Oscar Wilde is actually rather annoying

I first encountered Mr Wilde when I was 12 (perhaps 14?...), through his essay The Decay of Lying, which I still enjoy. It wasn't until now, however, that I've begun to read The Importance of Being Earnest.

"CECILY: I am afraid I am not learned at all. All I know is about the relations between Capital and Idleness--and that is merely from observation. So I don't suppose it is true.
MISS PRISM: Cecily, that sounds like Socialism! And I suppose you know where Socialism leads to?
CECILY: Oh, yes! That leads to Rational Dress, Miss Prism. And I suppose that when a woman is dressed rationally, she is treated rationally. She certainly deserves to be."

Which brings me back to an earlier scene from the same play:

"JACK: Is that clever?
ALGERNON: It is perfectly phrased! And quite as true as any observation in civilized life should be."

Likewise here, and here:

"CECILY: ... I hope that you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wicked and being really good all the time. That would be hypocrisy.
ALGERNON (looks at her in amazement): Oh! Of course I have been rather reckless."

"ALGERNON: ... Indeed, it is not even decent...and that sort of thing is enormously on the increase. The amount of women who flirt with their own husbands is perfectly scandalous. It looks so bad. It is simply washing one's clean linen in public [emphasis mine]."

He knew exactly what he was doing! Shameless.

Russian Futurists in a Nutshell

From Featuring Talking Guinea Pigs:

Man: 1st generation of futurists
Guinea pig: everyone else

Review of Laurie Manchester's /Holy Fathers, Secular Sons: Clergy, Intelligentsia, and the Modern Self in Revolutionary Russia/ by Christopher Read

From the American Historical Review, Vol 114, No 3 (June 2009).

"At the heart of Manchester's book is an analysis of the small--maybe one percent of the population (p.12)--group of sons of priests (popovichi). Traditionally, scholars have dismissed them as raznochintsy (people of miscellaneous ranks). Instead, Manchester presents them as a relatively clearly defined class with its own ethos and with an influence extending well beyond the church and well beyond its numerical strength."

I've always thought of Raskolnikov as a pretty stereotypical raznochinets.

"In particular, she illustrates many places, including the early Bolshevik Party, where popovichi exerted an influence, despite their small numbers. ... Among such fascinating insights, Manchester notes the way the popovichi identified themselves against the earlier, noble-descended intelligentsia, and how the attempt by Dmitrii Tolstoi to corral popovichi within the clerical estate by refusing to recognize their qualifications as valid for university entrance in fact ensured the values of the seminary would spread to society."

Add this to the long, long list of reasons there's never been a strong libertarian movement in Russia: an influential portion of its intelligentsia were the sons of priests (Catholic liberal embrace of the welfare state, anyone?).

"There are also tantalizing glimpses of unusual attitudes among the popovichi toward sexuality. Aleksei Dmitrievskii failed to consummate his marriage because 'romantic passion' was satisfied by his work. 'Scholarship is the most charming of the women in the world...its embrace...takes care of all the afflictions and misfortunes of life,' he wrote. Note surprisingly, his wife did not agree and left him (p. 185)."

Guess who was the son of a priest? Nikolai Chernyshevsky, socialist-marxist-utilitarian extraordinaire, and author of What is to be done? (so good that Lenin stole the title!). There are some great footnotes in this edition that delve into Chernyshevsky's theories about romantic life; if you've somehow dragged yourself through the beast of a 'novel' you'll understand just as well. Manchester based her book on "a study of 207 identifiable popovichi." It's terrifying how accurate a portrait such a study painted.

"...in Manchester's words, 'popovichi did not repudiate the clerical traditions of the Russian Orthodox Church,' but 'they managed paradoxically to see themselves as leaving the clergy in order to preserve clerical traditions and impose them on secular society.' This, she argues, is 'the very opposite of traditional secularization theory and dechristianization' (p.155)."

Noted.

Painting: Philosophers - Mikhail Nesterov