A comparison between Pushkin’s story Het Schot (The Belkin Stories 1830) and Lermontov’s story The Fatalist (A Hero of Our Time 1838).

These dramatic stories from the Romantic genre belong to the absolute top of Russian literature, and both stories are a harbinger of the dramatic fate of both writers.

I challenge the one who has read both De Fatalist and Het Schot to remember in which story ‘the Serbian’ belongs and in which story a certain ‘Silvio’? Both figures are outsiders with a passion for cards and pistols. One is fighting in a duel and the other is playing Russian roulette …

The same starting point

Indeed, both stories are as Russian as can be. They start with a regiment that is stationed in a small village. The officers play cards in the evening. Both Silvio and the Serbian like to keep a bank. In both stories, a cap with a bullet hole appears. But the agreements end there.

The shot

In Pushkin’s story, Silvio is insulted by a young officer and he challenges him to a duel. The young officer arrives, carelessly eating cherries. Silvio decides he can not shoot at someone who gives nothing to live and postpones his shot to a moment to be determined. He practices with his pistol every day until he hears years later that his opponent is about to get married. He leaves for the young man and wants to use his turn to shoot. Again his conscience stops him: he can not shoot at an unarmed man and organizes a new duel. The young man, now married and trembling with nerves, misses, the bullet drills into a painting on the wall. His wife enters her husband’s room and throws herself at Silvio’s feet. Silvio sees the real fear in the eyes of his opponent and is satisfied. Instead of shooting at the man, he shoots at the hole in the painting, his bullet next to the other.

The Fatalist

The Fatalist Serb uses the theory that it is impossible to die before it is your predestined time to die. To prove his theory, he starts a bet with Petsjorin (the protagonist from A Hero of Our Time). He takes a random pistol from the wall of the house of the host, points it to his sleep, and shoots. Although the gun was indeed loaded, no bullet was fired. He won the bet. Petsjorin, who has been in the army for some time and has seen many men die, is convinced that he sees a sign on the face of the Serb that he will soon die. And indeed, that same night, the Serb meets a drunken idiot who kills him. Petsjorin decides to put his own theory to the test, and convinces that it is not yet his time,

Self-determination or Lot?

Pushkin lets Silvio take control of fate; he had the chance and (to defend his honour) the full right to shoot at his opponent. And since he was the best shooter the narrator ever met, he would certainly have killed his opponent. The young man realizes that too well. This is a story about honour, respect and satisfaction.

Lermontov allows the fate to take control. Petsjorin enters the bet with the Serbian without moral objections. The Serbian puts his life at risk for a bet and Petsjorin does not feel guilty, even though, and perhaps precisely because he sees death on the face of the Serbian. This story is about predestination. Precisely because he is fatalistic, Petsjorin can be brave.

You have to wonder how both writers felt when they themselves were confronted with the bullet their name was on.

Lermontov, who until the last moment was convinced that the game would be called off. He arrives nonchalantly at the agreed place, we can almost imagine he is eating cherries. He is being killed. After all his anger at Pushkin’s death, and himself the impish successor of Pushkin. Did he see death on his own face when he looked in the mirror that morning?

Pushkin, who no longer felt any control over the situation. Forced to a duel with a trained officer. All too aware of the fact that he was mortal, and that he had four children and a wife. He also practised. His bullet hit d’Anthès, but the fate let the bullet hit on a metal uniform knot, and d’Anthès remained alive. He touched Pushkin in the belly and Pushkin died two days later. Two days in which he had enough time to think about his approaching death, there on the leather sofa in his study.

In 2010, Pushkin’s sofa was investigated by experts and indeed Blood Traces of Pushkin were found. Just before he died, he said to his friend Dal: “I dreamed that we climbed on these books, high on the shelves, and I became dizzy”.

© Elisabeth van der Meer

Photos: illustrations from the stories combined by myself, the waistcoat that Pushkin wore during the duel (Wikipedia) and the sofa in his study (The Moscow Times)

Read books: the two stories and Pushkin’s Button by Serena Vitale.

You can read these great stories online here in English:

https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/p/pushkin/aleksandr/p98sh/

https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/l/lermontov/mikhail/l61h/book4.html

You can read more about the last moments of these two writers here:

https://enrussischeaffaire.wordpress.com/2017/10/26/lermontovs-fatale-duel/

https://enrussischeaffaire.wordpress.com/2017/10/24/poesjkins-eigen-duel/