25) “Lazarus” by Leonid Andreyev

Plot:

According to the Bible story, Lazarus and his sisters Mary and Martha were friends of Jesus. Lazarus died and was buried while Jesus was in another town. He returned to find Mary and Martha in mourning, asked someone to roll the stone away from Lazarus’ tomb, and brought him back from the dead, much to the joy of his sisters. Not much is said about what happened to Lazarus after this. This story speculates about a possibility.

The story begins just after Lazarus has come back home to his sisters. He still looks like a corpse—sunken cheeks, blue lips, long fingers—and doesn’t say much. Before, he was a cheerful person who loved a joke, one of the reasons Jesus liked his company.

His friends and neighbors rejoice and dress him in the finest clothes they can find so that he looks like a bridegroom—except, of course, for the corpse-like appearance of his body, which will fade with time but never disappear.

One of the guests asks, “Why dost thou not tell us what happened Yonder?”

The party is over.

Thoughts:

The Bible story is often told as one of great joy, a precursor to Jesus’ resurrection. Andreyev turns all this on its head and offers the reader a portrait of something beyond despair. Is Lazarus sad? That’s impossible to say. People who look into the black discs of his eyes are no longer capable of joy. Lazarus says nothing about the Yonder, nor of his journey. They see it in his eyes.

Lazarus appears to experience neither sorrow nor joy.

The author tells the reader:

“For three days had he been dead: thrice had the sun risen and set, but he had been dead; children had played, streams murmured over pebbles, the wayfarer had lifted up hot dust in the highroad,—but he had been dead. And now he is again among them,—touches them,—looks at them,—looks at them! and through the black discs of his pupils, as through darkened glass, stares the unknowable Yonder.”

Interestingly enough, while most people are devastated by a glance into his eyes, not everyone reacts the same. Innocent children don’t seem bothered, nor is a particular artist.

Lazarus sits in the heat of the desert sun because he can no longer get warm. Some wounds don’t heal.

The piece is atmospheric and heavy with relentless despair.

The story can be read here.

The story can be listened to here via Librovox.

Bio: Author Leonid Andreyev (1871-1919) was born in the city of Orel, located about 229 miles (368 km) outside Moscow. While working as a police court reporter, he published a few poems which came to the attention of Russian literary great Maxim Gorky, who encouraged him to pursue literature. Among Andreyev’s best-known works are the 1908 novella The Seven Who Were Hanged and 1915 play He Who Gets Slapped. His horror short story works, published in translation in Weird Tales, influenced H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard, the creator of Conan the Barbarian.

Title: “Lazarus”
Author: Leonid Andreyev (1871-1919)
First published: First published in Russian in 1906; in English in 1918 in the anthology I Lazarus / The Gentleman from San Francisco; translator Abraham Yarmolinsky