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Ivan Turgenev — poem “The Rule Of Life”

Russian Poetry

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Russian Literature – Russian Poetry – Children’s books – Ivan Turgenev  – Poems – Obsolete Russian Words and their meaning
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The Rule Of Life

“If you desire thoroughly to mortify and even to injure an opponent,” said an old swindler to me, “reproach him with the very defect or vice of which you feel conscious in yourself.—Fly into a rage … and reproach him!

“In the first place, that makes other people think that you do not possess that vice.

“In the second place, your wrath may even be sincere…. You may profit by the reproaches of your own conscience.

“If, for example, you are a renegade, reproach your adversary with having no convictions!

“If you yourself are a lackey in soul, say to him with reproof that he is a lackey … the lackey of civilisation, of Europe, of socialism!”

“You may even say, the lackey of non-lackeyism!” I remarked.

“You may do that also,” chimed in the old rascal.

February, 1878.

Pushkin's farewell to the sea. 1877 painted by Repin

Translated from the Russian by Isabel F. Hapgood


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Russian Literature – Russian Poetry – Children’s books – Ivan Turgenev  – Poems – Obsolete Russian Words and their meaning

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