“What, without asking, hither hurried Whence?
And, without asking, Whither hurried hence!
Oh, many a Cup of this forbidden Wine
Must drown the memory of that insolence!”
“Foma Gordyeeff” is a big book — not only is the breadth of Russia in it, but the expanse of life. Yet, though in each land, in this world of marts and exchanges, this age of trade and traffic, passionate figures rise up and demand of life what its fever is, in “Foma Gordyeeff” it is a Russian who so rises up and demands. For Gorky, the Bitter One, is essentially a Russian in his grasp on the facts of life and in his treatment. All the Russian self-analysis and insistent introspection are his. And, like all his brother Russians, ardent, passionate protest impregnates his work. There is a purpose to it. He writes because he has something to say which the world should hear. From that clenched fist of his, light and airy romances, pretty and sweet and beguiling, do not flow, but realities — yes, big and brutal and repulsive, but real.
He raises the cry of the miserable and the despised, and in a masterly arraignment of commercialism, protests against social conditions, against the grinding of the faces of the poor and weak, and the self-pollution of the rich and strong, in their mad lust for place and power. It is to be doubted strongly if the average bourgeois, smug and fat and prosperous, can understand this man Foma Gordyeeff. The rebellion in his blood is something to which their own does not thrill. To them it will be inexplicable that this man, with his health and his millions, could not go on living as his class lived, keeping regular hours at desk and stock exchange, driving close contracts, underbidding his competitors, and exulting in the business disasters of his fellows. It would appear so easy, and, after such a life, well appointed and eminently respectable, he could die. “Ah,” Foma will interrupt rudely — he is given to rude interruptions —“if to die and disappear is the end of these money-grubbing years, why money-grub?” And the bourgeois whom he rudely interrupted will not understand. Nor did Mayakin understand as he laboured holily with his wayward godson.
“Why do you brag?” Foma, bursts out upon him. “What have you to brag about? Your son — where is he? Your daughter — what is she? Ekh, you manager of life! Come, now, you’re clever, you know everything — tell me, why do you live? Why do you accumulate money? Aren’t you going to die? Well, what then?” And Mayakin finds himself speechless and without answer, but unshaken and unconvinced.
Receiving by heredity the fierce, bull-like nature of his father plus the passive indomitableness and groping spirit of his mother, Foma, proud and rebellious, is repelled by the selfish, money-seeking environment into which he is born. Ignat, his father, and Mayakin, the godfather, and all the horde of successful merchants singing the paean of the strong and the praises of merciless, remorseless laissez faire, cannot entice him. Why? he demands. This is a nightmare, this life! It is without significance! What does it all mean? What is there underneath? What is the meaning of that which is underneath?
“You do well to pity people,” Ignat tells Foma, the boy, “only you must use judgment with your pity. First consider the man, find out what he is like, what use can be made of him; and if you see that he is a strong and capable man, help him if you like. But if a man is weak, not inclined to work — spit upon him and go your way. And you must know that when a man complains about everything, and cries out and groans — he is not worth more than two kopeks, he is not worthy of pity, and will be of no use to you if you do help him.”
Such the frank and militant commercialism, bellowed out between glasses of strong liquor. Now comes Mayakin, speaking softly and without satire:
“Eh, my boy, what is a beggar? A beggar is a man who is forced, by fate, to remind us of Christ; he is Christ’s brother; he is the bell of the Lord, and rings in life for the purpose of awakening our conscience, of stirring up the satiety of man’s flesh. He stands under the window and sings, ‘For Christ’s sa-ake!’ and by that chant he reminds us of Christ, of His holy command to help our neighbour. But men have so ordered their lives that it is utterly impossible for them to act in accordance with Christ’s teaching, and Jesus Christ has become entirely superfluous to us. Not once, but, in all probability, a thousand times, we have given Him over to be crucified, but still we cannot banish Him from our lives so long as His poor brethren sing His name in the streets and remind us of Him. And so now we have hit upon the idea of shutting up the beggars in such special buildings, so that they may not roam about the streets and stir up our consciences.”
But Foma will have none of it. He is neither to be enticed nor cajoled. The cry of his nature is for light. He must have light. And in burning revolt he goes seeking the meaning of life. “His thoughts embraced all those petty people who toiled at hard labour. It was strange — why did they live? What satisfaction was it to them to live on the earth? All they did was to perform their dirty, arduous toil, eat poorly; they were miserably clad, addicted to drunkenness. One was sixty years old, but he still toiled side by side with young men. And they all presented themselves to Foma’s imagination as a huge heap of worms, who were swarming over the earth merely to eat.”
He becomes the liv............