The Double

9

Balshazzar’s feast, described in Chapter 5 of the Old Testament book of Daniel, became the prototype of any sumptuous feast. The house of Clicquot (Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin) in Reims, founded in 1772, produces one of the finest champagnes. Eliseevs’ and Miliutin’s were actual shops on Nevsky Prospect (Eliseevs’ is still flourishing). The “fatted calf ” is found in Luke 15:23, the parable of the prodigal son: “And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat, and be merry.” For the table of ranks, see note 1 above.

10

Alexander Pushkin (1799–1837) is the greatest of Russian poets.

11

Demosthenes (384–322 b.c.) was an Athenian political leader, whose powerful oratory awakened the Greek national spirit in the conflict with Macedonia.

12

See note 1 above.

13

Anton Antonovich Setochkin will reappear in Dostoevsky’s Notes from Underground (1864), where he is the anonymous hero’s superior in the civil service.

14

Joseph, comte de Villele (1773–1854), French statesman, was leader of the ultra-royalists under the Restoration (1814–30) and president of the Council of Ministers from 1821 to 1828. The laws passed under his leadership made him extremely unpopular.

15

The Story of the English Milord George and Frederike Louise, Margravine of Brandenburg, with the Appended Story of the Former Turkish Vizier Marzimiris, by Matvei Komarov, was first published in 1782; its ninth edition came out in 1839.

16

Goliadka is an endearing diminutive of goliada (probably cognate with goliy, “naked”), meaning a poor man, a beggar.

17

After the disastrous flood of 1824, the citizens of Petersburg were warned of the danger of flooding by the firing of a cannon from the Peter and Paul fortress.

18

See note 7 above. The line “And the coffer had no trick to it” is from the fable “The Coffer.”

19

Field Marshal Alexander V. Suvorov (1729–1800), supreme commander of Russian forces under Catherine the Great, fought successfully against the Turks, put down the Polish uprising in 1794, and fought against the French revolutionary army in Italy until his defeat by Marshal Massena in 1799. He was known for several eccentricities, one of which was crowing like a rooster.

20

Karl Pavlovich Briullov (1799–1852), leader of the Russian Romantic school of painters, finished his most famous painting, The Last Day of Pompeii, in Italy in 1833; in 1834 it was brought to Russia and exhibited at the Academy of Fine Arts in Petersburg, where it met with great public admiration and critical acclaim.

21

A line from the eighteenth-century Russian poet A. P. Sumarokov (1717–77) in the prologue “New Laurels,” written for a ballet performed on the occasion of Catherine the Great’s birthday in 1759.