period of reform and one of reaction. The period of expectation and reform
is generally referred to as 'the sixties' even though it ran from 1856 to
1866. The periojLfifreaction followed the first attejn?t_onthelife_ of the _
Tsar in i866_and las^3ZjmBriii!e^-sggeCTStul assassination~of i88iTlinlike
Alexander I, Alexander Ilach^lyprornuhjgtedaseries of profound re
forms: freeing the serfsTTnstituting trial by jury, and creating zemstvos for
liffliteTTloc^^The
most important cultural and in1gflectulu'TIewlopm5it ofTneage was done outside of, and in opposition to, him and his court. Moreover, the period of most passionate rejection of official ideology occurred during the 'sixties,' the^perjod oJLgreatest liberalization; whereas the ?61111?????? affirmatioaa of the alienated intellectuals occurred _during the period of gpvernmenjgj reaction in the seventies.
Clearly the concerns of the thinking class were developing their own^ inde^end^nTdyn^mlcTTo understand it one musFconsider the psychology of the self-conscious, 'new men of the sixties.' This ic^oclastic^stud^e^ts^ generation effected in a few short years one of the~rnostthorough and far^J reaching rejections of past tradition in the history orrn^d^rrj^Eu^peTOut of this fermSTTfKsia produced in the later years of Alexander's reign a number of disturbing new ideologies of which the most important and original was theVpopulist movement, ^o central was this movement to the cultural accomplishments and aspu^ohs~oTthe'period that it is_more correct to sFpa^l^lJ^_r:T1ll1'''~^S thiil' Sjj age of Alexander II.
This newjgagrjition had been brought up in the harsh last years_pf Nicholas3'reign and had come to'stuorv in ^t'~1*etersbTirg amidst the grgaL. exftectafjo^Jar^elorniitiaLprevailed under JSeSajadjErJhev looked to the new regime with some of the optimism with which the reform-minded aristocracy a half century earlier had greeted the coming of Alexander I after the death of Paul But the new reformers lacked the broad aristocratic
1. l ?? ??? iv k»vwi
perspectives of earljer_reformers. ^he^Jn^lydMJ!mffi.^LXSHo^_jank?'
various minority groups. They included many provincial figures, who broiIgTu!«tnTrre!^
therlSSS '
merely tfietsar^^ himsdr=^w^s~m~arisrepute because of defeat in battle.
TEe^Sew-studditif-geHeration included an unusually large number of former seminarians, who brought with them a certain passion for absolute answers to the 'cursed questions' which hypnotized and seduced many of their uprooted and impressionable fellow students. The most important among these were the 'two Saint Nicholases,' Chernyshevsky and Dobroliu-bov, two former seminarians who dominated an editorial staff known as 'the consistory' of the journal with which Belinsky had ended his career, The Contemporary.
Taking the materialism of Feuerbach and the rationalism of the English utilitarians as their starting point', these influential critics helped lead the young generation into a systematic rejection of all past tradition and of the entire idealistic framework' within which the discussions of the aristocratic centm^ had ???? ????}?
on 'rational egoism*r'and a strict^mlibation of the utilitarian calculusjjf maximizing material pleasure. They imitated Belinsky's iconoclasm and glorified at the same time the art of the 'Gogolian period' of Russian literature with its concerns for suffering humanity over that of the more composed 'Pushkinians,' for whom art did not basically serve a social purpose. They preached the equality of sexes, thg_sancjity of the natural , sciences, a^^^^^^^r^cof^m^u^mdittxiaJL self-interest 1??~????? J everyjdeological pose. They-and even more, their imitators-:
their com^pe^ensForseparation from the past by adopting bizarre forms*' Ky4
of dress, practTcTngfree~*ove7and* attem^tirrgToTrvie^d WQrk cojrimuTranYr.
Medallions of Rousseau were worn in place of Orthodox medals; the stac-*' cato cry 'Man is a worm' {chelovek-cherviak) was shouted out at theology lectures;msultingremarks were made about Shakespeare, Raphael, Pushkin, and other artists especially revered by the older generation.
The waToTTBe generations was d^amaTrze^^y~Tufgenev in his famous Po^^kCS^jg^^'g^r^Jch he pubHsh?d^S]T8e2jug^afterTie, as™a representative of the 'fathers' ' generation, had left The Contemporary','' denouncii^^he~^sbevslqr^nd_Pobroliubov as 'literary Robespierres' 'trying to wipe from the face of the earth poetry, the fine arts, all aesthetic pleasures, and to impose in their place mere seminarian principles.'31 The
hero of the novel is Bazarov, the leader of the 'sons' and a young medical student who rejects all established aesthetic, moral, or religious ideals and spends his time dissecting frogs. His credo is that 'two and two is four and everything else is rubbish.' The term Turgenev used to describe Bazarov's philosophy was 'nihilism,' which accurately suggests the almost totally negative attitude of the 'men of the sixties' to all traditional ideas and practices. Chernyshevsky's associates considered Bazarov a caricature, but Pisarev, another rismgj^omig iconoclast, hajfled_BaarovjisJiJ^gllflixiSedel for ihe_!'ne3K-niea' of the sixties. When Dobroliubov died jn_i86i and
Chernyshevsky was arrested the following year~~PJsarey became the leading apostle of nihilistic materialism and remained so until 1868, when he-like Dobrolrubovandlo many others went tfl_an early death.
The importance of this spasm of negation would be hard to overemphasize. AlthoujpnrwaTaTrn^
it ^affected prgjaselythose'talented ISguteTwEISrer^to' projade the leader-ship in almost ewayTIeTdof cuTmTal effiteavor' for the remainder of the century^ Pisarev was correct in saying tEaPTf ???^???^???^?????^?? is the malady of our time.'32 No one was ever quite the same again, because the young generation had deliberately broken with the broader humanistic cuiture~oTtHe ansto^liy''as~*weTl as~tKe'official Orthodox culture 'of the tsans~fregiIip~Tne first and perhaps^ mostTnrportaht JesuifoFthe iconoclastic revolution was the opening of a decisrve_split between the newnjhffisg_arjd^ the original moderate Westernizers of the fortSCchSnylnevsky took the lead jn*Brea1ang WffiT^elzeniOTnis friendliness with liberals like Kavelin and Chicherin and his 'naive' hope for 'reform from above' through Alexander II. 'Let your 'bell' sound not for prayer but for the charge,' he wrote shortly after breaking with Herzen in 1859.33 The lesson to be learned from the revolution of 1848 was that radicals must avoi3'Trtfflg'4e,atfeT5nTp of revolutionary movements to timid liber
^ ?^-v,.j '??? imperfect and hesitant
