because it, too, is an instinctive yearning of the human spirit for the good, for life’s beauty, for freedom …

You heard the prostitute asking, “Can a person live without faith?”

And she answers, “No!”

And perhaps it was then, when this question of hers still had not been settled and was burning her heart, that one of us was embracing her drunkenly, kissing her with his slobbering lips, and, annoyed because she responded wanly to his caresses, telling her, “Why are you such a misery, eh? Come on, relax a bit … I’ll pay you another shilling!”

Why am I saying all this? So that you feel that we are crushing living human beings, we are killing living souls.

Perhaps there will be people with scornful expressions who will say, “Why print all this? An absurd idea! Tere’s no place at all in literature for prostitutes and their tales…”

Tose would be stupid and false words. Tere is a place in literature for any truth. Tere is a place for prostitutes with their tales, unfortunately. Teir names are too well known to cite them here. And their addresses are known to those they sell themselves to.

Tere is room in literature for any voice, if that voice is sincere. Literature is a tribune for any person who has in his heart a burning desire to tell people about life’s disorders and human sufering and the necessity that all people feel for freedom! freedom! freedom!

M. Gorky

My thanks to Irina Zhuravliova, director of the Central Scientifc Library of V.N. Karazin Kharkov University, for supplying scans of Te Northern Courier.