The Cambridge Introduction to Russian Literature

The two “brothers,” Savva and his false friend, become inseparable. They travel to the friend’s home – which is Hell, of course, but on the horizon of earth, a city of gold – to present Satan with the God-rejecting letter. At this point the tale veers off to the west, much as the leaner Grimm tale, “Faithful John,” had opened up to absorb a Koshchey-the-Deathless subplot when that famous German folk tale moved east. Savva Grudtsyn incorporates Muscovite military history as well as a Polish chivalric subplot. The two brothers join the tsar’s mercenaries fighting to recapture Smolensk from thePoles (an historically documented battle from the early 1630s). Savva jousts with three giant Polish knights, defeating them (although not without some wounds) with the devil’s help. Then Savva falls ill. The final phase begins.

Several aspects of this remarkable final segment prefigure the later, great moral Realists, most notably Leo Tolstoy, whose 1890 story “The Devil” begins

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with a similar psychological dynamic. Savva both knows, and does not wish to know, the true identity of his patron. His dilemma is at the core of traditional Russian religious thought, which values self-discipline and believes in the transfiguration, rather than the condemnation, of the human body. The devil depends for his effectiveness on a mix of outer stimulation and inner inclination. We know that evil has triumphed within us when we lose control, when our desire cannot be satisfied, when it becomes insatiable and thus unstable. This is the truth that the gentle Russian ascetics such as Abbot Theo-dosius (and Dostoevsky’s Elder Zosima) speak to the fanatics among their flock. The devil exploits the bad habits of the undisciplined body, but it is still our body and we still must answer for it. This lesson, which became central to the Russian psychological novel, registers in lapidary fashion on the body of Savva Grudtsyn.

Savva has fallen ill, and he is persuaded by a “wise, God-fearing woman” to take confession. The devil-brother immediately appears to him, waving the contract. For days, weeks, Savva undergoes the most awful physical tortures: he is thrown against the wall, onto the floor, throttled “until he begins to gasp and foam comes from his mouth” (p. 470). The bystanders can do nothing. Nor – significantly – do they attempt to do anything. The tale is marvelously dry-eyed. The Tsar is informed, so that there will be no ugly litigation should the courageous youth “die in such miserable plight” and those who are attending him be held accountable. All parties understand that Savva’s repentance must be paid for in the currency of the initial sin. For every hour of pleasurable uncontrolled lust, he will undergo an equivalent hour of torment.

In the final step of his return to life, Savva has a vision that the Mother of God will save him on Her holy day – but only if he agrees to take monastic vows. He is carried, crippled with torment, to the door of the church. A voice commands him to get up and enter the sanctuary; like Ilya Muromets, he rises to his feet as if he had never been ill. Suddenly, a “most marvelous miracle” occurs: the God-rejecting letter flutters down from the cupola, and “all writing was erased” (p. 473).

Miracle, magic, law

This survey of saints’ lives, folk tales, one epic bylina, and one hybrid cautionary tale barely taps the richness of Russian medieval literary forms. It omits many vital genres: chronicle histories, homilies, sermons, apocrypha, early travel literature, Kievan epic and Old Believer autobiography. The militant reformers of Peter the Great’s revolutionary era will redefine Russia as separate from this

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ancient heritage, in an attempt to start the culture anew. Before we survey this eighteenth-century divide in Chapter 4, can any generalizations be made about Russia’s traditional dual-faith culture?