St Petersburg полностью

So both Tchaikovsky’s and Benois’s extraordinary interest in ballet comes as no surprise—after all, it was the most imperial of all the arts. Nicholas I, who perceived a resemblance between the order and symmetry of ballet exercises with that of the military parades he so loved, particularly enjoyed ballet. And we find echoes of the cult of parades and military music in both Tchaikovsky and Benois. Tchaikovsky and Benois were also intrigued by ballet’s obsession with dolls and the dancers’ doll-like aspect, the automatic and predictable movements. This was a frequent theme in E. T. A. Hoffmann, beloved by both. One of Tchaikovsky’s most whimsical creations, the Nutcracker ballet, plays with a favorite Hoffmannesque idea of the fine line between human and doll, between a seemingly free individual and a windup mechanism. The idea of an animated doll both attracted and repelled Tchaikovsky. It was, of course, a purely balletic image that was realized brilliantly once again in a joint production of Benois and Stravinsky, the ballet Petrouchka.

The enchantment with ballet took on special significance in Petersburg. Besides the longing for a synthesis of the arts found in both Tchaikovsky and Benois, there was also the foreboding of an avalanche of anarchy and a subconscious wish to escape the coming destructive forces. Before Tchaikovsky’s very eyes, nihilism ceased being merely a philosophy, and the composer learned along with other residents of the capital what Petersburg political terror could be. Later, Benois was fated to be present when, under the Communist regime, that terror changed from an individual to a mass basis. Ballet dolls—they were the final refuge, a haven in a windswept sea.

Tchaikovsky was the first genius of Russian culture to express the horror of coming destruction for Petersburg and the disappearance of its festive, romantic universe. Tchaikovsky exhibited immeasurably more creative power than Benois or any other member of Mir iskusstva could ever aspire to do. Still, Tchaikovsky was heard but not understood. The decoding and popularization of Tchaikovsky’s prophetic vision was realized by Benois, who made up in energy and verve what he lacked in creative powers. Thus, on the threshold of the twentieth century the mythos of Petersburg was driven, contrary to Russian tradition, not by literature but by art.

When the capital of the empire seemed unshakable, while its very existence was perceived as a threat to the unfettered spirit, the mythos of Petersburg—in its literature-dominated, revolutionary interpretation—predicted the fall of the city. But as soon as the signs started to appear—however vague and inexplicable—of coming winds and ruinous floods, the more aesthetically and emotionally sensitive of the artistic circles sharply decreased their maledictions.

The image of the city, cleared of its nihilistic ideological associations, started to change noticeably. From sinister it was gradually transformed to benign, from dour to luminous. The artist Mstislav Dobuzhinsky, a member of Mir iskusstva and a friend of Benois, felt in those days that he was rediscovering Petersburg as a city “with languorous and bitter poetry.” For aesthetes, Petersburg at the start of the century was once again becoming a temple. They cherished “the sensation of mystery.”102 They imagined it was the mystery of the past; actually, it was the future that was mysterious and unpredictable.

The Petersburg mythos of the early twentieth century was about to enter a completely different, terrible era. On the way the capital, its image, and its mythos had to endure unprecedented catastrophes. Petersburg’s fate would change radically and with it, or rather, despite it, the symbolism of Petersburg would change, too, as would its place in the context of Russian and world culture and history.

Subsequently a number of great writers, poets, composers, artists, and choreographers would participate in the creation of a startlingly new concept of Petersburg. They would do so while surviving the destruction of many of the old city’s material and spiritual values, the disappearance of its name, as well as the death of multitudes of its inhabitants.

We thought: we are paupers, we have nothing,

But as we started to lose one thing after another,

So that every day became

A memorial day—

We began composing songs

About God’s great munificence

And about our former wealth.

This poem by Anna Akhmatova, which she liked the most of her early poetry, was prophetic, as was so much of her writing. When it first appeared in 1915, no one fully guessed to what degree all of Petersburg’s “wealth” would soon become “former.”