Boredom

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From The Art of Seduction (2001)

  The greatest lack of all is excitement and adventure, which is precisely what seduction offers. In 1964, the Chinese actor Shi Pei Pu, a man who had gained fame as a female impersonator, met Bernard Bouriscout, a young diplomat assigned to the French embassy in China. Bouriscout had come to China looking for adventure, and was disappointed to have little contact with Chinese people. Pretending to be a woman who, when still a child, had been forced to live as a boy—supposedly the family already had too many daughters—Shi Pei Pu used the young Frenchman's boredom and or emotional side of his nature, rises to the surface and demands its rights. When such a period occurs, all that which has formerly seemed important loses its significance. The will-of- the-wisp of illusion leads the man hither and thither, taking him on strange and complicated deviations from his former path in life. Ming Huang, the "Bright Emperor" of the T'ang dynasty, was an example of the profound truth of this theory. From the moment he saw Yang Kuei-fei bathing in the lake near his palace in the Li mountains, he was destined to sit at her feet, learning from her the emotional mysteries of what the Chinese call Yin. —ELOISE TALCOTT HIBBERT, EMBROIDERED GAUZE: PORTRAITS OF FAMOUS CHINESE LADIES 174 • The Art of Seduction discontent to manipulate him. Inventing a story of the deceptions he had had to go through, he slowly drew Bouriscout into an affair that would last many years. (Bouriscout had had previous homosexual encounters, but con- sidered himself heterosexual.) Eventually the diplomat was led into spying for the Chinese. All the while, he believed Shi Pei Pu was a woman—his yearning for adventure had made him that vulnerable. Repressed types are perfect victims for a deep seduction. People who repress the appetite for pleasure make ripe victims, particu- larly later in their lives. The eighth-century Chinese Emperor Ming Huang spent much of his reign trying to rid his court of its costly addiction to lux- uries, and was himself a model of austerity and virtue. But the moment he saw the concubine Yang Kuei-fei bathing in a palace lake, everything changed. The most charming woman in the realm, she was the mistress of his son. Exerting his power, the emperor won her away—only to become her abject slave. The choice of the right victim is equally important in politics. Mass se- ducers such as Napoleon or John F. Kennedy offer their public just what it lacks. When Napoleon came to power, the French people's sense of pride was beaten down by the bloody aftermath of the French Revolution. He offered them glory and conquest. Kennedy recognized that Americans were bored with the stultifying comfort of the Eisenhower years; he gave them adventure and risk. More important, he tailored his appeal to the group most vulnerable to it: the younger generation.

• From The Annotated Lolita (1991)

  Thumbing through that battered tour book, I dimly evoke that Magnolia Garden in a southern state which cost me four bucks and which, according to the ad in the book, you must visit for three reasons: because John Galsworthy (a stone-dead writer of sorts) acclaimed it as the world’s fairest garden; because in 1900 Baedeker’s Guide had marked it with a star; and finally, because ... O, Reader, My Reader, guess! ... because children (and by Jingo was not my Lolita a child!) will “walk starry-eyed and reverently through this foretaste of Heaven, drinking in beauty that can influence a life.” “Not mine,” said grim Lo, and settled down on a bench with the fillings of two Sunday papers in her lovely lap. We passed and re-passed through the whole gamut of American roadside restaurants, from the lowly Eat with its deer head (dark trace of long tear at inner canthus), “humorous” picture post cards of the posterior “Kurort” type, impaled guest checks, life savers, sunglasses, adman visions of celestial sundaes, one half of a chocolate cake under glass, and several horribly experienced flies zigzagging over the sticky sugar-pour on the ignoble counter; and all the way to the expensive place with the subdued lights, preposterously poor table linen, inept waiters (ex-convicts or college boys), the roan back of a screen actress, the sable eyebrows of her male of the moment, and an orchestra of zoot-suiters with trumpets. We inspected the world’s largest stalagmite in a cave where three southeastern states have a family reunion; admission by age; adults one dollar, pubescents sixty cents. A granite obelisk commemorating the Battle of Blue Licks, with old bones and Indian pottery in the museum nearby, Lo a dime, very reasonable. The present log cabin boldly simulating the past log cabin where Lincoln was born. A boulder, with a plaque, in memory of the author of “Trees” (by now we are in Poplar Cove, N.C., reached by what my kind, tolerant, usually so restrained tour book angrily calls “a very narrow road, poorly maintained,” to which, though no Kilmerite, I subscribe). From a hired motor- boat operated by an elderly, but still repulsively handsome White Russian, a baron they said (Lo’s palms were damp, the little fool), who had known in California good old Maximovich and Valeria, we could distinguish the inaccessible “millionaires’ colony” on an island, somewhere off the Georgia coast.

• From The Art of Seduction (2001)

  The Pampered Royal. These people were the classic spoiled children. All of their wants and desires were met by an adoring parent—endless enter- tainments, a parade of toys, whatever kept them happy for a day or two. Where many children learn to entertain themselves, inventing games and finding friends, Pampered Royals are taught that others will do the enter- taining for them. Being spoiled, they get lazy, and as they get older and the parent is no longer there to pamper them, they tend to feel quite bored and restless. Their solution is to find pleasure in variety, to move quickly from person to person, job to job, or place to place before boredom sets in. They do not settle into relationships well because habit and routine of some kind are inevitable in such affairs. But their ceaseless search for variety is tiring for them and comes with a price: work problems, strings of unsatisfying ro- mances, friends scattered across the globe. Do not mistake their restlessness and infidelity for reality—what the Pampered Prince or Princess is really looking for is one person, that parental figure, who will give them the spoiling they crave. To seduce this type, be ready to provide a lot of distraction—new places to visit, novel experiences, color, spectacle. You will have to main- tain an air of mystery, continually surprising your target with a new side to your character. Variety is the key. Once Pampered Royals are hooked, things get easier for they will quickly grow dependent on you and you can put out less effort. Unless their childhood pampering has made them too difficult and lazy, these types make excellent victims——they will be as loyal to you as they once were to mommy or daddy. But you will have to do much of the work. If you are after a long relationship, disguise it. Offer long-term security to a Pampered Royal and you will induce a panicked flight. Recognize these types by the turmoil in their past—job changes, travel, short-term relationships—and by the air of aristocracy, no matter their social class, that comes from once being treated like royalty. The New Prude. Sexual prudery still exists, but it is less common than it was. Prudery, however, is never just about sex; a prude is someone who is excessively concerned with appearances, with what society considers ap- 152 • The Art of Seduction propriate and acceptable behavior. Prudes rigorously stay within the bounda- ries of correctness because more than anything they fear society's judg- ment. Seen in this light, prudery is just as prevalent as it always was. The New Prude is excessively concerned with standards of goodness, fairness, political sensitivity, tastefulness, etc.

• From The Art of Seduction (2001)

  The lover will find in the same person the pleasure of variety. Temper is the salt, the quality which prevents it front becoming stale. Restlessness, jealousy, quarrels, making friends again, spitefulness, all are the food of love. Enchant- ing variety? . . . Too constant a peace is produc- tive of a deadly ennui. Uniformity kills love, for as soon as the spirit of method mingles in an affair of the heart, the passion disappears, languor super- venes, weariness begins to wear, and disgust ends the chapter. —NINON DE L'ENCLOS, LIFE, LETTERS AND EPICUREAN PHILOSOPHY OF NINON DE L'ENCLOS 417 418 • The Art of Seduction return to inflicting pain and pulling back. Never rely on your physical charms; even beauty loses its appeal with repeated exposure. Only strategy and effort will fight off inertia. Maintain mystery. Familiarity is the death of seduction. If the target knows everything about you, the relationship gains a level of comfort but loses the elements of fantasy and anxiety. Without anxiety and a touch of fear, the erotic tension is dissolved. Remember: reality is not seductive. Keep some dark corners in your character, flout expectations, use absences to fragment the clinging, possessive pull that allows familiarity to creep in. Maintain some mystery or be taken for granted. You will have only yourself to blame for what follows. Maintain lightness. Seduction is a game, not a matter of life and death. There will be a tendency in the "post" phase to take things more seriously and personally, and to whine about behavior that does not please you. Fight this as much as possible, for it will create exactly the effect you do not want. You cannot control the other person by nagging and complaining; it will make them defensive, exacerbating the problem. You will have more con- trol if you maintain the proper spirit. Your playfulness, the little ruses you employ to please and delight them, your indulgence of their faults, will make your victims compliant and easy to handle. Never try to change your victims; instead, induce them to follow your lead. Avoid the slow burnout. Often, one person becomes disenchanted but lacks the courage to make the break. Instead, he or she withdraws inside. As an absence, this psychological step back may inadvertently reignite the other person's desire, and a frustrating cycle begins of pursuit and retreat. Everything unravels, slowly. Once you feel disenchanted and know it is over, end it quickly, without apology. That would only insult the other per- son. A quick separation is often easier to get over—it is as if you had a problem being faithful, as opposed to your feeling that the seduced was no longer being desirable. Once you are truly disenchanted, there is no going back, so don't hang on out of false pity. It is more compassionate to make a clean break. If that seems inappropriate or too ugly, then deliberately disen- chant the victim with anti-seductive behavior. Examples of Sacrifice and Integration 1.

• From The Art of Seduction (2001)

  When a man believes himself to be the one and only lover in a woman's life, he'll whistle and go his way. • / ought to know; I have followed this profession for the last twenty years. If you want me to, I will tell you what happened to me a few years ago. • At that time I had a steady lover, a certain Demophantos, a usurer living near Poikile. He had never given me more than five drachmas and he pretended to be my man. But his love was only superficial, Chrysis. He never sighed, he never shed tears for me and he never spent the night waiting at Beware the Aftereffects • 421 things was through a man—and who better than the king? But to get in- volved with Charles was a dangerous game. A man like him, easily bored and in need of variety, would use her for a fling, then find someone else. Nell's strategy for the problem was simple: she let the king have his other girls, and never complained. Every time he saw her, though, she made sure he was entertained and diverted. She filled his senses with plea- sure, acting as if his position had nothing to do with her love for him. Vari- ety in women could wear on the nerves, tiring a busy king. They all made so many demands. If one woman could provide the same variety (and Nell, as an actress, knew how to play different roles), she had a big advantage. Nell never asked for money, so Charles plied her with wealth. She never asked to be the favorite—how could she? She was a commoner—but he ele- vated her to the position. Many of your targets will be like kings and queens, particularly those who are easily bored. Once the seduction is over they will not only have trouble idealizing you, they may also turn to another man or woman whose unfamiliarity seems exciting and poetic. Needing other people to divert them, they often satisfy this need through variety. Do not play into the hands of these bored royals by complaining, becoming self-pitying, or de- manding privileges. That would only further their natural disenchantment once the seduction is over. Instead, make them see that you are not the per- son they thought you were. Make it a delightful game to play new roles, to surprise them, to be an endless source of entertainment. It is almost impos- sible to resist a person who provides pleasure with no strings attached. When they are with you, keep the spirit light and playful. Play up the parts of your character they find delightful, but never let them feel they know you too well. In the end you will control the dynamic, and a haughty king or queen will become your abject slave. 3.

• From The Art of Seduction (2001)

  their disdain for convention: Théophile Gautier's red vest, Oscar Wilde's Sometimes, however, the green velvet suit, Andy Warhol's silver wigs. The great English Prime Min- tyranny of elegance became altogether insupportable. A ister Benjamin Disraeli had two magnificent canes, one for morning, one Mr. Boothby committed for evening; at noon he would change canes, no matter where he was. The suicide and left a note female Dandy works similarly. She may adopt male clothing, say, but if she saying he could no longer does, a touch here or there will set her truly apart: no man ever dressed endure the ennui of buttoning and unbuttoning. quite like George Sand. The overtall hat, the riding boots worn on the — T H E GAME OF HEARTS: streets of Paris, made her a sight to behold. HARRIETTE WILSON'S Remember, there must be a reference point. If your visual style is to- MEMOIRS, EDITED BY LESLEY tally unfamiliar, people will think you at best an obvious attention-getter, at BLANCH worst crazy. Instead, create your own fashion sense by adapting and altering prevailing styles to make yourself an object of fascination. Do this right and you will be wildly imitated. The Count d'Orsay, a great London dandy of This royal manner which [ the dandy] raises to the the 1830s and 1840s, was closely watched by fashionable people; one day, height of true royalty, the caught in a sudden London rainstorm, he bought a paltrok, a kind of heavy, dandy has taken this from hooded duffle coat, off the back of a Dutch sailor. The paltrok immediately women, who alone seem naturally made for such a became the coat to wear. Having people imitate you, of course, is a sign of role. It is a somewhat by your powers of seduction. using the manner and the The nonconformity of Dandies, however, goes far beyond appearances. method of women that It is an attitude toward life that sets them apart; adopt that attitude and a the dandy dominates. And this usurpation of circle of followers will form around you. femininity, he makes Dandies are supremely impudent. They don't give a damn about other women themselves approve people, and never try to please. In the court of Louis XIV, the writer La of this. . . . The dandy has something antinatural Bruyere noticed that courtiers who tried hard to please were invariably on and androgynous about the way down; nothing was more anti-seductive. As Barbey d'Aurevilly him, which is precisely how wrote, "Dandies please women by displeasing them." he is able to endlessly seduce. Impudence was fundamental to the appeal of Oscar Wilde. In a London theater one night, after the first performance of one of Wilde's plays, — J U L E S LEMAÎTRE, LES CONTEMPORAINS

• From The Art of Seduction (2001)

  Your clothes, the things you talk about, the places you take them, make a show of your difference. Exaggerate a little and they will imagine the rest, because such types tend to be self-deluders. Exotic Fetishists, however, do not make particularly good victims. Whatever exoticism you have will soon seem banal to them, and they will want something else. It will be a struggle to hold their interest. Their underlying insecurity will also keep you on edge. One variation on this type is the man or woman who is trapped in a stultifying relationship, a banal occupation, a dead-end town. It is circumstance, as opposed to personal neurosis, that makes such people fetishize the exotic; and these Exotic Fetishists are better victims than the self-loathing kind, because you can offer them a temporary escape from whatever op- The Seducer's Victims— The Eighteen Types • 155 presses them. Nothing, however, will offer true Exotic Fetishists escape from themselves. The Drama Queen. There are people who cannot do without some constant drama in their lives—it is their way of deflecting boredom. The greatest mistake you can make in seducing these Drama Queens is to come offering stability and security. That will only make them run for the hills. Most often, Drama Queens (and there are plenty of men in this category) enjoy playing the victim. They want something to complain about, they want pain. Pain is a source of pleasure for them. With this type, you have to be willing and able to give them the mental rough treatment they desire. That is the only way to seduce them in a deep manner. The moment you turn too nice, they will find some reason to quarrel or get rid of you. You will recognize Drama Queens by the number of people who have hurt them, the tragedies and traumas that have befallen them. At the extreme, they can be hopelessly selfish and anti-seductive, but most of them are relatively harmless and will make fine victims if you can live with the sturm und drang. If for some reason you want something long term with this type, you will constantly have to inject drama into your relationship. For some this can be an exciting challenge and a source for constantly renewing the relationship. Generally, however, you should see an involvement with a Drama Queen as something fleeting and a way to bring a little drama into your own life.

• From The Art of Seduction (2001)

  Stars create illusions that are pleasurable to see. The danger is that people tire of them—the illusion no longer fascinates—and turn to another Star. Let this happen and you will find it very difficult to regain your place in the galaxy. You must keep all eyes on you at any cost. Do not worry about notoriety, or about slurs on your image; we are remarkably forgiving of our Stars. After the death of President Kennedy, all kinds of unpleasant truths came to light about him—the endless affairs, the addiction to risk and danger. None of this diminished his appeal, and in fact the public still considers him one of America's greatest presidents. Errol Flynn faced many scandals, including a notorious rape case; they only enhanced his rakish image. Once people have recognized a Star, any kind of publicity, even bad, simply feeds the obsession. Of course you can go too far: people like a Star to have a transcendent beauty, and too much human frailty will eventually disillusion them. But bad publicity is less of a danger than disappearing for too long, or growing too distant. You cannot haunt people's dreams if they never see you. At the same time, you cannot let the public get too familiar with you, or let your image become predictable. People will turn against you in an instant if you begin to bore them, for boredom is the ultimate social evil. Perhaps the greatest danger Stars face is the endless attention they elicit. Obsessive attention can become disconcerting and worse. As any attractive woman can attest, it is tiring to be gazed at all the time, and the effect can be destructive, as is shown by the story of Marilyn Monroe. The solution is to develop the kind of distance from yourself that Dietrich had—take the attention and idolatry with a grain of salt, and maintain a certain detachment from them. Approach your own image playfully. Most important, never become obsessed with the obsessive quality of people's interest in you. Se- ducers draw you in by the fo- cused, individualized atten- tion they pay to you. Anti-Seducers are the opposite: insecure, self-absorbed, and unable to grasp the psychology of an- other person, they literally repel. Anti- Seducers have no self-awareness, and never realize when they are pestering, imposing, talking too much. They lack the subtlety to create the promise of pleasure that seduc- tion requires. Root out anti-seductive qualities in yourself, and recognize them in others— there is no pleasure or profit in dealing with the Anti-Seducer. Typology of the Anti-Seducers

• From The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty (1983)

  But he would only moan and press his face into her neck, and seemed bereft. "I love you," she implored him, and then he laid her down on the bed, and drawing up beside her, took his wine from the bedside stand and, gazing at the fire, seemed for a long time to be thinking. PRINCE ALEXI BEAUTY DREAMED a dream of boredom. She roamed the castle in which she had lived all her life, with nothing to do, and now and then paused in a deep window seat to watch the tiny figures of the peasants in the fields below gathering the fresh mown grass into haystacks. The sky was cloudless and she disliked the look of it, its sameness and vastness. It seemed she could not find anything to do that hadn't been done a thousand times before, and then suddenly there came to her ears a sound she could not identify. She followed the sound, and through a doorway saw an old woman, bent and ugly, plying a strange contraption. It was a great turning wheel with a thread that was winding itself upon a spindle. "What is it?" Beauty asked with great interest. "Come see for yourself," said the old woman, who had the most remarkable voice, because it was young and strong and so unlike her visage. It seemed Beauty had only just touched this marvelous machine with its whirring wheel when she fell down in a great swoon, and all about her heard the world weeping. "...sleep, sleep for a hundred years!" And she wanted to cry out, "Unbearable, worse than death," for it seemed some great deepening of the ennui she had struggled against ever since she could remember, the wandering from room to room... But she awoke. She was not at home. She was lying in the bed of her Prince, and she felt the prickling of the jeweled coverlet beneath her. The room was full of the leaping shadows of the fire, and she saw the gleam of the carved posts of the bed, and the drapery fallen about her in rich colors. She felt herself animated and flushed with desire, and she rose up, so eager was she to lose the weight and texture of her dream, and she realized that the Prince was not beside her. But there he was, by the fire, his elbow against the stone above it which bore a great crest with crossed swords. He wore his brilliant red velvet cloak still and his high turned down leather boots with their pointed toes, and his face was sharpened with brooding. The pulse between her legs quickened. She stirred, and gave some faint little sigh so that he awoke from his thoughts and approached her. She could not see his expression in the darkness.

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  Besides this, Konstantin Levin was not at his ease with his brother, because in summer in the country Levin was continually busy with work on the land, and the long summer day was not long enough for him to get through all he had to do, while Sergey Ivanovitch was taking a holiday. But though he was taking a holiday now, that is to say, he was doing no writing, he was so used to intellectual activity that he liked to put into concise and eloquent shape the ideas that occurred to him, and liked to have someone to listen to him. His most usual and natural listener was his brother. And so in spite of the friendliness and directness of their relations, Konstantin felt an awkwardness in leaving him alone. Sergey Ivanovitch liked to stretch himself on the grass in the sun, and to lie so, basking and chatting lazily. “You wouldn’t believe,” he would say to his brother, “what a pleasure this rural laziness is to me. Not an idea in one’s brain, as empty as a drum!” But Konstantin Levin found it dull sitting and listening to him, especially when he knew that while he was away they would be carting dung onto the fields not ploughed ready for it, and heaping it all up anyhow; and would not screw the shares in the ploughs, but would let them come off and then say that the new ploughs were a silly invention, and there was nothing like the old Andreevna plough, and so on. “Come, you’ve done enough trudging about in the heat,” Sergey Ivanovitch would say to him. “No, I must just run round to the counting-house for a minute,” Levin would answer, and he would run off to the fields. Chapter 2 Early in June it happened that Agafea Mihalovna, the old nurse and housekeeper, in carrying to the cellar a jar of mushrooms she had just pickled, slipped, fell, and sprained her wrist. The district doctor, a talkative young medical student, who had just finished his studies, came to see her. He examined the wrist, said it was not broken, was delighted at a chance of talking to the celebrated Sergey Ivanovitch Koznishev, and to show his advanced views of things told him all the scandal of the district, complaining of the poor state into which the district council had fallen. Sergey Ivanovitch listened attentively, asked him questions, and, roused by a new listener, he talked fluently, uttered a few keen and weighty observations, respectfully appreciated by the young doctor, and was soon in that eager frame of mind his brother knew so well, which always, with him, followed a brilliant and eager conversation. After the departure of the doctor, he wanted to go with a fishing rod to the river. Sergey Ivanovitch was fond of angling, and was, it seemed, proud of being able to care for such a stupid occupation.

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  Vronsky went into the theater at half-past eight. The performance was in full swing. The little old box-keeper, recognizing Vronsky as he helped him off with his fur coat, called him “Your Excellency,” and suggested he should not take a number but should simply call Fyodor. In the brightly lighted corridor there was no one but the box-opener and two attendants with fur cloaks on their arms listening at the doors. Through the closed doors came the sounds of the discreet _staccato_ accompaniment of the orchestra, and a single female voice rendering distinctly a musical phrase. The door opened to let the box-opener slip through, and the phrase drawing to the end reached Vronsky’s hearing clearly. But the doors were closed again at once, and Vronsky did not hear the end of the phrase and the cadence of the accompaniment, though he knew from the thunder of applause that it was over. When he entered the hall, brilliantly lighted with chandeliers and gas jets, the noise was still going on. On the stage the singer, bowing and smiling, with bare shoulders flashing with diamonds, was, with the help of the tenor who had given her his arm, gathering up the bouquets that were flying awkwardly over the footlights. Then she went up to a gentleman with glossy pomaded hair parted down the center, who was stretching across the footlights holding out something to her, and all the public in the stalls as well as in the boxes was in excitement, craning forward, shouting and clapping. The conductor in his high chair assisted in passing the offering, and straightened his white tie. Vronsky walked into the middle of the stalls, and, standing still, began looking about him. That day less than ever was his attention turned upon the familiar, habitual surroundings, the stage, the noise, all the familiar, uninteresting, particolored herd of spectators in the packed theater. There were, as always, the same ladies of some sort with officers of some sort in the back of the boxes; the same gaily dressed women—God knows who—and uniforms and black coats; the same dirty crowd in the upper gallery; and among the crowd, in the boxes and in the front rows, were some forty of the _real_ people. And to those oases Vronsky at once directed his attention, and with them he entered at once into relation. The act was over when he went in, and so he did not go straight to his brother’s box, but going up to the first row of stalls stopped at the footlights with Serpuhovskoy, who, standing with one knee raised and his heel on the footlights, caught sight of him in the distance and beckoned to him, smiling.

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  The highest Petersburg society is essentially one: in it everyone knows everyone else, everyone even visits everyone else. But this great set has its subdivisions. Anna Arkadyevna Karenina had friends and close ties in three different circles of this highest society. One circle was her husband’s government official set, consisting of his colleagues and subordinates, brought together in the most various and capricious manner, and belonging to different social strata. Anna found it difficult now to recall the feeling of almost awe-stricken reverence which she had at first entertained for these persons. Now she knew all of them as people know one another in a country town; she knew their habits and weaknesses, and where the shoe pinched each one of them. She knew their relations with one another and with the head authorities, knew who was for whom, and how each one maintained his position, and where they agreed and disagreed. But the circle of political, masculine interests had never interested her, in spite of countess Lidia Ivanovna’s influence, and she avoided it. Another little set with which Anna was in close relations was the one by means of which Alexey Alexandrovitch had made his career. The center of this circle was the Countess Lidia Ivanovna. It was a set made up of elderly, ugly, benevolent, and godly women, and clever, learned, and ambitious men. One of the clever people belonging to the set had called it “the conscience of Petersburg society.” Alexey Alexandrovitch had the highest esteem for this circle, and Anna with her special gift for getting on with everyone, had in the early days of her life in Petersburg made friends in this circle also. Now, since her return from Moscow, she had come to feel this set insufferable. It seemed to her that both she and all of them were insincere, and she felt so bored and ill at ease in that world that she went to see the Countess Lidia Ivanovna as little as possible. The third circle with which Anna had ties was preeminently the fashionable world—the world of balls, of dinners, of sumptuous dresses, the world that hung on to the court with one hand, so as to avoid sinking to the level of the demi-monde. For the demi-monde the members of that fashionable world believed that they despised, though their tastes were not merely similar, but in fact identical. Her connection with this circle was kept up through Princess Betsy Tverskaya, her cousin’s wife, who had an income of a hundred and twenty thousand roubles, and who had taken a great fancy to Anna ever since she first came out, showed her much attention, and drew her into her set, making fun of Countess Lidia Ivanovna’s coterie. “When I’m old and ugly I’ll be the same,” Betsy used to say; “but for a pretty young woman like you it’s early days for that house of charity.”

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  In September Levin moved to Moscow for Kitty’s confinement. He had spent a whole month in Moscow with nothing to do, when Sergey Ivanovitch, who had property in the Kashinsky province, and took great interest in the question of the approaching elections, made ready to set off to the elections. He invited his brother, who had a vote in the Seleznevsky district, to come with him. Levin had, moreover, to transact in Kashin some extremely important business relating to the wardship of land and to the receiving of certain redemption money for his sister, who was abroad. Levin still hesitated, but Kitty, who saw that he was bored in Moscow, and urged him to go, on her own authority ordered him the proper nobleman’s uniform, costing seven pounds. And that seven pounds paid for the uniform was the chief cause that finally decided Levin to go. He went to Kashin....

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  In the middle of the winter Vronsky spent a very tiresome week. A foreign prince, who had come on a visit to Petersburg, was put under his charge, and he had to show him the sights worth seeing. Vronsky was of distinguished appearance; he possessed, moreover, the art of behaving with respectful dignity, and was used to having to do with such grand personages—that was how he came to be put in charge of the prince. But he felt his duties very irksome. The prince was anxious to miss nothing of which he would be asked at home, had he seen that in Russia? And on his own account he was anxious to enjoy to the utmost all Russian forms of amusement. Vronsky was obliged to be his guide in satisfying both these inclinations. The mornings they spent driving to look at places of interest; the evenings they passed enjoying the national entertainments. The prince rejoiced in health exceptional even among princes. By gymnastics and careful attention to his health he had brought himself to such a point that in spite of his excess in pleasure he looked as fresh as a big glossy green Dutch cucumber. The prince had traveled a great deal, and considered one of the chief advantages of modern facilities of communication was the accessibility of the pleasures of all nations. He had been in Spain, and there had indulged in serenades and had made friends with a Spanish girl who played the mandolin. In Switzerland he had killed chamois. In England he had galloped in a red coat over hedges and killed two hundred pheasants for a bet. In Turkey he had got into a harem; in India he had hunted on an elephant, and now in Russia he wished to taste all the specially Russian forms of pleasure. Vronsky, who was, as it were, chief master of the ceremonies to him, was at great pains to arrange all the Russian amusements suggested by various persons to the prince. They had race horses, and Russian pancakes and bear hunts and three-horse sledges, and gypsies and drinking feasts, with the Russian accompaniment of broken crockery. And the prince with surprising ease fell in with the Russian spirit, smashed trays full of crockery, sat with a gypsy girl on his knee, and seemed to be asking—what more, and does the whole Russian spirit consist in just this?

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  But to Anna’s taste Liza was far more attractive. Betsy had said to Anna that she had adopted the pose of an innocent child, but when Anna saw her, she felt that this was not the truth. She really was both innocent and corrupt, but a sweet and passive woman. It is true that her tone was the same as Sappho’s; that like Sappho, she had two men, one young and one old, tacked onto her, and devouring her with their eyes. But there was something in her higher than what surrounded her. There was in her the glow of the real diamond among glass imitations. This glow shone out in her exquisite, truly enigmatic eyes. The weary, and at the same time passionate, glance of those eyes, encircled by dark rings, impressed one by its perfect sincerity. Everyone looking into those eyes fancied he knew her wholly, and knowing her, could not but love her. At the sight of Anna, her whole face lighted up at once with a smile of delight. “Ah, how glad I am to see you!” she said, going up to her. “Yesterday at the races all I wanted was to get to you, but you’d gone away. I did so want to see you, yesterday especially. Wasn’t it awful?” she said, looking at Anna with eyes that seemed to lay bare all her soul. “Yes; I had no idea it would be so thrilling,” said Anna, blushing. The company got up at this moment to go into the garden. “I’m not going,” said Liza, smiling and settling herself close to Anna. “You won’t go either, will you? Who wants to play croquet?” “Oh, I like it,” said Anna. “There, how do you manage never to be bored by things? It’s delightful to look at you. You’re alive, but I’m bored.” “How can you be bored? Why, you live in the liveliest set in Petersburg,” said Anna. “Possibly the people who are not of our set are even more bored; but we—I certainly—are not happy, but awfully, awfully bored.” Sappho smoking a cigarette went off into the garden with the two young men. Betsy and Stremov remained at the tea-table. “What, bored!” said Betsy. “Sappho says they did enjoy themselves tremendously at your house last night.” “Ah, how dreary it all was!” said Liza Merkalova. “We all drove back to my place after the races. And always the same people, always the same. Always the same thing. We lounged about on sofas all the evening. What is there to enjoy in that? No; do tell me how you manage never to be bored?” she said, addressing Anna again. “One has but to look at you and one sees, here’s a woman who may be happy or unhappy, but isn’t bored. Tell me how you do it?” “I do nothing,” answered Anna, blushing at these searching questions.

• From The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty (1983)

  "Don't try to understand all I say just now. That is, don't try to find immediate meaning in it," he said. "Merely listen and learn and perhaps what I tell you shall save you some mistakes, give you different paths for the mind later. Ah, you are so tender to me, my secret flower." He would have embraced her again, perhaps become carried away again by his passion again, but she stopped him with a touch of her fingers to his lips. "But tell me, when you were shackled to the wall, what did you think of...when you were alone, did you daydream, and what did you dream?" "What a strange question," he said. Beauty seemed very serious. "Did you think of your former life, and wish you were free for this or that pleasure?" "Not really," he said slowly. "I thought rather of what would happen to me next, I suppose. I don't know. Why do you ask this?" Beauty didn't reply, but she had dreamed three times since she had come and each time of her old life to her had seemed grim and fraught with tiny worries. She remembered hours with her embroidery, and the endless bowing at Court to the Princes who kissed her hand. She remembered sitting quite still for hours at interminable banquets where others talked and drank, and she had felt only boredom. "Please continue, Alexi," she said gently. "But to whom does the Queen give you when she's displeased?" "Ah, that is a question with several answers," he said. "But let me proceed. You can well imagine what my existence was, the hours of boredom and solitude broken only by these diversions: the Queen herself, Prince Gerald's punishment, or the fierce paddling from Felix. Well, soon, in spite of myself and my rage, I commenced to show my excitement whenever the Queen came into the chamber. She ridiculed me for it, but she marked it. And now and then, I could not conceal it when I saw Prince Gerald so boldly erect and taking his pleasure of one of the other slaves, or even taking the paddle. The Queen observed all this, and each time she saw that my organ was stiff and beyond my will, she would have Felix at once deliver a hard spanking to me. I struggled, I tried to curse her, and at first these spankings quelled my passion, but very soon they did not quell it. And the Queen added to my misery with her own hands, slapping my penis, stroking it, and then slapping it again at the very moment that Felix was punishing me. I twisted, struggled.

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  There was visiting the watering-place that year a real German Fürstin, in consequence of which the crystallizing process went on more vigorously than ever. Princess Shtcherbatskaya wished, above everything, to present her daughter to this German princess, and the day after their arrival she duly performed this rite. Kitty made a low and graceful curtsey in the _very simple_, that is to say, very elegant frock that had been ordered her from Paris. The German princess said, “I hope the roses will soon come back to this pretty little face,” and for the Shtcherbatskys certain definite lines of existence were at once laid down from which there was no departing. The Shtcherbatskys made the acquaintance too of the family of an English Lady Somebody, and of a German countess and her son, wounded in the last war, and of a learned Swede, and of M. Canut and his sister. But yet inevitably the Shtcherbatskys were thrown most into the society of a Moscow lady, Marya Yevgenyevna Rtishtcheva and her daughter, whom Kitty disliked, because she had fallen ill, like herself, over a love affair, and a Moscow colonel, whom Kitty had known from childhood, and always seen in uniform and epaulets, and who now, with his little eyes and his open neck and flowered cravat, was uncommonly ridiculous and tedious, because there was no getting rid of him. When all this was so firmly established, Kitty began to be very much bored, especially as the prince went away to Carlsbad and she was left alone with her mother. She took no interest in the people she knew, feeling that nothing fresh would come of them. Her chief mental interest in the watering-place consisted in watching and making theories about the people she did not know. It was characteristic of Kitty that she always imagined everything in people in the most favorable light possible, especially so in those she did not know. And now as she made surmises as to who people were, what were their relations to one another, and what they were like, Kitty endowed them with the most marvelous and noble characters, and found confirmation of her idea in her observations.

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  “But if they don’t do for us, if they’re stupid?” said Levin. And again he detected the expression of alarm in the eyes of Sviazhsky. “Oh, yes; we’ll bury the world under our caps! We’ve found the secret Europe was seeking for! I’ve heard all that; but, excuse me, do you know all that’s been done in Europe on the question of the organization of labor?” “No, very little.” “That question is now absorbing the best minds in Europe. The Schulze-Delitsch movement.... And then all this enormous literature of the labor question, the most liberal Lassalle movement ... the Mulhausen experiment? That’s a fact by now, as you’re probably aware.” “I have some idea of it, but very vague.” “No, you only say that; no doubt you know all about it as well as I do. I’m not a professor of sociology, of course, but it interested me, and really, if it interests you, you ought to study it.” “But what conclusion have they come to?” “Excuse me....” The two neighbors had risen, and Sviazhsky, once more checking Levin in his inconvenient habit of peeping into what was beyond the outer chambers of his mind, went to see his guests out. Chapter 28 Levin was insufferably bored that evening with the ladies; he was stirred as he had never been before by the idea that the dissatisfaction he was feeling with his system of managing his land was not an exceptional case, but the general condition of things in Russia; that the organization of some relation of the laborers to the soil in which they would work, as with the peasant he had met half-way to the Sviazhskys’, was not a dream, but a problem which must be solved. And it seemed to him that the problem could be solved, and that he ought to try and solve it. After saying good-night to the ladies, and promising to stay the whole of the next day, so as to make an expedition on horseback with them to see an interesting ruin in the crown forest, Levin went, before going to bed, into his host’s study to get the books on the labor question that Sviazhsky had offered him. Sviazhsky’s study was a huge room, surrounded by bookcases and with two tables in it—one a massive writing-table, standing in the middle of the room, and the other a round table, covered with recent numbers of reviews and journals in different languages, ranged like the rays of a star round the lamp. On the writing-table was a stand of drawers marked with gold lettering, and full of papers of various sorts. Sviazhsky took out the books, and sat down in a rocking-chair. “What are you looking at there?” he said to Levin, who was standing at the round table looking through the reviews.

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  “Of course it is. Such boredom, my dear, that one doesn’t know what to do with oneself.” “How can you be bored, prince? There’s so much that’s interesting now in Germany,” said Marya Yevgenyevna. “But I know everything that’s interesting: the plum soup I know, and the pea sausages I know. I know everything.” “No, you may say what you like, prince, there’s the interest of their institutions,” said the colonel. “But what is there interesting about it? They’re all as pleased as brass halfpence. They’ve conquered everybody, and why am I to be pleased at that? I haven’t conquered anyone; and I’m obliged to take off my own boots, yes, and put them away too; in the morning, get up and dress at once, and go to the dining-room to drink bad tea! How different it is at home! You get up in no haste, you get cross, grumble a little, and come round again. You’ve time to think things over, and no hurry.” “But time’s money, you forget that,” said the colonel. “Time, indeed, that depends! Why, there’s time one would give a month of for sixpence, and time you wouldn’t give half an hour of for any money. Isn’t that so, Katinka? What is it? why are you so depressed?” “I’m not depressed.” “Where are you off to? Stay a little longer,” he said to Varenka. “I must be going home,” said Varenka, getting up, and again she went off into a giggle. When she had recovered, she said good-bye, and went into the house to get her hat. Kitty followed her. Even Varenka struck her as different. She was not worse, but different from what she had fancied her before. “Oh, dear! it’s a long while since I’ve laughed so much!” said Varenka, gathering up her parasol and her bag. “How nice he is, your father!” Kitty did not speak. “When shall I see you again?” asked Varenka. “Mamma meant to go and see the Petrovs. Won’t you be there?” said Kitty, to try Varenka. “Yes,” answered Varenka. “They’re getting ready to go away, so I promised to help them pack.” “Well, I’ll come too, then.” “No, why should you?” “Why not? why not? why not?” said Kitty, opening her eyes wide, and clutching at Varenka’s parasol, so as not to let her go. “No, wait a minute; why not?” “Oh, nothing; your father has come, and besides, they will feel awkward at your helping.” “No, tell me why you don’t want me to be often at the Petrovs’. You don’t want me to—why not?” “I didn’t say that,” said Varenka quietly. “No, please tell me!” “Tell you everything?” asked Varenka. “Everything, everything!” Kitty assented. “Well, there’s really nothing of any consequence; only that Mihail Alexeyevitch” (that was the artist’s name) “had meant to leave earlier, and now he doesn’t want to go away,” said Varenka, smiling. “Well, well!” Kitty urged impatiently, looking darkly at Varenka.

• From The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty (1983)

  "I'm your slave, my Prince," she said. But he would only moan and press his face into her neck, and seemed bereft. "I love you," she implored him, and then he laid her down on the bed, and drawing up beside her, took his wine from the bedside stand and, gazing at the fire, seemed for a long time to be thinking. PRINCE ALEXI BEAUTY DREAMED a dream of boredom. She roamed the castle in which she had lived all her life, with nothing to do, and now and then paused in a deep window seat to watch the tiny figures of the peasants in the fields below gathering the fresh mown grass into haystacks. The sky was cloudless and she disliked the look of it, its sameness and vastness. It seemed she could not find anything to do that hadn't been done a thousand times before, and then suddenly there came to her ears a sound she could not identify. She followed the sound, and through a doorway saw an old woman, bent and ugly, plying a strange contraption. It was a great turning wheel with a thread that was winding itself upon a spindle. "What is it?" Beauty asked with great interest. "Come see for yourself," said the old woman, who had the most remarkable voice, because it was young and strong and so unlike her visage. It seemed Beauty had only just touched this marvelous machine with its whirring wheel when she fell down in a great swoon, and all about her heard the world weeping. "...sleep, sleep for a hundred years!" And she wanted to cry out, "Unbearable, worse than death," for it seemed some great deepening of the ennui she had struggled against ever since she could remember, the wandering from room to room... But she awoke. She was not at home. She was lying in the bed of her Prince, and she felt the prickling of the jeweled coverlet beneath her. The room was full of the leaping shadows of the fire, and she saw the gleam of the carved posts of the bed, and the drapery fallen about her in rich colors. She felt herself animated and flushed with desire, and she rose up, so eager was she to lose the weight and texture of her dream, and she realized that the Prince was not beside her. But there he was, by the fire, his elbow against the stone above it which bore a great crest with crossed swords. He wore his brilliant red velvet cloak still and his high turned down leather boots with their pointed toes, and his face was sharpened with brooding. The pulse between her legs quickened. She stirred, and gave some faint little sigh so that he awoke from his thoughts and approached her.