Farewell! I hope that these few lines will give you much pleasure. Greet every one you see whom I have known — forget no one. I have not forgotten anybody. What can the children be thinking of me, and how do they explain to themselves my disappearance? Farewell. If you can at all manage it, send me the O. Z. Then I should at any rate have something to read. Write me a few lines — it would extraordinarily cheer me.
Till next time!
XVIII. To his Brother Michael
[FROM THE FORTRESS],
August 27, 1849.
I rejoice that I may answer you, dear brother, and thank you for sending the books. I rejoice also that you are well, and that the imprisonment had no evil effects upon your constitution. I am most particularly grateful to you for the O. Z. But you write far too little, and my letters are much more comprehensive than yours. This only by the way — you’ll do better next time.
I have nothing definite to tell you about myself. As yet I know nothing whatever about our case. My personal life is as monotonous as ever; but they have given me permission to walk in the garden, where there are almost seventeen trees!
This is a great happiness for me. Moreover, I am given a candle in the evenings — that’s my second piece of luck. The third will be mine if you answer as soon as possible, and send me the next number of the O. Z.
I am in the same position as a country subscriber, and await each number as a great event, like some landed proprietor dying of boredom in the provinces. Will you send me some historical works? That would be splendid. But best of all would be the Bible (both Testaments). I need one. Should it prove possible, send it in a French translation. But if you could add as well a Slav edition, it would be the height of bliss.
Of my health I can tell you nothing good. For a month I have been living almost exclusively on castor oil. My haemorrhoids have been unusually tormenting; moreover I detect a pain in the breast that I have never had before. My nervous irritability has notably increased, especially in the evening hours; at night I have long, hideous dreams, and latterly I have often felt as if the ground were rocking under me so, that my room seems like the cabin of a steamer.
From all this I conclude that my nerves are increasingly shattered. Whenever formerly I had such nervous disturbances, I made use of them for writing; in such a state I could write much more and much better than usual; but now I refrain from work that I may not utterly destroy myself. I took a rest of three weeks, during which time I wrote not at all; now I have begun again. But anyhow, all this is nothing: I can stick it out to the end. Perhaps I shall get quite right again.
You most tremendously astonish me when you write that you believe they know nothing of our adventure in Moscow. I have thought it over, and come to the conclusion that that’s quite impossible. They simply must know, and I attribute their silence to another reason. And that was, after all, to be expected. Oh, it’s quite clear….
[The letter goes on to speak of his brother’s family. Dostoevsky also makes some unimportant remarks on the articles in the O. Z.]
XIX. To his Brother Michael
[FROM THE FORTRESS],
September 14, 1849.
I have received, dear brother, your letter, the books (Shakespeare, the Bible, and the O. Z) and the money (ten roubles): thank you for all. I am glad that you are well. I go on as before. Always the same digestive troubles and the haemorrhoids. I don’t know if all this will ever leave me. The autumn months, which I find so trying, are drawing near, and with them returns my hypochondria. The sky is already grey; my health and good heart are dependent on those little tatters of blue that I can see from my casemate. But at any rate I’m alive, and comparatively well. This fact I maintain; therefore I beg you not to think of my state as wholly grievous. My health is at present good. I had expected worse, and now I see that I have so much vitality in me that it simply won’t allow itself to be exhausted.
Thank you again for the books. They divert me, at all events. For almost five months I have been living exclusively on my own provisions — that is to say, on my own head alone and solely. That machine is still in working order. But it is unspeakably hard to think only, everlastingly to think, without any of those external impressions which renew and nourish the soul. I live as though under the bell of an air-pump, from which the air is being drawn. My whole existence has concentrated itself in my head, and from my head has drifted into my thoughts, and the labour of those thoughts grows more arduous every day. Books are certainly a mere drop in the ocean, still they do always help me; while my own work, I think, consumes my remains of strength. Nevertheless it gives me much happiness.
I have read the books you sent. I am particularly thankful for the Shakespeare. That was a good idea of yours. The English novel in the O. Z. is very good. On the other hand, Turgenev’s comedy is unpardonably bad. Why has he always such ill-luck? Is he fated to ruin every work of his which runs to more than one printed sheet? I simply could not recognize him in this comedy. Not a trace of originality; everything in the old, worn-out groove. He has said it all before, and much better. The last scene is puerile in its feebleness. Here and there one thinks to see signs of talent, but only for want of something better. How splendid is the article on the Banks — and how universally true! I thank all who remember me; greet your Emilie Fyodorovna from me, our brother Andrey too, and kiss the children, who, I greatly hope, are better. Truly I don’t know, brother, when and how we shall meet again! Farewell, and please don’t forget me. Write to me, even if it can’t be for a fortnight. Till next time!
Thy
F. DOSTOEVSKY.
Pray do not be anxious about me. If you can get hold of any books, send them.
XX. To his Brother Michael
[FROM THE FORTRESS],
December 22, 1849.
To-day, the 22nd of December, we were all taken to Semionovsky Square. There the death-sentence was read to us, we were given the Cross to kiss, the dagger was broken over our heads, and our funeral toilet (white shirts) was made. Then three of us were put standing before the palisades for the execution of the death-sentence. I was sixth in the row; we were called up by groups of three, and so I was in the second group, and had not more than a minute to live. I thought of you, my brother, and of yours; in that last moment you alone were in my mind; then first I learnt how very much I love you, my beloved brother! I had time to embrace Plechtcheyev and Dourov, who stood near me, and to take my leave of them. Finally, retreat was sounded, those who were bound to the palisades were brought back, and it was read to us that His Imperial Majesty granted us our lives. Then the final sentences were recited. Palm alone is fully pardoned. He has been transferred to the line with the same rank.
F. DOSTOEVSKY.
XXI. To his Brother Michael
[FROM OMSK],
February 22, 1854.
At last I can talk with you somewhat more explicitly, and, I believe, in a more reasonable manner. But before I write another line I must ask you: Tell me, for God’s sake, why you have never written me a single syllable till now? Could I have expected this from you? Believe me, in my lonely and isolated state, I sometimes fell into utter despair, for I believed that you were no longer alive; through whole nights I would brood upon what was to become of your children, and I cursed my fate because I could not help them.
But whenever I heard for certain that you were still alive, I would get furious (this happened, however, only in times of illness, from which I have suffered a very great deal), and begin to reproach you bitterly. Then those states of mind would pass, and I would excuse you, I would exert myself to find a justification for you, and grow tranquil as soon as I discovered any — nor did I ever for a moment utterly lose faith in you: I know that you love me, and keep me in kindly remembrance.
I wrote you a letter through our official staff; you simply must have got it; I expected an answer from you, and received none. Were you then forbidden to write to me? But I know that letters are allowed, for every one of the political prisoners here gets several in the year. Even Dourov had some; and we often asked the officials how it stood about correspondence, and they declared that people had the
