Владимир Набоков - Комментарии к «Евгению Онегину» Александра Пушкина

   “The ray of dawn will gleam tomorrow,
   and brilliant day will scintillate;
   whilst I, perhaps — I shall descend
 4 into the tomb's mysterious shelter,
   and the young poet's memory
   slow Lethe will engulf;
   the world will forget me; but thou,
 8 wilt thou come, maid of beauty,
   to shed a tear over the early urn
   and think: he loved me,
   to me alone he consecrated
12 the doleful daybreak of a stormy life!...
   Friend of my heart, desired friend, come,
   come: I'm thy spouse!”

   Thus did he write, “obscurely
   and limply” (what we call romanticism —
   though no romanticism at all
 4 do I see here; but what is that to us?),
   and finally, before dawn, letting sink
   his weary head,
   upon the fashionable word
 8 “ideal,” Lenski dozed off gently;
   but hardly had he lost himself
   in sleep's bewitchment when the neighbor
   entered the silent study
12 and wakened Lenski with the call,
   “Time to get up: past six already.
   Onegin's sure to be awaiting us.”

   But he was wrong: at that time Eugene
   was sleeping like the dead.
   The shadows of the night now wane,
 4 and Vesper by the cock is greeted;
   Onegin soundly sleeps away.
   By now the sun rides high,
   and shifting flurries
 8 sparkle and spin; but still his bed
   Onegin has not left,
   still slumber hovers over him.
   Now he awakes at last
12 and draws apart the curtain's flaps;
   looks — and sees that already
   it is long since time to drive off.

   Quickly he rings — and his French valet,
   Guillot, comes running in,
   offers him dressing gown and slippers,
 4 and hands him linen.
   Onegin hastes to dress,
   orders his valet to get ready
   to drive together with him and to take
 8 along with him also the combat case.
   The racing sleigh is ready; in he gets;
   flies to the mill. Apace they come.
   He bids his valet carry after him
12 Lepage's39 fell tubes
   and has the horses moved away
   into a field toward two oaklings.

   On the dam leaning, Lenski had been waiting
   impatiently for a long time;
   meanwhile Zaretski, a rural mechanic,
 4 with the millstone was finding fault.
   Onegin with apologies came up.
   “But where,” quoth with amazement
   Zaretski, “where's your second?”
 8 In duels classicist and pedant, he
   liked method out of feeling and allowed
   to stretch one's man not anyhow
   but by the strict rules of the art
12 according to all the traditions
   of ancientry
   (which we must praise in him).

   “My second?” Eugene said.
   “Here's he: my friend, Monsieur Guillot.
   I don't foresee
 4 objections to my presentation:
   although he is an unknown man,
   quite surely he's an honest chap.”
   Zaretski bit his lip. Onegin
 8 asked Lenski: “Well, are we to start?”
   “Let's start if you are willing,” said
   Vladimir. And they went
   behind the mill.
12 While, at a distance, our Zaretski and the “honest chap”
   enter into a solemn compact,
   the two foes stand with lowered eyes.

   Foes! Is it long since bloodthirst
   turned them away from one another?
   Is it long since they shared their hours of leisure,
 4 meals, thoughts, and doings
   in friendliness? Now, wickedly,
   similar to hereditary foes,
   as in a frightful, enigmatic dream,
 8 in silence, for each other they
   prepare destruction coolly....
   Should they not burst out laughing while
   their hand is not yet crimsoned?
12 Should they not amiably part?...
   But wildly beau-monde enmity
   is of false shame afraid.

   The pistols now have gleamed. The mallet clanks
   against the ramrod. The balls go
   into the polyhedral barrel,
 4 and the cock clicks for the first time.
   The powder in a grayish streamlet
   now pours into the pan. The jagged,
   securely screwed-in flint
 8 anew is drawn back. Disconcerted
   Guillot behind a near stump takes his stand.
   The two foes shed their cloaks.
   Zaretski paces off thirty-two steps
12 with excellent accuracy; his friends
   apart he places at the farthest mark,
   and each takes up his pistol.

   “Now march.” The two foes, coolly,
   not aiming yet,
   with firm tread, slowly, steadily
 4 traversed four paces,
   four mortal stairs.
   His pistol Eugene then,
   not ceasing to advance,
 8 gently the first began to raise.
   Now they have stepped five paces more,
   and Lenski, closing his left eye,
   started to level also — but right then
12 Onegin fired.... The clock of fate
   has struck: the poet
   in silence drops his pistol.

   Softly he lays his hand upon his breast
   and falls. His misty gaze
   expresses death, not pain.
 4 Thus, slowly, down the slope of hills,
   shining with sparkles in the sun,
   a lump of snow descends.
   Deluged with instant cold,
 8 Onegin hastens to the youth,
   looks, calls him... vainly:
   he is no more. The young bard has
   found an untimely end!
12 The storm has blown; the beauteous bloom
   has withered at sunrise; the fire
   upon the altar has gone out!...

   Stirless he lay, and strange
   was his brow's languid peace.
   Under the breast he had been shot clean through;
 4 steaming, the blood flowed from the wound.
   One moment earlier
   in this heart inspiration,
   enmity, hope, and love had throbbed,
 8 life effervesced, blood burned;
   now, as in a deserted house,
   all in it is both still and dark,
   it has become forever silent.
12 The window boards are shut. The panes with chalk
   are whitened over. The chatelaine is gone.
   But where, God wot. All trace is lost.

   With an insolent epigram
   'tis pleasant to enrage a bungling foe;
   pleasant to see how, bending stubbornly
 4 his buttsome horns, he in the mirror
   looks at himself involuntarily
   and is ashamed to recognize himself;
   more pleasant, friends, if, as the fool he is,
 8 he howls out: It is I!
   Still pleasanter — in silence to prepare
   an honorable grave for him
   and quietly at his pale forehead
12 aim, at a gentlemanly distance;
   but to dispatch him to his fathers
   will hardly pleasant be for you.

   What, then, if by your pistol
   be smitten a young pal
   who with a saucy glance or repartee
 4 or any other bagatelle
   insulted you over the bottle,
   or even himself, in fiery vexation,
   to combat proudly challenged you?
 8 Say: what sensation
   would take possession of your soul
   when, motionless upon the ground,
   in front of you, with death upon his brow,
12 he by degrees would stiffen,
   when he'd be deaf
   and silent to your desperate appeal?