The Island
This is from Chekhov’s account of Sakhalin Island, a Russian Penal Colony and Place of Exile:
Very little can be said about the intellectuals. To have to punish your fellow man because you are under oath and in duty bound to do so, constantly violating your feelings of repugnance and horror, knowing that you are far away from anywhere, ill-paid and bored, in continual proximity with shaved heads, chains, executioners, bribes, fights, and with the knowledge of your complete helplessness to combat the encompassing evil–all these things makes service in the penal administration exceptionally difficult and forbidding. There was a time when these civil servants were slovenly, negligent and slothful, and it made no difference to them where they served so long as they could eat, drink, sleep and play cards. Then, of necessity, respectable people were employed, but they left their posts at the first opportunity or else they became confirmed drunkards, or went insane, or committed suicide. Slowly they were engulfed in the poisonous atmosphere, as by an eight-armed octopus, and they, too, began stealing and beating prisoners savagely.Â
Â
Â
Â
Â
Â
