CHAPTER 8. HUMAN SENTIMENTALITY.

February 8, 1971.

“He never believed in me! From the very first moments of my existence, was he extremely biased against my unique nature? Why was I born then? Maybe I was just a whim of chance? Be that as it may, it seemed he was not happy to have me. He constantly pointed out my flaws and never mentioned my merits—that’s how I first learned the feeling of injustice. My soul grew in a garden of humiliation and was rarely nourished by life-giving moisture in the form of a few kind words—and did I need anything more? All the works I studied were despised by him just because it was my own choice—he fiercely yearned to make me a product of his peculiar thoughts, where the key role was played by a long-forgotten and, most importantly, gone past… Having no one and nothing in this world, I first began to seek solace in creativity—having achieved certain successes, known only to me, in the thickets of Melpomene, I realized that all those who now despise me will soon admire me: for that reason I felt warmer, but for that reason, I also temporarily lost my inspiration—isn’t pride the main enemy of inspiration?… Every day, listening to all kinds of humiliation and insults, thereby tirelessly hardening my own patience, my own soul, and my own mind, being, perhaps, the most unhappy person within the confines of this sublunary world, every evening, completely plunging into the abyss of creativity, I was, without a doubt, the happiest person on earth—I had everything I wanted: in front of me was a pencil and a blank sheet of paper! Night—that was the best time of day for me, but… but it, to my great regret, was, like everything in this world, fleeting: every morning, the ruins of past happiness smoldered in my consciousness! Every morning I woke up to go through a life of purgatory throughout the day, and at the end of the day, at night, at the very time of day which is often associated with dark forces, to find heavenly pleasure! Suffering for the sake of pleasure—that was my motto! Yes, I suffered, I openly suffered—did he love me if he not only didn't want to stop it, but also caused it daily? During the day my soul wept from pain, while at night—tears of happiness streamed from my eyes! Growing in an environment of destruction, I not only did not get destroyed but also created! A wonderful story! A pitiful, insignificant blade of grass, entirely permeated only by the energy of the Universe, only by the thirst for life, only by the impulses of natural instincts, for some reason managed to show its appearance in one of the cracks of seemingly unshakable asphalt! Asphalt! The pitiful, insignificant blade of grass found a crack in it—from the side, people naively believe that it cut through it!… He couldn't bear it, but even more, he couldn't come to terms with the fact that some people accepted my "wrongness" as something "normal," "right," and some people even admired it! Yes, such people also exist and have existed!… He always chased after mediocre idols, and all mediocre idols were my main enemies—he adored Dumas and hated Rousseau: he adored the first because he had read his works, and hated the second just because he had never read him… and he would never have read him, and even if he had, he would, without a doubt, not have understood! He adored the perfectly well-known mediocre Constance and hated the completely unknown exceptional Julie!… He always admired those whom history remembers in one way or another—insane and bloodthirsty warriors, and never loved those who are always in oblivion throughout history—virtuous and pious people! The former were always his idols, while the latter were never an example for him!… He… he was afraid to admit that I surpassed him in intellect, and so he hated me!… He never believed in me, but now he is proud of my successes! What can I say! He never believed in God either, but he always claimed to be a person who strictly adhered to the canons of faith! Had he read the lines of the Bible even once? Of course not! That is precisely why I don’t believe in God, because I have studied the lines of the Bible very carefully! Which of us is closer to the truth—he or I?… He used my time as if it belonged to him entirely—was he pious? He hated freedom and revered slavery—was he a creation of civilization? Whoever he was… I became withdrawn! The Uroboros was closing—I gradually stopped feeling the need for one or another manifestation of the outside world: with every minute, my own world became more and more filled with diverse images in my nature—in it, I was God and the devil, in it, I was everything and nothing, in it, I was chaos and harmony… I died to the outside world for the sake of life for the inner world!… Tears now fall from my eyes to the ground just as for some reason, the moisture that has escaped from the stone confinement of the aqueduct rushes to the parched and therefore unsightly soil, to the sublunary matter!

All the time, my whole life—and the moments of his life since I appeared in it—he, as if a blinded player, as if lost in the dark… all the time he bet on the wrong people, and at the very moment when his eyes finally opened, at the very moment when he finally saw the light… he had nothing left to bet! He had spent everything on his false ideals and principles—he only realized their falsity now, when harsh reality knocked them out from under his feet! What can I say, a worthy support, a worthy foundation for the views of a person who constantly spoke of understanding and knowing the laws of life in this sublunary world!… Ah! I cannot stop my mind now—my words follow the very first word of that record as blindly as the Myrmidons followed Achilles!…

I did not become who I am today—I became this long ago: today I am surrounded by recognition, wealth, and glory: today I am surrounded by vices… Today he is proud of me, he admires me in the very minutes when everyone does… even the last of those who most sincerely despised me! But did he feel the same feelings then, when the thoughts now revered by all were continuously pouring from my pen onto the snow-white purity of cheap parchment? No! I am by no means claiming to be a comrade of Martin Eden! No! Martin Eden was moved by love for a woman, while I was moved by only one desire—the desire to prove the fallacy, the falsehood of his views! But is one person worthy of another person writing many, if not exceptional, then, without a doubt, extraordinary works for the sake of his enlightenment, and accordingly, the destruction of his delusion?… Nonsense! So what was really moving me? Egoism? The desire to be happy? The desire to make another unhappy?…