RKS RUSSIAN LITERATURE: Bloodsucker Mademoiselle Blanche Completely Cleans Out Our Protagonist (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

I frequently had recourse to champagne because I constantly felt depressed and bored, owing to the fact that I was living in the most bourgeois, mercenary milieu imaginable, where every sou was counted and grudged. Indeed, two weeks had not gone by before I realized Blanche had no real affection for me, even though she dressed me in elegant clothes, and tied my cravat herself every day. Quite simply, she utterly despised me. But that did not bother me at all. Bored and depressed I generally spent my evening at the Château des Fleurs where I would get drunk and dance the cancan (which in that establishment, was performed pretty indecently) with some distinction. At length, the time came when Blanche had drained my purse dry.

Fyodor Dostoevsky, “The Gambler”, 1866

RKS RUSSIAN LITERATURE: Mademoiselle Blanche an Unapologetic Bloodsucker (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

‘What do you want with money?’ she would say to me with an air of total simplicity, and I never argued the point. She fitted out her flat very nicely with the money, which did not stop her from saying when, later, she was showing me over the rooms of her new home.’ See what care and taste can do with the most scanty means.’ That ‘scantiness’ however, had cost me fifty thousand francs! With the remaining fifty thousand she purchased a carriage and horses. Also we gave a couple of balls, evening parties attended by Hortense, and Lisette and Cléopâtre women remarkable both for the number of their liaisons and (though only in some cases) for their good looks. At these gatherings I had to play the ridiculous role of host, to meet and entertain fat parvenu merchants, unbearable both in their rudeness and their boasting, colonels of various kinds, starving authors and journalistic hacks, all in fashionable tailcoats and pale yellow gloves and displaying such conceit and boastfulness as would be unthinkable even in St. Petersburg- and that’s saying a lot!

Fyodor Dostoevsky, “The Gambler”, 1866

RKS Literature: Giving Thanks to God When There is No One Else to Give it To (Salman Rushdie)

I always in my own godless way found it hard to believe that she actually believed in an actually existing god. But she probably did; I was probably wrong about that too; and anyway, what other word is there? When there’s that gratitude in you for life’s dumb luck, when there’s nobody to thank and you need to thank somebody, what do you say? God, Vina said. The word sounded to me like a way of disposing emotion. It was a place to put something that had no place else to go.

Salman Rushdie, “The Ground Beneath Her Feet”, 1999

RKS RUSSIAN LITERATURE: Charlatan Poles at the Casino Robbing Grandmother (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

An hour later, the two Poles who earlier in the day had been thrown out of the casino, made a reappearance behind the old lady’s chair and renewed their offers of service, even if only to be sent on errands; but Potapych told me these rascals exchanged winks with the said “gentleman of honour”, and the latter handed something to them. Next, since Grandmother had not yet had lunch – she had scarcely left her chair for a moment – one of the two Poles ran to the casino restaurant and brought her a bowl of soup and afterwards some tea. In fact both Poles hastened to run errands for her. Eventually, at the end of the day there were no fewer than six natives of Poland who had never been seen or heard before: and as soon as the old lady staked the coin in question, they took no further notice of her, but pushed their way past her chair to the table, grabbed the money and staked it, shouting and arguing all the while, and squabbling with “the gentleman of honour” (who had also forgotten Grandmother’s existence) as though he was their equal. Even when Grandmother had lost everything and was returning to the hotel, some three or four Poles could not bring themselves to leave her, but continued running beside her chair and protesting volubly that Grandmother had cheated them and that she ought to be made to hand over what was not hers. Thus the party arrived at the hotel, from which the rogues were unceremoniously ejected.

Fyodor Dostoevsky, “The Gambler”, 1866

RKS RUSSIAN LITERATURE: Croupiers at Casino Guardians of Assets of the House (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

At the casino Grandmother seemed to be expected, for no time was lost in getting her to her former place beside the croupier. It is my opinion that though croupiers seem such ordinary humdrum officials – men who couldn’t care whether the bank wins or loses – they are, in reality anything but indifferent to the bank’s losing, and are given instructions to attract players, and to keep a watch over the bank’s interests, and that for such services, these officials are awarded gifts and bonuses. At all events the croupiers of Roulettenburg seemed to look on Grandmother as their rightful prey.

Fyodor Dostoevsky, “The Gambler”, 1866

RKS RUSSIAN LITERATURE: The Tedious and Unbearable Frenchman (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

He was a true Frenchman insofar as that, though he could be lively and engaging when it suited him, he became insufferably dull and wearisome as soon as the need for being lively and engaging had passed. Seldom is a Frenchman naturally polite: he is polite only to order and for a purpose. For example, if he thinks it is incumbent on him to be whimsical, original and unconventional, his behaviour is always silly and unnatural because it consists of trite and hackneyed forms. In short, the natural Frenchman is a conglomeration of commonplace, petty, everyday sobriety, making him the most tedious person in the world. I believe that the only the innocent and inexperienced, especially the Russians, feel an attraction towards the French; for to any man of sensibility, such a compendium of outworn forms, of drawing room manners, familiarity and gaiety, becomes instantly noticeable and quite unbearable.

Fyodor Dostoevsky, “The Gambler”, 1866

RKS RUSSIAN LITERATURE: Yet Another Satirical Knock on the Germans (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

I remember that the baroness was clad in a voluminous silk dress, pale grey in colour, and adorned with flounces and a crinoline and train. Also, she was short and inordinately fat, while her gross, flabby chin completely concealed her neck. Her face was purple, and the little eyes in it had an impudent, malicious expression. Yet she walked as though she was conferring a favour on everybody by doing so. As for the baron, he was tall, wizened and, like most Germans wry faced, and he was wearing spectacles. He would be about forty-five. And he had legs that seemed to begin almost at his chest – a sign of good breeding. Yet for all his air of peacock like conceit, his clothes were a little baggy, and he had a sheep-like look on his face which some might have taken for a look of profundity.

Fyodor Dostoevsky, “The Gambler”, 1866

RKS CANADIAN LITERATURE: Teen Phone Obsession and Illiteracy (Joanna Goodman)

Arden looks helplessly around Ivey’s room, her eyes darting wildly from the closet to the backpack on the floor to the drawers of her desk, wishing she could tear it all apart and uncover some piece of her child, something stashed away, hidden. Letters, a diary, poems, notes she’s passed to friends in class. Arden used to do that, save all her notes in a shoebox, but she won’t find any of that in here. Kids don’t write anymore. There are no more paper trails. Everything is on their phone now, locked behind impenetrable passcodes or messages that evaporate into thin air. Technology makes them as slippery as eels. Arden has never felt so powerless.

Joanna Goodman, “The Inheritance”, Harper Collins 2024

RKS RUSSIAN LITERATURE: Russian Ineptitude and German Efficiency (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

‘On the fact that to the virtues and merits of the civilized Westerner, there has, historically, been added – almost as his main virtue – a capacity for acquiring capital, whereas not only is the Russian incapable of acquiring capital, but he also loses what he has wantonly and by sheer folly. Nonetheless, we Russians often need money, so we are glad of, and greatly devoted to, a method of acquiring it such as roulette, whereby one may grow rich in a couple of hours without doing any work. This method, I repeat, has a great attraction for us, but since we play recklessly, and without taking any trouble, we almost invariably lose.

I would rather live a wandering life in a Kirghiz tent,’ I cried ‘than bow the knee to the German idol!’

‘What idol?’ exclaimed the General, now seriously angry.

‘The German method of amassing riches.’

Fyodor Dostoevsky, “The Gambler”, 1866

RKS CANADIAN LITERATURE: Teen Phone Obsession (Joanna Goodman)

Scott didn’t think Ivey having her own phone at eleven was a problem. Meth is a problem he’d say. Opioids are a problem. Let her have a phone. But he isn’t here to see how the powerful triumvirate of Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok have brainwashed his sweet daughter; how it’s shaped her personality, reprogrammed her developing mind, afflicted her self-esteem, taught her to live and die by the number of likes and comments and the twin gods of comparison and FOMO.

Joanna Goodman, “The Inheritance”, Harper Collins 2024