‘You do not love Russia YEt...’ What Nikolay Vasilievich quarrelled about with Vissarion Grigorievich

Abstract

How can a teacher make seemingly anachronistic literary polemics sound interesting to a modern student? The article offers an example of making an age-old dispute about the reasons of social hardships in Russia sound relevant. In June 1847, V. Belinsky penned his embittered and passionate missive to N. Gogol, full of fierce criticism of the latter's book Selected Passages from Correspondence with Friends [Vybrannye mesta iz perepiski s druziami]. Belinsky was convinced that the blame should fall on the despotic authorities and defective public and social institutions which restrict people's freedom and leave them morally debilitated; therefore, reforms must begin with an overthrow of the regime. Gogol was gazing inwards and decided that everybody had themselves to blame and should feel personally responsible. Who of the two was right? Were their opinions so irreconcilable? Gogol admitted that there was some truth in Belinsky's scolding, citing his disconnect due to living abroad, whereas Belinsky, insulted from the very first pages by what he called ‘obscurantism and bigotry,' may have overlooked or misinterpreted something, hot-tempered as he was.