Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Sidor ...
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
302
SÖNYA KOVALÉVSKY
people who understand how to choose the right road."
" But how can you know all this about me 1" asked the
astonished woman. " I saw the way in which you took leave
of your mother at the station," replied Sophia. " You
laughed as you bade her farewell, and then, when the train
started, you began to cry. I immediately perceived that
you have a heart and courage; such people always
understand how to choose the right road at the proper moment."
Sophia Kovalévsky loved argument for the sake of
argument ; she often retorted on herself, and then triumphantly
refuted her own arguments. A. C. Leffler was much more
interested in the matter of the conversation than in
argument, and when she was called upon to defend any idea,
she did it with a remarkable calmness, which impressed her
friend greatly, because she admired nothing so much as
she did calmness. She often said that there were people
who, by their mere presence in the room where she was,
shed abroad peace, brought harmony into her inner world,
producing on her " the freshness and repose of marble, or
the softness of velvet." In Anna Carlotta she found not
only calmness of temperament, but also a breadth of view
and thought which acted upon her like a charm. The
love for psychological problems and clearness of thought
these women had in common, though their gifts presented
such a wide difference in many other respects. Sophia was
most fond of music and lyrics, and often thought in images;
she possessed that peculiar comprehension of nature which
seeks in it, first of all, that which most nearly corresponds
to a given mind or personifies it; at the same time she was
distinguished by a wonderful capacity for conveying these
impressions in a remarkably vivid, artistic, and poetical
form. Anna Carlotta, on the contrary, loved nature most
of all; and, next to it, the arts which reproduced it—
painting and sculpture. She never expressed her thoughts in
images, but always in separate sentences; but she greatly
admired Sophia’swealth of imagination and imagery, and her
lyrical qualities, just as the latter admired Anna Carlotta’s
power of setting forth her thoughts in a clear, simple form.
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
