Page:Phelps - Essays on Russian Novelists.djvu/79

Rh oncerned, the father died while Turgenev was a boy, leaving him with only one—even if the more formidable—of his parents to contend with. His mother despised writers, especially those who wrote in Russian; she insisted that Ivan should make an advantageous marriage, and "have a career"; but the boy was determined never to marry, and he had not the slightest ambition for government favours. The two utterly failed to understand each other, and, weary of his mother's capricious violence of temper, he became completely estranged. Years later, in her last illness, Turgenev made repeated attempts to see her, all of which she angrily repulsed. He endeavoured to see her at the very last, but she died before his arrival. He was then informed that on the evening of her death she had given orders to have an orchestra play dance-music in an adjoining chamber, to distract her mind during the final agony. And her last thought was an attempt to ruin Ivan and his brother by leaving orders to have everything sold at a wretched price, and to set fire to other parts of the property. His comment on his dead mother was "Enfin, il faut oublier."

It is significant that Turgenev has nowhere in all his novels portrayed a mother who combined intelligence with goodness.

French, German, and English Turgenev learned as a child, first from governesses, and then from