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2. See part one, note 12, and part two, note 31. Mikhail Vassilievich Lomonosov (1711-65) was a peasant who came on foot from Arch-angelsk to Petersburg in order to study; he became a great poet and scientist, and, like both Pushkin and Gogol after him, is often called "the father of modern Russian literature."
3. Pavel Afanasyevich Famusov is the father of the heroine in Griboedov's Woe from Wit (see part one, note 30).
4. See part one, note 13.
5. Provoked by the young Frenchman's attentions to his wife, Pushkin challenged Georges d'Anthès to a duel; having the first shot, d Anthès may have fired sooner than he intended to, and his bullet hit Pushkin in the stomach; the wound proved fatal.
6. General Epanchin is trying to use the French expression ne pas se sentir dans son assiette, literally "not to feel that you are in your plate," meaning "to be out of sorts."
7. Dueling was forbidden in Russia until 1894, when it was made legal for army officers. Taking part in a duel was severely punishable by law, and a lieutenant like Keller risked being broken to the ranks and thus acquiring the "red cap" of the common foot soldier.
8. Ippolit is recalling the song of the archangel Raphael (11. 243-244), from the "Prologue in Heaven" that begins the monumental drama Faust, by Joha
9. See part two, note 44.
10. Cf. Revelation n: 6-7.
n. François-Marie Arouet, known as Voltaire (1694-1778), was a facetious debunker of religious literalism. Dostoevsky especially admired his philosophical novel Candide (1759).
12. An ironic reference to Thomas Robert Malthus (1766-1834), English economist, author of An Essay on the Principle of Population, who first perceived the threat posed by the geometric increase of the earth's population; he declared that the "superfluous population" of the earth was bound to perish and that all social reforms would fail, and he called for the abolition of falsely philanthropic laws alleviating the condition of the poor. The radical Petrashevsky circle, to which Dostoevsky belonged as a young man, was interested in Malthus's thought and translated some of his writings.
13. See part two, note 23. Ippolit plays on the ambiguity of the Russian translation, which we render here.
14. See part one, notes 2 and 36. An imperial was a Russian gold coin worth ten roubles.
15. Actual state councillor was fourth in the table of fourteen civil service ranks established by Peter the Great, equivalent to the military rank of major general.
16. After his defeat at Waterloo and his second abdication in 1815, Napoleon (1769-1821) wanted to escape to America, but owing to the blockade of the port at Rochefort, he was forced to negotiate with the British, who exiled him to the island of St. Helena.
17. These words come from Pensées sur la religion et sur quelques autres sujets ("Thoughts on religion and on several other subjects"), by the French philosopher Blaise Pascal (1623-62).
18. The references are to the raising of Jairus's daughter (Mark 5: 22-43) and the raising of Lazarus (John n: 1-44). Talitha cumi is Aramaic for "Damsel, arise."
19. The lines that follow are not by Charles-Hubert Millevoye (1782-1816), romantic poet, author of "Falling Leaves," but by the satirical poet Nicolas Gilbert (1751-80), from the end of his A dieux à la vie ("Farewell to Life"). Dostoevsky misquotes slightly; the first verse should read: aAh, puissent voir longtemps votre beauté sacrée . . ." ("Ah, may they long behold your sacred beauty . . .").
20. In Petersburg during the month of June, the sun rises at between two and three o'clock in the morning; this is the season of the famous "white nights."
21. Pierre-François Lacenaire (1800-36), the subject of a notorious criminal trial in Paris, was a murderer of exceptional vanity and cruelty.
22. The prolific French novelist Paul de Kock (1794-1871) depicted petit bourgeois life, often in rather risqué detail.
23. The name Aglaya comes from the Greek aglabs, meaning "splendid, shining, bright, beautiful."
24. Cf. John 8:3-11: "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her" (King James version).
25. See part two, note 41, and part three, note 11. Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-78), Swiss-born French novelist and philosopher, author of The Social Contract, was influential on young Russian radicals like Ippolit and Kolya.
26. The English fraternity of Freemasons reorganized itself in 1717 to form a "grand lodge" in London, with a new constitution and ritual and a system of secret signs; this was to be the parent lodge of all the other lodges in Great Britain and throughout the world. Because of their secrecy and the political role they began to play (for instance, in the French revolution), the Masons were outlawed in some countries, including Russia, where they were forbidden by the emperor Alexander I in 1822. Kolya is probably referring here to the Masons' secrecy and conspiratorial reputation.
27. The French word is contrecarrer, "to oppose directly, to thwart."
28. Russian civil servants wore uniforms similar to the military, including hats with cockades.
29. The phrase is proverbial in Russian. In A
30. The details come from the Mazurin murder case (see part one, note 44). Zhdanov liquid was a chemical mixture invented in the 1840s by N. I. Zhdanov to eliminate bad odors. Mazurin-kept Kalmykov's body for eight months this way.
PART FOUR
1. Podkolesin is one of the suitors in Gogol's play The Marriage (1842); at the decisive moment he jumps out of the window and runs away.
2. A line from the comedy Georges Dandin (1668), by Molière (1622-73).
3. Lieutenant Pirogov is one of the heroes of Gogol's tale "Nevsky Prospect" (1835); his name, while common in Russia, happens to come from the word for pastry.
4. See part one, note 36.
5- Nozdryov is another of Gogol's heroes, this time from the comic novel-poem Dead Souls (1842)—an absurd, blustering liar.
6. See part one, note 5.
7. The year 1812 was the year of Napoleon's disastrous invasion of Russia.
8. This epitaph was actually composed by the Russian writer and historian N. M. Karamzin (see part one, note 4). Dostoevsky and his brother Mikhail had it inscribed on their mother's tombstone in 1837.
9. A panikhida is an Orthodox memorial prayer service for the dead.
10. R. A. Chernosvitov (b. 1810), a member of the Petrashevsky circle (see part one, note 15, and part three, note 12), wrote a book entitled Instructions for the Designing of an Artificial Leg (1855).
11. The Russian Archive was a highly respected historical review founded in 1863 by P. Bartenev.
12. The reference is to the opening chapter of From my Past and Thought, autobiographical reflections by the liberal Russian writer Alexander Herzen (1812-70).
13. Moscow was evacuated at the approach of Napoleon's army and the city was set on fire.
14. The boyars were a privileged rank of the old nobility, the highest in Russia after the rank of prince. Since they were always ready to dispute the absolute power of the tsar, the rank was abolished by Peter the Great.