A note on transliteration.
My rendering of Russian names is a traditional and “literary” one, involving certain inconsistencies. For example, I have conveyed the softness of a consonant preceding a vowel by means of an “i” (Briusov rather than Bryusov), but between two vowels I have preferred to use a “y” (Komissarzhevskaya rather than Komissarzhevskaia). Certain names have been given in their more familiar western forms (Diaghilev, Chaliapine, Alexandrinsky). Russian names of foreign origin are given in their original form (Benois, Roerich rather than Benua, Rerikh). However, in the titles cited in the following notes (which will be of interest primarily to readers of Russian) I have adhered to a stricter system of transliteration.
1. “Unnecessary Truth.” First published in Mir iskusstva, 1902, no. 7.
2. Rubek and Irene: Characters in Ibsen’s When We Dead Awaken, first produced by the Moscow Art Theatre in 1901.
3. Tsar Maximilian: The most popular example of Russian folk drama. The play’s blending of tragic and grotesque elements and its remoteness from “realism” attracted the Symbolists. Remizov made a highly personal version of Tsar Maximilian (1918).
4. “On the Theatre.” First published in Zolotoe runo, 1908, nos. 3-5.
5. “The hero striding forward in his winged helmet, sword slung over shoulder”: Blok put these words into the mouth of German, the hero of his play The Song of Fate, which dates from the same year as this article.
6. “Vera Fiodorovna Komissarzhevskaya.” First published in Rech’, 1910, February 12, and subsequently in Sbornik pamiati V. F. Komissarzhevskoi (St. Petersburg, 1911). Komissarzhevskaya died of smallpox while on tour in Tashkent on February 10, 1910. She had been forced to undertake a prolonged tour in order to recoup the losses her theatre had suffered as a result of the last-minute banning of Salome, and her premature death had an aura of martyrdom about it. Blok composed two “obituaries” for Komissarzhevskaya: the one offered here, and another which he delivered at an evening dedicated to her memory on March 7, 1910.
7. The Puppet Show. First published in the almanac Fakely in April 1906, and subsequently, together with The Stranger and The King in the Square, in Liricheskie dramy (St. Petersburg, 1908). The Russian title (Balaganchik) has sometimes been rendered, with greater literal accuracy but less poetic truth as “The Fairground Booth.” A balagan (-chik is a diminutive suffix) was a gaily painted booth at a fair, inside which the spectator could expect to see conjurers, jugglers, acrobats, clowns and a pantomime, as well as a Petrushka—the Russian equivalent of a Punch and Judy show. Balagan has acquired an additional metaphorical meaning of “tomfoolery,” “buffoonery.”
8. “At her back a scythe”: In Russian kosa means both “scythe” and “braid,” and Blok takes advantage of this double meaning to make both verbal and visual puns.
9. The Rose and the Cross. First published in the literary almanac Sirin in August 1913. Blok’s special fondness for this last major dramatic work of his (and perhaps a deep-seated doubt as to its theatrical viability) is witnessed by a number of secondary writings of an elucidatory nature. After reading the play to Stanislavsky (who pronounced it unstageworthy) in April 1913, Blok composed “Bertrand’s Memoir, Written a Few Hours before His Death”—a kind of autobiography of the play’s hero. When in 1915 the Moscow Art Theater did at last decide to stage The Rose and the Cross, Blok wrote an “Explanatory Note for the Art Theatre.” Finally, for the play’s publication in his collected plays (Teatr) in 1916, Blok added extensive notes that demonstrate the thoroughness of his research into historical background. Although of interest in themselves, these writings “around” The Rose and the Cross add little to the understanding of the play as theatre, and considerations of space have made it impossible to include them here.
10. To ***: The dedication (which first appeared in the 1918 edition) was intended for the singer Liubov Delmas, to whom Blok had earlier dedicated his lyrical cycle “Carmen.”
11. “You pay me in Toulouse gold”: The gold of Toulouse has been proverbial since pagan times; it signifies riches that bring misfortune (author’s note).
12. “Presentiments and Portents.” First published in Zolotoe runo, 1906, nos. 5-6, and reprinted in Po zvezdam (St. Petersburg, 1909).
13. Meon: “Unbeing” (Greek).
14. “Rapture at the grim abyss’s brink”: A quotation from a song in Pushkin’s “Little Tragedy” A Feast in the Time of the Plague (1830).
15. Orchestra: Russian makes a distinction in spelling between “orchestra” in the sense of the part of ancient Greek theatre reserved for the chorus and its modern sense of an instrumental ensemble. Since the word is used in both meanings here, it has been italicized in its archaic sense.
16. “The poetry of Innokenty Annensky.” First published in Borozdy i mezhi (Moscow, 1916).
17. “He loves his song”: A quotation from a short lyric by Pushkin (1827), itself adapted from a poem by André Chénier, in which the poet compares himself to a Venetian gondolier.
18. “Olympus is the smile of the god”: A verse cited by Nietzsche in Section Ten of The Birth of Tragedy.
19. “The Cherry Orchard.” First published in Vesy, 1904, no. 2, and reprinted in Arabeski (Moscow, 1911).
20. “The Theatre and Modern Drama.” Published in Teatr: Kniga o novom teatre (St. Petersburg, 1908).
21. Schuré: Edouard Schuré (1841-1929), French music critic and contributor to the Revue Wagnérienne.
22. “That beefwitted oaf Siegfried, waving his cardboard sword”: Apparently an attack on the heroic Wagnerian imagery favored by Blok at this time (see note 5).
23. “The Theatre of the Single Will.” Published in Teatr: Kniga o novom teatre (St. Petersburg, 1908).
24. E. K. Vizener. The Silence of the First Bride: I have been unable to trace any such author or novel, and both may well be the author’s invention. The fake epigraph is a well-established tradition of Russian letters.
25. “Children, only children live”: The opening lines of a poem by Sologub (1897).
26. “…the capricious Aisa … the strict and consoling Ananka”: Aisa—“fate”; Ananka—“necessity” (Greek).
27. Simply in order that “the people should congregate”: Apparently a dig aimed at Viacheslav Ivanov’s notion of sobornost’ (a kind of mystical communion), which Sologub made fun of elsewhere (for example, in his play Night Dances).
28. “In reproach to the unjust day”: A quotation from one of Sologub’s best known poems (1902).
29. Whether Shuisky or Vorotynsky is bustling about on stage: A reference to Pushkin’s historical drama Boris Godunov, which opens with a dialogue between the boyars Shuisky and Vorotynsky.
30. “With mystery he veiled”: A quotation from a poem by Sologub (1894).
31. “No—the sufferings of a self-aware schoolboy”: A reference to Moritz in Wedekind’s play Spring’s Awakening. Sologub edited the translation of the play made by G. Feder for production by Meyerhold at Komissarzhevskaya’s theatre in September 1907.
32. “How sweet to know another life is with us”: A quotation from Briusov’s poem “Myshi” (1899).
33. The Triumph of Death. First published in Fakely, 1908, no. 3.
34. Charodeika: Russian for “enchantress”.
35. Death: “Automobile” and “death” do not rhyme in Russian any more than they do in English.
36. Living and dead water: In Russian folklore, “dead water,” if sprinkled upon parts of a dismembered body, will cause them to grow together again, while “living water” will bring the body back to life.
37. The Comedy of Alexis, Man of God. Published in Tri komedii (St. Petersburg, 1908).
38. Saints Gurias, Samonas and Abibus preserve us: Fourth-century Christian martyrs of Edessa. According to Butler’s Lives of the Saints, “they had the curious distinction of being venerated as the ‘avengers of unfulfilled contracts.’”
39. The Venetian Madcaps. Published in Moscow, 1915.
40. Thamyris Kitharodos. Published posthumously in Moscow, 1913 (in an edition of one hundred copies).
41. By the Cretan cavern, king: According to myth, Zeus passed his childhood on the island of Crete, where his mother, Rhea, hid him from the wrath of his father, Cronos.
42. The Tragedy of Judas, Prince of Iscariot. First published in Zolotoe runo, 1909, nos. 11–12, and subsequently in Sochineniia, vol. 8: Rusal’nye deistva (St. Petersburg, 1912) in a revised version. It is this later version (which the author pruned somewhat of folk idioms) that forms the basis of the present translation.
43. Beormas: Perm the Great, which extended, according to the conjecture of learned men, from the banks of the Northern Dvina to the Ural Mountains (author’s note).
44. Yumala: The idol stood near the White Sea on the Northern Dvina, where the town of Kholmogory now stands (author’s note).
45. Sorochinskoye Field: Not the field near which Gogol’s Sorochinskaya Fair took place, but the field close to Jerusalem into which the Golubinaya kniga fell from the clouds (author’s note). The Golubinaya kniga—which may be translated “Book of Wisdom,” “golubinaya” derived from “glubina” (“depth”) rather than “golub’” (“dove”)—was a popular cosmogonal treatise.
46. “He was called after the great bird”: According to the Golubinaya kniga, “the stratim bird is the mother of all birds” (author’s note).
47. Polivania: The land of the great sinners, laid waste for its sins; mentioned in Russian scriptural verses (author’s note).
48. “Letters on the Theatre.” “Letter One” was first published in Maski, 1912, no. 3, and reprinted in the literary almanac Shipovnik, 1914, vol. 22, where it was followed by “Letter Two.”
49. “I have loved, I have suffered”: This will not be found in the text of The Three Sisters, and is clearly a Stanislavskian interpolation.
50. “These funny futurists”: The Futurists, in that movement’s early phase, found that studied outrageousness of public behavior brought them useful publicity; to this end, they wore odd clothes (Mayakovsky’s famous yellow blouse) and painted their faces.