A Herzen Reader

This was first published as the introduction to the anthology Five Years Later, and then separately in The Bell, No. 72, June 1, i860. At this point, Herzen shifted his focus from the tsar as the primary agent of change to the progressive intelligentsia. The poet and journalist Alexey Pleshcheev (i825-i893) wrote to a friend that while he had not yet received a copy of the book, judging by recent issues of The Bell, it was likely to assume a hostile tone; however, since the powerful people of the world were unlikely to read it, the consequences would be minimal. Turgenev liked the introduction, but Tolstoy was critical of the scattershot effect and the incredible display of egoism, but he also acknowledged "the broad-mindedness, cunning, kindness, and elegance" as quintes- sentially Russian (Let 3^20-24, i35).

Five Years Later [i860]

Farewell, Alexander Nikolaevich, have a good journey! Bon voyage!.. Our path lies this way!

—The Bell, April i5, i860

The publication of our political articles from the last five years, scattered in The Polestar and The Bell, by chance takes on a particular meaning on ac­count of the gloomy events at the time of the collection's appearance.¹ Cir­cumstances are turning it into a signpost. Once more we are entering some kind of new realm of chaos and twilight and again we must change our clothes and our language precisely because we remain unalterably true to our convictions. A certain depth is essential for navigation and the choice of channel depends not on us but on the stream; we will follow all of its twists and turns, provided that we are moving forward to our goal and not coming to a halt on a sandbank. while imagining that we are still in motion. Five years ago, for the first time after seven terrible years spent burying people, nations, hopes, and beliefs, we gazed a little more radiantly at the future and sighed, as people do when recovering from a serious illness.²

A flickering streak of pale light caught fire on the Russian horizon. We had a premonition, and made a prediction in the midst of the dark night, but did not expect it to happen that quickly—on it we focused all our re­maining hopes and fragments of all our expectations. We were already so alien to the West that its fate was no longer a vital question for us. With deep interest, with a sympathetic melancholy, we followed its darkly devel­oping tragedy, but, strengthened by what we had found out and, blessing the great past, we gathered ourselves together, like Fortinbras after Hora­tio's tale, to continue our journey.

We did not get very far—we were stopped by some sort of endless swamp which we had not expected and which threatened without any great noise to steal our last strength with its swampy, tedious filth, softening our despair with expectations and diluting our hatred with pity. [. . .]

Once again we were wrong about the timing, overjoyed by the pale dawn, not taking into consideration those uncontrolled, dark, insurmountable clouds over which light has no power, or with which entire generations must battle.

The fateful power of contemporary reaction in Russia—senseless, un­necessary reaction—is crushed with such difficulty because it relies on two strong points of the granite fortress, the obtuseness of the government and the underdevelopment of the people.

Slowness in understanding is a power, a force, and the greatest irony over reason and logic. Underdevelopment is not as stubborn, but it only yields to time, a very long period of time. This is what sends us into de- spair—we would sooner give up all things—our property, our freedom— rather than time. "Time is money," as the English say, and it is as expensive and as big a thing as possible: time is us!

But no matter how natural the annoyance that gnaws at a person when he sees that "happiness was so possible, so close," and is slipping away because of the clumsiness of his fingers, no matter how natural the horror that overcomes us when we cry out to our fellow traveler—who does not notice the abyss beneath our feet—and we feel that our voice is not reach­ing him, we must nevertheless submit to the truth. Instead of stubbornness and a waste of strength in defending paths that have been covered over by reactionaries, we must travel the path along which it is possible to get through. It is in this flexibility during a period of constant striving that all the creativity of nature consists, all the rich variety of its forms, notwith­standing a unity and simplicity of principles and goals.

We must get our bearings in the new situation. It is true that we are emerging poorer from these five years of good hopes, but, to make up for it, with less of a burden on our swampy journey.