The Secret City · Chapter
XIV explained
The narrator falls ill with a fever and is bedridden for several days, experiencing delirious dreams and nightmares.
What happens
The narrator falls ill with a fever and is bedridden for several days, experiencing delirious dreams and nightmares. During his illness, he is attended by his old servant Marfa and a new acquaintance, the Rat, a primitive and amoral Russian peasant who has attached himself to the narrator. The Rat is depicted as a savage, happy anarchist with no redeeming qualities, yet he forms a strange attachment to the narrator. In his feverish state, the narrator is haunted by visions of Petrograd and the figure of Semyonov, feeling the city's instability and the thin ice beneath him.
Themes in this chapter
Class and Social Contrast
The Rat's primitive existence and the narrator's relative luxury highlight the vast divide between rich and poor in Petrograd.
Fate and Uncertainty
The narrator's feverish dreams and the unstable, icy imagery reflect a sense of impending doom and the precariousness of life.
Characters to notice
- M. Durward
The narrator falls ill with a fever and is bedridden, experiencing delirious dreams and nightmares.
- Marfa
The old servant who looks after the narrator during his illness, telephones the doctor, and warns him about the Rat.
- The Rat
A primitive and amoral Russian peasant who attaches himself to the narrator, visits during his illness, and shows a strange loyalty.
- Alexei Petrovitch Semyonov
Haunts the narrator's fever dreams, watching and sneering at him throughout his illness.
Key passages
“He was the only absolutely happy Russian I have ever known. He had no passages of despair.”
The Rat was the only truly content Russian I had met, never experiencing moments of hopelessness.
The narrator reflects on the Rat's unique, carefree nature despite his brutal life.
“I saw it all laid out as though I were a great height above it—the fashionable streets, the Nevski and the Morskaia with the carriages and the motorcars and trams...”
In my fever, I envisioned Petrograd from above, with its grand avenues, traffic, and bustling life.
The narrator's delirious vision of the city's layout and activity.