HERTZEN, ALEXANDER
(1812?1870), Russian author, was
born at Moscow, a very short time before the occupation of that
city by the French. His father, Ivan Yakovlef, after a personal
interview with Napoleon, was allowed to leave, when the invaders
arrived, as the bearer of a letter from the French to the Russian
emperor. His family attended him to the Russian lines. Then
the mother of the infant Alexander (a young German Protestant
of Jewish extraction from Stuttgart, according to A. von
Wurzbach), only seventeen years old, and quite unable to speak
Russian, was forced to seek shelter for some time in a peasant’s
hut. A year later the family returned to Moscow, where Hertzen
passed his youth?remaining there, after completing his studies
at the university, till 1834, when he was arrested and tried on a
charge of having assisted, with some other youths, at a festival
during which verses by Sokolovsky, of a nature uncomplimentary
to the emperor, were sung. The special commission appointed to
try the youthful culprits found him guilty, and in 1835 he was
banished to Viatka. There he remained till the visit to that
city of the hereditary grand-duke (afterwards Alexander II.),
accompanied by the poet Joukofsky, led to his being allowed to
quit Viatka for Vladimir, where he was appointed editor of the
official gazette of that city. In 1840 he obtained a post in the
ministry of the interior at St Petersburg; but in consequence of
having spoken too frankly about a death due to a police officer’s
violence, he was sent to Novgorod, where he led an official life,
with the title of “state councillor,” till 1842. In 1846 his father
died, leaving him by his will a very large property. Early in
1847 he left Russia, never to return. From Italy, on hearing of
the revolution of 1848, he hastened to Paris, whence he afterwards
went to Switzerland. In 1852 he quitted Geneva for
London, where he settled for some years. In 1864 he returned to
Geneva, and after some time went to Paris, where he died on the
21st of January 1870.
His literary career began in 1842 with the publication of an
essay, in Russian, on
Dilettantism in Science
, under the pseudonym
of “Iskander,” the Turkish form of his Christian name?convicts,
even when pardoned, not being allowed in those days to
publish under their own names. His second work, also in Russian,
was his
Letters on the Study of Nature
(1845?1846). In 1847
appeared, his novel
Kto Vinovat?
(Whose Fault?), and about the
same time were published in Russian periodicals the stories
which were afterwards collected and printed in London in 1854,
under the title of
Prervannuie Razskazui
(Interrupted Tales).
In 1850 two works appeared, translated from the Russian
manuscript,
Vom anderen Ufer
(From another Shore) and
Lettres
de France et d’Italie
. In French appeared also his essay
Du
Developpement des idees revolutionnaires en Russie
, and his
Memoirs
, which, after being printed in Russian, were translated
under the title of
Le Monde russe et la Revolution
(3 vols., 1860?1862),
and were in part translated into English as
My Exile to
Siberia
(2 vols., 1855). From a literary point of view his most
important work is
Kto Vinovat?
a story describing how the
domestic happiness of a young tutor, who marries the unacknowledged
daughter of a Russian sensualist of the old type, dull,
ignorant and genial, is troubled by a Russian sensualist of the
new school, intelligent, accomplished and callous, without there
being any possibility of saying who is most to be blamed for the
tragic termination. But it was as a political writer that Hertzen
gained the vast reputation which he at one time enjoyed. Having
founded in London his “Free Russian Press,” of the fortunes of
which, during ten years, he gave an interesting account in a
book published (in Russian) in 1863, he issued from it a great
number of Russian works, all levelled against the system of
government prevailing in Russia. Some of these were essays,
such as his
Baptized Property
, an attack on serfdom; others were
periodical publications, the
Polyarnaya Zvyezda
(or Polar Star),
the
Kolokol
(or Bell), and the
Golosa iz Rossii
(or Voices from
Russia). The
Kolokol
soon obtained an immense circulation, and
exercised an extraordinary influence. For three years, it is
true, the founders of the “Free Press” went on printing, “not
only without selling a single copy, but scarcely being able to get
a single copy introduced into Russia”; so that when at last a
bookseller bought ten shillings’ worth of
Baptized Property
, the
half-sovereign was set aside by the surprised editors in a special
place of honour. But the death of the emperor Nicholas in 1855
produced an entire change. Hertzen’s writings, and the journals
he edited, were smuggled wholesale into Russia, and their words
resounded throughout that country, as well as all over Europe.
Their influence became overwhelming. Evil deeds long hidden,
evil-doers who had long prospered, were suddenly dragged into
light and disgrace. His bold and vigorous language aptly
expressed the thoughts which had long been secretly stirring
Russian minds, and were now beginning to find a timid utterance
at home. For some years his influence in Russia was a living
force, the circulation of his writings was a vocation zealously
pursued. Stories tell how on one occasion a merchant, who had
bought several cases of sardines at Nijni-Novgorod, found that
they contained forbidden print instead of fish, and at another
time a supposititious copy of the
Kolokol
was printed for the
emperor’s special use, in which a telling attack upon a leading
statesman, which had appeared in the genuine number, was
omitted. At length the sweeping changes introduced by
Alexander II. greatly diminished the need for and appreciation
of Hertzen’s assistance in the work of reform. The freedom he
had demanded for the serfs was granted, the law-courts he had so
long denounced were remodelled, trial by jury was established,
liberty was to a great extent conceded to the press. It became
clear that Hertzen’s occupation was gone. When the Polish
insurrection of 1863 broke out, and he pleaded the insurgents’
cause, his reputation in Russia received its death-blow. From
that time it was only with the revolutionary party that he was in
full accord.
In 1873 a collection of his works in French was commenced in
Paris. A volume of posthumous works, in Russian, was published
at Geneva in 1870. His
Memoirs
supply the principal information
about his life, a sketch of which appears also in A. von Wurzbach’s
Zeitgenossen
, pt. 7 (Vienna, 1871). See also the
Revue des deux
mondes
for July 15 and Sept. 1, 1854.
Kto Vinovat?
has been translated
into German under the title of
Wer ist schuld?
in Wolffsohn’s
Russlands Novellendichter
, vol. iii. The title of
My Exile in Siberia
is misleading; he was never in that country.
(
W. R. S.-R.
)