Part 6

Byelinsky, who has taught me to appreciate much in Pushkin which I otherwise would not have appreciated, speaks of this little piece as "especially excellent" among Pushkin's anthological poems, written in hexameter, and says, that a breath antique blows from them. Well, I cannot agree with Byelinsky. There is, doubtless, a _sentimentlet_ in the piece,--a germ; but it is only a germ, incomplete, immature. I would not have translated it (since its beauty, whatever that be, it owes entirely to its form, which is untranslatable), but for the sake of the reader, in justice to whom, a poem so highly thought of by Byelinsky ought to be given, whatever my opinion of it.

QUESTIONINGS.

In the original this piece is headed, "26 May, 1828."

FAME.

The first cantos of Eugene Onyegin were issued with the "Dialogue between the Bookseller and the Poet" as a preface. This poem is one of the arguments of the poet in the dialogue; and, as it is an independent song in itself, I have not hesitated to treat it as such.

HOME-SICKNESS.

In the original these lines are entitled, "To P. A. Ossipova."

DEATH-THOUGHTS.

In the original this poem is headed, "Stanzas."

RIGHTS.

In the original this is called, "From VI. Pindemonte." But this is an original piece by Pushkin; at first he called it, "From Alfred Musset." Evidently the censorship was likely to pass it as a work of a foreign author where it would not as one of Pushkin; to his political convictions Pushkin never, indeed, did dare to give free expression. He never deliberately misled the government, but he did at times lead it to believe more in his loyalty than was strictly in accordance with the facts.