Eugene Onegin · Chapter
XXXVI explained
The narrator reflects on the superficiality and tediousness of high society, criticizing the empty, pious, and prudish conversations of aristocratic women, which he finds both harmless and nonsensical.
What happens
The narrator reflects on the superficiality and tediousness of high society, criticizing the empty, pious, and prudish conversations of aristocratic women, which he finds both harmless and nonsensical.
Themes in this chapter
The Aristocratic Malaise
The narrator expresses boredom and vexation with the manners and conversations of high society, highlighting the emptiness and artificiality of aristocratic life.
Key passages
“Ye miracles of courtly grace, He left you first, and I must own The manners of the highest class Have latterly vexatious grown;”
You paragons of courtly elegance, he abandoned you first, and I admit that the customs of the upper class have recently become irritating.
The narrator distances himself from high society, finding its manners increasingly tiresome.
“And though perchance a lady may Discourse of Bentham or of Say, Yet as a rule their talk I call Harmless, but quite nonsensical.”
And although a lady might occasionally discuss Bentham or Say, generally I find their conversation harmless but utterly meaningless.
Even when women engage with intellectual topics, their talk is deemed superficial and without substance.