Tag Archives: RKS literature

RKS Literature: Letter from Leopold Mozart to His Son 14November1777, Salzburg: What’s Necessary in Paris

“You can’t spend the whole winter travelling; and if you plan to stay anywhere, it should be in  large town with lots of people where there are hopes and opportunities of earning some money: and where is such a place to be found in the whole of this region?-apart from Paris- but life in ParisContinue reading “RKS Literature: Letter from Leopold Mozart to His Son 14November1777, Salzburg: What’s Necessary in Paris”

RKS Literature: Lording it Like a Real Gentleman (Gogol)

“By and large he lorded it like a real gentleman, as they say in the provinces, married a pretty girl with a dowry of two hundred serfs and several thousand in cash. These funds were immediately lavished on a team of six truly excellent horses, gilt locks for the doors, a tame monkey for theContinue reading “RKS Literature: Lording it Like a Real Gentleman (Gogol)”

RKS Literature: Did I Really Lose My Nose (Gogol)

“My God, my God. What have I done to deserve this? If I’d lost an arm or a leg it wouldn’t be so bad. Even without ears things wouldn’t be pleasant, but it wouldn’t be the end of the world. A man without a nose, though, is God knows what, neither fish nor fowl. JustContinue reading “RKS Literature: Did I Really Lose My Nose (Gogol)”

RKS Literature: The Hurons’ Anger Breaks Montcalm’s Promise of Safe Passage for the Surrendering British

“More than two thousand raving savages broke from the forest at the signal and threw themselves across the fatal plain with instinctive alacrity. We shall not dwell on the revolting horrors that succeeded. Death was everywhere, and in his most terrific and disgusting aspects. Resistance only seemed to inflame the murderers, who inflicted their furiousContinue reading “RKS Literature: The Hurons’ Anger Breaks Montcalm’s Promise of Safe Passage for the Surrendering British”

RKS Literature: Bad or simply strange people?

“We often complain how difficult or impossible it is to get on with certain people. That may of course be true. But many such people are not bad but only strange, and if you got to know them well with all their ins and outs and learnt how to deal with them properly, neither tooContinue reading “RKS Literature: Bad or simply strange people?”

RKS Literature: “The Communist Manifesto”: FREE TRADE

“The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all the feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his “natural superiors” and has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous cash payment. ItContinue reading “RKS Literature: “The Communist Manifesto”: FREE TRADE”

RKS Literature: “The Communist Manifesto”: The History of Existing Society

“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Freeman and slave, patrician and plebian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionaryContinue reading “RKS Literature: “The Communist Manifesto”: The History of Existing Society”

RKS Literature: The Fleeting State of Happiness (Anton Chekov)

“Someone ought to stand with a hammer at the door of every happy contented man, continually banging on it to remind him that there are unhappy people around and that however happy he may be at the time, sooner or later life will show him its claws and disaster will overtake him in the formContinue reading “RKS Literature: The Fleeting State of Happiness (Anton Chekov)”

RKS Literature: Happiness as Mass Hypnosis? (Anton Chekov)

“But we don’t hear or see those who suffer: the real tragedies of life are enacted somewhere behind the scenes. Everything is calm and peaceful and the only protest comes from statistics-and they can’t talk. Figures show that so many went mad, so many bottles of vodka were emptied, so many children died of malnutrition.Continue reading “RKS Literature: Happiness as Mass Hypnosis? (Anton Chekov)”

RKS Literature: Accepting a Nasty Marriage (Anton Chekov)

“She had married for money because, as her ex-schoolgirl friends put it, he was madly rich, because she was terrified of becoming an old maid, like Rita, because her doctor father got on her nerves and because she wanted to annoy Little Volodya. Had she guessed when she was contemplating marriage that it would turnContinue reading “RKS Literature: Accepting a Nasty Marriage (Anton Chekov)”