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p A feeling of purity came to me in Solenga that was especially precious after my painful experiences. I wanted to treasure that feeling and to begin a new life. And I threw myself at books, 54 reading them in a state of self-oblivion and always threatening someone mentally: "Just you wait! You’ll see!" It did not matter who “they” were. I also threatened myself: "Just wait, I will beat everything out of you that is possible.” And I threatened the children as well: "I will awaken you, and make you quiver with happiness and cry from your encounter with the purity that I will bring to you!”

p The further development of my inner thoughts required some material. I turned to my tiny stock of cultural properties: a collection of postcards and reproductions of paintings, and some clippings from journals. These small relics were especially dear to me, they were permeated with memories of my childhood. I began to collect such “pictures” when I was no more than ten years old. My stepfather had many old journals and a stack of postcards tied with a string depicting various fantastic subjects: gods, nymphs, angels, warriors. The postcards, made of firm paper, almost cardboard, had a glossy surface and were cracking at the corners. They had golden edges that had worn away in places and smelled just as warm and musty as the old frayed books that I had read at night. They conveyed a sense of mystery and of ancient wisdom.

p I did not show these postcards to anyone. Some of the children had laughed at their naked figures, and my mother had told me not to show them to anyone. She often took them away and hid them. But I would find them again and store them in a cardboard box.

p Later, when I was a university student, I discovered that these postcards were reproductions of classical works of art by Raphael, Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, and Rembrandt. And I would go to the library to read about these artists. There is a special tie between what penetrates deeply into one’s soul as a child and the new knowledge that one acquires as a young man and later as an adult.

p When I saw that large, solidly-bound volumes contained the same images as my own postcards, but in brighter colours and carefully covered with tissue paper, when a slight rustle of papers suddenly uncovered what had first been given to me in the distant past, I would recall my stepfather’s words to my mother: "Leave him alone. There is something in him ...”

p I remembered this "something within me”, and “it” remained with me, living its own life. There was a time during childhood when I was seriously ill. I remained indoors for weeks, and the doctors had already told my mother that I would not recover. When I began to feel better, I would ask for my pictures and 55 with tears in her eyes my mother would bring me the precious cardboard box. I did not understand of course why she was crying. I would lay out my pictures, sorting them in a different way each time. For hours I would gaze at their mysterious figures: a woman flying in the clouds, or more precisely, walking gracefully on clouds; another woman holding a sword and a man’s severed head (on one postcard the woman was stepping on a severed head, while on another she was advancing calmly holding a sword, followed by another woman carrying a basket with a warrior’s head); and various depictions of Christ, surrounded by crying faces, nailed with large nails to a wooden cross, his legs slightly bent at the knees and blood pouring from his wounds. And I could not understand ho.v anyone could hammer nails into living flesh and why he then should be removed from the cross so carefully, why people should weep, and wrap his body in such clean white shrouds, in which the dead body seemed to fly, like the woman in the clouds. The delicate hands holding up the body had unusually long fingers and thin soft skin, while the clothing’s folds were coloured deep red, unworldly blue and yellow, and whitish pink. The eyes expressed suffering. And I felt drawn to these pictures and remembered them because they merged with the images from my readings— with Claes’ ashes, with Don Quixote’s calmless soul (my feeling for him was always one of pity), with the secret Inquisition torturing and interrogating, and with other events and heroes in books that I had read.

p These were the images that, together with others that had come later, stirred in my memory as I prepared to meet my pupils in Solenga.

p And I intended to begin my first introductory lecture by drawing their attention to art’s more general principles. Accordingly, I wanted them to note the delicate lines in both Italy’s Botticelli and Russia’s Vrubel who achieved realistic perfection through seeming disproportion, when elongated figures and hands appeared to produce a merging of fantasy and reality, and of decorative monumentality with an intimate-lyrical theme.

p I could already see my pupils: Vanya Zolotykh, his lettuce green eyes opened wide, completely captivated by Botticelli’s miraculous melody: Zina Shugayeva all curled up at her desk, how the teacher could show such things to her, a Komsomol organizer; and also Romuskov, turned red as a lobster at the sight of naked figures; and Prismotrov, suddenly alive and curious while normally he would be half asleep, his head bent 56 backwards and his long legs in brown felt boots stretching under the desk in front of him...

p And my small postcards projected on the wall were more in place than the most perfect reproductions; the fact that they were worn made them even more interesting, as if the five hundred years that separated us from the original paintings had left their imprint on them; and even the cracks in the paper, the worn corners, and the fissure through Botticelli’s three graces seemed appropriate!

p There was so much to tell in this dark classroom alive with the warmth of the pupils’ breathing and their glistening eyes. My words, associations and comparisons acquired deeper meaning, for I was conveying more than what was expressed by Vasari, Signorelli, or Vrubel. Names, dates and titles easily came to lips in this inquisitive silence (I felt this subconsciously and warned that there may be mistakes that students might later find occasion to check). Of course, I was actually speaking not about artists alone, but also about what I myself saw in life, my dreams and hopes, and my own understanding of the world around us, as events from my life quietly slipped into the narrative.

p This entrancing intertwining of delicate hands that seem to barely touch opposed everything that was evil and frightening in this world. I was referring to Botticelli’s three graces. Standing beside them, I explained, was young Mercury. The graces were probably in love with this handsome youth, but to no avail. He turned away and this made them closer. Instead of quarrelling, they were joined by their common rejection, which was so close to humility. Perhaps Mercury needed another dream, searched for greater perfection, but then he might simply be still uninterested in such refined creatures. He was still a boy and it was not clear whether he was simply caught in his own thoughts as he looked upwards or whether he was examining the fruits in the trees. He resembled the graces, his face was calm, his figure expressed innocence and possessed the inner light that was characteristic of Antiquity’s heroes.

p While speaking about Mercury I stressed that everyone should have such a light, that it comes to life in one’s youth and should be carefully preserved.

p I deliberately stressed Mercury’s spirituality, for there were also Mercuries in my own class. But these live Mercuries were torn by rivalry, and in particular Kolya Lekarev was watching me. We saw each other in the dark and I was merciless in my analysis, while he seemed to be pleading: "Enough of Mercury.” I did not stop and made an educational error.

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p Next I turned to people of small stature—Napoleon, Suvorov and Pushkin, for my class included Vanya Zolotykh, who suffered from his own small size. He was excluded from games, some of the girls laughed at him and he tended to generally keep to himself. I explained that a person’s height was of secondary importance in comparison with his moral stature, his purity and his ability to carry a burden that was just a bit heavier than what one could normally carry—it was that which made a man. I also spoke of exceptional challenges; as soon as it took hold of a person it transformed him completely, for then he was no longer alone but supported by his other self which always sustained him, gave him strength and enhanced him in his own eyes. And both Vanya Zolotykh and Zoya Kraeva, who was known as Birdie, slightly straightened out their shoulders; they were grateful to me. In a few moments I would turn on the lights and Olya Samoilova would first lower her eyes and then suddenly raise her lashes as if saying: "I know very well whom you had in mind when you were speaking about the pictures. It is not my fault if I am pretty. Your Mercuries stick to me like burs but I do not care for them. And in general, I will do what I like.”

p And Alia Dochernayeva would turn up her nose, raise her shoulder, and blow a lock of her hair with her Mona Lisa lips and walk past me.

p Two “Mercuries”—Kolya and Sasha—would suddenly start vying with each other for the favours of all the graces of the class displaying their prowess. They would jump on desks, touch the ceiling with their fingertips and then one of them would carry the other on his shoulders.

p And only Vanya Zolotykh would approach me and ask blushingly:

p “But why are there holes in Mercury’s slippers?”

p “What slippers?" I asked amazed.

p “He is wearing something like socks or else boots, but only without soles and one can see all his toes. Everyone else in the picture is barefoot.”

p “Can it really be,” I wondered, "that all this time he was looking at what all personages were wearing on their feet?" Indeed, I had not noticed that everyone but Mercury was barefoot and I told him that this was a special kind of slipper, whose sole was not visible.

p “No,” Vanya replied, "there are no soles. I had a good look.”

p I looked at the picture again but also failed to find them and finally replied:

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p “But does it really matter!”

p Vanya and I continued looking at each other as he again repeated: "There are no soles,” his eyes glued to my face.

p I was long unable to forget about Mercury’s “slippers”, or my stupid reaction. I should have been delighted by Vanya’s keenness, put aside my sense of superiority and told the children: "How wonderful! I have been looking at this reproduction for a dozen of years and have never noticed that only Mercury is wearing sandals, while Vanya did, what a remarkably sharp eye he has.”

p This would have alerted the other children (is the teacher serious or is he sarcastic ?), and everyone would have begun to search for something that either was not present in the picture or was barely visible.

p “What is that design on Mercury’s clothes ?”

p “They are tongues of flames.”

p “How does one call this kind of clothing ?”

p “It is a toga !”

p “But why are the flames pointing downwards ?”

p “This is true, they are upside down ! Does this also mean something ?”

p “Of course...” (another clarification follows).

p I did, in fact,describe many things to my pupils. But my narrative was lacking a basis for combining my own thoughts with their naivete and thirst for clarity. Vanya Zolotykh’s question concerning the slippers had come from a timid soul and expressed an elemental need for knowledge. That tiny question allowed one to see a person’s inner world, that of his present-day values, clearing the way for future values. This is a fundamental point concerning the essence of pedagogics: should one proceed from tangible and living elemental needs, or from vague abstractions? It is needs that must bring people to a search for knowledge without which human soul would not develop. And there is only one way—not acquaintance with culture, but recreation of culture within each personality through a hierarchy of accessible and understandable values based on directness and simplicity, in short, on Mercury’s slippers.

At that time, during my first year in Solenga, I did not understand this. I thought that I had found a refined form of influencing children’s souls; that if I succeeded in entering a pupil’s spiritual world through art and that if he accepted me inwardly, the result of my influence would inevitably become positive. On 59 the surface my half-baked pedagogics seemed attractive but it lacked wisdom, and that required experience—my own experience, made up both of successes and defeats.