This review is written with
a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede
all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing
without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at
WordPress & Blogspot by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: Acia
Series: (The
Russians)
Author: Ivan Turgenev
Translator:
Constance Garnett
Rating:
3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Classic
Pages:
76
Words: 20K
Publish: 1858
The spelling for this, ACIA, is the old time translation by Garnett.
More modern translations call it ASYA, as seen on the cover I am
using. I would be upset, except new time’y translations all call
Dostoyevsky “Dostoevsky”, so screw them. They are stupid
gugenheimers and deserve to choke to death on a hotdog. WITH mustard!
See, I’m not upset at all about this ;-)
The more I read these smaller works, the more I realize just how
completely different the Russian mindset is in comparison to the
American. I read a Shadow novel soon after this and in it, two
characters were talking to each other but one of them left a sentence
unfinished and yet I still knew exactly what he meant. That happens
in Russian stories and I simply haven’t a clue what is being left
unsaid or meant. I can tell there IS meaning by that silence, but I
can’t fill in the gap. It frustrates me to no end and yet I enjoy
the heck out of it because it shows me, in no uncertain terms, that
humans can think differently. I don’t mean have different thoughts,
but think in ways that the others can’t comprehend easily. It
reminds of the conversation in Dune when Paul is talking to
Chani about water and she just can’t comprehend it falling from the
sky. She never would have thought of that idea on her own, but even
that isn’t as alien as what I experience with some of these Russian
reads.
AND THAT IS WHY I READ THEM!
Even if I don’t understand the meaning of the silences, simply
being exposed to them and knowing there is something there that I am
not getting expands my overall comprehension, of the written word, of
others, of the world as a whole.
That being said, I still want to take the narrator and shake him
until his head falls off. He’s an idiot and doesn’t know what he
actually wants until something is suddenly out of reach, THEN he
wants it and pines for it the rest of his life. He’s too spineless
and wimpy to decide what he wants, so things just pass him by. How
does a culture that is like that produce a Lenin, a Stalin, a Putin?
It just leaves me scratching my head.
See? More questions, more thoughts, more things I never would have
thought about without the prodding of a novella like this.
★★★☆☆
From Wikipedia.org
The narration is told on behalf of an
anonymous narrator (Mr. N.N.). He remembers his youth, his
stay in the small town of Sinzig. on the banks of the
river Rhine. One day he is ferrying a boat and follows the sound
of music and noise from a festival, he crosses the river to the
neighboring town of Leubsdorf. Here the narrator meets two
Russians: a young man named Gagin, who wants to become an artist, and
a girl named Asya (Anna), whom he introduced as his sister. Asya's
mood changes rapidly from being happy to sad, and is often eccentric
things such as climbing the ruins of a castle to water the flowers.
The hero begins to suspect that Asya is not Gagin’s sister due to
the extreme difference between their personalities.
A few days later, the narrator
befriends Gagin and learns that Asya is really his sister. At the age
of twelve, Gagin was sent to St. Petersburg to study at
a boarding school while his widowed father remained in the
countryside. After the death of his father, Gagin came to know that
his father had another child, a daughter named Asya, whose mother was
Tatyana, a maid at the Gagins' house. Gagin is forced to
raise the thirteen-year-old girl alone. He sends her to a boarding
school for some years. However, due to them facing social stigma due
to her illegitimate birth, he finally decides to go abroad with Asya.
The narrator feels deep pity for Asya -
be believes that it is her unclear social position (the daughter of
a serf and a master) that causes her to have nervous
breakdowns. Gradually he falls in love with Asya. Asya writes him a
letter asking him to meet. Gagin, who knows about his sister’s
feelings, asks the narrator if he would agree to marry her. The hero,
unsure of his feelings, cannot fully agree and promises to reject
Asya's love at the meeting (if it takes place).
The narrator's meeting with Asya takes
place in the house of the burgomaster's widow. After the
confession of her feelings, Asya finds herself in his arms, but then
the narrator conveys his disappointment to her for ruining everything
by confessing to her brother, and now their happiness is impossible.
Asya runs away. Hero and Gagin look for her. In the end, the narrator
realizes that he truly loves Asya and wants to marry her. The next
day he plans to ask his brother for the girl’s hand in marriage.
But the next day it turns out that Gagin and Asya left the city. The
hero tries to catch up with them, but loses their trail in London.
The narrator never meets Asya again.
There were other women in his life, but now, on the threshold of old
age and death, he understands that he truly loved only her, and that
even the dried flower that she gave him will outlive both lovers -
reflecting on the fleeting nature of human life.
