Refusing to Love. The Paths of Russian Love from Pushkin to AI. Part II – The Silver Age

And you give me timid inspiration,
And sweet healing of ailments,
And bring me quiet dreams,
My genius, my angel, my friend…

The genius of young Blok’s first passionate love was thirty-seven-year-old Ksenia Sadovskaya. Witnesses of the stormy holiday romance note that «she was Ukrainian, and her beauty, dapper toilets and bold, enticing coquetry had a strong effect on the youthful imagination.»

But in the near future, Blok began to lack this easy quiet poetic and musical inspiration of Fet for expressing emotional disturbances and love experiences. Fascinated by amateur theater, Blok also became interested in his peer, theater partner Lyubov Mendeleeva, daughter of the famous scientist-chemist, whose dacha was next door. During this period of his life, «in connection with acute mystical and romantic experiences,» when, next to the still unextinguished feeling of first love, new heartfelt desires arose, when he was «disturbed by the signs» that he saw in nature, he felt a craving for mystical poetry. In the spring of 1901, Blok discovered the poet Vl. S. Solovyov[2 - With the worldview of philosopher-poet Vl. S. Solovyov and the intertwining of his love stories with the heroes of the Golden Age of Russian love we introduced readers in the first part of this book.] and his philosophy of life and love for the «eternal friend,» who appears at the «call of the soul» as the «radiance of the Divine.»

Having found support for his spiritual turmoil and armed with deep thoughts about the meaning of love, Blok chooses his Beautiful Lady – after a year-long cooling of the relationship, he goes to the Mendeleevs and in long conversations shares his new secret spiritual world with Lyubov Dmitrievna, in which, as she felt, «everything is melodious, everything is unsaid, where these beautiful poems, one way or another, still come from me.» Now his vague inner vibrations of the soul began to resonate more and more confidently with the music of the world, and the mysteries of life became close and understandable to him, and the image of the «Majestic Eternal Wife» appeared in its earthly incarnation.

Alexander Alexandrovich Blok (1880—1921)

I never understood
The art of sacred music,
And now my hearing discerned
The voice of someone’s innermost voice.

I loved that dream in it
And the excitement of my soul
That all the beauty of the past
They bring in waves from oblivion.

The past rises to the sound
It seems close and clear:
Then the dream sings for me,
It smells like a beautiful mystery.

His beloved and confidant in secret thoughts about another life, new trends in art, carrying the initiated into «primordial chaos,» «into the thrill of ideas, into singing images,» also approached the resumption of relations renewed. If earlier she was represented by «magnificent golden hair,» «delicate white-pink complexion, black eyebrows, childish blue eyes and a stern, unapproachable appearance,» now the lights of sensual desires flashed in her eyes. In her memoirs about her growing up, Lyubov Mendeleeva wrote:

I felt my awakened young body. <…> Sometimes, late in the evening, when everyone was already asleep, <…> I took my ball gown, put it right on my naked body and went into the living room to the large mirrors. <…> Then I threw off my dress and admired myself for a long, long time. <…> I was a gentle, well-groomed ancient girl. <…> Later I found the flow of my lines partly in Giorgione, especially the flexibility of long legs, short waist and small, barely blooming breasts.

It is not difficult to imagine the deep disappointment of a young girl yearning for «non-platonic love» when, on the third day after the proposal, her groom withdrew into his illness, which «they do not tell girls about,» and a year later immediately after the wedding (1903) he announced that he would like for ideal reasons, in order to maintain a high style of relationship, to avoid physical intimacy with her. Aphrodite Pandemos wanted to protect her from a cruel fate and sent her signs a year before the fatal consent, so the premonition of the strange role in which her attraction to Blok involved her resulted in the decision to break with him. In a prepared but unsent letter, she informed Blok that she felt like

something in my soul had suddenly broken off, died; I felt that your attitude towards me now only outrages my entire being. I am a living person and I want to be one, at least with all the shortcomings; when I am looked at as some abstraction, even the most ideal one, it is unbearable, offensive, alien to me…

None of these thoughts were expressed; the relationship cooled for the second time, but did not break off. In fact, a direct explanation would not reveal anything that the poet did not already know about, catching involuntary signs – a year ago he wrote down:

I’ve understood the meaning of your aspirations —
I’m blocking your path.
The fire of unearthly lusts
Heaves up the virgin breast.

Shall my pathetic, feeble speech
To fight your flame
On the verge of an uncharted rendezvous
With a beginning dear and alien!

At the same time, Aphrodite Urania fought with «unearthly lusts» for the soul of the poet, who had embarked on the path of the «knight-monk,» and revealed to him her transcendental and underground secrets:

Oh, how alive I am, how the blood springs beat!
I am kindred here with subterranean springs!
Moments of mystery! You, eternal love!
I understood you! I’m with you! I’m behind you!

In this verse from the collection Poems about a Beautiful Lady (1902), with its cheerful opening, there are also hints of other experiences associated with one’s own shadow sneaking «by the moonlit walls,» some «joyless seeds,» cold wind, bare twigs and yet a triumphant smile at the crossroads of the one who «revealed the holy writings.»

Here, in our opinion, one of the characteristic features of symbolism is quite clearly manifested, not so much as a special direction of art that conveys an intuitive understanding of the depths of the natural and spiritual world through secret signs and symbolic images, but as the artist’s own immersion in the world of these shadows, conventions and mysteries, bringing all life to the altar of sacred revelations and setting up life experiments in order to test the true power and truth of the vague, but inexorably attractive phenomena of the divinely beautiful.

One of such tests of «his system» for Blok was communication with prostitutes – not just to satisfy «dirty lust,» but in order to awaken passion even in these women – «flat professionals,» achieve manifestations of tenderness and feel the breath of the «eternal femininity.» As if Dostoevsky’s hero from his spiritual underground, Blok resorts to «debauchery,» though not for the purpose of a reckless collision of the dark and noble qualities of his own soul, but in order to «drink the passion of a vampire» and establish himself in connection with the higher and brighter beginning of life.

In a letter to his fiancée, in raptures of love, Blok amazingly mentions both Dostoevsky and Chekhov, feeling that he is standing «on the threshold of all-joyful knowledge,» that the «era of Chekhov’s despair,» darkness, skepticism, decadence and… romanticism is left behind. At that moment, Blok was infinitely confident in the earthly incarnation of the Beautiful Lady: «I feel that everything I would ever again need, I will find in You.» Indeed, during periods of life’s adversity and hours of despair, Blok always turned to his wife and found her understanding.

But the ghost of the Beautiful Lady gradually dissipated and four years later Blok saw her features in the image of another «Stranger» – actress Natalya Volokhova, who «combined subtle, solemn beauty, an interesting mind and nobility of character.» Although the door of the soul was already bolted in the ice cave, Volokhova’s «wonderful charm» – «tall, slender figure, pale face, delicate features, black hair and eyes, precisely winged, black, wide open» – burned the «golden coal» into the poet’s heart, despite the fact that it also caught «the snowy gloom of her eyes.» However, even this time Blok was disappointed – the heart of the Snow Maiden listened to his beautiful poems, but remained mute.

Lyubov Dmitrievna Blok (Mendeleeva) (1881—1939)

And once again, sparkling from the wine cup,
You put fear in my heart
With your innocent smile
In heavy-snaked hair.

I’m overturned in the dark currents
And inhale again without love,
Forgotten dream of kisses
Of snowy blizzards around you.

Blok’s love for Volokhova, which lasted through two theater seasons, was immersed in an atmosphere of endless fun «in the ghostly light» of the capital’s young «literary and artistic bohemia.» Perhaps, observing her husband’s deep passion and heartache, Lyubov Dmitrievna decided to give him up to Volokhova, warning that with love it was necessary to «accept the poet with his high mission.» The sacrifice was rejected due to Blok’s inconsistency with the ideal image of someone whom the actress, famous for her «bright personality,» could love with «ordinary female love.» At the end of 1908, the love obsession began to wane, Blok tried to assure himself that «it no longer mattered which lips to kiss, which shoulders to caress,» but he could not decide what mark the «debunked shadow» left in his fate, and, having forgotten her, he «became serious.» A year later, Blok wrote his own version of poems on the theme of the now famous for centuries romance «Don’t go away, stay with me…,» created by the natural composer Nikolai Zubov, who was passionately and unrequitedly in love with the singer Anastasia Vyaltseva, who from a poor peasant family became a popular singer, a rich a woman and a model of feminine elegance. In contrast to the banal «delight of love» and «fiery caress,» the poet spoke to his imaginary friend about deception enveloping like a «gray fog,» about the «sadness of gloomy places» and proposed, having fenced her with «a living ring, a ring of hands,» to flow together like smoke towards the light of dawn «into the scarlet circle.»

In search of an answer to the question of the feasibility of the earthly embodiment of the Eternal Femininity, Blok in 1911 discovered the works of the Swedish writer August Strindberg, where, behind love tragedies and family troubles, the underlying causes of the eternal struggle of the sexes are revealed and the path along which «culture will follow in creating a new type of man» is illuminated. Reflecting on the new man, Blok imagines a different combination of «masculine and feminine principles» – their «harmonious distribution» – than the one created so far by culture. At the same time, in the conditions of a «changed life» these principles should not degenerate – the masculine should be open, firm, truthful, and the feminine should not turn into «womanhood.» Choosing, like Strindberg, the path of masculinity, Blok speaks of a preference «to be left alone with one’s cruel fate, when there is no real woman in the world, whom only an honest and austere soul can accept.»

Blok’s fragmentary thoughts about a new type of man in the article In Memory of August Strindberg (1912) were a rare turn of the poet to a profound reflection of his supersensual experience and mystical insights. By this time, he had already become disillusioned with the collective efforts of the Russian creative intelligentsia, initially united by «wide acquaintance with the French symbolists,» and then gathered in a religious-philosophical society to develop the teachings of Vl. S. Solovyov, Blok’s spiritual inspirer. He was closer to those who carried within themselves internal chaos, manifested in bursts of «lonely ecstatic states; this is the best thing that happened, and what brought real results.»

Meanwhile, in the Russian «intelligent society» there had already emerged turbulent currents, which, deepening the course of comprehension of the spiritual nature of man, branched out and followed parallel courses. A close friend of the Blok family, the poet’s rival in love, creativity and worldview, Andrei Bely, became an ardent follower of the anthroposophical movement led by Rudolf Steiner, which, in his opinion, was engaged in «the study of human life in Sophia.» Blok remained indifferent to the new philosophy, which had as its practical goal to help «the individual to become a more moral, creative and free personality – capable of actions motivated solely by love.» According to Andrei Bely, Blok believed that Sophia, as the soul of the world, reveals itself not to the collective consciousness, but to individual mystics, their poetic consciousness, and this knowledge cannot «be clothed in metaphysical speculation,» but only «transmitted in subjectively intimate lyrical outpourings.» Before we, at this fork in the road, follow, together with Andrei Bely, the «systematic» development of the theme of the Beautiful Lady in anthroposophy, let’s take a quick look at two more stages in the life of the symbolist poet Alexander Blok.

In the spring of 1914, Blok became infatuated with the actress Lyubov Delmas, who performed incomparably in the role of Carmen. However, in the poems dedicated to the dazzling Carmen there are no longer symbolic images of the Beautiful Lady, and in the memoirs of his wife we learn that «only with her did Blok recognize the desired synthesis of both loves.» Perhaps the «sunny cheerfulness» of the Ukrainian Carmen-Delmas momentarily revived the first love in the poet’s soul?

You are like the echo of a forgotten hymn
In my black and wild fate.
Oh, Carmen, I’m sad and wondrous,
That I had a dream about you.

Spring trembling, and babbling, and rustling,
Eternal, wild dreams,
And your wild beauty —
Like a guitar, like a tambourine of spring!

Having completed the hopeless search for the embodiment of Eternal Femininity in the representatives of the beautiful half, the poet continued to listen to the signs of the New Goddess in the broad social mass – the folk element, in which one could sense «the slow awakening of a giant… with some kind of grin on his lips.» He prophetically felt the gap between the mass of people and the intelligentsia flirting with it, since he did not see sincere compassion and true love in this going to the people on the one hand, but heard the roar of the «mad troika flying straight at us» on the other.

After the February revolution and then the Bolshevik coup, the poet still remained optimistic in 1919: