A Hero of Our Time

by Mikhail Lermontov

If only people thought a little more about it, they would see that life is not worth worrying about so much.

The story of a man’s soul, even the pettiest, can be more interesting and instructive than the story of a whole nation, especially if it is based on the self-observation of a mature mind and is written with no vain desire to arouse sympathy or surprise.

She had plenty of breeding, and breeding in a woman, as in a horse, means a lot – a discovery first made by Young France.10 It (breeding, that is, not Young France) comes out chiefly in a woman’s walk, in her hands and feet, the nose being specially significant. In Russia a well-shaped nose is rarer than a tiny foot.

My whole life has been nothing but a series of dismal, unsuccessful attempts to go against heart or reason.

My premonitions have never deceived me. There’s no one so susceptible to the power of the past as I am. Every memory of past joy or sorrow stabs at my heart and strikes the same old chords. It’s silly the way I’m made: I forget nothing – absolutely nothing.

‘In the first place, she scarcely knows me as yet.’ ‘Women only love men they don’t know.’

Passions are merely ideas in their initial stage. They are the property of youth, and anyone who expects to feel their thrill throughout his life is a fool. Tranquil rivers often begin as roaring waterfalls, but no river leaps and foams all the way to the sea. Tranquillity, however, is often a sign of great, if hidden, power.

‘The world’s a fool, fortune’s a whore, and life’s a bore.’