The horses, sure to find Kavérin.
Inside, corks pop. The foam, the fizz
Of Comet wine, the best there is!
Bloody roast beef will soon restore him,
With truffles. Young folk are so keen
On this fine flower of French cuisine!
And Strasburg pie is waiting for him
Between a living Limburg cheese
And golden pineapples. Yes, please. 17
And now the glasses need refilling
To slake the chops’ hot fat—but hey!
The Bréguet now alerts them, shrilling—
The new ballet is under way.
He was the theatre’s closest stickler.
With actresses no one came fickler;
He loved the nice ones (any age),
And was a regular backstage.
He hurried there. With free demeanour
The liberals there will shout hurrah
To celebrate an entrechat,
Boo Phèdre or call out Moëna
Or Cleopatra. (In a word,
They shout to get their voices heard.) 18
O magic realm! There, in his season,
A brilliant satirist was seen,
That friend of freedom, bold Fonvízin,
And the mercurial Knyazhnín.
There Ozerov shared an ovation,
The tears and plaudits of the nation,
With young Semyónova, and then
Katénin brought to life again
The spirit of Corneille so splendid.
There comedies, good Shakhovskóy’s,
Swarmed through and filled the house with noise,
And Didelot to fame ascended.
There, there, at a much younger age,
I spent my early days backstage. 19
Where are you now, my lost goddésses?
Oh, hear my melancholy call.
Are you the same, or have successors
Emerged to supersede you all?
Can I still hope to hear your chorus?
Terpsichore, will you dance for us
That doleful, Russian, soulful dance?
Is no one left for my sad glance
To recognize on that drab staging?
Must I allow this alien set
To disillusion a lorgnette
That finds their frolics unengaging?
Am I to yawn at everyone,
Silently ruing what is gone? 20
House full. We see the boxes gleaming,
The pit and stalls a seething world.
On high, the heckling gods are teeming,
The curtain zooms up, sweetly swirled.
Semi-ethereally splendid,
Watching the magic bow, suspended,
Surrounded by a crowd of nymphs,
There stands—Istómina. We glimpse
Two tiny feet twirling together,
One circling, one upon the boards,
And then she skips and flits and soars,
Puffed like a soft aeolian feather.
She twines, untwines, spins at the hips.
Her tiny toes touch at their tips. 21
Everyone claps. And, having tangled
With toes of people where they sit,
He peers across, his glasses angled
At unknown ladies opposite,
Taking things in on every level—
Clothing and faces that bedevil—
Onegin’s still dissatisfied.
Exchanging bows on every side,
He gives the stage some small attention,
But soon, distracted and withdrawn,
He turns back, saying with a yawn,
“It’s time to put this lot on pension.
Ballet! I’ve taken all I can—
And Didelot’s such a boring man!” 22
There’s many a cupid, devil, dragon
Still clomping on the boarded floor,
And footmen still, with coats to sag on,
Sleep wearily beside the door.
Much foot-stamping is in the offing,
Blown noses, hissing, clapping, coughing,
And still at every end, it seems,
Inside and out, a lantern gleams.
Chilled horses stand, pawing the whiteness,
Irked by their harnesses and reins,
While drivers, cursing near the flames,
Beat their cold hands. And yet, despite this,
Onegin’s gone. Is that so strange?
Oh, no, he’s driving home to change. 23
Shall I describe, with qualm and scruple,
The hidden room of peace and rest
Where this man, fashion’s model pupil,
Is dressed, undressed and then re-dressed?
Every last whim and freak of fancy
And London-born extravagancy
Exchanged across the Baltic seas
For timber and for tallow, these,
Along with goods hailing from Paris,
Where trade and good taste are on hand
To make things for our pleasure, and
Where luxury with fashion marries—
No one had more of these things than
This eighteen-year-old thinking man. 24
Byzantine pipes on tables (ambered),
Lay beside porcelain and bronze
And, to delight the truly pampered,
Bottles of perfume (cut-glass ones),
With combs and little steels for filing
And scissors straight or curved for styling
And thirty brushes (various scales)
For treating dirty teeth and nails.
I can’t help adding: Jean-Jacques Rousseau
(Loquacious oddball) watched while Grimm
Dared clean his nails in front of him,
And thought it rude of Grimm to do so.
On human rights Rousseau was strong,
But in this instance he was wrong. 25
You can be an effective person
And still take good care of your nails.
Don’t blame the age, the times that worsen:
Fashion’s a tyrant to young males.
A new Chadáyev, my Yevgeny
Feared jealous blame and thought it brainy
To dress the pedant, toe to top,
And be what we would call a fop.
Three hours or more he ( just between us)
Would spend at mirrors hung about
His dressing room, and then walk out,
For all the world a giddy Venus,
A goddess in men’s clothes arrayed,
Departing for a masquerade. 26
No doubt your interest has been captured
By his toilette and taste. And how
The learned world would be enraptured
If I described his clothing now!…
This would not be a wise endeavour.
I’ve been describing things for ever,
But pantalon, Frack, gilet… Please!
There are no Russian words for these.
I know my poor vocabulary
Is reason to apologize.
It has already, for its size
Too many foreign words to carry.
I say this after having scanned
The expert wordsmiths of our land. 27
But this we cannot be delayed in.
We’d better rush off to the ball.
In a fast hackney my Onegin
Has hurtled there before us all.
Past many city houses darkling,
Along the sleeping highways, sparkling
With double lanterns, hackneys go
In relays, lighting up the snow
And scattering rainbows. In this setting,
See, here we have a splendid pile
Lit up with oil lamps in fine style,
Its plate-glass windows silhouetting
A group that features, when it stops,
Fine ladies and pretentious fops. 28
Our hero now flies through the entry,
Darts past the porter and ascends
A marble staircase for the gentry,
Smoothing his hair with finger-ends.
He’s in. The room is full of dancers,
The band has thundered, but now answers
With a mazurka danced by all,
While noisy revellers cram the hall.
The boots of cavalrymen jingle
And lovely ladies flick their feet,
Leaving an afterview so sweet
They catch the eye and tease and tingle,
While scraping fiddles in the band
Drown gossip hushed behind the hand. 29
When we were sporty, yearning creatures
I loved the ballroom well. We knew
No better place for lovelorn speeches
Or handing over billets doux.
You, husbands—each an upright figure—
I conjure you with all my vigour:
Listen to what I have to say.
I’d like to warn you, if I may.