In her diary entry on 24 June 1917 we find Yudina’s exalted declaration ‘to have exclusively meaningful thoughts leading to Light. Fichte, Schelling. Hegel – I want, I want, I want to study philosophy!’ In the same entry, Yudina mentions Pumpyansky for the first time, identifying him as one of the friends ‘helping me find the way to Light’.26 The others included the literary critic and musician, Yevgeniya Oskarovna Tilicheyeva (née Otten’), and the extraordinary Boris Zubakin, poet, historian and Grand Master of the Rosicrucian Order.
A brilliant philologist, and polymath, Pumpyansky did much to stimulate Yudina’s literary and spiritual interests. He had converted to Orthodoxy in 1911 at a time when many Jewish intellectuals relinquished their ancestors’ religion, converted to Christianity, or renounced formal religion altogether. Or else, as in the case of the poet Osip Mandelstam, they adopted a world view shaped by Hellenism. Not to be forgotten were the socially conscious revolutionaries of Jewish origin, many of them fervent Bolsheviks, who rose to power during the Revolution, not least amongst them Leon Trotsky.
Although brought up in an agnostic family, Yudina related to her Judaic roots and knew the Yiddish traditions that were widely practised in Nevel’. Later in life she recalled a proud beggar, ‘an old Jew with dark grey curls, who would walk into our house each Friday morning, bang his stick threateningly, crying out, “Achtzehn Kopkes auf’n Tisch” (eighteen kopecks on the table) – he refused to take money from a woman’s hand, either mother’s or ours. He always demanded this sacramental sum. We children were frightened of him.’27 Even after her conversion to Russian Orthodoxy, Yudina remained proud of her Jewish origins.
As a repository of her thoughts, feelings and evolving beliefs, her diary provides a detailed record of Yudina’s development between June 1917 and February 1918. Here she made careful note of her reading – the Gospels, the Church fathers, the German poets and philosophers – and scatters it with quotations from the great writers, her own verses and those of Pumpyansky. During the summer of 1917 she translated a large chunk of St Augustine’s Confessions from German into Russian, before asking herself why – there already existed a good translation into Russian from the original Latin.
Behind Yudina’s serious investigation into Christianity, one is constantly aware of Pumpyansky’s guiding influence. As she confessed in her diary, the affinity between mentor and student gradually developed into a mutually declared love. Yet her doubts as to the true nature of her feelings were still unresolved when the diary breaks off in February 1918. This first experience of love aroused tempestuous and bewildering sensations, undermined by a tortured inner debate on spiritual versus passionate love. Never for a moment did she doubt that their friendly union was divinely consecrated. On 1 August 1917 she writes: ‘Dear friend, today you shared your most precious thoughts with me [. . .] I was right in saying that His Light shines upon us, this is a God-given friendship.’28 In the same entry we learn that Pumpyansky was leaving Nevel’ for a short trip to Petrograd: ‘Dear friend, your train is speeding its way to that beloved but cold city, and as you look up at the starry orbs, pure and serene thoughts permeate your spirit. Some of your thoughts are for me – and from me, for my yearning, turbulent spirit is surely dear to you!’ Translating these sentiments into musical terms, Yudina declared that ‘The lofty spirit of Beethoven soars above me – you too will be able to hear it.’29
Perhaps inspired by Pumpyansky’s military duties, Yudina seriously considered leaving home to work as an auxiliary nurse. However, she abandoned this romantic vision of herself tending wounded soldiers at the front when she realized what suffering it would cause her parents. Interestingly enough, on the outbreak of the Second World War, Yudina’s instincts were exactly the same, although in 1941 she actually completed a first-aid course to acquire basic nursing skills.
As Yudina’s love for Pumpyansky grew, she felt she was no longer in control of the situation. ‘What have you done to me?’ she confided to her diary. ‘Where is my pride, my solitude? I had such faith in him, and I am dying without him. I never thought that my spirit was so filled by him, to see both the light and strife in this person.’ A fortnight later, love was replaced by the need for complete independence; perhaps Yudina realized that justifying love through its God-given aspect was self-deluding. ‘Yesterday it came to pass. A new stage in my spiritual development. I have turned away from him to whom I owe so infinitely much, who has shown me the way. A terrible fateful dilemma, but I am convinced I have made the right decision.’30
Yet her doubts did not disappear: ‘I don’t know what he sees in me. When he is here, everything is easy and wonderful [. . .] And when he is not here then I am simply consumed by the flames of love. What is to become of me?’ Such uncertainties could lead to petty disagreements. ‘Why did I say those evil words to him! Forgive me! Understand I am searching for the light that illuminates the darkness.’ Within a week, peace was restored: ‘It was so extraordinary, wonderful, all barriers were overcome, all misunderstanding and hostility, once again his profound words spoke of spiritual closeness [. . .] And the golden autumn with the stealthy rustling of the forests, and at our feet the flow of splashing water, nature itself blessed our Union.’31
In mid-September Maria decided to return to Petrograd, to sound out the situation at the Conservatoire. The inflammation of her hands still hampered her piano playing, and with the uncertain political situation everything was up in the air. In the meantime Pumpyansky was being sent to the Eastern Front. The idea of parting produced a flurry of despair in Maria, not untouched by melodrama. ‘Suddenly everything seems dreadful and terrifying [. . .] Shells will be flying over his head – over him, and not over me, he will be facing fire and blood. I hadn’t understood this straight away, I hadn’t taken in that he might not come back – Oh Lord, please preserve him in storm and battle. He must not die now [. . .] It would be totally my fault.’ Accordingly she put off her own departure until his longed-for return. When Pumpyansky came back unharmed, Yudina wondered how he could be so cheerful, ‘as if he had never experienced the crossfire of battle and death. It’s very strange. This attachment to life and its good things does not accord with his fundamental depth of spirit. In reality he knows how to live life simultaneously at different levels; at the most basic level he forgets the existence of the other, much deeper level.’32
Her arrival in Petrograd towards the end of September did little to appease her feelings. The city provoked a feeling of unease: ‘How it seethes with people, these soulless crowds, where each person is alienated one from the other [. . .] What a cold unpleasant town.’ In compensation there was the joy of attending Church: ‘Yesterday I went to divine service for the first time. It seems that I will definitely embrace Christianity!’33