“Fëdor Dostoevskij and Eduard Manet”
-In 1862 Dostoevsky travels around Europe and observes the effects of the industrial and cultural revolution. He makes a comparison with Russia and take notes of the superficiality of the European environment and of the city of Paris.
-In 1863 Eduard Manet, using his pictorial technique, scandalizes Paris and the aforementioned Parisians by exhibiting “Luncheon on the grass” at the Hall of Refused.
-From the written impressions of Dostoevsky to the impressions painted by Manet to conclude with the reactions aroused in spectators and readers.
In “Winter notes on summer impressions” the author begins to write saying that he does not want to report precise data, for the data there are encyclopedias and guides, but he wants to convey sincere impressions to his readers. Dostoevsky does not like the homologation of thought such that you go to check on “authoritative sources” if your thoughts are right. For Dostoevsky this is true both for Russian and European citizens.
The author wants the citizens, both the bourgeois who have started new jobs linked to industrialization and the peasants who continue to work the land, to advance culturally and that the education they receive is not a “list of rules” to obey but a stimulus for reasoning.
Unfortunately, Dostoevsky is disappointed both at home and abroad. The decline that Dostoevsky perceives is given by the fact that the former brigands who committed misdeeds out of necessity have now been replaced by honest people who behave “cowardly by virtue”. In this sense, the Russian and French nobility, and both the ruling classes of the two countries share the same defects despite the distances. Dostoevsky takes up the motto “Freedom, equality and fraternity” and observing the reality affirms that is not realized or even applied. Fact checking reveals that the new way of life has been elaborated precisely to maintain, by other means, differences and exploitation. We report that Dostoevsky, one year after the outbreak of the American Civil War, draws a parallel between the black slaves of the states of the south in the US and the part of the population who live in similar conditions in Paris, London and obviously in Russia.
“Winter notes on summer impressions” is considered a book in which Dostoevsky feeds his prejudice towards the West. I do not agree at all with this judgment which seems limited to the literal meaning of the work. Intrigued by the use of the word “impressions” in the title, I went to look for the “impressionists” par excellence and the first works of Eduard Manet, a precursor of the “Impressionist” current. In the year 1863, as everyone knows, “Luncheon on the grass” makes the headlines.
Here the fundamental facts: Manet confirms Dostoevsky’s impressions of Parisian citizenship, well dressed, but full of prejudices, who can read books but makes servile and unreasonable bows to both political and artistic orthodoxy. Dostoevsky’s observations show how profound is the lack of critical spirit of the new citizenship that arose thanks to the industrial revolution and how deep is the prejudice; better political institutions are needed.
At this point, “Luncheon on the grass” shown above should be seen in two ways. The first with our eyes in 2020 in which we can admire or not the painting technique and the second imagining that we live in the era in which it was exhibited. We are aware that nudes had been in vogue for some centuries, landscapes as well and therefore, one wonders why a woman without clothes sitting on a lawn is so surprising, with two men who do not even “observe” her but converse with each other.
What’s the problem? Her look towards the spectators? If this is the case, Dostoevsky’s impressions would be, I repeat, extremely truthful. In fact, even in the following years, Eduard Manet was never appreciated for his paintings and the critics continued his work of marginalization. Manet continued to counter the dominant thought with his paintings using official channels and therefore, he also revealed the impressions of Parisians and the reactions of Parisians despite the “grandeur”, education, the third estate, arts and crafts. At the end of the book there is the announcement, written by Dostoevsky, to promote his new magazine “Vremja” which will be published starting from January 1861, almost at the end the author explains that the editors will not hold back in the face of controversy, nor there will be hesitations to “annoy the geese of literature; their cry is sometimes useful: it announces the time that awaits us, even if it is not always enough to save the Capitol. “ (Pg 127. “Winter notes on summer impressions”. Ed. Feltrinelli). Again the intuition of Dostoevsky is carried forward by the paintings of Manet which regularly makes the geese of French critics quack as well as the bigoted citizenship.
For me, the work of both authors acquires an incalculable value.They have spent their lives trying to persuade the public to change their point of view to acquire their own, despite the violent orthodoxy that surrounded them. In this sense, even “The plum” of 1877 seems to be a portrait of a tired, alloyed bourgeoisie, devoted only to the superficiality of dressing and appearing.
I conclude by repeating that the method of analysis of Manet and Dostoevsky today, bombarded with all information of dubious origin, is even more fundamental to extricate oneself from those who try to sell something, those who want to preserve the “status quo” and those who instead want to arouse a critical spirit and make emerge a coherent and independent “composition” of the facts.
