Cirrus@Austlit

In the fall of 1869 Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky, lately a resident of Germany, is summoned back to St. Petersburg by the sudden death of his stepson, Pavel. Half crazed with grief, stricken by epileptic seizures, and erotically obsessed with his stepson's landlady, Dostoevsky is nevertheless intent on unraveling the enigma of Pavel's life. Was the boy a suicide or a murder victim? Did he love his stepfather or despise him? Was he a disciple of the revolutionary Nechaev, who even now is somewhere in St. Petersburg pursuing a dream of apocalyptic violence? As he follows his stepson's ghost - and becomes enmeshed in the same demonic conspiracies that claimed the boy - Dostoevsky emerges as a figure of unfathomable contradictions: naive and calculating, compassionate and cruel, pious and unspeakably perverse. (Source: Libraries Australia)

William Watt advises the Colonist that he intends to apply for leave to file 'a criminal information against you for a series of false, scandalous, and malicious libels contained in The Colonist newspapers, on the 30th July and 20th August last: and in sundry other papers'.

A brief response from the Colonist follows.

The Gazette's correspondent writes: 'I beg you will be kind enongh to notify to such as may feel desirous of seeking any personal satisfaction from the author, in the full meaning of the word, either as a writer or a gentleman, that the necessary information will not be withheld on the assignment of a suitable cause. I must leave the public or private notification to your better judgment; empowering you to disclose my proper name should occasion seem to demand such step.'

The Gazette omits the author's signature, as does the Monitor's reproduction.

William Watt disputes all charges laid against him by Edward Smith Hall in Hall's editorial of 30 July 1834. Watt refutes the claim that he is 'Humanitas': 'It is false that I am or was in any way connected with the pamphlet, signed "Humanitas," until I saw it given into hand for the press.' He also states that he has no connection with the editorial department of the Sydney Gazette. (Hall had chared that he was assistant editor.)

Watt then proceeds to expose the source of Hall's supposed malice towards him - an earlier falling out between them. Watt had been employed at Hall's Sydney Monitor newspaper, but chose to leave. Watt quotes extensively from a letter he received from Hall (dated 16 March 1834) in which Hall cordially concludes 'I cannot blame you ... for adopting new and other views' (i.e. for choosing to leave the Monitor). The letter includes explicit details of Hall's proposed arrangements for giving editorial charge of the Monitor to Watt.

'Humanitas' responds to a letter, published in the Sydney Monitor on 11 April, in which E. S. Hall names William Watt and Edward O'Shaughnessy as 'the authors of all personalities' published in the Sydney Gazette 'whether you write editorially or under anonymous signatures'.

Humanitas writes: 'Perceiving in your journal of this date [11 April 1834], that you charge two individuals, by name, as well as by terming them the joint-editor of the Sydney Gazette, as the authors of a certain pamphlet about to be published; I have to acquaint you, that the assertion is decidedly untrue, and I call upon you publicly, to declare by what authority you have been induced to make so unfounded a statement.' Humanitas dissociates himself from Watt and O'Shaughnessy (without actually naming them).