ABSTRACT
Alexander Pushkin insistence on joining the army advancing on Turkey prompted him to request Benkendorf’s assistance. The war, not yet begun, hung palpably in the air. Pyotr Vyazemsky put in his bid for a post in the army, and was promised a civilian position in the theater of operations. That day, Vyazemsky met Pushkin for a stroll on the banks of the Neva. The official reason for denying the two men entry into the army was obviously a mockery-it is not as though Pushkin had requested the command of a regiment. Vyazemsky shared with Pushkin the same thoughts he had expressed in his letters to Turgenev, and Pushkin agreed with him. The alternatives for a continued survival in Russia, the war, and the West-it was around these themes that the conversation between Pushkin and Vyazemsky revolved.
