Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 1.pdf/174

148 successor, there existed comparative freedom for the literary expression of political and social ideas. The novel now became a forum for the sociological analysis of society and its evolution, verse yielding place to prose.

The position secured by criticism through the work of Bělinskii was maintained, and the opposition to official Russia was continued. In this connection must be mentioned the names of many authors unknown in Europe, those of Maikov and Miljutin, the Comtists, those of Družinin, Annenkov, etc. The realists of the sixties exercised great influence, above all Černyševskii, Dobroljubov, and Pisarev. Next to them comes Mihailovskii, whose work as critic continued for more than thirty years.

Conservative and reactionary literature was notably weaker than progressive literature, alike quantitatively and qualitatively.

Characteristic of the epoch and of its consolidating character are the historico-philosophical investigations which form the content and purport of Černyševskii's novel What is to be Done? whose title sums up the whole problem. The book in question is devoted to an account of these various philosophical doctrines, but in the present historical sketch no more than a brief reference can be made to the different trends.

The contrast between Russia and Europe, between Old Russia and New, between Moscow and St. Petersburg, is represented by two parties, the slavophils (Kirěevskii, Homjakov, etc.) and the westerners (Čaadaev, etc.). The počvenniki, those whose leading interest was the land (počva, soil), occupy an intermediate position; so also do the narodniki, who take their stand upon the common people and upon the folk institutions of mir and artel.

Černyševskii marched forward to the adoption of western socialism; so did Herzen, whose "Kolokol" was at this time exercising considerable influence abroad. Side by side with Herzen, and sometimes in conjunction with him, Bakunin became representative of revolutionary socialism and anarchism.

The conservative and reactionary tendency, led in the journalistic world by Katkov, found a spokesman in Pobědonoscev, and in Dostoevskii as well.

Alike practically and theoretically, the alternative between