International Weekly Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science - Volume 1, No. 8, August 19, 1850

by Various

The origin of the Russian theater is altogether more recent. It is true that Peter the Great meddled a good deal with the theater as well as with other things, but it was not till the Empress Catharine that dramatic literature was really emancipated by the court. Under Alexander and Nicholas the most magnificent arrangements have been made in every one of the cities that from time to time is honored by the residence of the Emperor, so that Russia boasts of possessing five theaters, two of which excel everything in Europe in respect to size and splendor, but yet possesses no sort of taste for dramatic art. The stage, in the empire of the Muscovites, is like a rose-bush grafted on a wild forest tree. It has not grown up naturally from a poetic want in the people, and finds in the country little or nothing in the way of a poetic basis. Accordingly, the theater in Russia is in every respect a foreign institution. Not national in its origin, it has not struck its roots into the heart of the people. Only here and there a feeble germ of theatrical literature has made its way through the obstinate barbarism of the Russian nature. The mass have no feeling for dramatic poetry, while the cultivated classes exhibit a most striking want of taste.

But in Russia everything is inverted. What in other nations is the final result of a long life, is there the beginning. A natural development of the people appears to its rulers too circuitous, and in fact would in many things require centuries of preparation. Accordingly, they seek to raise their subjects to the level of other races by forcing them outwardly to imitate their usages. Peter the Great says in his testament: "Let there be no intermission in teaching the Russian people European forms and customs." The theater in Russia is one of these forms, and from this it is easy to understand the condition it is in.

It is true there are in the country a few independent companies of players, but they are not Russian, or at least were formed as a speculation by some foreigner. For example, Odessa has often two such, and sometimes three. The Italian company is said to be good. The Russian, which has now become permanent, has hitherto been under the management of a German, and has been very poor. The company in Kiew consists mostly of Poles, from the old Polish provinces incorporated with Russia, and has a high reputation. In Poland it would be possible in every little nest of a city to get together a tolerable company for dramatic performance. In Russia it would be much easier to raise an army. The ultimate reason of this striking contrast is the immense dissimilarity in the character of the two nations. The Pole is remarkably sanguine, fiery, enthusiastic, full of ideality and inspiration; the Russian is through and through material, a lover of coarse physical pleasures, full of ability to fight and cut capers, but not endowed with a capacity quickly to receive impressions and mentally elaborate them.

In this respect, the mass and the aristocracy, the serfs and their masters, are as alike as twins. The noble is quite as coarse as the peasant. In Poland this is quite otherwise. The peasant may be called a rough creature, but the noble is almost always a man of refinement, lacking indeed almost always in scientific information, but never in the culture of a man of the world. The reason of this is, that his active, impetuous soul finds constant occasion for maintaining familiarity with the world around him, and really needs to keep up a good understanding with it. The Russians know no such want.

Even in St. Petersburg the German was long much more successful than the native theater, though the number of Russians there is seventeen times larger than that of the Germans. The Russians who there visit the theater are the richest and most prominent members of the aristocracy. They however consider the drama as simply a thing of fashion. Hence results the curious fact that it is thought a matter of good taste to be present at the beginning but not to wait for the end of a piece. It has happened that long before the performance was over the house was perfectly empty, everyone following the fashion, in order not to seem deficient in public manners. If there is ever a great attraction at the theater, it is not the play, but some splendid show. The Russian lady, in studying the coiffure or the trailing-robe of an actress, forgets entirely her part in this piece, if indeed she has ever had an adequate conception of it. For this reason, at St. Petersburg and Moscow the ballet is esteemed infinitely higher than the best drama; and if the management should have the command of the Emperor to engage rope-dancers and athletes, circus-riders and men-apes, the majority of Russians would be of opinion that the theater had gained the last point of perfection. This was the case in Warsaw several years ago, when the circus company of Tourniare was there. The theaters gave their best and most popular pieces, in order to guard against too great a diminution of their receipts. The Poles patriotically gave the preference for the drama, but the Russians were steady adorers of Madame Tourniare and her horse. In truth, the lady enjoyed the favor of Prince Paskiewich. General O—— boasted that during the eleven months that the circus staid he was not absent from a single performance. The Polish Count Ledochowski, on the other hand, said that he had been there but once when he went with his children, and saw nothing of the performance, because he read Schiller's William Tell every moment. This was Polish opposition to Russian favoritism, but it also affords an indication of the national peculiarities of the two races.

From deficiency in taste for dramatic art arises the circumstance that talent for acting is incomparably scarce among the Russians. Great as have been the efforts of the last emperors of Russia to add a new splendor to their capitals by means of the theater, they have not succeeded in forming from their vast nation artists above mediocrity, except in low comedy. At last it was determined to establish dramatic schools in connection with the theaters and educate players; but it appears that though talent can be developed, it cannot be created at the word of command. The Emperor Nicholas, or rather his wife, was, as is said, formerly so vexed at the incapacity of the Russians for dramatic art, that it was thought best to procure children in Germany for the schools. The Imperial will met with hindrance, and he contented himself with taking children of the German race from his own dominions. The pride of the Russians did not suffer in consequence.

While poetry naturally precedes dramatic art, the drama, on the other hand, cannot attain any degree of excellence where the theater is in such a miserable state. It is now scarcely half a century since the effort was begun to remove the total want of scientific culture in the Russian nation, but what are fifty years for such a purpose, in so enormous a country? The number of those who have received the scientific stimulus and been carried to a degree of intellectual refinement is very small, and the happy accident by which a man of genius appears among the small number must be very rare. And in this connection it is noteworthy, that the Russian who feels himself called to artistic production almost always shows a tendency to epic composition.

The difficulties of form appear terrible to the Russian. In romance-writing the form embarrasses him less, and accordingly they almost all throw themselves into the making of novels.

As is generally the case in the beginning of every nation's literature, any writer in Russia is taken for a miracle, and regarded with stupor. The dramatist Kukolnik is an example of this. He has written a great deal for the theater, but nothing in him is to be praised so much as his zeal in imitation. It must be admitted that in this he possesses a remarkable degree of dexterity. He soon turned to the favorite sphere of romance writing, but in this also he manifests the national weakness. In every one of his countless works the most striking feature is the lack of organization. They were begun and completed without their author's ever thinking out a plot, or its mode of treatment.

Kukolnik's "Alf and Adona," in which at least one hundred and fifty characters are brought upon the stage, has not one whose appearance is designed to concentrate the interest of the audience. Each comes in to show himself, and goes out not to be in the way any longer. Everything is described and explained with equal minuteness, from the pile of cabbages by the wayside, to the murder of a prince; and instead of a historical action there is nothing but unconnected details. The same is the case with his "Eveline and Baillerole," in which Cardinal Richelieu is represented as a destroyer of the aristocracy, and which also is made up of countless unconnected scenes, that in part are certainly done with some neatness. These remarks apply to the works of Iwan Wanenko and I. Boriczewski, to I. Zchewen's "Sunshine", five volumes strong; to the compositions of Wolkow, Czerujawski, Ulitinins, Th. Van Dim, (a pseudonym,) in fact to everything that has yet appeared.