Korney Chukovsky

“ Winter life in a Finnish village is mean, uncomfortable, and dead. Snow and stillness—even the wolves do not howl. A Finnish village is not for dukes.
Anyway this magnificent life seemed at times theatrical. Behind the coulisses there seemed to be hiding something else.
"You think that's granite?" said a drunken writer to me once, standing in front of the façade of Andreyev's house. "It's not granite, but cardboard. Blow on it and it will tumble down." ”

“ Why was he struggling in the Gulf of Finland when he was great enough to wade through the ocean? How could such an exceptional soul be wasted on gramophones? Yesterday he spent the whole night talking about war; for eight hours he paced up and down the room declaiming a wonderful monologue on Zeppelins, landings, bloody Austrian fields. Why doesn't he go there himself? Why does he stick in the desert, seeing nothing, knowing nothing, and unburdening himself only to a passing friend? ”

“ But however hard the writer blew, it did not collapse; yet there was truth in his drunken words; in actuality there was something theatrical and decorative in everything that surrounded or reflected Andreyev. The whole interior of his house had this character, and the house itself—in the Norwegian style, with a tower—looked like the creation of a talented scenic artist. Andreyev's costumes suited him as they suit an operatic tenor—costumes of a sportsman, artist, sailor. ”

“ Sometimes, watching him as he strolled about the yard, among his stables and outhouses, followed by his magnificent hound, Tyucha, or posed, dressed in a velvet coat, in front of some visiting photographer, one could not believe that this man could be carrying within him a tragic consciousness of eternity, non-existence, chaos, worldly desolation. ”

“ You attempt to talk about something else. He listens only out of politeness. To-morrow is varnishing day at the Academy of Arts, yesterday he was visited by Ryepin, the day after to-morrow he is going to Gallen. You feel inclined to ask, "What about the yacht?"—but the members of the family sign to you, "Don't ask." Having become interested in something, Andreyev can talk about nothing else; all his previous enthusiasms become repulsive to him. . . . He does not like to be reminded of them.
When he plays at being an artist he forgets his previous part as a sailor ”

“ There are people who seem to have been created for oppression and poverty: it is difficult to conceive Dostoevsky as degenerate. To do so would be unnaturally perverse. Similarly, Leonid Andreyev was meant to be a magnate: every one of his movements suggested the grandee. ”

“ If he could only use the energy which he spends in his nightly pacing up and down his room—or even half of it—for other purposes, he would be a remarkable traveller; he would wander round the whole world, eclipsing Livingstone and Stanley. ”

“ It seems that not one man, but a gigantic factory, working in shifts, has produced these numberless heaps of large and small photographs, which have been piled up in his room stored in special boxes and chests, which hang in the windows and are stacked up on chairs. ”

“ His room was turned into a studio. He is as fertile as Rubens; the brush never leaves his hand the whole day. You pass from one room to another and he shows you his golden, yellow-green, pictures. Here is a scene from The Life of Man. ”