Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Sidor ...
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
A BIOGRAPHY
231
vividly in "Væ Victis," and later in "Vera
Voront-zoff"1 — exercised a strong influence upon her, and
made her restless and nervous, full of longing and
impatience.
The light summer nights, so dear to me, only
enervated Sönya. " The everlasting sunshine seems to
promise so much," she would say, " but fails to fulfil
the promise. Earth remains cold—development is
retarded just when it has commenced. The summer
seems like a mirage—a will-o’-the-wisp which you
cannot overtake. The fact that the long days and light
nights begin so long before full summer comes is all
the more irritable because they seem to promise a joy
they can never fulfil."
Sönya could not work, but she maintained with more
and more eagerness that work—especially scientific
work—was no good; it could neither afford pleasure
nor cause humanity to progress. It was folly to waste
one’s youth on work, and especially was it unfortunate
for a woman to be scientifically gifted, for she was
thus drawn into a sphere which could never afford her
happiness.
As soon as the term ended that year, Sönya hastened
on " the short and beautiful journey from Stockholm"
to Malmö, and thence to the Continent. She went to
Paris, and wrote thence only one letter to me.
Contrary to her custom, it is dated.
142 Boulevard d’Enfer, June 26, 1886.
Dear Anha Carlotta : I have just received your letter. I
reproach myself very much that I have not written to you before.
I am ready to admit that I was a little jealous, and thought you
no longer cared for me. I have only time for a few lines — if my
letter is to be in time for to-day’s post—to tell you that you
are quite wrong in reproaching me for forgetting you when I
1 Appendix G.
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
