have never spoken to any one of this. And there’s no one I
could speak of it to, except you. You know we’re utterly unlike each other, different tastes and views and everything;
but I know you’re fond of me and understand me, and that’s
why I like you awfully. But for God’s sake, be quite straight
67
forward with me.’
‘I tell you what I think,’ said Stepan Arkadyevitch, smiling. ‘But I’ll say more: my wife is a wonderful woman…’
Stepan Arkadyevitch sighed, remembering his position with
his wife, and, after a moment’s silence, resumed—‘She has a
gift of foreseeing things. She sees right through people; but
that’s not all; she knows what will come to pass, especially in the way of marriages. She foretold, for instance, that
Princess Shahovskaya would marry Brenteln. No one would
believe it, but it came to pass. And she’s on your side.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘It’s not only that she likes you—she says that Kitty is certain to be your wife.’
At these words Levin’s face suddenly lighted up with a
smile, a smile not far from tears of emotion.
‘She says that!’ cried Levin. ‘I always said she was exquisite, your wife. There, that’s enough, enough said about it,’
he said, getting up from his seat.
‘All right, but do sit down.’
But Levin could not sit down. He walked with his firm
tread twice up and down the little cage of a room, blinked
his eyelids that his tears might not fall, and only then sat
down to the table.
‘You must understand,’ said he, ‘it’s not love. I’ve been in
love, but it’s not that. It’s not my feeling, but a sort of force
outside me has taken possession of me. I went away, you see,
because I made up my mind that it could never be, you understand, as a happiness that does not come on earth; but
I’ve struggled with myself, I see there’s no living without it.
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Anna Karenina
And it must be settled.’
‘What did you go away for?’
‘Ah, stop a minute! Ah, the thoughts that come crowding on one! The questions one must ask oneself! Listen. You
can’t imagine what you’ve done for me by what you said.
I’m so happy that I’ve become positively hateful; I’ve forgotten everything. I heard today that my brother Nikolay…you
know, he’s here…I had even forgotten him. It seems to me
that he’s happy too. It’s a sort of madness. But one thing’s
awful…. Here, you’ve been married, you know the feeling…
it’s awful that we—old—with a past… not of love, but of
sins…are brought all at once so near to a creature pure and
innocent; it’s loathsome, and that’s why one can’t help feeling oneself unworthy.’
‘Oh, well, you’ve not many sins on your conscience.’
‘Alas! all the same,’ said Levin, ‘when with loathing I go
over my life, I shudder and curse and bitterly regret it….
Yes.’
‘What would you have? The world’s made so,’ said Stepan
Arkadyevitch.
‘The one comfort is like that prayer, which I always liked:
‘Forgive me not according to my unworthiness, but according to Thy lovingkindness.’ That’s the only way she can
forgive me.’
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Chapter 11
Levin emptied his glass, and they were silent for a while.
‘There’s one other thing I ought to tell you. Do you know
Vronsky?’ Stepan Arkadyevitch asked Levin.
‘No, I don’t. Why do you ask?’
‘Give us another bottle,’ Stepan Arkadyevitch directed the Tatar, who was filling up their glasses and fidgeting
round them just when he was not wanted.
‘Why you ought to know Vronsky is that he’s one of your
rivals.’
‘Who’s Vronsky?’ said Levin, and his face was suddenly
transformed from the look of childlike ecstasy which Oblonsky had just been admiring to an angry and unpleasant
expression.
‘Vronsky is one of the sons of Count Kirill Ivanovitch
Vronsky, and one of the finest specimens of the gilded youth
of Petersburg. I made his acquaintance in Tver when I was
there on official business, and he came there for the levy
of recruits. Fearfully rich, handsome, great connections, an
aide-de-camp, and with all that a very nice, good-natured
fellow. But he’s more than simply a good-natured fellow, as
I’ve found out here—he’s a cultivated man, too, and very intelligent; he’s a man who’ll make his mark.’
Levin scowled and was dumb.
‘Well, he turned up here soon after you’d gone, and as I
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Anna Karenina
can see, he’s over head and ears in love with Kitty, and you
know that her mother…’
‘Excuse me, but I know nothing,’ said Levin, frowning
gloomily. And immediately he recollected his brother Nikolay and how hateful he was to have been able to forget him.
‘You wait a bit, wait a bit,’ said Stepan Arkadyevitch,
smiling and touching his hand. ‘I’ve told you what I know,
and I repeat that in this delicate and tender matter, as far as
one can conjecture, I believe the chances are in your favor.’
Levin dropped back in his chair; his face was pale.
‘But I would advise you to settle the thing as soon as may
be,’ pursued Oblonsky, filling up his glass.
‘No, thanks, I can’t drink any more,’ said Levin, pushing
away his glass. ‘I shall be drunk…. Come, tell me how are
you getting on?’ he went on, obviously anxious to change
the conversation.
‘One word more: in any case I advise you to settle the
question soon. Tonight I don’t advise you to speak,’ said Stepan Arkadyevitch. ‘Go round tomorrow morning, make an
offer in due form, and God bless you…’
‘Oh, do you still think of coming to me for some shooting? Come next spring, do,’ said Levin.
Now his whole soul was full of remorse that he had begun this conversation with Stepan Arkadyevitch. A feeling
such as his was profaned by talk of the rivalry of some Petersburg officer, of the suppositions and the counsels of
Stepan Arkadyevitch.
Stepan Arkadyevitch smiled. He knew what was passing
in Levin’s soul.
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‘I’ll come some day,’ he said. ‘But women, my boy, they’re
the pivot everything turns upon. Things are in a bad way
with me, very bad. And it’s all through women. Tell me
frankly now,’ he pursued, picking up a cigar and keeping
one hand on his glass; ‘give me your advice.’
‘Why, what is it?’
‘I’ll tell you. Suppose you’re married, you love your wife,
but you’re fascinated by another woman…’
‘Excuse me, but I’m absolutely unable to comprehend
how…just as I can’t comprehend how I could now, after my
dinner, go straight to a baker’s shop and steal a roll.’
Stepan Arkadyevitch’s eyes sparkled more than usual.
‘Why not? A roll will sometimes smell so good one can’t
resist it.’
“Himmlisch ist’s, w
Meine irdische Begier;
Aber doch wenn’s nich gelungen
Hatt’ ich auch recht huebsch Plaisir!’
As he said this, Stepan Arkadyevitch smiled subtly.
Levin, too, could not help smiling.
‘Yes, but joking apart,’ resumed Stepan Arkadyevitch,
‘you must understand that the woman is a sweet, gentle loving creature, poor and lonely, and has sacrificed everything.
Now, when the thing’s done, don’t you see, can one possibly
cast her off? Even supposing one parts from her, so as not to
break up one’s family life, still, can one help feeling for her,
setting her on her feet, softening her lot?’
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Anna Karenina
‘Well, you must excuse me there. You know to me all
women are divided into two classes…at least no…truer to
say: there are women and there are…I’ve never seen exquisite fallen beings, and I never shall see them, but such
creatures as that painted Frenchwoman at the counter with
the ringlets are vermin to my mind, and all fallen women
are the same.’
‘But the Magdalen?’
‘Ah, drop that! Christ would never have said those words
if He had known how they would be abused. Of all the Gospel those words are the only ones remembered. However,
I’m not saying so much what I think, as what I feel. I have a
loathing for fallen women. You’re afraid of spiders, and I of
these vermin. Most likely you’ve not made a study of spiders
and don’t know their character; and so it is with me.’
‘It’s very well for you to talk like that; it’s very much like
that gentleman in Dickens who used to fling all difficult
questions over his right shoulder. But to deny the facts is no
answer. What’s to be done—you tell me that, what’s to be
done? Your wife gets older, while you’re full of life. Before
you’ve time to look round, you feel that you can’t love your
wife with love, however much you may esteem her. And
then all at once love turns up, and you’re done for, done for,’
Stepan Arkadyevitch said with weary despair.
Levin half smiled.
‘Yes, you’re done for,’ resumed Oblonsky. ‘But what’s to
be done?’
‘Don’t steal rolls.’
Stepan Arkadyevitch laughed outright.
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‘Oh, moralist! But you must understand, there are two
women; one insists only on her rights, and those rights are
your love, which you can’t give her; and the other sacrifices
everything for you and asks for nothing. What are you to
do? How are you to act? There’s a fearful tragedy in it.’
‘If you care for my profession of faith as regards that, I’ll
tell you that I don’t believe there was any tragedy about it.
And this is why. To my mind, love…both the sorts of love,
which you remember Plato defines in his Banquet, served as
the test of men. Some men only understand one sort, and
some only the other. And those who only know the non-platonic love have no need to talk of tragedy. In such love there
can be no sort of tragedy. ‘I’m much obliged for the gratification, my humble respects’—that’s all the tragedy. And in
platonic love there can be no tragedy, because in that love all
is clear and pure, because…’
At that instant Levin recollected his own sins and the
inner conflict he had lived through. And he added unexpectedly:
‘But perhaps you are right. Very likely…I don’t know, I
don’t know.’
‘It’s this, don’t you see,’ said Stepan Arkadyevitch, ‘you’re
very much all of a piece. That’s your strong point and your
failing. You have a character that’s all of a piece, and you
want the whole of life to be of a piece too—but that’s not
how it is. You despise public official work because you want
the reality to be invariably corresponding all the while with
the aim—and that’s not how
