To the memory of Waclaw Lednicki (1891-1967)
“Homme de toute sorte de savoir,” was how Alexander Turgenev was once described by Chateaubriand, while Francis Jeffrey, the editor of the Edinburgh Review, in a letter to Sydney Smith, called him “a Russian gentleman accomplished in all liberal and orthodox sciences.” The word “orthodox” was underlined by Jeffrey, and Turgenev said that he did not understand the meaning of that underlining. It is possible, of course, that all Jeffrey had in mind was that Turgenev was of the Russian Orthodox faith and knew all about its tenets.
