What Gorky said about Tolstory

 I like the documents that historians call primary sources: diaries, interviews, memoirs.

But, as Gabriel García Márquez suggested in yesterday’s note, interviews can be based in fantasy, rather than in fact. Diaries and memoirs can be similarly unreliable.

The great Russian writer Gorky left a portrait of the greater Russian writer Tolstoy.

Some of the details are — well, so detailed that they seem genuine. Gorky said Tolstoy had hands with big, ropy veins. He rolled books up like newspapers and put them into the big pocket of his tunic.

Gorky also said that Tolstoy laughed freely, used crude language about sex and asked everyone about their experiences with prostitutes.

It’s not exactly the picture of Tolstoy you get from reading The Gospel in Brief, The Kingdom of God is Within You or 23 Tales. Is Gorky a reliable witness?

Gorky also said Tolstoy really didn’t care much about his friend’s feelings. He valued truth and told it, even when it hurt. Gorky also said he liked to ask friends difficult questions: Do you love your wife? What do you think of yourself? He preferred those kinds of conversations to talking about the weather.

The Gorky remark that seems truest to me was his observation that Tolstoy had suspicious relations with God. He said that Tolstoy and God sometimes reminded him of two bears in one den.

Just so.