SOURCE: "Chapter XVII," in The Extraordinary Decade: Literary Memoirs, by P. V. Annenkov, edited by Arthur P. Mendel, translated by Irwin R. Titunik, University of Michigan Press, 1968, pp. 86-91.

Annenkov, a Russian of aristocratic background, was a member of the same intellectual circles as Herzen, and he later proved to be a faithful recorder of his colleagues' thoughts and manners. In the following excerpt, Annenkov sketches Herzen 's multifaceted character.

In the early days of my acquaintance with [Herzen], I must admit, I was stunned and nonplussed by that extraordinarily mobile intellect which ranged from one subject to another with inexhaustible wit, brilliance, and incomprehensible rapidity, and which was able to grasp, be it in the case of someone's speech or some simple happening from current life or any abstract idea, the one telling detail that gave it its distinctive shape and vital expression. Herzen had an unusually...