e are two
dying men whose illusions of life persist till the supreme moment.

* * * * *

If we carefully study a few of Andreyev's characters we can more
easily understand his feelings and his style. Here is, for
instance, Serge Petrovich, a student. Although he is not very
intelligent, he is above the average. His mind is preoccupied with
all sorts of questions; he reads Nietzsche, he ponders over many
things, but he does not know how to think for himself. The fact that
there are people who can find a way to express themselves appears to
him as an inaccessible ideal; while mediocre minds have no
attraction for him at all. It is from this feeling that all his
sufferings come. So "a horse, carrying a heavy burden, breathes
hard, falls to the ground, but is forced to rise and proceed by
stinging lashes from a whip."

These lashes are the vision of the superman, of the one who
rightfully possesses strength, happiness, and liberty. At times a
thick mist envelops the thoughts of Serge Petrovich, but the light
of the superman dispels this, and he sees his road before him as if
it had been drawn or told him by another.

Before his eyes there is a being called Serge Petrovich for whom all
that makes existence happy or bitter, deep and human, remains a
closed book. Neither religion nor morality, neither science nor art,
exists for him. Instead of a real and ardent faith, he feels in
himself a motley array of feelings. His habitual veneration of
religious rites mingles with mean superstitions. He is not
courageous enough to deny God, not strong enough to believe in Him.
He does not love his fellow-men, and cannot feel the intense
happiness of devoting himself to his fellow-creatures and even dying
for them. But neither does he experience that hate for others which
gives a man a terrible joy in his struggle with his fellow-men. Not
being capable of elevating himself high enough or falling low enough
to reign over the lives of men, he lives or rather vegetates with a
keen feeling of his mediocrity, which makes him despair. And the
pitiless words of Zarathustra ring in his ears: "If your life is not
successful, if a venomous worm is gnawing at your heart, know that
death will succeed." And Serge Petrovich, desperate, commits
suicide.

The hero of "At the Window" is quite different. This man has
succeeded in building for himself a sort of fortress, "in which he
retires, sheltered from life." Lik