Tuesday, August 3, 2021

Prediction of the First World War 29 years before its start

 The prediction was made by a great Russian writer and visionary

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov in a short story “Psyhopates”.

Chekhov published this story in  "Peterburgskaya Gazeta", 1885, No. 275, October 7, p. 3, section "Flying Notes".

 

PSYCHOPATHES

Excerpt

The titular councilor Semyon Alekseich Nyanin, who once served in one of the provincial commercial courts, and his son Grisha, a retired lieutenant, a colorless person who lives on the bread of his father and mother, are sitting in one of their little rooms and having dinner. Grisha, as usual, drinks glass after glass and speaks incessantly; poppa, pale, always alarmed and surprised, timidly peers into his face and freezes from some indefinite feeling, similar to fear.

“Bulgaria and Rumelia are just flowers,” says Grisha, fiercely picking his teeth with a fork. - This is nothing, rubbish! But you read what is happening in Greece and Serbia, and what a conversation is going on in England! Greece and Serbia will rise, Turkey too ... England will stand up for Turkey.

- And France will not tolerate ... - Nyanin remarks, as if hesitantly.

- Lord, we started talking about politics again! - coughs in the next room tenant Fyodor Fedorovich. - If only they would feel sorry for the sick man!

“Yes, and France will not stand it,” Grisha agrees with father, as if not noticing Fyodor Fedorovich's cough. - She, man, has not yet forgotten five billion! She, man ... these French, man, are canny! They are just waiting to stage Bismarck drubbing and put hellebores in his snuffbox! And if the Frenchman gets up, the German will not wait - kommen sie her, Ivan Andreevich, sprechen sie deutsch! ..  Ho-ho-ho! Austria follows the Germans, then Hungary, and then, look, Spain follows about the Caroline Islands ... China with Tonkin, Afghans ... and off it went, and went, and went! That, man, will happen you never dreamed of! you mark my word! You will only spread your hands ...

... The old man usually surrenders to fear silently, Grisha cannot do without irritating himself and his father with long word torrents; he will not calm down until he scares himself fully.

- You will see! - he continues. - You will not have time to gasp, as in Europe everything will go topsy-turvy. You'll get yours.  Let’s assume that you don’t care, no matter what, but for me - please go to war! However, I do not care ... with our pleasure

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