Tolstoi asked me not to play Chopin, saying: “I am afraid I might burst into tears.”
Tolstoi asked for something by Mozart or Haydn.
He asked: “Why do pianists never play Haydn? You ought to. How good it is—beside a modern complicated, artificial work—to play something of Mozart or Haydn!”
1900
Moscow, January 29th. Tolstoi had a conversation with V. E. Den when Chalyapin was here. Tolstoi is working now on the article on the labour question, “New Slavery,” and the conversation turned upon labour.
Tolstoi said: “We are going through a new stage in the evolution of slavery: the slavery of the working men suffering under the yoke of the well-to-do classes.
“Slavery will never cease at the bottom first, exclusively from the movement of the slaves themselves. We saw it in America, and here during the serfdom of the peasants. So must it happen now again. It is only when we realize that it is a shame to have slaves, that we shall cease to be slave-drivers, and shall voluntarily give up exploiting the working classes.
“Freedom cannot come from the slaves. Individual slaves who have rid themselves of the yoke of slavery become in the majority of cases particularly harsh oppressors and tyrants over their late brothers. Nor can it be otherwise. How can you expect from them—harassed and tortured—anything else? It is only when we voluntarily give up the shameful use of the labour of the slaves, our brothers, that slavery will come to an end.