Who is Professor Persikov in Reality?
Posting #1.
“All people have souls of
beasts in them –
That one is a bear, that
one is a fox,
that one is a wolf, And
life is a big wood,
Where the dawn gallops
like a red horseman.
One must have strong,
strong fangs.”
Sergei Yesenin. Pugachev.
In
this chapter, the reader will no longer be surprised to find out that M. A.
Bulgakov as a matter of principle turns to Russian poetry for his prose. The
reader is in for more fascinating discoveries.
The
Russian poetess Marina Tsvetaeva was also instrumental in Bulgakov’s creation
of the character of Professor Persikov in the novella Fateful Eggs. (See my eponymous chapter Fateful Eggs.)
Having
written about V. Ya. Bryusov that he was “anational,” Tsvetaeva gave Bulgakov
the idea of making Persikov a Russian nationalist. And indeed, Persikov’s wife
flees abroad, whereas Professor Persikov remains in Russia.
Marina
Tsvetaeva writes about Bryusov:
“He replaced love for his country by curiosity for not only foreign
countries, but lands, planets: anthill – beehive – infusorial swarming in a
drop of water.”
And
all of this has been given an impetus by 4 lines in Marina Tsvetaeva, which she
offers right away:
“I
love my sharp brain and the glitter of my eyes,
My heartbeat and the blood in
my arteries.
I love myself and the world.
To all nature
And to Humanity I want to
give myself in full measure.”
Having
offered these four lines to the reader, Marina Tsvetaeva adds her comment to
them:
“Bryusov did not want like this – when he wanted!”
Bulgakov
did not want to present Professor Persikov as heartless. Although his wife has
abandoned him, he loves her nevertheless. When a letter arrives from abroad informing
him that his wife has died, he cries disconsolately.
“But a microscope or a telescope, or an infusorial swarming, or a
universe boiling with worlds – it is the same dispassionate, evaluating,
curiosity-filled glance.”
Although
a Russian ultra-patriot, Professor Persikov orders all equipment for his
Institute from Germany. Zeiss!
And
indeed, in his novella Fateful Eggs, M.
Bulgakov has shown us a Russian scientist, preoccupied with science, yet
unwilling even in hard times for the Russian State to abandon it in hunger and
cold.
Marina
Tsvetaeva writes:
“...A microscope or a telescope – Bryusov lacked a simple human
glance: Bryusov was not endowed with it.”
This
is how Bulgakov builds the character of Professor Persikov. He was the epitome
of a scientist, and thus a thorough man.
Having
no collections of Bryusov’s works in my possession, I, as the reader knows,
discovered this poet in the memoirs of the Russian poetess Marina Tsvetaeva.
Having become interested in Bryusov (which had not been the case before), I
found him in the literary articles of N. S. Gumilev, who, like M. Tsvetaeva,
quoted Bryusov’s poems in his text. The rest I got from the Internet.
Already
on the first page of Bulgakov’s novella Fateful
Eggs, I found an indication that Bulgakov uses a Russian poet as Professor
Persikov’s prototype, and that this Russian poet is Bryusov.
“…Professor Persikov lit up the upper opaque sphere and looked
around.”
This
sentence indicates that the electric light coming from this “sphere” into
Professor Persikov’s study is more closely resembling moonlight, as compared to
sunlight. It was N. S. Gumilev who wrote of the lunar femininity of Bryusov’s
personality, contrasting it to the sunny masculine personality of the Russian
poet of that time Vyacheslav Ivanov.
And
also Bulgakov writes on the same 1st page of his novella that
Professor Persikov was tall. V. Bryusov was tall.
Enumerating
the areas of Professor Persikov’s scientific interest, that is, zoology,
embryology, anatomy, and geography, Bulgakov with great humor describes Russian
poetry of his time, which Professor Persikov dissects for his students, like
the students at Bryusov’s Institute were taught to dissect poetry in order to
write better verses, which was exactly the purpose of Bryusov’s Institute.
Absolutely
hilarious, isn’t it?!
Bulgakov
gives it away with the following line on the second page of the novella:
“For some reason, [Professor Persikov] blamed all these deaths [of
the hairless reptilians, tailless skinks, the Suriname toad] on the current
People’s Commissar [Minister] of Education.”
In
such a veiled manner, Bulgakov refers to the death of the Russian poet
Alexander Blok in 1921, as well as the execution of the Russian poet Nikolai
Gumilev in the same month of August 1921. –
“But for such a thing,
Petr Stepanovich, it wouldn’t be enough to merely kill him! [the People’s Commissar of Education] What
are they doing? They will destroy the Institute! [the Bryusov Institute] What? An incomparable male of the Americana
type, 13 cm long!”
Here
Bulgakov probably has S. Yesenin in mind, because later he confirms it with the
following words:
“Perished are rabbits, foxes, wolves, fishes, and all
ordinary non-lethal snakes without exception.”
Yesenin
was born and used to live in a village. He loved wild animals and wrote poems
about them. The poem about a wounded vixen is simply amazing:
“…She
hobbled home on a shattered paw
And
curled up into a circle by the hole.
A
thin trickle of blood contoured
A
mysterious face on the snow…
The
head was lifting disquietedly,
And
the tongue was gelling on the wound.
The
yellow tail’s fire fell into the blizzard…”
Another
piece of amazing writing about animals comes from Yesenin’s poem-play Pugachev:
“All people have souls of
beasts in them –
That one is a bear, that
one is a fox, that one is a wolf,
And life is a big wood,
Where the dawn gallops
like a red horseman.
One must have strong,
strong fangs.”
As
for “an
incomparable male of the Americana type, 13 cm long” – Sergei
Yesenin was married to the famous American dancer Isadora Duncan and even spent
some time in America.
To
be continued…
***
No comments:
Post a Comment