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We already know that real literary criticism should be competent at assessing poetic ideas, which are always of an abstract nature. So says Mr. Volynsky. On p. 214 of his book this real literary critic reproaches Dobrolynbov for the fact that the latter’s "analysis never delves into the subject of a literary work with tho aim of revealing some general psychological elements, of illuminating with a certain philosophical concept the complex processes of human creativity”. Unfortunately Mr. Volynsky himself has never shown us by his own example what exactly assessing a poetic idea and illuminating with a philosophical concept the

171 process which takes place in a writer’s head means: the fits of hysterics to which our critic is prone from time to time do not, of course, illuminate anything except certain “processes” which take place in his own nervous system. Consequently we are compelled willy-nilly to turn again to the "man who conceived eternity”.

p What is the main idea of Sophocles’ Antigone? The clash of family and state law, Hegel replies: the former is represented by Antigone and the latter by Greon. Antigone perishes as a victim of this significant clash. This idea of Hegel’s is far more comprehensible than Mr. Volynsky’s lamentations: we shall note it and proceed further. We shall now ask whether Hegel’s reference to this idea can be considered tantamount to "revealing some general psychological elements"? "No,” Hegel would reply to us, "do not believe Mr. Volynsky if he starts saying that in my opinion illuminating the artist’s creative process with a philosophical concept means delving into psychology. You know that I have no groat fondness for psychology. Illuminating an artistic work with the light of philosophy means interpreting it as an expression of one of the elements, the clash, the contradiction of which determines the course of world history. The psychological processes that take place in the individual soul are of interest to me only as an expression of the general, only as a reflection of the process of development of the absolute idea."

p The reader is already aware that our viewpoint is diametrically oppose’i to the idealist one. Nevertheless it is with great pleasure that \v.;- quote Hegel here. In his views on art there is a great deal of truth, but this truth is upside down, to use the well-known expres-ion, and one must be able to put it the right way up.

p Whereas we examined Antigone together with Hegel as the artistic expression of the struggle between two legal principles, we shall now be able to examine without Hegel Beaumarchais’ Marians de Figaro, for example, as an expression of the third estate s struggle against the old regime. And once we have learnt to illuminate literary works with the light of this philosophy, we shall again have no need of the absolute idea, but we shall find it absolutely necessary to admit that the person who is not clearly aware of this struggle, the age-old and diverse process of which constitutes history, cannot be an intelligent literary critic.

p In regarding the Mariage de Figaro as an expression of the third estate’s struggle with the old regime we shall not, of course, overlook /">’t> this struggle is expressed, i.e., whether the writer succeeded in his task. The content of a literary work consists of a certain general or (as Mr. Volynsky, forgetting the terminology of the ”man who conceived eternity”, puts it) abstract idea. But where this idea appears in its “abstract” form there is no artistic creativity whatsoever. The artist has to individualise the general 172 that forms the content of his work. And since we are dealing with the individual, we find ourselves confronted with certain psychological processes, so that here psychological analysis is not only perfectly relevant, but quite essential and even most instructive. But the psychology of the characters assumes such importance for us precisely because it is the psychology of whole social classes or at least strata and consequently the processes taking place in the individual characters are a reflection of historical movement.

p Mr. Volynsky will perhaps accuse us angrily of utilitarianism, saying that we are rapidly approaching the viewpoint of the publicistic criticism so repellent to him. But we shall take refuge from his blows behind the broad back of the "man who conceived eternity”. Let Mr. Volynsky deal with Hegel himself.

p Hegel would probably have been highly contemptuous of our men of talent, major and minor, who promise to show us "new beauty" but do not yet always cope with the old. He would have said that their works lack any significant content. And content was an extremely important thing in Hegel’s eyes.  [172•*  We know, for example, that he was somewhat ill-disposed towards the glorification of amorous sentiments and prone to grumble about poets who thought it terribly important that he (dieser) loved her (diese), but she loved another and would not look al anyone else, etc. In general, according to him, poetry has not yet acquired any significant content when it tells us that "em Schaf sicb verloren, ein Madchen verliebt" (a sheep is lost, a maid is in love). Such grumbling would probably not be to the liking of our preachers of art for art’s sake, who would see it as a tendency towards publicistic criticism, and Mr. Volynsky might well Lave had a fit of hysterics if he had forgotten for a moment that in the given case it was Hegel grumbling, and not a “whistler”.^^53^^ In general it would seem to us that in declaring himself to be an idealist Mr. Volynsky was not fully aware of how many heretical ideas can be found in the eighteen volumes of Hegel’s works.

p In order not to irritate the “real” literary critic, we should declare outright exactly which sort of criticism we support: philosophical or publicistic. But the trouble is that we cannot do so, because we believe that truly philosophical criticism is at the same time truly publicistic criticism.

p We shall proceed to explain ourselves; but first let us make a minor comment with regard to terminology. We have called 173 criticism of a certain type philosophical only because Mr. Valyasky is prone to use this expression, and we did not want to confuse our idea by using different terminology to express it. But in fact we are convinced that given the present state of our knowledge we can now permit ourselves the luxury of replacing old philosophical criticism and aesthetics in general with scientific aesthetics and criticism.

p Scientific aesthetics does not lay down any instructions for art; it does not say to art: you must stick to such and such rules and devices. It confines itself to observing how the different rules and devices that predominate in different historical epochs arise.  It does not proclaim eternal laws of art; it strives to study those eternal laws the operation of which determines the historical development of art. It does not say: "French Classical tragedy is good, but Romantic drama is worthless.” For it everything is good during its time; it has no predilection for this and not that school in art; and if (as we shall see below) such predilections do arise, at least it does not try to justify them by reference to the eternal laws of art. In a word, it is objective, like physics, and therefore alien to all metaphysics. And this objective criticism, we maintain, is publicistic precisely in so far as it is truly scientific.

p In order to explain this idea let us return to Guizot who declared the "Classical system" to be the creation of the upper classes of French society. Imagine for a moment that in his study he did not confine himself to a few isolated remarks and instructions, but, on the contrary, gave a thorough description of the artificiality which dominated the manners of the aristocracy and showed in detail the social foundation on which it arose and the degree of humiliation of the third estate which it signified. Imagine also that he wrote all this quite objectively, like the scribe grown greyhaired in the chancery

p Who looks unmoved on innocence and guilt,
And good or ill indifferent regards,
Nor sign of pity or of anger shows.^^54^^

Imagine, finally, that this objective “tale” of criticism is read by a person belonging to the bourgeoisie. If this person is not totally indifferent to the historical fate of his class, he will probably feel hostile to an order in which the nobility and the clergy could cultivate "a refined manner" sitting on the back of the tiersetat. And since Guizot’s study appeared at a time when the final battle between the old regime and the new bourgeois society was at its height, we can say with certainty that it was of considerable publicistic importance and that this importance would have been even greater had the author dwelt longer on the historical causality between the old order and the "Classical system”. Then

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174 research into the history of literature might easily, without for a moment ceasing to satisfy the strictest scientific requirements, have turned out, even against the will of the author, to be a passionatepublicistic appeal. "The poet, even when he preaches patience, rubs salt on the heart’s wounds, because he always moves it strongly" (said Foscolo). It can be said of scientific criticism that it highlights social evil all the more vividly, the more objective its analysis, i.e., the more clearly and distinctly it portrays this evil.

p To tell criticism that it must not indulge in publicistics is as pointless as going on about the “eternal” laws of art. If anyone listens to you it is only for a while, i.e., only until prevailing tastes change under the influence of social development and nrw “eternal” laws of art are discovered. The enemy of publicistics. Mr. Volynsky, evidently has no idea that there arc epochs when not only criticism, but even artistic creativity itself is full of publicistic spirit. Are not the cold pomp and the cold regal grandeur exuded by the art "of the age of Louis XIV" publicistic in part? Are they not deliberately introduced into creativity in order to extol a certain political idea? Is there not a publicistic element in David’s paintings or the so-called bourgeois drama? There is; even too much of it, if you like. But what would you have done about it? If eternal laws of art really do exist, they are those by virtue of which at certain historical epochs publicislics forces its way irrepressibly into the sphere of arlistic creation and takes charge there as in its own home.

p The same applies to criticism. In all transitional social epochs it is infused with the spirit of publicistics, and actually becomes publicistics in part. Is this good or bad? C’est selon!  [174•*  But the main thing is that it is inevitable, and no one has yet invenled any cure for this disease.

p But wait! We are wrong: there is one! It consists, believe^ it or not, in taking a sensible view of scientific criticism. Anyone who has once realised the great social power of this criticism, will never want to arm himself with criticism that is “publicistic” in quotes, just as the man who has realised the power of a magazine rifle, will never return to a primitive bow.

p Do you remember Pisarev’s article "Stagnant Water"? This is publicistic criticism in the fullest sense of the word. Although under the title of the article we find in brackets The Works of A. F. Pisemsky and so on, Pisemsky’s writings are mentioned in it only in passing, a fact which the author himself brings to the reader’s notice in the first few lines. In general the article is about our backwardness, lack of character, dumbness and inertia, about our prejudices, about the barbarity of our family relations, about 175 the oppression of women, etc. All these negative qualities of ours are examined as the simple result of our intellectual lack of development, against which the author’s impassioned preaching is directed. In a word, Pisarev adopts here, as everywhere, the viewpoint which the Germans call the enlightened one and from which one can see only an abstract difference between truth and error, between knowledge and ignorance, between intellectual backwardness and intellectual development. There is no denying that Pisarev castigates our backward society brilliantly, but his ardent preaching, while censuring ignorance and branding petty tyranny, does not point to any real means of lighting against them. To say "study, develop yourselves" is the same as exclaiming "repent, brothers!" Time is passing, but we still do not seem very repentful. There would appear to exist certain general reasons for both our backwardness and our unrepentfulness. Until these general causes have been discovered and pointed out, advocating knowledge will not yield a fraction of the results which it is capable of producing. And the advocate himself will necessarily be full of doubts. It would, perhaps, be difficult to believe in the all-saving power of knowledge more ardently than Pisarev; it would, perhaps, be difficult to imagine a type better fitted for the fight against petty tyranny arid prejudice than Bazarov, who, to quote Pisarev, possesses both knowledge and will. Yet how does Pisarev understand the activity which awaits Bazarov? Reread the end of the article “Bazarov” and you will be struck by its sad. hopeless tone: "But the Bazarovs have a hard life, although they sing and whistle. There is no activity, no love, and therefore no enjoyment. They are incapable of suffering and refuse to complain, but from time to time they feel only that life is empty, tedious, colourless and pointless.” Why is 1here no activity? All because the power of our backwardness, lack of character, dumbness and inertia, and our other negative qualities which so often arouse Pisarev’s eloquent indignation is so great. Until these qualities are understood as "historical categories”, until they are explained as transient phenomena, until their emergence as well as their future disappearance are connected with the historical development of our social relations, they are necessarily bound to appear as a kind of invincible force, a kind of insurmountable essence, an indestructible “thing-in-itself”, which is quite inaccessible to Bazarov in spite of all his knowledge and strength of will. And this is why he is compelled to turn his back on the social life around him and seek salvation in the “laboratory”.

p The French “philosophers” of the eighteenth century also believed passionately in the power of reason, but they too frequently came to the bitter conclusion that life was empty, tedious, colourless and pointless and that there was no activity for a thinking person. In general it should be remembered that in all "enlighten- 176 ers" (Aufklärer, as the Germans put it) firm belief in the power of reason was accompanied by an equally firm belief in the power of ignorance, so that their mood was constantly changing, depending on which belief happened to gain the upper hand.

p Thus, the power and impact of Pisarev’s publicistic criticism were bound to be weakened due to the viewpoint which he held. It allowed him to write an ardent denunciation of ignorance and petty tyranny, but prevented him from pointing to the fatal social forces, incomparably more powerful than all ignorance or petty tyranny, which, while operating like all elemental forces, are at the same time clearing the ground for the noble and intelligent labour of people of good-will and true knowledge. If, instead of the impassioned article "Stagnant Water”, Pisarev had written a perfectly calm and even cold review of Pisemsky’s story The Flabby Fellow, examining this story as a portrayal of the negative aspects of a life which has already been overthrown by history “(Stagnant Water" was published in October 1861), his calm language would have had a more reassuring effect on readers than his simple although talented attacks on weakness of character and obtuseness.

p But in that case Pisarev would have had to change the whole character of his literary activity arid take up sociological research, the reader will point out to us.

p True, we reply. In Pisarev’s day it was impossible for a Russian writer to adopt the viewpoint to which we refer, without first, solving with his own mind a whole series of basic sociological questions. And anyone who took it into his head to seek their solution, would have been quite lost as a literary critic. But we do not wish to blame Pisarev: we are merely saying that it would be strange today to engage in the sort of criticism in which the circumstances of his age compelled him to engage.

p Today scientific literary criticism is possible, because today some of the essential prolegomena of social science have already been established. And since scientific criticism is possible, publicistic criticism, as something separate from and independent of it, becomes a ridiculous archaism. This is all that we wish to say.

p Until now we have assumed that people who engage in scientific criticism should and can remain in their writings as cold as marble, as unruffled as the scribes grown grey-haired in the chancery. But this assumption is essentially superfluous. If scientific criticism regards the history of art as the result of social development, it too is the fruit of this development. If history and the present position of a given social class necessarily engender within it specific aesthetic tastes and artistic preferences, scientific critics too may show definite tastes and preferences, because these critics do not appear out of thin air either, because they too are the products of history. Let us again take Guizot. He was a scien- 177 tific critic in so far as he succeeded in linking the history of literature with the history of classes in modern society. In pointing to this link, he was proclaiming a perfectly scientific objective truth. But this link became apparent to him only because history placed his class in a certain negative relationship to the old order. Without this negative relationship, the historical consequences of which are q_uite innumerable, the objective truth, most important for the history of literature, would not have been discovered. But precisely because the discovery of this truth was the fruit of history and the clashes of real social forces which had taken place in history, it was bound to be accompanied by a definite subjective mood which, in its turn, was bound to find a certain literary expression. And indeed Guizot does not dwell only on the link between literary tastes and social customs. He condemns certain of these customs; he argues that the artist should not pander to the caprices of the upper classes; he advises the poet to serve no one but the “people” with his lyre.

_p The scientific criticism of the present time has every right to resemble Guizot’s criticism in this respect. The only difference is that the subsequent historical development of modern society has defined more accurately for us the contradictory elements that went to make up the “people” in whose name Guizot condemned the old order, and has shown us more clearly which of these elements is of truly progressive historical significance.

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