The Artist As Literary Character in the Works of Anton Chekhov

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THE ARTIST AS LITERARY CHARACTER IN THE WORKS OF ANTON CHEKHOV

Amber Jo Aulen

A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures University of Toronto

 Copyright by Amber J. Aulen 2018

ABSTRACT

The Artist as Literary Character in the Work of Anton Chekhov Doctor of Philosophy 2017 Amber Jo Aulen Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures University of Toronto

The present dissertation considers the methodology of Anton Chekhov’s literary ethics

by focusing on the figure of the artist in his work. There are two general strategies he

employs in depicting this figure. The first regards his engagement with typicality in

characterizing the artist, and the second regards the reflexivity of the artist, which is to

say the artist’s actions on the fictional plane draw attention to the author’s actions on the

meta-fictional plane.

The concern with typicality vis-à-vis the artist is more prominent in his earlier stories

and is the focus of the first part of the dissertation. Chapter One addresses typicality in

the genre of the physiologie in France and its Russian counterpart, the fiziologicheskii

ocherk. This discussion lays the groundwork for Chapter Two, which addresses

Chekhov’s move towards the complicated type in a trio of stories showcasing artists

published in short succession in February 1886 – “An Actor’s Death” (“Akterskaia gibel’”), “Requiem” (“Panikhida”), and “Anyuta” (“Aniuta”).

The reflexive quality of the figure of the artist, which we also find in the three aforementioned stories, is more prominent in Chekhov’s later stories and is the focus of

the second part of the dissertation. How an artist sees is of particular importance to

Chekhov. Chapter Three examines the visual artists in his mature work to determine the

components of artistic vision he sets forth, namely serdechnost’, temporal and sensory

specificity, and indeterminacy. Chapter Four analyzes the actress. From his early days as

a writer, he was attentive to the power dynamics in the theater. His sympathy towards the

actress in stories such as “Requiem” (“Panikhida”) and “A Boring Story” (Skuchnaia

istoriia”) is noteworthy. Yet, as Chapter Four argues, he moves beyond sympathy in The

Seagull (“Chaika”) to invest Nina, an actress, with the power of self-representation.

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Table of Contents

ABSTRACT ……………………………………………………………………………..ii

INTRODUCTION: Characterization and Ethics ……………………………………..1 1. Ethics, Metapoetics, and Character Study in Chekhov……………………………..…..6 2. Approaches to Characterization and Literary Character: Past and Present ……..……12 3. Literary Characters as Types …………………………………………………….…...19 4. Character Types and Comedy …………………………..…………………………….23 5. The Figure of the Artist in Chekhov: An Overview ……………………………….....25

CHAPTER ONE: Aesthetics and the Type …………………………………………..37 1.1. The Physiologie …………………………………………………………………….38 1.2. The Physiological Sketch on Russian Soil ………………………………………….51 1.3. The Chinovnik: A Quintessential Russian Type ……………………………………54 1.4. Vissarion Belinsky: Typicality in Theory …………………………………………..62 1.5. Dmitry Grigorovich: Typicality in Practice ………………………………………...66

CHAPTER TWO: Convention and Innovation – Navigating the Journalistic Context of the ‘Small Press’ and Beyond ………………………………75 2.1. The Journalistic and Social Context of the Illustrated Weeklies …...………………76 2.2. Straightforward Artist Types in Chekhov …………………………………………..85 2.3. Exploring the Inadequacies of the Type ………………………….……………….100 2.4. “Begi ot shablona”: Publication Context and Chekhov’s Aesthetics ……………..109 2.5. A New Path ………………………………………………………………………..112 2.6. From Theory to Practice: “The Bishop” …………………………………………..126

CHAPTER THREE: The Visual Artist – Seeing Artistically ……………………...135 3.1. Constructing an Artistic Perspective: Three Stories with Artists …………………139 3.2. The Makings of an Artistic Perspective (I): Non-Categorical …………………….144 3.3. The Makings of an Artistic Perspective (II): Serdechnost’ ……………………….151 3.4. The Makings of an Artistic Perspective (III): Temporal Specificity and Sensory Experience ……………………………………………………………………………...156 3.5. The Makings of an Artistic Perspective (IV): Indeterminacy ……………………..168 3.6. From Theory to Practice: “Lady with a Dog” ……………………………………..173

CHAPTER FOUR: “Ia – aktrisa” – Authority, Agency, and the Actress ………...181 4.1. Contextualizing the Figure of The Actress (I): Social and Cultural Perceptions …187 4.2. Contextualizing the Figure of the Actress (II): Russian Literature ………………..190 4.3. The Figure of the Actress in Chekhov …………………………………………….198 4.4. The Seagull ………………………………………………………………………...210

CONCLUSION ……………………………………………………………………….225

APPENDIX ONE: English and Russian Names of Journals, Short Stories, Etc. ...230

BIBLIOGRAPHY …………………………………………………………………….233

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Whenever I open a book for the first time, I turn to the acknowledgments’ page. It reminds me that our lives and our accomplishments are built on community, and it is with great pleasure and gratitude that I write my own. My supervisor, Donna Orwin, has patiently led me through the PhD process, from my initial coursework to the completed dissertation. She has modeled how to be a thorough and deeply thoughtful scholar who is also personally invested in the questions she is asking. Kate Holland has read numerous drafts of the dissertation and has provided valuable commentary on its form and cohesion. Ralph Lindheim is a careful and meticulous reader of Chekhov. His expertise has been valuable in refining my argument and increasing my appreciation of Chekhov’s work. My external reader, Angela Brintlinger, has helped me more clearly articulate my vision of the dissertation as a whole and where I might go from here.

I am unspeakably grateful for friends who have encouraged me on this journey. Jodi, Sarah, Rachel, and Anna have checked in, visited me, and opened their homes to me over the years. Our yearly gatherings have kept me sane and grounded. Olya has become a cherished friend over the course of preparing for comprehensive exams and navigating the challenges of writing a dissertation. Ania – my favorite knitting and yoga partner – is another of the valued friends I’ve met in this process. Jen has challenged and enabled me to live a balanced life, even while in graduate school. I couldn’t have asked for a better roommate. The GCF community at University of Toronto has been a rich source of support and sustenance, both physically and emotionally.

I would choose Scott, Amber, and Ellie to be my friends even if they weren’t family. I’m fortunate they’re both. The standard Jean sets for being an aunt is high. She opened her home to me for several months as I finished writing the dissertation, continually makes me laugh, and has always been in my corner. Luke is the person I most want to talk with about literature, life, and everything in between. He has been incredibly supportive at the close of this chapter, and I am so happy to begin the next chapter with him by my side. Finally, I dedicate this dissertation to my parents. They have instilled in me a conviction that we have a responsibility to treat others well and to be kind to ourselves. Their support has been unwavering and this dissertation would not have been possible without them.

INTRODUCTION Characterization and Ethics

All of those things I’ve been learning about in class, those bone-chilling abstractions theme, plot, and symbol are de-abstracted by hearing Toby read Chekhov aloud: they are simply tools with which to make your audience feel more deeply – methods of creating higher-order meaning. The stories and Toby’s reading of them convey a notion new to me, or one which, in the somber cathedral of academia, I’d forgotten: literature is a form of fondness-for-life. It is love for life taking verbal form. - George Saunders, “My Writing Education: A Time Line”1

In Anton Chekhov’s short story “Art” (“Khudozhestvo”), Seryozhka’s craftsmanship and attention to artistic form has a galvanizing effect both on the community and on him personally. Customarily lazy and prone to drunkenness, Seryozhka is enlisted once a year to create a Jordan (Iordan’): an ice hole cut in the shape of a cross for the Russian

Orthodox celebration of Epiphany.2 Once he starts the work in earnest, he displays a singular devotion to its form, from the wooden pegs that hold a wooden circle in place to ice sculptures of a lectern and a cross. On the cross sculpture he goes so far as to “carve an expression of meekness and humility on the face of the dove.”3 After the intricate ice carving is finished, he frantically rushes from store to store to procure paints. As he does so, the text recounts the impact art has in bringing the villagers together, alongside

Seryozhka, “….they all feel that his art is not his personal affair but something that

1 George Saunders, “My Writing Education: A Time Line” (The New Yorker, 22 Oct. 2015) www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/my-writing-education-a-timeline (last accessed 13 Dec. 2016). 2 The Jordan in this story is elaborate and includes the following components: a wooden ring, which is placed over a hole in the ice, with pegs along the outside and a red cross in the center; two ice sculptures, one of a lectern with the Gospel and a cross carved into it and another of a cross with a dove carved on it. All the components are subsequently painted with a variety of colors, including two of which Seryozhka makes himself (using beetroot, presumably for a dark red color, and onion peels for a yellow color). 3 выточить на лице голубя кротость и смиренномудрие (4:290). All quotes from Chekhov’s work are taken from A. P. Chekhov, Polnoe sobranie sochinenii i pisem v tridtsati tomakh (Nauka, 1974). The sources for the English translations are identified in Appendix One.

concerns them all, the whole people.”4 The finished creation inspires wonder and

enlivens onlookers. Seryozhka’s attention to form also transforms him, “…the lazy

fellow’s soul is filled with a sense of glory and triumph.”5 In short, he becomes an artist, even if only for a moment.

The interplay between form and ethics in Chekhov’s work constitutes an important aspect of his aesthetics. His artistic talent, with regard to form, was recognized early and has been affirmed often. Critical appreciation of his ethics developed more slowly. His literary output fell outside the established norms of his day, which called for ideological exposition in literature. As a result, early critics faulted him for indifference to the ethics of art. One early contemporary critic, N. K. Mikhailovskii (1842-1904), pointedly, and at length, criticized him for treating all material (whether it be a man, his shadow, a bell, or a suicide) with the same cold-blooded nonchalance.6

Indeed, aesthetics is a fraught sphere when it comes to Chekhov’s works, though not

for the reasons Mikhailovskii set forth. First, his self-proclaimed “autobiographophobia”

coupled with his reticence to speak about his own art distinguish him from his

predecessors and contemporaries. Readers and critics are left to deduce Chekhov’s

aesthetics from his work alone rather than from supplementary commentary or

explanations offered by the author. Second, his works are notoriously (and deliberately)

ambiguous. They are also subtle. Yet a story such as “Grief” (“Toska”), which is a

4 ….все чувствуют, что художество есть не его личное, а общее, народное дело (4:291). 5 …душа лентяя наполняется чуствовом славы и торжества (4:292). 6 N. K. Mikhailovskii, “Ob otsakh i detiakh i o g. Chekhove,” Literaturno-kriticheskie stat’i (Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo kudozhestvennoj. literatury, 1957) 594-607. It is worth noting that Mikhailovskii appreciates Chekhov’s talent. In fact, it is possible that Mikhailovskii’s criticism is so harsh precisely because he recognizes that Chekhov is talented. The lack of ideological merit is a greater tragedy because Chekhov holds so much artistic potential. This idea that Chekhov’s talent outpaces meaning in his work is also present in Zinaida Gippus’ commentary on Chekhov. Zinaida Gippius, Dnevnik 1 (Intelvak, 1999), especially “O poshlosti” 267-272, “Slovo o teatre” 230-236, and “Chto i kak” 272-289.

sensitive portrayal of a cabbie whose son has recently died, forcefully counters

Mikahilovskii’s accusation of indifference.

Chekhov’s work is deeply ethical. In fact, I contend that ethics is a fundamental force in his literary output. I am not alone in this conviction. Writers such as Virginia Woolf and Raymond Carver attest to this aspect of Chekhov’s work, each in their own way.7 My favorite sentiment in this regard is expressed in the epigraph to this chapter, which was written by George Saunders and occasioned by a public reading of Chekhov’s story

“About Love” (“O liubvi”) by Tobias Wolff. Many critics also attest to the ethical nature of Chekhov's work.8 Yet his conception of the ethical mandate of art is challenging to pin down even as it is deeply felt. If we grant that the ethics of art is foundational to his work, why is it so difficult to codify his aesthetics? Moreover, why has he developed the reputation of being a harsh writer, objective to the point of callousness? Mikhailovskii’s intuition is at least partially accurate. Chekhov’s works don’t ‘mean’ in the same way those of his predecessors do.9 He strongly and consistently eschewed ideology and dogmatism, which can provide relatively direct access to an author’s aesthetics and ethical system. Chekhov, therefore, requires a more indirect analytic route. In the

7 Virginia Woolf wrote of Chekhov, “Is it that he is primarily interested, not in the soul’s relation with other souls, but with the soul’s relation to health – with the soul’s relation to goodness?” Virginia Woolf, “The Russian Point of View,” The Common Reader (Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1925) 248. In a short meditative piece on a quote taken from Saint Teresa (“Words lead to deeds…They prepare the soul, make it ready, and move it to tenderness”) Raymond Carver applies this quote to Chekhov’s story “Ward No. 6”: “In a productive alchemy, Chekhov combines words and deeds to cause us to reconsider the origin and nature of tenderness.” Raymond Carver, “Meditations on a Line from Saint Teresa,” Call if You Need Me: The Uncollected Fiction and Prose (Harvill, 2000) 124. 8 See the following section for more information. 9 A less charitable interpretation, adopted by Mikhailovskii, is that Chekhov’s works don’t “mean” at all. In the same article Mikhailovskii says that Chekhov’s stories have the same accidental, purposeless quality of a stroll. “Chekhov himself doesn’t live in his works. It’s as if he’s strolling through life and in so doing he lays hold of this and that. Why, exactly, this and not that? Why that and not something else? With these choices Chekhov amazes us with his randomness.” / “Г. Чехов и сам не живет в своих произведениях, а так себе, гуляет мимо жизни и так гуляючи, ухватит то одно, то другое. Почему именно это, а не то? почему то и не другое? Выбор тем г Чехова поражает своею случайностью” (Mikhailovskii 599-600).

following pages I explore the figure of the artist in Chekhov’s work as an inroad to his

aesthetics.

The artist in his work has a meta-poetic function. In the beginning of 1886 he used the

figure of the artist to indicate his new aesthetic path as a writer. This occurs in a trio of

stories clustered around his initial publication in New Times (Novoe vremia): “An Actor’s

Death” (“Akterskaia gibel’”), “Requiem” (“Panikhida”), and “Anyuta” (“Aniuta”). I will

refer to these stories collectively as the “aesthetic statement” stories. This was a

watershed moment in his career as a writer. His aesthetic sensibilities were maturing at

this time, and the figure of the artist heralded his development. Yet it is important to note

that the meta-poetic function of the artist in his work does not produce an ideal artist,

akin to Tolstoy’s Mikhailov,10 who exemplifies the author’s artistic principles. Instead,

the artist in his work provides an indirect commentary on his aesthetics.

First, in the aesthetic statement stories mentioned above, he portrays the artists as

complicated types. The complicated type is a dualistic entity in which a typical structure

and an expansion of the type interact in a productive state of tension. It is set in opposition to the straightforward type. Second, the artist’s presence on the fictional plane, in the aforementioned stories as well as others, provides a natural point of comparison to

Chekhov’s practice as author on the meta-fictional plane. At times, such as in “Anyuta,” he sets the artist’s activities in opposition to his practice as an author. He highlights, and

then corrects, the artist’s deficiencies. At other times, such as in “An Actor’s Death” and

“Requiem,” he fills out an incomplete or inaccurate characterization of the artist present

10 Mikhailov is a model artist type in Anna Karenina who encodes aspects of Tolstoy’s aesthetics. For studies that analyze Mikhailov in this capacity, see the following: Finke, Metapoesis: The Russian Tradition from Pushkin to Chekhov (Duke UP, 1995); Amy Mandelker, Framing Anna Karenina: Tolstoy, the Woman Question, and the Victorian Novel (Ohio State UP, 1993); Gary Saul Morson, Anna Karenina in Our Time: Seeing More Wisely (Yale UP, 2007).

within the fictional plane of the text. In such instances he aligns himself more closely

with the artist, whose artistry (broadly defined) exemplifies the author’s own artistic values. Still at other times, as in “Easter Eve” (“Sviatoiu noch’iu”), the artist’s practice

magnifies artistic devices and principles Chekhov employs in the story. Whether by

means of opposition or correspondence, the reflexivity of the artist in Chekhov’s work

places the ethical contours of his literary practice in greater relief. This is especially true

in his more mature stories.

The artists in his work have received little scholarly attention and hold underexplored

potential. The research that does exist often focuses on identifying real-life figures and

situations upon whom his fictional characters are based.11 Interest in the biographical

correspondences, however, has distracted scholars from attending to these figures as

artistic constructs. Given that Chekhov was a writer, it is reasonable to begin with writers

in his work; however, there are surprisingly few. Being a writer was close to the core of

Chekhov’s self-identity and was caught up in his “autobiographophobia.”12 He displaces

his views of art and the task of the writer onto other artists, namely visual artists and

performance artists, a practice that is not uncommon in the Russian literary tradition.13

Visual art and performance art are both integral to the context of Chekhov’s literary practice. From the outset of his professional writing career, begun in the illustrated weeklies, Chekhov’s work overlapped with that of the visual artist. His brother Nikolai

11 The PSS notes to “The Grasshopper” outline several of the biographical correspondences related to this story, (8:429-433). In relation to The Seagull see Donald Rayfield, Anton Chekhov: A Life (Northwestern UP, 1998). 12 Notably, Chekhov has several stories in which doctors are prominent characters. While being a doctor is also an important aspect of his identity, I would submit that he was more confident and secure in this identity; therefore, he was able to distance himself from it more easily in order to artistically manipulate it. 13 Examples of visual artists include Chartkov in Gogol’s “The Portrait” (“Portret”) and Mikhailov in Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina. Negina in Ostrovsky’s Artists and Admirers (“Talanty i poklonniki”) provides an example of a performance artist.

worked as an illustrator for the weekly Spectator (Zritel'), where Anton also published many of his early stories. In addition, Nikolai provided illustrations for several of

Anton’s stories during the early years. Many of the other journals where Chekhov cut his literary teeth (Alarm Clock/Budil’nik, Fragments/Oskolki) were also illustrated. In addition, visual art, especially that of Isaak Levitan, is recognized as an important influence on Chekhov’s literary practice.14

As a dramatist Chekhov was deeply invested in theatrical performance. Theater

resonated with him from an early age, and he wrote his first play while still in

gymnasium. In the early stage of his writing career Anton worked as a journalist and

several of his pieces focused on theater and performance artists, including Sarah

Bernhardt (whom he dealt with harshly) and Mikhail Lentovsky (whom he dealt with

frequently). Additionally, actors were common characters in the illustrated weeklies prior

to and during Chekhov’s tenure. Chekhov himself followed this literary trend.

Chekhov was living in a time of aesthetic transition, from Realism to Modernism, in

which the boundaries between different art forms were becoming more porous. Unlike

many of the Symbolists, Chekhov was not interested in the intersection of art forms on a

theoretical level. Nonetheless, the degree to which visual art and performance art interact

with Chekhov’s literary practice situates him as a man of his times. My decision to

analyze writers, visual artists, and performance artists as indicators of Chekhov’s literary practice is, in part, a testament to the artistic spirit of the times in which he lived.

1. Ethics, Metapoetics, and Character Study in Chekhov

14 For more on this relationship see Serge Gregory, Antosha & Levitasha: The Shared Lives and Art of Anton Chekhov and Isaac Levitan (Northern Illinois UP, 2015).

Ethics, metapoetics, and character study are fundamental to the present study. Critics

have engaged with the ethics of Chekhov’s work in various ways. Robert Louis Jackson

presents Chekhov as an artist who renders a unified whole from a collection of parts. He

credits him with “the gift of perceiving connections in the natural, social, and moral worlds, the gift of sensing the organic relation of detail, the part, to the whole complex truth.”15 In Jackson’s formulation, this sense of wholeness and connection are central to

Chekhov’s ethical contribution as a writer. Yuri Corrigan takes a similarly broad

perspective on Chekhov’s ethics in his article “Chekhov and the Divided Self.” He

perceives a trend towards reconciliation between an engaged (but lacking self-awareness) mode of interacting with the world and a detached (but self-aware) one. He traces the evolution between these two modes first as they are present in characters set against each other, then as a source of psychological dualism within one character, and finally as

Chekhov attempts to reconcile the two modes into a character who is both self-aware and engaged. Corrigan writes, “Over the course of his career, Chekhov worked hard to portray the reintegration of estranged consciousness into life.”16 This consideration is

relevant to the actual world of readers and critics as well as the fictional world in which it

is manifest.

According to Vladimir Kataev, Chekhov is primarily interested in the ways that

humans orient themselves in the world or, in other words, ethical action. Furthermore,

Kataev demonstrates that Chekhov probes his enduring interest in man’s orientation in

the world by “treating each individual case in isolation,”17 which indicates a concern with

15 Robert Louis Jackson, “On Chekhov’s Art,” Chekhov the Immigrant: Translating a Cultural Icon (Slavica, 2007) 23. 16 Yuri Corrigan, “Chekhov and the Divided Self,” The Russian Review 70.2 (2011) 277. 17 Vladimir Kataev, If Only We Could Know!: An Interpretation of Chekhov (Ivan R. Dee, 2002) 163.

ethical treatment, modeled by the author and applicable to the reader. In Cathy Popkin’s investigation of Chekhov’s reconfiguration of narrative event, too, aesthetics and ethics are closely intertwined. She identifies four Chekhovian strategies directed towards rethinking the notion of the “significant event.” Each strategy is ethically charged.

Consider the first strategy, in which Chekhov elevates a seemingly trivial occurrence to the level of a significant narrative event, such as occurs in “Death of a Clerk” (“Smert’ chinovnika”). The seemingly insignificant event is the eponymous clerk’s sneeze, which lands on a man of higher rank (a general) seated in front of him at the theater. The general brushes off the clerk’s initial apology, which sets off a litany of apologies that finally cause the general to lose his temper and yell at the clerk to leave his office, after which the clerk goes home and dies. The “trifling” event of a sneeze in fact invokes the contemporary social structure, built on the Table of Ranks. Moreover, the story challenges that structure, as Popkin indicates.

Any event challenges the inviolability of the boundary, but an absurdly small one challenges that boundary’s very validity. The distinction in rank turns out to be an untenable position if applied consistently. And a sneeze turns out to be eminently tellable.

By confounding aesthetic norms, Chekhov also challenges social ones.

Lisa Knapp also recognizes the interplay between aesthetics and ethics in her discussion of “Ward Six” (“Palata No. 6”) by applying the Aristotelian concepts of fear and pity to the story. While they operate ineffectively on the character, the potential remains for these affective states to motivate action on the part of the reader.

For the inmates of ward 6, fear stuns, paralyzes, and even kills. But the reader who “visits” ward 6 may, by being, “lifted out of himself,” learn from the fear

witnessed through the medium of art. The reader may even be motivated to act on behalf of the sick and the prisoners…18

The fear, with its implicit call to action, is, of course, communicated to the reader through

literary form.

To this end, Chekhov makes the fictional (mental) visit to ward 6 as vivid as possible. He concentrates on physical details, on the stench of the place that makes you feel as though “you’ve entered a menagerie,” on the bars on the window, and so forth…19

The aforementioned critics attest to both formal and ethical facets of Chekhov’s work.

Popkin and Knapp are more explicit about the interaction between form and ethics, which

they present as two-fold: form can be used to express ethical concerns thematically and it can act on the reader in the direction of certain outcomes. The relationship is unidirectional: form conveys ethics. How does this relationship operate in reverse? There

are almost certainly ethical principles that govern form in Chekhov’s work. What are

they? This constitutes one of the overarching questions of the present dissertation. As

with most questions regarding Chekhov’s artistic practice, the best sources for exploring

this question are his works.

When we look to Chekhov’s work to answer aesthetic questions about it, we quickly

find ourselves in the meta-fictional realm. Michael Finke has explicitly practiced this line

of critical investigation when it comes to Chekhov. In Metapoesis: The Russian Tradition

from Pushkin to Chekhov he reads “The Steppe” (“Step’”) as a representation of the

process of artistic creation. In addition he argues that, through the motif of water, the

novella “presents an allegory of its own reading and misreading.”20 In a later essay he

18 Lisa Knapp, “Fear and Pity in ‘Ward Six’: Chekhovian Catharsis,” Reading Chekhov’s Texts (Northwestern UP, 1993) 153. 19 Knapp 153. 20 Finke Metapoesis 160.

once again takes up this idea of the text as a hermeneutic guide to itself in a discussion of

“The Kiss” (“Potselui”) as a “lesson in reading.”21 In this same essay he advocates for a

fuller examination of the meta-fictional aspects of Chekhov’s work. More specifically he refers to “a tendency toward self-reflexivity” that “especially showed itself, in ways yet to be fully investigated, in works written during watershed moments in Chekhov’s career.”22 Chekhov’s three aesthetic statements stories (mentioned above) occur at such a

point in his career and are the conceptual centerpiece of the present dissertation.

Using the language of allegory rather than metapoetics, Carol Apollonio provides

three articles that analyze select texts as indices of Chekhov’s artistic creation. In “The

Grasshopper” (“Poprygun’ia”) the progressive settings of the apartment in the city, the

dacha, and the country encode, in narrative form, the creative process in reverse, “the movement from art to material reality.”23 The two sisters in “House with a Mezzanine:

An Artist’s Story” (“Dom s mezaninom: rasskaz khudozhnika”), Zhenia and Lida, symbolize two opposing threads: inspiration/ timelessness and hard work/ the passage of

time, that join together in the creation of art. Apollonio writes, “But no art can be created

without an interaction between both of these elements; inspiration (Zhenia) is

meaningless unless it is crafted, by hard work (Lida), into a finished work of art.”24

21 Michael C. Finke, “Of Interpretation and Stolen Kisses: From Poetics to Metapoetics in Chekhov’s ‘The Kiss,’ ” Chekhov for the 21st Century (Slavica, 2012) 139. 22 Finke “Of Interpretation and Stolen Kisses” 127. 23 Carol Apollonio, “Scenic Storytelling in Chekhov’s ‘Grasshopper,’ ” The Bulletin of the North American Chekhov Society, vol. XVI (2008) 11. 24 Carol A. Flath, “Art and Idleness: Chekhov’s ‘The House with a Mezzanine’” Russian Review 58 (1999) 466.

Apollonio shifts her focus in The Seagull (“Chaika”) to the “allegorically charged

relationships”25 in it, namely Treplev’s relationship with his mother, Arkadina, and with

his father, who is unnamed. On the mother-son axis, Arkadina’s invective against

Treplev, that he is a “nonentity” (spoken in a moment of anger) is translated into action

by the end of the play. Arkadina’s outburst reveals that she perceives Treplev as a threat,

both existentially (his existence as a grown man reminds her that she is no longer young)

and artistically (his bias towards Symbolism challenges her artistic affiliation). Treplev’s

father, on the other hand, is entirely absent. Yet this void is the source of much that

happens in the play, namely “Arkadina’s affair with Trigorin and her quasi-incestuous

relationship with her son.”26 Apollonio not only highlights the broad metafictional

potential of Chekhov’s work, she also presents literary character (more pointedly, the

artist) as a specific formal element that reveals his aesthetics.

Savely Senderovich’s study regarding the resonance of the St. George myth in

Chekhov’s work is based on a select group of literary characters: those named George, in

its numerous Russian forms (Egor’, Egorushka, Georgii, Zhorzh, etc.).27 By means of the

characters that bear this name, Chekhov explores the interplay of religious symbol and

folk myth in the cultural imagination of the Russian people. Characters named Mary

(Maria et. al. in Russian) similarly demarcate the field of analytical inquiry in Julie De

Sherbinin’s investigation of the “Marian paradigm” in Chekhov’s work. This paradigm

25 Carol A. Flath, “The Seagull: The Stage Mother, the Missing Father, and the Origins of Art,” Modern Drama 42.4 (1999) 491. 26 Flath “The Seagull” 500. 27 For a summation of his argument in English, see Savely Senderovich, “Anton Chekhov and St. George the Dragonslayer (An Introduction to the Theme),” Anton Chekhov Rediscovered: A Collection of New Studies with a Comprehensive Bibliography (Russian Language Journal, 1987) 167-87. For a later examination of the same theme in Russian, see the chapter “Bitva so smeem” in Savely Senderovich, Chekhov s glazu na glaz: istoriia odnoi oderzhimosti A. P. Chekhova (Bulanin, 1994).

refers to “the relationship between Mary of Egypt and Mary Magdalene, and their sexual

antithesis, the Virgin Mary.”28 Chekhov evokes this paradigm as a way to explore how

Russians accommodate Orthodox teaching to their lived experience. De Sherbinin writes,

“Chekhov is interested in how Russians ‘act out’ their religio-cultural heritage, in how

the premises of a religious creed become translated into individualized, idiosyncratic, and

sometimes highly profane understandings.”29 The artist is also a fruitful characterological

category in Chekhov’s work. This category delineates the material I will use in the

present study to analyze the ethical principles that guide Chekhov’s artistic form.

2. Approaches to Characterization and Literary Character: Past and Present

My dissertation benefits from and contributes to the study of character in literature, a

field of literary criticism experiencing a resurgence of interest after being stalled

throughout much of the twentieth century. In short, characterization is the way a fictional

character is portrayed in a literary work. The analysis of literary character in the

following pages attends to devices of characterization and the characters that emerge.

Literary character is a basic element of literature. A theoretical awareness of character

as a noteworthy component of literature dates back at least to Aristotle. Yet historically

the study of characterization in literature has received less critical attention than most

other elements (plot, setting, genre, etc.). Distinct from the incorporation of character in

literature, the modern study of characterization in literature began in earnest with the rise

of Formalist criticism, specifically Vladimir Propp’s Morphology of the Folk Tale (1928).

28 Julie W. de Sherbinin, Chekhov and Russian Religious Culture: The Poetics of the Marian Paradigm (Northwestern UP, 1997) 9. 29 Sherbinin 10.

In it Propp subjugates all components of the literary text, including character, to plot. In

Propp’s formulation, characters are important solely as functional elements that advance

the plot. (For this reason he is able to say that character is dispensable.)

Propp’s conception of literary characters stands in opposition to the so-called

Humanizing Approach, especially prevalent in the nineteenth century, which construes

literary characters as fully akin to living beings. In its most extreme form, this approach

leads to the creation of extra-textual biographies and psychological motivations for

literary characters with no regard for their fictional status. These disparate views on the

ontology (human, textual) of a literary character were polarized throughout much of the

twentieth century,30 resulting in a period of critical stagnation.

Both the Humanizing and the Formalist approaches offered valuable contributions to

an appreciation of literary character; yet neither, by itself, provided a satisfactory

account. E. M. Forster was one of the first critics to bridge the gap. Implicit in his writing

is the possibility of analyzing literary character in light of her/his dual nature: personal

and constructed. A hybrid approach to literary character does justice to literary character

as an artistic construct with special relevance to the actual lives of the author and readers.

Through an analysis of the formal properties of literary character we can thereby gain a

greater appreciation of the author as well as the texture of the culture in which a work

was written. As Forster, a writer and informal literary critic, wrote, “Since the novelist is

himself a human-being, there is an affinity between him and his subject matter…”31 Or as

Marina MacKay attests, “we can learn to understand a culture better from how it

30 The following works provide a more detailed study of the history of character analysis in literature. Maria DiBattista, Novel Characters: A Genealogy (Wiley-Blackwell, 2010). Marina MacKay, The Cambridge Introduction to the Novel (Cambridge UP, 2011). Piergiorgio Trevisan, Towards a Stylistic Approach to Character in Literature (Forum, 2008). 31 E. M. Forster, Aspects of the Novel and Related Writings (E. Arnold, 1974) 30.

imagines the fictional human being.”32 The present study puts a slightly different spin on

this argument: we can understand Chekhov’s aesthetics better by understanding how he constructs the fictional artist.

Forster encourages a two-pronged approach to literary characters in his insightful,

albeit “ramshackly,”33 work, Aspects of the Novel. In it he devotes two chapters to literary character. His application of the term “People” to literary characters in this work functions “to reduce and in some measure demystify the distance between readers and

novelistic characters,”34 which is a nod towards the Humanizing Approach. At the same

time, he admits a distinction between what he calls “Homo Fictus” and “Homo Sapiens,”

thereby recognizing the fictional ontology of the literary character.

One of Forster’s most enduring contributions to literary criticism is his dimensional description of characters, as ‘flat’ or ‘round.’ This grows out of his appreciation of the constructed nature of the literary character. Forster famously delineates these two characterological categories as follows,

We may divide characters into flat and round. Flat characters were called “humorous” in the seventeenth century, and are sometimes called types, and sometimes caricatures. In their purest form, they are constructed around a single idea or quality: when there is more than one factor in them, we get the beginning of the curve towards the round.35

The terms ‘flat’ and ‘round’ are, admittedly, limited (and slippery) but helpful

nonetheless as a starting point for recognizing that not all literary characters are created

equal. More specifically, Forster highlights that characters differ in terms of their

dimensionality.

32 MacKay 66. 33 Forster’s own description of this work (54). 34 DiBattista vii. 35 Forster 46-47.

While I don’t often use the terms ‘flat’ and ‘round’ in my analysis of artists in

Chekhov’s work, I do draw on Forster’s appreciation of dimensionality in relation to literary character. Before proceeding, I would like to clarify a couple of related points.

First, I adhere to Marina MacKay’s suggestion to approach a character’s dimensionality descriptively, not evaluatively (‘flat’ is bad, ‘round’ is good).36 While there are situations in which Chekhov imparts flatness to a character as a critique of that character, the significance of a character’s dimensionality arises from the text. In other words, I do not assume a universal significance attached to flatness or roundness in Chekhov’s work.

Second, I view dimensionality as collaborative and dynamic rather than oppositional and static. I share David Fishelov’s conviction that there is a tension between individuality and typicality in literary characters.37 Yet, unlike Fishelov, I do not view

typicality and individuality within an either/or framework. Within Fishelov’s conception,

typicality displaces individuality and vice-versa. My analysis of artists in Chekhov’s

work has instead led me to a both/and framework, according to which a move away from

typicality does not displace typicality but rather complicates it. Typicality remains

prescient, even for individualized characters in Chekhov’s work. Chekhov’s mature

means of characterization entails a dynamic interaction between typicality and

individuality. Forster himself provides a model for a more fluid approach. While he

initially presents ‘flat’ and ‘round’ as two definitive, oppositional categories, he curiously

applies both in reference to Lady Bertram (Mansfield Park). Bertram, Forster argues,

36 MacKay 70. 37 David Fishelov, “Types of Character, Characteristics of Types” Style 24.3 (1990) 422. Fishelov applies the flat and round distinctions on two axes, textual and constructed, to come up with a total of four categories: “pure” type (textual – flat, constructed – flat), type-like individual (textual – flat, constructed – round), individual-like type (textual – round, constructed – flat), “pure” individual (textual – round, constructed – round).

rounds out and deflates (in the course of a sentence!). My proposed understanding of

dimensionality vis-à-vis literary character allows for an author’s manipulation of a

character’s dimensions.

Thirdly, the identification of a character’s dimensionality (flatness/ roundness) serves

as a starting point for my research rather than an end in itself. In contrast to studies of

character that primarily aim to establish a typology of literary character,38 I am interested

in the function(s) of a character’s dimensionality within a given text. More significant,

then, is not where a specific character falls on the flat/ round spectrum, but why she or he

is positioned as such. What is the function of a character’s flatness or roundness?

James Phelan’s work on the rhetorical aspect of literary character, as found in Reading

People, Reading Plots: Character, Progression, and the Interpretation of Narrative,39

provides another point of reference for the study of literary character. Particularly useful

is his identification of three distinct components of literary character: synthetic, which is

the artificial or constructed element of a literary character; mimetic, which is the

component of a character that allows us to view him/ her as a possible person; and

thematic, which is the representative nature of a literary character that coincides with a

proposition or assertion. Of the three only the synthetic component is necessary, but it

can be more or less fore-grounded. When the mimetic and thematic components are

present, the development of each component varies according to the character. Thus the

38 W. J. Harvey slots characters into one of four categories: protagonist, background, card, “ficelle.” W. J. Harvey, Character and the Novel (Cornell UP, 1965). Baruch Hochman provides a more complicated system of classification based on eight sets of binaries: stylization/ naturalism, coherence/ incoherence, wholeness/ fragmentariness, literalness/ symbolism, complexity/ simplicity, transparency/ opacity, dynamism/ staticism, closure/ openness. Baruch Hochman, Character in Literature (Cornell UP, 1985). Hochman. Fishelov also provides a typology: “pure” type, type-like individual, individual-like type, “pure” individual. 39 James Phelan, Reading People, Reading Plots: Character, Progression, and the Interpretation of Narrative (University of Chicago Press, 1989).

relative prominence afforded to the synthetic, mimetic, and thematic components, as well

as the relationship between them, is flexible.

In Realist literature the synthetic component of a character is less pronounced. In

Modernist literature, by contrast, the synthetic component of a character is exalted, so it

makes sense to look there for a clear illustration of this component. Consider Pepp

Peppovich Pepp, a character whose material existence arises solely from imaginative

revelry, thus underlying the constructed nature of the character (Petersburg, Andrei

Bely). The extent to which Anna Karenina is invested with a complicated and highly

plausible psychological existence demonstrates the mimetic component of character

(Anna Karenina, Lev Tolstoy). Many of Dostoevsky’s characters, including Prince

Myshkin in The Idiot, highlight the thematic component of literature.

Phelan also distinguishes between a character’s dimensions and functions. He defines

the former as “any attribute a character may be said to possess when that character is

considered in isolation from the work in which he or she appears.”40 So, a dimension of a

character is simply an attribute or trait as is. “A function,” Phelan continues, “is a

particular application of that attribute made by the text through its developing structure.”41 Dimensions, therefore, have the potential to become functions, though this

potential is not always realized. Phelan extends the components listed above (synthetic,

mimetic, thematic) onto the functional plane. This results in a six-part analytical scheme:

synthetic dimensions, synthetic functions, mimetic dimensions, mimetic functions,

thematic dimensions, mimetic functions. As previously mentioned, I am more interested

in the functions of characterization (i.e. synthetic, mimetic, and thematic). Again, while I

40 Phelan 9. 41 Phelan 9.

don’t necessarily use Phelan’s specific terminology, the notions are present in my

analysis of the artist as a character in Chekhov’s work.

Forster touches upon additional points of interest that are relevant to my discussion of

the artist in Chekhov. As previously mentioned, Forster devotes two chapters of Aspects

of the Novel to literary character: the first concerns the relationship between author and

literary character; the second concentrates on the relationship between literary character

and other aspects of the text. In short, literary character can be analyzed according to two

planes: the character-fictional world plane and the character-author plane. I will attend to

both in the following pages.

On the relationship of author to literary character, Forster insists that a character is

fully understood by the author. He writes the following.

And that is why novels, even when they are about wicked people, can solace us: they suggest a more comprehensible and thus a more manageable human race, they give us the illusion of perspicacity and power.42

This “illusion of perspicacity and power,” Forster claims, arises from the fact that

characters’ “secret lives are visible or might be visible”43 to the author. As one who is

privy to the inner lives of characters, the author maintains power, or authority, over

literary characters. Yet, Forster destabilizes this claim when he writes the following.

The characters arrive when evoked, but full of the spirit of mutiny. For they have these numerous parallels with people like ourselves, they try to live their own lives and are often engaged in treason against the main scheme of the book…they are creations inside a creation…44

42 Forster 44. 43 Forster 44. 44 Forster 46. Interestingly, and importantly, Forster applies this same dynamic to drama. He writes, “These trials beset the dramatist also, and he has yet another set of ingredients to cope with – the actors and actresses – and they appear to side sometimes with the characters they represent, sometimes with the play as a whole, and more often to be the mortal enemies of both. The weight they throw is incalculable, and how any work of art survives their arrival I do not understand” (46).

The power dynamics between the author and the character are not so straightforward as it may seem. This is especially true in the case of Chekhov.

3. Literary Characters as Types

In one of the excerpts quoted above, Forster says that a type is another name for a

“flat” character. While this proposed confluence is too simplistic, the lineage

(seventeenth century “humours”) and the semantic field (types, caricatures) he establishes for flat characters provide a useful starting point for thinking about the type as a means of characterization in literature. The appearance of character types in literature dates to at least the so-called Characters of Theophrastus (319 B.C.). Theophrastus, a pupil of

Aristotle, is generally credited as the author of the first collection of character sketches in

Western literature; these sketches, and the characterization they espoused, influenced the creation of the stock characters of Greek and Roman New Comedy. It is worth noting that the meaning of character set forth by Aristotle is broader than both its meaning in

Theophrastus’ character sketches and in the sense I am using it, as a fictional personage.

Aristotle views character as a person’s moral essence: tested by circumstances, revealed and crystallized through actions.45 Theophrastus’ character types, which include The

Country Bumpkin and The Penny-Pincher, are akin to what Aristotle refers to as “mere dummies.” They are the opposite of a character in the Aristotelian sense.46 Character in

Aristotle is dynamic whereas character types in Theophrastus’ sketches are static.

A rich tradition of character writing, or charactery, blossomed in the seventeenth century, with writers such as Sir Thomas Overbury (New Characters; also referred to as

45 Aristotle, Poetics (Oxford UP, 2013) 35, 18, 24. 46 Aristotle 49.

Overbury’s Characters) and Jean de La Bruyère (Les Caractères ou les Mœurs de ce

siècle). A direct connection between Theophrastus and Overbury is doubtful. La Bruyère,

however, references Theophrastus in the preface to his own compilation of character

sketches. Subsequently, the French physiological sketch writers, who popularized the use

of types in the nineteenth century, cited La Bruyère as a model, thereby establishing an

affinity between characters (in the Theophrastan sense) and nineteenth-century social

types.

Leaving aside the question of Theophrastus’ influence on later practitioners, we can

see that an interest in the delineation and analysis of humanity through the creation of

character types (Theophrastan, “humourous,” moral, social) spans centuries. At the heart

of such an endeavor is a desire to comprehend and explain the social world. That we as

creative beings write and read about fictional characters as a way to understand our own

life is interesting; equally fascinating is how we construct these characters.

The type is a significant ‘how’ of character construction that claims to portray what such a person is like. This claim, and the type itself, has ethical import. In creating a type,

the writer has an ethical responsibility to portray that person in a truthful manner. In

addition, ethical questions attend the very concept of the type. In what ways might a

typical representation lead us closer to the truth of a person and in what ways might it distance us from that same truth?

The figure of the artist is a fruitful place to explore typicality and ethics as they relate to an author’s aesthetics. First, as a member of this group, the author is uniquely invested in this typical designation (artist) and is especially sensitive to it.47 If anything is amiss

47 See point 3 below for the reason I fold the writer into the larger category of artist.

with typicality, ethically speaking, from an author’s perspective then the artist as a type is

a place where the author will first become aware of it and correct it. Second, the artist is

the genesis of artistic representation, of which typicality is a form. This associative thread

makes the artist a thematic lightning rod for considerations of typicality and attendant

questions of ethics. It is no coincidence that Chekhov uses the artist to showcase the

complicated type as a preferred means of characterization in art.

Character construction is one way that literary trends distinguish themselves. In “The

Concept of Realism in Literary Scholarship” René Wellek identifies the social type as

central to Realism as a period-concept in literature, just as the universal type is an integral

part of Classicism in the eighteenth century.48 David Fishelov further confirms that

character construction differs in accordance with literary movements, as he observes,

“…the modernist novel strongly tends to disperse with the “pure” type character as well

as with the individual-like type.”49 My research into the artist as a character type and

beyond contributes to our understanding of Chekhov’s precarious position as a bridge

between Realism and Modernism.

3. The Artist as Hero

There is a literary precedent in the Russian tradition (and beyond) of reading artist

figures as an indication of an author’s aesthetics. For this reason I fold the writer into the

broader category of the artist. The artist as a literary hero and a proxy for the writer was

central to Romanticism, especially in Germany.50 Romanticism’s late entrance onto the

48 René Wellek, “The Concept of Realism in Literary Scholarship” Neophilologus 45.1 (1961) 11-13. 49 Fishelov 432. 50 Sigrid Martha Karkavelas, The Visual Artist in Russian Literature of the First Half of the Nineteenth Century, Dissertation (UC Berkeley, 1980) 14.

Russian literary stage was accompanied by a fascination and exaltation of the artist.

Beginning with the painter’s initial appearances in Russian literature in the late 1820s, he

was a cipher for the writer’s own creative experience and thoughts about art (including

literature). Sigrid Karkavelas’ research into the visual artist in Russian literature during

this period shows that writers of the time drew heavily from Schelling’s philosophy of

nature and art: art as mystical, the “contemplation of beauty and truth,” with a “quality of

immediate, intuitive cognition.”51 The artist was imbued with vitality, the creator of life

itself rather than an image or imitation of it. Writers such as Nikolai Polevoi (1796-1846),

Ivan Panaev (1812-1862), and Vladimir Odoevskii (1803-1869) expressed these ideas

about art through the visual artists in their works.

Starting around this time, and continuing through to the twentieth century, a number

of notable relationships developed between writers and painters, including Nikolai Gogol

(1809-1852) and Alexander Ivanov (1806-1858), Lev Tolstoy (1828-1910) and Nikolai

Ge (1831-1894), Vsevolod Garshin (1855-1888) and Ilya Repin (1844-1930), Chekhov

and Isaak Levitan (1860-1900). More pertinent to the present dissertation are the

depiction of fictional visual artists. Scholars have productively analyzed painters in works

by Gogol, Tolstoy, and Garshin to draw conclusions about these writers’ aesthetics.52 The visual artists in Chekhov have received scant scholarly attention in this respect.

51 Karkavelas 15. 52 In his analysis of Garshin’s story “Art and Assassination” Leland Fetzer presents a nexus of an actual painting (Ivan Groznyi and ego syn Ivan noiabria 16, 1581), an actual painter (Ilya Repin), and the fictional painter of the story (Lopatin) that construes art as an ideological tool, in this case against the concept of non-violence. See Leland Fetzer, “Art and Assassination: Garshin’s Nadezhda Nikolaevna” Russian Review 34.1 (1975) 55-65. Adrian Wanner’s analysis of Gogol’s “Portrait” considers both the fictional artist (Chartkov) and the fictional work of art as presenting a larger statement about art. See Adrian Wanner, “Gogol’s ‘Portrait’ Repainted: On Gary Shteyngart’s ‘Shylock on the Neva’” Canadian Slavonic Papers 51.2/3 (2009) 333-348. See above (footnote 9) for more information related to the fictional painter Mikhailov in Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina.

The artist in Chekhov’s work is the hero, so to speak, of the present dissertation. Yet,

instead of being set apart from the world he represents, the artist in Chekhov’s work is part of the represented world. The guiding analytical question is how the artist is

represented, and the type is central to this analysis.

4. Character Types and Comedy

Character types are particularly amenable to comedy. A critic of Theophrastus

concludes that The Characters of Theophrastus “were written as a literary hand-book, a

guide to comic characterization; probably they formed a mere appendix at the end of a

work on the theory of drama.”53 Forster, too, notes that “flat” characters are more suited

to comedy than tragedy: “A serious or tragic flat character is apt to be a bore.”54 The

relationship between types and comedy is pertinent to Chekhov, given the comic context of the journals where he first published. A comic strain is present throughout the whole of

Chekhov’s literary career.

Andrew Stott offers a couple of reasons as to why types are especially suited for comedy. Comedy, as a dramatic genre, is traditionally driven by a formulaic plot.

Consequently, characterization in comedy serves the plot. The relationship between characterization and plot in comedy is similar yet distinguished from what we find in

Aristotle. For him, plot (“men in action,” what people do) conditions and reveals

character.55 Moreover, this revelation cannot be completely foreseen by the reader. If not

a surprise, it at least comes as an unknown. Stott notes that the easiest characters to slot

53 R. G. Ussher, ed., The Characters of Theophrastus (Macmillan & Co., 1993) 23. 54 Forster 50. 55 Aristotle 24 and ff.

into a pre-determined formula are “one-dimensional characters,”56 or types. This is one

reason that types pair nicely with comedy. In traditional comedy, plot reveals the one-

dimensionality of the character, but this revelation is expected. The way in which the

character’s typicality is revealed is more interesting than the fact of the typicality. As a

notable aside, the traditional structure of comedy (referred to as New Comedy) originates

with Menander, a student of Theophrastus. The requisite stock characters of New

Comedy owe much to The Characters of Theophrastus.

In addition to its generic definition, Stott presents comedy as a tone or mode that

occurs in a wide selection of literary works, regardless of genre. This conception of

comedy is especially appropriate to Chekhov’s works. In this sense, the term ‘comedy’

indicates themes related to “various forms of inversion,” which disrupt an established

order or structure.57 The applicability of types to comedy as a mode of inversion is not

readily apparent, but Forster’s observations once again prove useful. He concludes his

remarks on literary character with the assertion that, “The test of a round character is whether it is capable of surprising in a convincing way. If it never surprises, it is flat.”58

A flat character, or type, cannot surprise because it has no capacity for change and no

room for acting out of “character.” In contrast, a rounder character has the space to act in

ways that are unexpected or not readily apparent; when such a character acts in an

unexpected way the reader is surprised, but the order of the fictional world remains intact

(a rounder character is expected to act in unexpected/ unforeseen ways). A type, on the other hand, is expected to be stable and unchanging. When a type acts in way that is out

56 Andrew Stott, Comedy (Routledge, 2005) 51. 57 Stott 13-22. 58 Forster 54.

of “character” this result is a sense of disruption. The comic element of Chekhov’s work

frequently relies on inversion through disruption.

5. The Figure of the Artist in Chekhov: An Overview

The figure of the artist in Chekhov’s work conveys ethical contours of his formal

practice: a tension between generality and typicality, which forms the basis of a truthful

depiction of human persons; a movement away from categorization and towards affection

(serdechnost’), temporal specificity, and indeterminacy; and respect for the agency of

others. There are two general strategies Chekhov employs in depicting this figure. The

first regards his engagement with typicality in characterizing the artist, and the second

regards the reflexivity of the artist, which is to say that the artist’s actions on the fictional

plane draw attention to the author’s actions on the meta-fictional plane.

The concern with typicality as it relates to the charaterization of the artist is more

prominent in his earlier stories, whereas the reflexivity of the artist is more pronounced in

his later work. Both are present in the trio of aesthetic statement stories mentioned above,

which are the structural centerpiece of the dissertation and are discussed at length

towards the end of Chapter Two. Typicality, which is the focus of the first two chapters

of the dissertation, is central to the characterization of the artists in these stories. The first chapter (typicality in the physiological sketch) prepares the ground for the second

(typicality in Chekhov). The reflexivity of the artist is a burgeoning element in the

aesthetic statement stories and it constitutes the focus of the last two chapters of the

dissertation, each of which focuses on a categorical subset of the artist: the visual artist

(Chapter Three) and the actress (Chapter Four). These last two chapters expand on the

nascent reflexivity of the artists in in Chapter Two and have a parallel relationship to each other.

The aesthetic statement stories represent a pivotal point in the dissertation, from a discussion of typicality and the artist to considerations of reflexivity and the artist. This is fitting, given that these stories also represent a pivotal point in Chekhov’s career. The focus on these three stories as a transitional point may suggest a more abrupt shift in

Chekhov’s artistic practice than I intend. In terms of periodization, I see the whole of

Chekhov’s work as continuous. Aspects of the reflexive artist occur in his early work just as there is continued engagement with typicality and the artist in his later work. While his later works are generally more complex and more nuanced than his earlier ones, there is no strict line of demarcation between the two. The mature Chekhov, as I view him, is a natural outgrowth of the early Chekhov rather than a break from him.

The three aesthetic statement stories present the artist as a complicated type, in

contrast to its literary predecessor, the nineteenth-century social type. In order to

understand the complicated type, we must first comprehend the construction and function

of the straightforward type, which is the focus of Chapter One. We look to the

physiological sketch, the genre in which the nineteenth-century social type originated and

was most fully expressed. The French physiologie first appeared in the 1830s with the

goal of providing an encyclopedic record of the social types that comprised everyday

society.

Borrowing from the practices as well as the values of contemporary scientific

paradigms (zoology and physiology) and pseudo-scientific ones (physiognomy and

phrenology), the physiological sketch advances comprehensibility as an implicit and

desired good. In addition, the aforementioned paradigms underlying the construction of

the physiological sketch highlight the categorical, abstract, and referential nature of the type, respectively. There are implicit values that attend each of these formal qualifiers, yet each also has a shadow side, by which I mean a problematic aspect that is implied and unintended. I explore the values and also briefly consider the shadow sides, since they propel Chekhov’s movement towards the complicated type.

Following the French example, Russian litterateurs also penned physiological sketches. The categorical, abstract, and referential nature of the type remained in its

Russian incarnation. In addition, ideology emerged as an important feature. More specifically, the type became a way of expressing ideological positions regarding Russian society. This is especially true of the chinovnik, a uniquely Russian type. In his theoretical writing, Vissarion Belinsky championed the ideological nature of the type.

Subsequently, he broadened the generic context of the type beyond the physiological sketch, calling for the proliferation of types in mainstream literature.

Whereas Belinsky advocated for the ideological element of typicality in his criticism,

Dmitry Grigorovich put it into practice. In fact, Grigorovich’s physiological sketch

“Petersburg Organ Grinders” (“Peterburgskie sharmanshchiki”) provides a case study in the considerations of Chapter One: the visual and objective orientation of the physiological sketch, the type as a generalized, abstract subject, the importance of classification in the physiological sketch, and the author’s role as a spokesperson for the type. This sketch also demonstrates the lack of plot, which is customary for this genre. So

Chapter One explores the history of the type prior to Chekhov’s career, outlining formal

properties from its creation in France to its integration into Russian literature.

We turn to typicality and the artist in Chekhov’s work in Chapter Two, starting with the straightforward type and building towards the complicated type. Chekhov drew on typicality from the outset of his literary career. An important influence in this regard was the generic context of the illustrated weeklies, where he began publishing. The typicality of these journals was broad, encompassing not only characters but also the format and themes of the journal. The comic intention of the illustrated weeklies translates into the reproduction of characteristic and identifiable features of types that have already gained traction in the literary and cultural imagination. They are often trite in a way that the physiological sketch types were not.

Chekhov’s stories are full of such humorous types. To the extent that they communicate artistic and ethical values, they do so by means of a negative argument, that is by drawing attention to what is not but should be or by arguing against what is but shouldn’t be. There are four qualities of straightforward types of artists that are of interest: poverty, the artist as a concept, lack of sincerity, and promiscuity. First, poverty is the most prominent quality attributed to writers in Chekhov’s early work. In addition to its merely descriptive function it also develops an ethical one when implicated in the practice of placing economic gain ahead of values such as truth and human decency.

Second, the artist exists as a typical concept in several characters’ minds, resulting in various problems for these characters. The most pernicious problem occurs when the concept of the artist displaces a more accurate notion of the artist, a scenario that forestalls artistic creation.

Chekhov’s depiction of actors is very unflattering. There are two aspects of this portrayal that are relevant to the dissertation. The first is that they lack integrity. They

misuse the tools of theatrical performance, applying them towards self-serving, improper

ends. The second is promiscuity, which is interesting because he treats actors differently

than actresses in this regard. He acknowledges the actress-as-prostitute as a truism in the

contemporary cultural imagination, but he does not adhere to it. By way of contrast, he

portrays actors as promiscuous in his early stories, to comic effect. The reason for the

difference is that actresses were disadvantaged vis-à-vis the power dynamics of the

theatre (and society), whereas actors were not (at least not in the same way or to the same

degree). Chekhov was sensitive to this power differential and chose to counter it in his

work. The values that arise from the qualities attached to the straightforward artist types find positive expression in his later work.

Even as Chekhov was mastering the conventions of typicality in the illustrated weeklies, he was sensitive to the disadvantages of the type. Several of his stories prior to

February 1886 are probing, intermediary ones in terms of typicality. The characters are not straightforward types, yet neither are they complicated, though they gesture in that direction. In these stories he explores the ways in which the assumed benefits of the type become liabilities. In other words, he uncovers the shadow sides of the paradigmatic building blocks that make up the type (discussed in Chapter One), which he identifies as the reductive tendencies of the type, as well as dissonant interpretations and incorrect assumptions that attend it. The complicated type corrects for these inadequacies.

The development of Chekhov’s artistic practice is one thread that leads to the complicated type. Another thread is the journalistic context, which provided the most immediate impetus for his complication of the type. His authorial advice during the time he was primarily publishing in Fragments, paraphrased from a letter written in 1883, was

to ‘embrace typicality.’ By May 1886 this same typicality felt too prescribed and

constricting. His new advice to ‘flee the template’ (begi ot shablona) is both occasioned

by and enacted in his debut in New Times.

In December 1885, during his first trip to St. Petersburg, Chekhov learned he had a

more serious literary following than he thought. This increased his own felt sense of

responsibility as a writer. This is one of those “watershed moments in Chekhov’s career”

accompanied by an increased “tendency towards self-reflexivity,”59 which led to the three

aesthetic statement stories with artists. These stories set forth the complicated type as a

more ethical and truthful means of characterization than the straightforward type.

It is worth emphasizing that the expansion of the type, which creates the complicated type, neither erases the typical structure, nor reconciles it with its expanded features. The complicated type both is and is not a type, simultaneously. This entails more than individualizing each character. The story “Easter Eve,” which features the closest

Chekhov comes to depicting a model writer in his works and was published in New Times in April 1886, illustrates the dual nature of the complicated type.

In “An Actor’s Death” the actor Shiptsov is originally presented as a type (a noble father and simpleton) in a world of types (the comic actor, the jeune-premiere, the tragic actor, and the theater director). During a heated argument with the theater director, “he suddenly felt as though something was torn apart in his chest.” The ‘something’ that is torn apart is his straightforward typicality and in its place a subjective, inner life emerges.

In other words, Shiptsov becomes a complicated type. As such he is no longer intelligible

to the other characters, who continue to operate with a typical understanding of the world.

59 This formulation is Finke’s (“Of Interpretation and Stolen Kisses” 127), though he was not referring to this event specifically.

Conversely, his jolt of feeling awakens him to a world of outward appearances lacking inner substance and authenticity. The rift between him as a complicated type and the world of straightforward types is so great that when he complicates his typical roles as

‘noble father’ and ‘simpleton’ the only option available to him is death, which is how the story ends.

Chekhov broke from his established practice of signing his work with a pseudonym and attached his real name to his debut story in New Times, “Requiem.” He takes the typification of the actress-as-prostitute as his point of departure for the complicated type of the actress, Maria, in the story. She has died and, when asking for a requiem on her behalf, her father (Andrei Andreich) struggles to overcome his own perception of her in typical terms, as a ‘harlot’ (bludnitsa). Chekhov’s characterization of her, through her father’s recollections, discredits this typical association (she is not a harlot) and instead presents her as a vivacious young woman, sensitive and responsive to the world around her. In short, she is an artist.

Not only is Maria a complicated type, so is her father. The fact that both of the main characters receive this treatment is a distinct feature of this story, when compared to the other two in this section. In “An Actor’s Death” the theatrical types surrounding Shiptsov remain straightforward types throughout, as do the artist and the doctor in “Anyuta.” The assertion of the complicated type is the same in all three stories, but the publication context of each requires a different treatment. “Requiem” is the most poignant and the fullest expression of Chekhov’s artistic intentions.

The third story under consideration (“Anyuta”) details a medical student and art student’s unethical treatment of the title character. Correlations between the two students

allow us to treat them as instantiations of the same phenomenon: a character who typifies another and, as a result, is ethically in the wrong. By discrediting these students Chekhov indicates that straightforward typicality is not appropriate to true art (or medicine). In the letter Chekhov sent to Leikin accompanying “Anyuta” he writes, “I’m sending along a story…it touches on students, but there’s nothing liberal about it. Besides, it’s time to stop being so ceremonious.” The last sentence is most immediately a reference to censorship demands, on account of which Leikin had recently increased his vigilance against liberal tendencies in the journal. It is also an oblique reference to the formulaic, typical practice of Fragments.

As previously mentioned, the straightforward type, as Chekhov uses it, functions best to advance values via negation, i.e. by highlighting what is not but should be. By contrast, the complicated type positively advances aesthetic value. In addition, the complicated type corrects the inadequacies Chekhov perceives in its straightforward counterpart. It is expansive rather than reductive, dynamic, and nearly impossible to pin down. As such it defies any set interpretation and preconceived assumptions. Seeds of the complicated type are found throughout Chekhov’s early work. He played with typicality, investigating it and testing its limits. To reference the letter accompanying “Anyuta,” when he begins publishing in New Times, ‘it’s time’ for him to move beyond the straightforward type.

These aesthetic statement stories also draw attention to Chekhov’s practice through a comparison between him as author and the artists in them. For example, his detailed interest in Anyuta is brought into greater relief when seen as a corrective to the fictional artist’s inattention towards her. Similarly, in “An Actor’s Death” he perceives Shiptsov as sympathetic, whereas the latter’s comrades view him as pathetic. “Requiem” also

includes this corrective quality, most notably in the final paragraph, which provides the

affective testament to Maria’s life that her father was unable to offer. This story also

includes a resonant relationship between Maria, whose big eyes take in the world with

appreciation and wonder, and Chekhov as author, who carefully and respectfully attends

to the particulars of his characters and their world. In Chekhov’s subsequent stories with

artists, this comparative, reflexive quality has significant aesthetic import. It is to these

stories and this aspect that we turn in the remaining two chapters.

In Chapter Three I analyze the visual artists in Chekhov’s more mature work, namely

“The Grasshopper,” “House with a Mezzanine: An Artist’s Story,” and “The Fiancée”

(“Nevesta”). Olga and Riabovsky, the artists in “The Grasshopper,” are characterized

more as straightforward types than complicated ones. At this point in his career, such a

characterization has a delineated purpose, to satirize them. They provide a counterpoint to

the artists in the other two stories, who are more complicated types. Taken together, the

artists in all three stories, by means of reflexivity, set forth qualities – serdechnost’, temporal and sensory specificity, and indeterminacy – of artistic vision.

In a letter written on May 10, 1886, Chekhov names affection (serdechnost’) an

important artistic principle. Serdechnost’ has a wide semantic field. At least part of what

Chekhov means by it is attentiveness to the unique existence of an entity in itself, rather

than as a category or designation. Through both the presence and absence of serdechnost’

in “The Grashopper,” Chekhov implicitly argues for it as an element of an artistic

perspective.

The artist-narrator of “House with a Mezzanine” models temporal and sensory

specificity as an aspect of artistic vision. This occurs most prominently through

references to light. The artist of this story provides a positive correlate to the earlier artist figures (Chapter Two) whose ideas about what it means to be an artist forestall their creation of art. In this story we see artistic vision, as it were, in action. Like serdechnost’, temporal and sensory specificity require attention on the part of the observer, in this case to the present moment. This reliance on temporal specificity imparts an impressionistic quality to Chekhov’s work.

Sasha is a supporting character in “The Fiancée.” Even though we never see him create art in the story, his status as an artist is justified by the indeterminacy he introduces into the text and the life of the main character, Nadia. His artistic activity consists of propelling her out of her stagnant life into a dynamic one. The ending of the story, too, is indeterminate. Inconclusive endings are customary for Chekhov. This is because for him art is an agent of instability. It should challenge and destabilize the reader’s expectations and preconceived notions. Serdechnost’, temporal and sensory instability, and indeterminacy do not only appear thematically as qualities of an artistic perspective in his work. They are also present in the form. I conclude the chapter with an analysis of these elements as structural components of “The Lady with a Dog” (“Dama s sobachkoi”).

In Chapter Four I turn to the depiction of the actress, Nina Zarechnaia, in The Seagull.

Considerations of authority and agency attend the actress in Chekhov’s work. The nineteenth-century cultural and literary legacy of the figure of the actress highlights one of the potential problems of representation. Power is located in the one who does the representing not the one represented. The actress was often portrayed as sexually immoral and a threat to society. Yet that is only one side of the discussion of representation, power, and the actress. The other is that when on-stage, the actress is the

one who represents. So even as the figure of the actress was often maligned, the actual actress gained power and social capital.

In The Seagull, Chekhov engages this matrix of representation, power, and the actress to upend the traditional narrative associated with this figure. Chekhov is attentive to the power dynamics in the theater from his early period. His sympathy towards the actress in stories such as “Requiem” and “A Boring Story” (“Skuchnaia istoriia”) is noteworthy.

Yet he moves beyond sympathy in The Seagull to invest the actress Nina with the power of self-representation. At the end of the play she exercises her authority to speak for herself, rather than follow the narratives that others place on her.

This play also relates to other aspects of Chekhov’s aesthetics through the characters of Arkadina (an actress), Trigorin, and Treplev (both writers). Through Arkadina and her

Chekhovian lineage (Sarah Bernhardt and Mikhail Lentovsky) we gain a deeper appreciation for Chekhov’s aversion to melodrama and sensationalism. Trigorin and

Treplev indicate potential pitfalls associated with writing, including the exploitation of people and circumstances, competition, and innovation for its own sake.

In the body of my dissertation I use the traditional English spelling of well-known

Russian names (e. g. Belinsky, Herzen). Otherwise, I follow a modified Library of

Congress transliteration system. Russian first names ending in –ий are rendered by –y (e. g. Dmitry rather than Dmitrii). I do not use the Russian soft sign in English renderings of

Russian names. I use the standard Library of Congress transliteration in the bibliographical references. Unless otherwise indicated (see Appendix One), translations from the Russian are my own. My analysis in Chapter Two is dependent upon the journalistic context where Chekhov was publishing. Upon the first mention of a story in

this chapter, I include the date of publication and journal where the story was published.

Throughout the body of the dissertation I include the English title of a story and its

Russian original when I first mention it. This information is also available in Appendix

One.

CHAPTER ONE Aesthetics and the Type

The salience and ethical import of the complicated type in Chekhov is due to its

deviation from the nineteenth-century type. As a deviation, the significance of the complicated type becomes most apparent when it is seen in the context of the norm (the nineteenth-century type). We might begin with a basic question: what, exactly, is a type?

It is a term that is frequently encountered but rarely defined, so let’s begin with the latter.

It is “a fictional character who stands as a representative of some identifiable class or group of people.”60 At first glance, it appears to be a straightforward concept. Its use in

contemporary parlance (that person’s not my type, he’s an absent-minded professor type,

etc.) suggests that its ontology is self-evident.

Similarly, nineteenth-century Russian writers’ and critics’ frequent discussions of

various types assume the validity of the type as such. By the type as such I mean the

general concept of the type rather than any specific type. As Russian literature and

criticism attests, there may be disagreement on the meaning and accuracy of a given type

(for example, the chinovnik), but in literary/cultural criticism there is less discussion than

one might expect regarding the benefits and drawbacks of the type as such. Upon closer

examination, however, the type becomes more elusive. When does a character who is a professor become a professor type? The more directly you look at the idea of the type, the less definite it becomes. It is, after all, a mental construct without material manifestation.

The type carries different semantic weight in various literary contexts. For example, in

Christian theology, personages in the Hebrew Scriptures are read as types of Christ.61 The

60 Chris Baldick, “Type,” The Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms (Oxford UP, 2008). 61 Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays, edited by Robert D. Denham (University of Toronto Press, 2006). Erich Auerbach also addresses this concept, which he refers to in terms of figural

type in this sense is interchangeable with archetype, which is the term Northrop Frye uses

in his foundational work of literary criticism Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays. In the

eighteenth century, by comparison, the type is ideal and, thereby, aspirational. The type

of the nineteenth century is descriptive and actual. The most concentrated expression of

this iteration of the type is found in the physiologie (physiological sketch), a genre dedicated to the exposition of types.62 This genre was an immediate and influential

precursor to Realist literature, and the type as found in the physiologie is folded into

Realist praxis.63 Physiological sketch writers and Realist writers shared fundamental

literary aims, including the investigation and codification of the social world as well as

objectivity. The type was instrumental in accomplishing these aims. In the present

chapter I work backwards from the type, the creative product, to reveal the literary aims

and aesthetics that fueled its creation in mid-nineteenth-century literature in France and

Russia.

1.1. The Physiologie

interpretation. Erich Auerbach, Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature (Princeton UP, 1968). 62 Physiological sketches were not always concerned with social types. They can include the typology of a diverse range of phenomena, including cigars and the cancan. For more information see Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov and Thomas Gaiton Marullo, editors, Petersburg: The Physiology of a City, translated by Thomas Gaiton Marullo (Northwestern UP, 2009) xxii. Nonetheless, the sketches were often focused on social types. Judith Wechsler presents physiologies as “little paperbound monographs on Parisian occupational and avocational types.” Social and occupational identities were often one and the same, so social type is a broad term that includes occupational and avocational types. Judith Wechsler, A Human Comedy: Physiognomy and Caricature in 19th Century Paris (University of Chicago Press, 1982) 32. 63 A. Tseitlin contends that Russian realism is rooted in the physiological sketch of the 1840s. See A. G. Tseitlin, Stanovlenie realizma v russkoi literature: russkoi fiziologichsekii ocherk (Nauka, 1965).

The physiologie was a short-lived phenomenon. The genre originated in France in the

1830s, peaked in the 1840s, and subsided by the 1850s.64 Yet, it was quite popular during

its brief tenure. According to Judith Wechsler, “Half a million copies of the Physiologies

were bought during the few years of their vogue. (The Paris population at this time was less than one million, and only half were literate.)”65 The French example encouraged

analogous literary activity in England, Germany, and Russia.

What, then, was this genre that so powerfully (albeit briefly) captured readers’ and

litterateurs’ attention? The physiologie is a fictional, expository piece of writing that aims to acquaint the reader with a chosen cultural phenomenon, often a social type, through descriptive means. The use of the term ‘physiology’ in this context is generally credited to Balzac, who first used it in 1829 in the title of a humorous, satirical work on marriage,

The Physiology of Marriage, or The Musings of an Eclectic Philosopher on the

Happiness and Unhappiness of Married Life (Physiologie du marriage ou Méditations de philosophie éclectique sur la Bonheur et le Malheur conjugal).66 The term quickly caught

on and the literary phenomenon of the physiologie proliferated in monograph form. In

addition to these individual monographs, collections of physiologies were also published.

Two important collections in France were Paris, or The Book of One Hundred and One

(Paris, ou Le Livre des cent-et-un, 1831-34) and Pictures of the French: A Series of

Literary and Graphic Delineations of French Character (Les Français peints par eux-

mêmes; Encyclopedie morale du dix-neuvième siècle, 1840-42).

64 Judith Wechsler, A Human Comedy: Physiognomy and Caricature in 19th Century Paris (University of Chicago Press, 1982) 32. 65 Wechsler 34. 66 Joachim T. Baer, “The ‘Physiological Sketch’ in Russian Literature,” Mnemozina: Studia Litteraria Russica in Honorem Vsevolod Setchkarev, edited by Joachim T. Baer and Norman W. Ingham (Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1974) 3.

The conceit of the physiologie is similar to the character sketches of Theophrastus.

Both seek to provide an encyclopedic record of the types that comprise the everyday lived experience of the time. This intention is communicated at the outset of

Theophrastus’ character sketches, which begin, “The toady [chatterbox, etc.] is a sort of person who…”67 In the Introduction to Pictures of the French, Jules Janin places the

present writers’ collection within Theophrastus’ literary lineage. Janin writes, “If such a yearly record had been handed down to us, without interruption, since the time of

Theophrastus, it would be impossible to describe a more varied, instructive, and amusing work.”68 Janin subsequently assures the reader that he and his co-collaborators will

record this information for posterity.

There are several components, though, that distinguish the physiologie within the

broader category of character sketches. For one, Theophrastus’ sketches focus on moral

types, whereas the physiologie focuses on social types (The Parisian Lady, The Grocer,

The Grisette,69 etc.). In this regard we can see the influence of Louis-Sébastien Mercier

(1740 – 1814), a French writer at the end of the eighteenth/ beginning of the nineteenth

centuries. His Tableau of Paris (Le Tableau de Paris) was a forerunner to the

physiologie. This twelve-volume work, published from 1781 to 1788, consisted of

hundreds of “verbal drawings”70 that characterize the different classes and professions of

Paris. Its importance for the physiologie is apparent in Paris, or the Book of One Hundred and One, in which the authors express a desire to do for contemporary France what

67 Theophrastus, Characters, edited by James Diggle (Cambridge UP, 2004) 69. 68 Jules Janin et. al., Pictures of the French: A Series of Literary and Graphic Delineations of French Character (W. S. Orr and Co., 1840) x. 69 These are the first three sketches in the collection Pictures of the French: A Series of Literary and Graphic Delineations of French Character. 70 Martina Lauster, Sketches of the Nineteenth Century: European Journalism and Its ‘Physiologies,’ 1830- 50 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007) 157.

Mercier did in his own time. The emphasis on the social context of the type is in line with

the newly developing academic field of sociology.71

Another foundational and distinctive quality of the physiologie is the combination of

text and image. The verbal descriptions of types in this genre are accompanied by illustrations. In the Introduction to Pictures of the French, Jules Janin also writes, “What

interest would such illustrations have added to Theophrastus’s text! How much more

vivdly would he have appealed to our imagination!”72 This claim bolsters and validates

the extensive incorporation of illustrations in the collection, in which a drawing of the

type precedes the written exposition. To get an idea of the integral nature of the

illustrations, consider Wechsler’s description of the pocket volumes as having “30 to 60

engravings to a hundred pages of print.”73

Visuality is central to the physiologie, both on account of the illustrations and in

relation to the text, which attend to physical descriptions of the types under consideration.

Consider, for example, the following excerpts taken from Balzac’s physiologies in

Pictures of the French. The first is of The Parisian Lady and the second of The Grocer.

She wears no dazzling colours, no elaborately carved zone or buckle; no embroidered flounce is seen waving over her instep; on her feet are shoes of prunella, the sandals crossing a cotton stocking of exceeding fineness, or a plain silk one of soberest grey; or else she wears a delicate boot of the simplest character. Her gown is of a stuff well chosen, but of no great cost; yet its style and fashion shall attract you, and excite the envy of many a city-bred dame; it is usually a wrapper, fastened with knots or bows, and prettily edged with a cord that is but slightly perceptible.74

71 Martina Lauster, “Physiognomy, Zoology, and Physiology as Paradigms in Sociological Sketches of the 1830s and 40s,” Physiognomy in Profile: Lavater’s Impact on European Culture, edited by Melissa Percival and Graeme Tytler (University of Delaware Press, 2005) 161. 72 Janin xx. 73 Wechsler 33. 74 Janin 1.

To express a whole series of insults at once, they cry out to a man, “You are a Grocer.” Let us have done with these Diocletians of Grocery. Why do you blame a Grocer? Is it because he has chocolate-coloured, coffee-coloured, or green-tea- coloured breeches? – because he wears blue stockings in slippers? – because the tassel that dangles from his sealskin cap is of dirty green silver or of dingy black gold – because the triangular tail of his apron reposes on the region of his midriff?75

The physical descriptions in the physiologie are not simply present as superficial

adornment. Instead they indicate essential, set aspects of the type. The interpretation of

external elements, accessible through sight, as an indication of inner essence highlights

another important influence on the physiologie: Johann Caspar Lavater (1741-1801).

Lavater was a prominent Swiss physiognomist at the end of the eighteenth century.

The notion underlying physiognomy, which is “the discernment of character from the

physical (and especially facial) features,”76 has a long history dating back to the ancient

Greeks.77 Since that time it has experienced periods of near oblivion that alternate with

moments of resurgence. Lavater was instrumental in reviving physiognomy in Europe in

the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries through his work Essays on Physiognomy: For the Promotion of the Knowledge and the Love of Mankind (Physiognomische Fragmente zur Beförderung der Manschenkenntnis und Menschenliebe, 1775-78). The text takes as its premise “the correspondence of physical appearance and moral character.”78 His work

drew on physiognomy to create a guidebook for evaluating and interacting with others.

People relied on his work as a manual of actionable knowledge well into the nineteenth

75 Janin 10. 76 Melissa Percival, “Introduction,” Physiognomy in Profile: Lavater’s Impact on European Culture, edited by Melissa Percival and Graeme Tytler (University of Delaware Press, 2005) 17. 77 Wechsler writes, “Like Aristotle, Descartes, Le Brun and Hogarth, Lavater maintained that often- repeated emotions leave their mark on the permanent expression of the person” (24). 78 Wechsler 24.

century. “Lavater was a basic resource in a gentleman’s home, to be consulted when hiring staff, making friends and establishing business relations.”79

The French physiologie is several steps removed from Chekhov’s work. Why not skip at least one step and begin with the Russian physiological sketch (fiziologicheskii ocherk)? The main reason is that the French physiologie has been theorized more extensively. The conclusions drawn from the physiologie are applicable to the Russian incarnation of this genre, in large part because the Russians overtly patterned their physiological sketches after the French ones. To understand the type in nineteenth century Russian literature one must look to the Russian physiological sketch, and to understand the Russian physiological sketch one must look to the French physiologie.

According to French physiologie writers and illustrators, the city was a living organism and their work was akin to a scientific enterprise. They sought to arrive at a comprehensive portrait of urban society by means of literary texts and corresponding visual sketches. Borrowing from the practices as well as the values of contemporary scientific paradigms (zoology and physiology) and pseudo-scientific ones (physiognomy and phrenology), the physiological sketch advances comprehensibility as an implicit and

desired good. Each of these paradigms highlights an aspect of the type as a means of characterization. There are implicit values that attend each of these aspects, yet each also has a shadow side.

Zoology: The Type as Categorical

For the physiological sketch writers, human identity is primarily social and one of their central tasks was to understand the structure of society. The taxonomical system of

79 Wechsler 24.

zoology provided a helpful model. The underlying assumption is that just as the natural

world acts on organisms through evolution to yield various biological species, the social

environment acts on humanity to create various social ones. On this point, Lauster notes

that Balzac wrote the following in the preface to The Human Comedy (La Comédie

humaine): “Does not society transform man, according to the kind of environment in

which he acts, into as many different men as there are varieties in zoology?...There have

thus existed, and there will always exist, social species just as there are zoological

species.”80 Terms such as genus and species appear often in connection to the

physiological sketch, both in France and in Russia. The grocer as a social group is

equivalent to a species classification. The type, in other words, is a categorical entity.

A categorical process is useful because it makes an unwieldy amount of information

manageable. It does so by defining a phenomenon according to a categorical distinction,

composed of essential traits shared by the group to which the category refers.

Classification empowers those who determine and possess (through knowledge) the categories (through their knowledge of them). This is as true of social types as it is of

zoological species. The shadow side to categorization is two-fold. First, it places the observer/categorizer in a position of power over the observed/ categorized, creating an uneven power dynamic. Second, it is limiting. By defining a phenomenon according to shared, essential traits it disregards distinctive ones. Caroline Warman writes, “This common strain of interest in types – only laterally manifest in anatomy but central to physiognomy – may lead us to conclude that more urgent in the eighteenth and nineteenth

80 Lauster “Physiognomy, Zoology, and Physiology” 170.

centuries…was the need to classify, catalogue and name, or, in other words, to delimit

and possess the object of knowledge, to pin it down.”81

Physiology: The Type as Abstract

The creative process for physiological sketch writers began with roaming the streets

and observing their surroundings. They would proceed from a specific encounter (a

specific grocer) to an abstract concept (the grocer as a type). From this we can determine

a second quality of the type: it is a general, abstract concept rather than a distinct,

material reality. As Lauster notes, “The precision of [the physiological sketch writers’]

observation, much though it may have in common with photographic accuracy, derives

from an artistic view of ‘type,’ which is a cartoon-like abstraction.”82 In this regard the

relationship between the physiologie and its scientific namesake, physiology (and its

companion science, anatomy), is relevant.

Anatomy is analytic. It entails dividing the body as a whole into constituent parts and

then identifying the characteristic features of the parts. Physiology, by contrast, is

synthetic. It considers the interactions of the parts within the body as a whole. The

physiologie writers were ultimately more aligned with physiology, which is to say they

were more interested in synthesis, but dividing the body into separate parts was a

necessary prerequisite. A. Tseitlin describes the process as follows:

The distinctiveness of the “physiologie” consists precisely in the fact that in it there occurs a “dismembering” of specific phenomena from the whole multitude of reality. Becoming interested in a certain “type” of Petersburg society…the physiological sketch writer sets himself the goal of determining the distinguishing

81 Caroline Warman, “What’s Behind a Face? Lavater and the Anatomists,” Physiognomy in Profile: Lavater’s Impact on European Culture, edited by Melissa Percival and Graeme Tytler (University of Delaware Press, 2005) 106. 82 Lauster Sketches of the Nineteenth Century 85.

qualities of this type within the scope of the complicated whole to which it belongs.83

“Dismembering” here refers to the process of analysis that then leads to the synthesis of

the type. To reiterate, the synthesized mental construct that emerges is an abstract

concept.

The generation of abstract concepts from concrete information, such as we find in

physiology, is helpful in life and essential in science. Abstractions, for example, make

explanations possible. They enable us to “know the parts of a thing and how they are

joined together, to know what things do and do not have in common, and to know the laws or principles by which things cohere, live, and act.”84 The abstract nature of the type

also enables the writer to fulfill an important mandate of Realism: to extend beyond “the

world viewed” to “the world made comprehensible.”85

In order to appreciate the shadow side of the type’s abstract nature, it is useful to view

the type as analogous to an average. An average results from the manipulation of actual

data points to arrive at an abstract, representative entity. While an average does not have

a material manifestation in the actual world, it is assumed to communicate truth about the actual phenomenon to which it relates. In The End of Average: How We Succeed in a

World That Values Sameness, Todd Rose relates several historic attempts to create representative entities (be it a set of physical measurements, a statue, or an amalgamated brain scan image) of groups of people based on averages. For example, in 1943 a statue

83 Своеобразие «физиологий» состояло именно в том, что в них происходило «вычленение» определенного жизненного явления из всего многообразия дейвствительности. Заинтересовавшись каким-либо «типом» петербургского общества...физиолог ставил себе целью фиксировать отличительные черты этого объекта в пределах того сложного целого, к которому он принадлежал (Tseitlin Stanovlenie 110-111). 84 Wendell Berry, Life is a Miracle: An Essay Against Modern Superstition, (Counterpoint, 2000) 39. Berry is a poet, environmental activist, and cultural critic, among other things. 85 Peter Brooks, Realist Vision (Yale UP, 2005) 3.

named “Norma” was created as a physical manifestation of the typical (average) woman.

The statue was based on data from fifteen thousand young adult women that Dr. Robert

L. Dickinson (1861-1950), a prominent gynecologist, collected. Rose writes, “Like many

scientists of his day, Dickinson believed the truth of something could be determined by

collecting and averaging a massive amount of data.”86

Contrary to the above assumption, Rose demonstrates that when mathematical averages are applied to the human person they obscure the truth. In 1945 a newspaper contest awarded war bonds and war stamps to the thirteen women whose dimensions

matched Norma’s most closely on nine axes. Of the 3,864 entrants, fewer than 40 were

average on five of the dimensions and no one was average on all nine. The type of the

nineteenth-century physiological sketch was likewise intended to illuminate the actual

world in which they lived. Yet when applied to an actual person its usefulness is limited

and even potentially misleading. Another of the examples Rose mentions is the United

States Air Force’s reliance on average metrics in designing the cockpit of planes and gear

in accordance with the average dimensions of pilots. Before 1952 the cockpits of U.S. Air

Force planes were ‘one size fits average.’ The problem was that none of the airline pilots

was average, at least not on all ten dimensions. The cockpit was, therefore, ‘one size fits none,’ and as a result “pilots could not keep control of their planes.”87 In short order the

Air Force introduced adjustable features in the planes (adjustable seats and foot pedals)

and the gear (adjustable helmet straps and flight suits), the result of which was that “pilot

performance soared.”88

86 Todd Rose, The End of Average: How We Succeed in a World that Values Sameness (HarperOne, 2016) 5. 87 Rose 1 88 Rose 9.

Physiognomy/ Phrenology: The Type as Referential

As previously mentioned, Lavater was popular in nineteenth-century Europe in his

capacity as a physiognomist. His work was first translated into French in an edition

entitled Essays on Physiognomy Intended for Knowing and Loving Man (Essai sur la

physiognomie destiné à faire connaître l’homme et à le faire aimer, 1781-1803) and then

into a more popular edition entitled The Art of Knowing Man through Physiognomy

(L’Art de connaître les homes par la physiognomie, 1806-9, re-issued in 1820). Lavater’s

Essays on Physiognomy includes many different plates with drawings, to which he refers when expounding on their attendant moral qualities. For example, plate XXII includes twelve drawings of men’s faces and shoulders, mostly in profile. In relation to the first face Lavater writes, “Evidently no strength of mind. Commonness, not stupidity, in the outline of the nose; want of strength in the parts about the eye. The lower muscles of the

nose, and the wrinkles of such a mouth, are almost a decisive mark of feebleness.”89 The work also includes pairing specific physical characteristics with moral qualities, such as long teeth as signs of weakness and pusillanimity. By the time the French physiologies began appearing in the 1830s, physiognomy was embedded in the cultural psyche.

After 1830 physiognomy became closely associated with phrenology, established by

Franz Joseph Gall (1758-1828). Phrenology was similar in kind to physiognomy but narrower in scope, claiming that “particular sections of the brain and particular brain formations were indicative of certain talents or faculties, and that these brain formations in turn affected the appearance of the skull.”90 Phrenology was a system of mapping out

areas of the skull associated with specific abilities and attributes (physical and moral).

89 Johann Caspar Lavater and Thomas Holcroft, Essays on Physiognomy, Designed to Promote the Knowledge and the Love of Mankind; Written in the German Language, 12th ed. (William Tegg, 1862) 127. 90 Lauster “Physiognomy, Zoology and Physiognomy” 163.

Adherents of phrenology assumed an immediate connection between the size of a

person’s skull in a given locale and the aspect associated with that area. Phrenology, thus,

focused on the skull, while physiognomy was concerned with the whole body (with

special emphasis on facial features).

In the nineteenth-century imagination, physiognomy and phrenology were

consolidated into a valid scientific pursuit that influenced the physiologie. Both practices

posit and make manifest a direct and visible connection between the inner (unseen) world

of a person and his or her outer appearance. In other words, these practices materialize

immaterial qualities such as character traits or mental faculties. When these paradigms

are transferred to literature via the physiologie, character types become the “material”

objects that represent the immaterial aspects of society. The grocer of the physiologie is thus analogous to long teeth. Whereas the latter indicates weakness and cowardice in a person, the former is a manifestation of congeniality and social cohesion in society.

From this we can see that the type is referential, i.e. it refers to something outside of itself. In the physiologie, as in physiognomy and phrenology, the type/material object (be it a grocer, long teeth, or protrusion on the skull) is meaningful primarily on account of its presumed correspondence with an inner, unseen reality. Long teeth are not of interest in and of themselves; instead, their importance lies in the weakness of character in an individual to which they refer.91 The shadow side of referential value, imparted to the

type, is that it interferes with ontological value and does not allow for self-determination.

Additional Notes on the Physiologie: Objectivity, The Scientific Mode

91 When a physical trait becomes synonymous with a type then the type can become the referent. This is common in racism.

The referential aspect of the type, according to which a physical entity (the grocer) refers to immaterial qualities (congeniality, social cohesion), is a matter of objectification.92 When congeniality is embodied in the grocer it has been given material form, or objectified. This is one sense in which the physiologie writers are objective. The writers are also objective in that they focus on that which can be accessed by the senses, sight in particular.93 The visual orientation of the sketch imparts authority to it by positioning the author as a first-hand observer and, therefore, a reliable source. Critics opposed the inclusion of everyday, and sometimes even sordid, presentations of life. In light of such criticism, physiological sketch writers lent credibility to their presentation of reality through references to sights, sounds, and smells.

Objectivity is an indistinct term with a variety of meanings and semantic associations.94 It is often conflated with disinterest or ideological neutrality. This association is inaccurate in relation to the physiological sketch writers. To the contrary, their objective portrayals were meant to unearth and challenge the status quo.95 The

92 I use the term objectification in accordance with its neutral meaning, present in the first entry in the Oxford English Dictionary: “The action or an act of objectifying something; a material thing which embodies or expresses an abstract idea, principle, etc.” (“objectification, n.”). 93 In case the connection between objectivity and the senses is unclear, I will outline it more fully here. One of the definitions of an object is “a material thing that can be seen and touched (”object, n.” OED) Objectivity, or the act of being objective, is the act of attending to an object, i.e. that which is “external to or independent of the mind.” (“objective, adj. and n.”) So objectivity is a matter of accessing an external object by means of the senses. The sense that is most often associated with objectivity is sight. 94 Louise McReynolds outlines several potential meanings attached to objectivity: 1. non-aligned politically, 2. standing outside as an observer, 3. empirical and factual, 4. free of inherent bias. The various definitions do no apply equally well to the Russian physiological sketch writers and to Chekhov. Consider the first meaning. The physiological sketch writers were motivated to expose social ills. In doing so they spoke against the regnant political system. Chekhov, on the other hand, was notoriously silent on political matters. Louise McReynolds, The News under Russia’s Old Regime: The Development of a Mass- Circulation Press (Princeton UP, 1991) 8. 95 Conservative critics were particularly attuned to, and displeased with, this aspect of the physiological sketch. Thomas Marullo quotes a reviewer from the Library for Reading as condemning the Russian physiological sketch writer as follows: “’Armed with the knife of an anatomist,’ he was to ‘open up the body of Petersburg society, cut and push back its folds, and without mercy, show to you the boils and abscesses in the innards of your friends and acquaintances’” (xxxiii).

objectivity that forms and informs the type in the physiological sketch has an ideological

directive.

The objectivity of the physiological sketch is another way its connection to the

scientific mode is manifest. To consider another fact of this relationship more concretely,

the set nature of the type is analogous to the reproducibility of scientific findings.

Historically, a type referred to a “small rectangular block, usually of metal or wood,

having on its upper end a raised letter, figure, or other character, for use in printing.”96

These types (also called sorts) were placed together in a form for printing numerous copies of a document. In this context a type is like a stamp.97 The connection between the

type as a wooden block and the type as a means of characterization is that both are

definite and unchanging (in intention, at least). The definiteness of the type is desirable

because it makes it possible to fix one’s knowledge of it in a rational framework.98 In

other words, the nineteenth-century social type is constructed in the service of delineated

knowledge or, as stated earlier, comprehensibility.

1.2. The Physiological Sketch on Russian Soil

96 "type, n," OED Online (Oxford UP, 2016), web, accessed 14 Dec. 2016. 97 The Greek term for “characters” can also refer to a stamp or impression ("character, n." OED Online). R. G. Ussher credits Theophrastus with the first use of the Greek term for characters as the title of a work. R. G. Ussher, “Introduction,” The Characters of Theophrastus, edited by Robert G. Ussher (MacMillan & Co Ltd., 1960) 27. 98 Robert Park draws a useful distinction between two ways of knowing. He distinguishes between ‘acquaintance with’ and ‘knowledge about.’ The first includes first-hand knowledge that comes from personal interaction. The second entails knowledge that derives from observations and facts. The knowledge the type offers is more akin to ‘knowledge about’ than ‘acquaintance with.’ Robert Park, “News as a Form of Knowledge: A Chapter in the Sociology of Knowledge” American Journal of Sociology 45.5 (1940) 670-72.

In 1844 the Russian author and journalist Ivan Panaev (1812-1862) wrote, “Now we

all write types and consider ourselves to be writers of the typical.”99 His comment attests

to the proliferation of the physiological sketch in Russia during the 1840s. The tenure of

the genre – 1839-1848 – was even shorter in Russia than in France.100 Nonetheless, it was

robust during its brief moment of fame, with no fewer than 700 physiological sketches

appearing within this ten-year period.101 Reviews in the journal Notes of the Fatherland

in the early 1840s demonstrate (and further propagate) familiarity with the French

physiologie, providing both a concise description102 and numerous examples.103

Most attempts by Russians to imitate the genre were mediocre.104 As Joachim Baer

writes, “In Russia where these projects had an imitative character we find fewer great

names and as a consequence more modest results.”105 One attempt, however, The

Physiology of Petersburg (Fiziologiia Peterburga), was successful from the outset and continues to be important in the history of Russian literature.106 Nikolai Nekrasov (1821-

1877), an important writer, poet, and publisher in Russian literature, edited the two

99 Quoted with a slight change to the wording (Nekrasov and Marullo l). Instead of ‘writers of the typical’ Marullo’s translation reads ‘‘typical’ writers.’ The original quote is “Мы все теперь пишем типы и считаем себя типическими писателями.” 100 Tseitlin Stanovlenie 98. 101 Tseitlin Stanovlenie 98. 102 Quoted in Tseitlin Stanovlenie 70: “Особый модный род составляют появившиеся в последнее время физиологий различных сословий и классов народов или их представителей” / “An especially fashionable sort consists of the physiologies of various estates and social classes or their representatives that have been appearing lately.” 103 Quoted in Nekrasov and Marullo xxiv: “’The Physiology of the Priest’…’The Physiology of a Married Man’…’The Physiology of Lovers’…’The Physiology of a Wanderer’…’The Physiology of a Prankster’…and ‘The Physiology of a Governmental Official.’” 104 For more detailed descriptions of select Russian physiological sketches, see Nekrasov and Marullo xxiv-xxvii, and Baer 2-3. 105 Baer 3. 106 According to Marullo, “The work was a financial success, the entire run of the work being snatched up immediately by avid readers and reviewers” (xlvi).

companion volumes. The first was published April 5, 1845 and the second August 28,

1845.107

Vissarion Belinsky (1811-1848), an extremely influential literary critic, wrote the

Introduction to The Physiology of Petersburg. When comparing it to the Introduction to

Pictures of the French, a noteworthy difference in intention emerges. Whereas the French volume is directed towards providing a record for posterity, the Russian volume aims to make sense of current life to those who are presently living it. In criticizing previous physiological sketch-like attempts in Russia, Belinsky writes, “Russian readers could hardly find anything Russian, that is to say, anything which would acquaint them with

Russian society and consequently with themselves.”108 By extension, one of the aims of

the present volume was to provide such an acquaintance. Moreover, the intention was not

only to describe the populace but also to shape Russian national identity and thereby

effect change in Russia. Marullo writes, “Most crucially, perhaps, the Russian interest in physiologies was seen by many writers, editors, and publishers as fostering national aspirations for political and philosophical progress.”109 For this reason, the physiological sketch was a point of contention between liberal and conservative critics. At the center of this debate was the most Russian of types: the chinovnik, a petty bureaucrat whose designation derives from the Table of Ranks established by Peter the Great in 1722.

107 The first volume includes five stories: “Petersburg and Moscow”/“Peterburg i Moskva” (Vissarion Belinsky); “The Petersburg Yardkeeper”/“Peterburgskii dvornik” (Vladimir Dal’); “The Petersburg Organ Grinders”/“Peterburgskie sharmanshchiki” (Dmitry Grigorovich); “The Petersburg Quarter”/“Peterburgskaia storona” (Evgeny Grebenka); and “Petersburg Corners”/“Peterburgskie ugly” (Nikolai Nekrasov). The second volume consisted of six stories: “The Alexander Theater”/“Aleksandrynskii teatr” (Belinsky); “The Bureaucrat”/“Chinovnik” (Nekrasov); “The Omnibus: Scenes from Petersburg Country Life”/“Omnibus” (Mikhail Kul’chitsky); “The Literature of Petersburg”/“Peterburgskaia literatura” (Belinsky); “The Lottery Ball”/“Lotereinyi bal” (Grigorovich); and “The Petersburg Feuilletonist”/“Peterburgskii fel’etonist” (Ivan Panaev). 108 русский читатель всего менее мог найти для себя чего-нибудь русского, то есть такого, что бы знакомило его с русским обществом, а следовательно, и с самим собою (Fiziologiia 8). 109 Nekrasov and Marullo xxvii.

1.3. The Chinovnik: A Quintessential Russian Type

Conservative and radical critics in Russia argued about what was appropriate material

for literature. Faddei Bulgarin (1789-1859), a literary critic and figurehead for literary

conservatives, thought only “that which is graceful and proper”110 should enter into

literature. His demand for the exemplary in literature is set against both the vulgar and the

commonplace. His commentary on the types in the physiological sketch draws on his

disdain of the everyday man as too pedestrian to be worthy of literary acclaim.

“…аs with the renewal of old things, a new name was necessary. So in place of what had previously been referred to as “manners” (moeurs) and “character” (caractères) people began to use the Greek word “type,” by which they meant prototype, the ideal form or original. This appellation is incorrect in every way. What kind of prototype is a porter (portier) or an office clerk (commis de bureau) when you encounter thousands of the same model?”111

Bulgarin attempts to discredit the physiological sketch by arguing that the characters are

too commonplace. His view of the type is based on an inaccurate, eighteenth-century

understanding of it as ‘prototype.’ As a result, his argument against the type becomes an

apologetic for the type as the French physiologists, and subsequently Russian radical

writers, conceived of it. Rather than an exemplary model unique unto itself, the radical

camp used the term ‘type’ to mean “generalized qualities, characteristic of a whole class

of people.”112 The type as a representative figure dominates the physiological sketch, as

we saw above. A quote from the story “Military Valet” (“Denshchik”), written by the

110 Quoted in Marullo xxxvii. 111 …как для возобновления старой вещи, надобно было новое название, то вместо прежних названий «нравы» (moeurs), характеры (caractères), употребили греческое слово тип (type), т. е. первообраз, то же, что первая форма или подлинник (original). Название во всех отношениях ложное. Что за придверник (portier) или канцелярский писец (commis de bureau), которых вы встретите тысячу на один образец? (Tseitlin Stanovlenie 208). 112 обобщение черт, своиственных «целом классу людей» (Tseitlin Stanovlenie 209).

author and lexicographer Vladimir Dal (1801-1872), illustrates this well in its final paragraph: “Such was Yakov [the eponymous military valet – A.A.] and such will be all

our Yakovs, or at least the majority of them.”113

The disagreement about the physiological sketch was not limited to the literary realm.

It was equally about the political and social structure of Russia. Marullo explains as

follows:

The concern was not only about Russian literature but about Russian life. Bulgarin and company had very definite ideas on national freedom and order, identity and success, as well as on the function of writing to support (or negate) their views on the world. Above all, the folk was not to get any ideas from what it had read, the fear being that the Russian public, if presented with fictional portraits of unhappy citizens, would rock the empire with revolution and repression.114

Conservative critics, including Bulgarin, altered their stance on the physiological

sketch upon realizing that popular readership favored it and its attendant types. Bulgarin

then adopted the notion of type present in the physiological sketch, and the point of

contention between the camps shifted to the meaning attributed to a designated type. The

type of the chinovnik, or petty bureaucrat, was central to this debate.115 Beginning with

“The Overcoat” (“Shinel’”), a story by the eminent writer and dramatist Nikolai Gogol

(1809-1852), and Vissarion Belinsky’s reading of it, this figure received much attention

at the hands of liberal writers and critics as a means of protesting unacceptable social

conditions. As Marullo presents it, Bulgarin claimed that such literary representations of

this social class were inaccurate and unfair. In the process Bulgarin created his own

113 Таков был Яков, и таковы будут все Яковы наши, по крайней мере большинство их (Dal’ [pseudonym V. Luganskii], “Military Valet,” 1845). Quoted in Nekrasov and Marullo lxiii. 114 Nekrasov and Marullo xl. 115 Marullo writes, “In fact, it was over the fictional chinovnik that the battle lines over Russian physiology were often drawn.” For this quote and more on the chinovnik as a political lightning rod see Nekrasov and Marullo xxxix.

typology of the chinovnik, whom he presented as a figure above reproach and a pillar of

society. At issue, therefore, was no longer typicality itself, but, rather, who held the rights

to this (and by extension any other) type.

(Re-)Structuring Society

The theme of the chinovnik captivated the Russian literary scene in the 1840s, with

around 150 stories dealing with this figure by the end of the decade.116 This character figures prominently in the history of social types in Russia, as both a literary model

(Akaky Akakievich) and a focal point of polemical debates regarding the relationship

between literature and society. This is a surprising legacy for a seemingly uninspiring

figure. How can we account for the literary significance of this erstwhile insignificant or

“little” man? There are two points of consideration that make sense of the chinovnik’s

rise in prominence in Russian literature alongside the physiological sketch.

First, as Regina Kecht and Andrew Weeks point out, the chinovnik is “peculiarly

Russian.”117 He was not plucked from French literature and transplanted into the Russian

tradition; instead, he was securely rooted in the Russian context. He was a deeply

resonant figure in the Russian cultural imagination, the child of Peter the Great’s social

reforms. Second, the Table of Ranks, the birthplace of the chinovnik, is analogous to

typology. Both are structuring systems that seek to fix identity by means of categories,

both systems are relatively rigid, and both achieve their end through a reductive process.

The chinovnik thus lends itself to typological representation and as a literary type it

inherently invokes the categorical structure of Russian society. Arguably, for these

116 Alexander Tseitlin, Povesti o bednom chinovnike Dostoevskogo: k istorii odnogo siuzheta (Moscow, 1923) 7. 117 Andrew Weeks and Regina Kecht, “The Theme of the Cinovnik and the Antinomies of Order and Life in Nineteenth Century Russian Literature” Russian Literature 11.4 (1982) 310.

reasons it became a central and controversial type in Russia, and an unfavorable portrayal

of this character was understood as an implicit attack against the status quo. Objective

portrayals of the hardships facing the chinovnik were often unavoidably (and

purposefully) ideological. In this case, objectivity and ideology are not mutually

exclusive, but instead can work together.

Speaking for the Type

When creating a type the author does not simply transcribe a person from life to text.

Instead, he or she arrives at a literary portrayal of a designated type through a process of

selection and distillation. The author is, therefore, in a position of authority over the type

as the arbiter of what to include and what to discard. Given that the physiological sketch

promises a comprehensively representative picture of the type, the author becomes its de

facto spokesman. The author is an authority on the type as the one who establishes its

meaning.

One of the ways that several of the authors of The Physiology of Petersburg mark their characters as types is through a redundant naming practice using a first name and its derivative patronymic. Examples include Ivan Ivanovich (“The Petersburg

Quarter”/“Peterburgskaia storona”) or Foma Fomich (“The Lottery Ball”/“Lotereinyi bal”). While this naming practice occurs in actual life in Russia, its use in the physiological sketch (and subsequently Realism) functions to identify the character as a type. This practice constitutes a nominative expression of the reproducibility of the type.

Since French doesn’t have patronymics, the redundant naming practice is unique to the

Russian physiological sketch when compared to its French counterpart. The French

collection Pictures of the French does at times identify characters by name (for example,

Jenny in “The Grisette”),118 but there is no direct correlate to Ivan Ivanovich.

Arguably, the most important influence on this naming practice is the hapless hero of

“The Overcoat,” Akaky Akakievich. While he is less typical than his legacy suggests, he

provides a useful case study for the dynamic of authority in a literary text, especially in

relation to the type. He demonstrates an affinity with the type through the aura of

generality that surrounds him. The narrator of “The Overcoat” flaunts the lack of specific

markers of identity associated with him in the story’s opening line, “In a department…but

perhaps it is better not to say in which department.”119 Instead, the narrator provides a

nondescript setting and introduction.

So to avoid all sorts of unpleasant misunderstandings, we shall refer to the department in question as a certain department. And so in a certain department there served a certain Civil Servant, a Civil Servant who cannot by any stretch of the imagination be described in any way as remarkable. He was in fact somewhat short, somewhat pockmarked, somewhat red-haired and looked rather sort-sighted...120

Both S. G. Bocharov and Kathleen Scollins have argued that Akaky Akakievich’s

name is key to understanding this literary character.121 While its peculiarity adds a

distinctive element, it functions more to expresses his anonymity and lack of personal

118 Otherwise, the figures in Portraits of the French are usually identified by their profession, which also is common in The Physiology of Petersburg. 119 В департаменте...но лучше не называть, в каком департаменте (Gogol PSS 3:140). 120 Итак, во избежание всяких неприятностей, лучше департамент, о котором идет дело, мы назовем одним департаментом. Итак, в одном департаменте служил один чиновник; чиновник нельзя сказать чтобы очень замечательный, низенького роста, несколько рябоват, несколько рыжеват, несколько даже на вид подслеповат…(Gogol PSS 3:140). 121 S. G. Bocharov, “Pushkin i Gogol (stantsionnyi smotritel i shinel'),” Problemy tipologii russkogo realizma, edited by N. L. Stepanov and U. R. Focht (Nauka, 1969), 225–35. Kathleen Scollins, “Kako sdelan Akakii: Letter as Hero in The Overcoat” The Russian Review 71.2 (2012) 187-208.

agency. Presented as a last resort, the decision to name Akaky after his absent father is a

hyperbolic expression of his “little-man-ness.”

He acquires his name through a series of comic blunders. Bocharov associates it with a sense of inevitability and a lack of freedom. He writes, “…so there was no other option,

as soon as they named Akaky after his father, copying that namе, resulting in Akaky

Akakievich, the child was predetermined to spend his whole life copying texts…”122 As fate (or the author) would have it, Akaky is associated with copying throughout the text, and this quality is encoded in his name. On a related note, Akaky’s name also denotes repetition and reproducibility. Recall that reproducibility is also an important feature of the physiological sketch, which Tseitlin underscores.

The [physiological sketch] became systematic, striving to produce a “monograph” of an occurrence, its “genus” and “species.” They depicted characteristic, often repeated, typical occurrences of life, striving to give their creation a “scientific” form, make their method scientific...123 (Italics mine)

A redundant first name-patronymic is a literalized form of this feature.

Akaky Akakievich is an empty character, both in terms of personal agency and

signification, and this vacuity is inscribed in his name. According to Bocharov (quote

above), his profession is predetermined. This invocation of predestination removes

personal agency, the absence of which is a defining feature of this well-known chinovnik.

Akaky Akakievich is, to quote S. G. Bocharov, “devoid of a first-person relationship to

122 …так что не было выбора, как только лишь повторить Акакия по отцу, переписать еще раз это, и получился Акакий Акакиевич, предопределенный уже тем самым всю жизнь переписывать...(Bocharov 231). 123 Последнее становилось у них систематическим, стремилось заключить в себе «монографию» явления, «породы», «вида». Они изображали характерные, повторяющиеся, типические явления жизни, стремясь придать своим созданиям «наукообразную» форму, сделать свой метод таким же научным...(Tseitlin Stanovlenie 259).

life (he doesn’t have an “I”)…he has no words of his own.”124 Unable to speak for

himself, he requires a spokesman, and the story’s chatty narrator willingly obliges. The

narrator assumes a position of authority over the voiceless, disempowered Akaky

Akakievich, who is consequently “fully ‘imprisoned’ in the narrator’s tale.”125

A similar dynamic of authority and narrative imprisonment is present in the

physiological sketch, in which authors assumed the role of spokesmen for the character-

as-type. They purposely positioned themselves as authorities in the text, interpreting and presenting their findings as experts.126 In doing so, they undercut the character’s ability

to speak for himself/ herself. Admittedly, it may seem odd to argue that a character

created and sustained solely by the author’s words could, in fact, speak for herself.

Forster’s comments are helpful here. Recall that he writes that characters can be “full of

the spirit of mutiny” and that in an effort to live their own lives they are “often engaged

in treason against the main scheme of the book.”127 Forster is also careful to note that this

is not true of flat characters, who are more pliable and amenable to the author’s

intentions.

What Forster means is that one condition of plausibility in a character is that she will

see herself as the center of her world. Her words, actions, etc. will be primarily self-

referential. From the character’s point of view, every act is particular and self-

determined, not representative and determined by narrative demands. The author, on the

124 У героя «Шинели» нет отношения к жизни в первом лице (нет «я»)...Он не имеет своего слова (Bocharov 230). 125 целиком «заключен» в рассказа автора (Bocharov 230). 126 This is arguably different than the situation in “The Overcoat,” especially if we follow Scollins’ reading of the story. She argues that “The Overcoat” problematizes Akaky’s powerlessness within the story. By contrast, the power dynamics in the physiological sketch remain unrecognized and, as such, unproblematic. 127 Forster 46.

other hand, is also concerned with the character’s words and actions in reference to the

broader narrative, of which the character is only a part.128

At issue is the character’s referentiality as it relates to the text’s meaning. That is, the

extent to which a character’s words, actions, descriptions, etc. are meaningful as such, or

gain meaning as signifiers directed elsewhere. The more a character is made to fit the

narrative goals of the author, the less his appearance, behavior, etc. is significant in and

of itself and the less authority the character has over himself in the text. In the

physiological sketch, for example, a character’s every word, action, and descriptive detail

is directed towards an exposition of the character’s type. These aspects (words, actions,

details) are significant because they refer to something beyond the singular character. The

type, like Akaky Akakievich, derives its existential weight from the author/narrator’s

authority.

The second facet of Akaky Akakievich's emptiness is semantic rather than

ontological; he is an empty signifier. Kathleen Scollins draws out this element of the

character in her productive reading of him as a personified form of the Church Slavonic

letter “kako,” as a letter without its requisite alphabet and as such a signifier incapable of

signification.129 As a singular letter, his existence is insufficient to generate meaning.

Instead, meaning must be attributed to him, from without. In the Russian literary tradition

one way this happens is through Vissarion Belinsky's reading of the character as a

downtrodden “little man” whose pitiable state is a criticism of the social system.

128 Of course, Forster’s comments don’t cover the full range of literary production. One exception is stream-of-consciousness writing, in which the character’s thoughts, words, and actions constitute the narrative. Nonetheless, his observations are relevant for Chekhov and his literary tradition, broadly speaking. 129 Scollins 194-97.

1.4. Vissarion Belinsky: Typicality in Theory

Vissarion Belinsky’s concept of typicality and the type plays a fundamental role in his

understanding of literature.

One of the most distinctive signs of artistic originality, or, more accurately, artistic creation itself, is found in this typicality, if we can call it that. It is the artist’s official stamp. For a true true talent, every face is a type, and, for the reader, every type is a familiar stranger.130

А different designation of art adheres to [the works of Gogol] – that of the reproduction of reality in all its truth. Here the situation relates to types, and the ideal here is not understood as a decoration (consequently, a lie) but rather as a relationship, in which the types created by the authors correspond to the idea the author wants to advance through his works.131

Belinsky's notion of the type in the first excerpt easily conforms to that of the

physiologie. In addition to that conception of the type, Belinsky adds an ideological

agenda, as is apparent in the second excerpt. In the context of the present chapter, this addition of an explicit and necessary ideological component to the type constitutes

Belinsky's literary legacy.

Through his written work, Belinsky helped to situate the type firmly in Russian literary practice. This occurs both within the generic context of the physiological sketch

(he wrote both the introduction and a sketch for The Physiology of Petersburg) and, more importantly, outside it. In his 1845 review of the illustrated work Types of Contemporary

Manners, Presented in Illustrated Tales and Stories (Tipy sovremennykh nravov,

130 Один из самых отличительных признаков творческой оригинальности, или, лучше сказать, самого творчества, состоит в этом типизме, если можно так выразиться, который есть гербовая печать автора. У истинного таланта каждое лицо – тип, и каждый тип, для читателя, есть знакомый незнакомец (Belinsky PSS 1:295-96). 131 К ним идет другое определение искусства – как воспроизведение действительности во всей ее истине. Тут все дело в типах, а идеал тут понимается не как украшение (следовательно, ложь), а как отношения, в которые становит друг другу автор созданные им типы, сообразно с мыслию, которую он хочет развить своим произведением (Belinsky PSS 10:294-95).

predstavlennye v illiustrirovanykh povestiakh i rasskazakh) Belinsky argues for typicality

as a fundamental component of art.

This story includes sufficiently amusing aspects and, maybe, much that is true, but there are no types. As a result it is very boring to read. Many people think it’s nothing to write in a humorous vein. All that is required is to sit down and copy from nature. Of course, it comes out well if someone can copy nature well. That is talent of a kind, albeit of a lesser sort. After all, what can copy better than a daguerreotype? Meanwhile, even the best daguerreotype is far below any decent painter. For that reason I repeat that it is good if someone is able to be a good daguerreotypist in literature, but it is immeasurably better and more honorable to be a painter in literature…in it [the book under review, A.A.], five or six people in all of Russia might recognize themselves but no one else. This book will only arouse interest in the place where its original people live, because there is nothing shared or typical in it, even though it makes pretensions towards types…132

Overall, Belinsky’s presentation of typicality in this excerpt is aligned with the literary

practice of the physiologie writers, yet unlike them he distinguishes between a mere

representation of reality and true art. Art entails an accurate representation of the world,

but it is not reduced to that. Typicality elevates an accurate representation to the level of

art. For Belinsky, a defining feature of art is generality.

If we look more extensively at Belinsky’s writing, we find that his conception of

typicality is more demanding than that found in the physiologie. For him, it merges the

real and the ideal. While it is difficult to determine precisely what Belinsky meant by the

ideal (his literary reflections are frequently imprecise), there are at least two facets of the

ideal that relate to typicality, both of which are present in his 1841 article “The Idea of

132 В этом рассказе есть довольно забавные черты и, может быть, много правды; но в чем нет типов: от этого очень скучно читать его. Многие думают, что писать в юмористическом роде ничего не значит; так-же вот возьми да и списывай с природы. Конечно, выйдет хорошо, если кто умеет хорошо списывать с природы: и это талант своего рода, хотя и талант низший. Уж кто лучше дагерротип списывает? – а между тем, как далеко ниже сколько-нибудь порядочного живописца самый лучше дагерротип! И потому, повторяем: хорошо, если кто умеет быть хорошим дагерротипом в литературе, но несравненно лучше и почетнее быть в питературе живописцем...в нем, может быть, узнают себя пять или шесть человек во всей России; но больше никто не узнает, и эта книжка может возбудить интерес только в том месте, где живут оригиналы ее, потому что в ней ничего общего, типического, хотя она и претендует на типы…(Belinsky PSS 9:56).

Art” (“Ideia Isskustva”). The first is that the ideal is a way of referring to the realm of

ideas. He begins the article with what has become a well-known formulation, “Art is the

direct contemplation of truth or thinking in images.”133 The relevant point is that art is a matter of image and thought. This facet of the ideal is also present in the second excerpt quoted at the beginning of this section, in which Belinsky writes of the ideal in terms of infusing types with an idea, which the types themselves work to espouse.

The second facet of the ideal relates to the process by which art is created. At first glance Belinsky’s description of this process is baffling.

Separating the shared features of natural phenomenon away from the features that are endlessly varied and innumerable, one arrives at an awareness of genus and species. In the face of these categories, disorderly chaos disappears, yielding its place to complete order. Millions of accidental phenomena are transformed into a few necessary phenomena, each of which is a momentary embodiment of the unfolding divine idea forever arrested in flight.134

Adolphe Quetelet (1796-1894) was a Belgian mathematician, astronomer, and social

scientist, who transplanted the use of mathematical averages from astronomy into the

study of the human person. His convictions about the nature of the average man help to

clarify Belinsky’s seemingly inaccessible jumble of words. The way Quetelet spoke of the efficacy of averages bears resemblance to Belinsky’s comments above.

In speaking of the individual it must be understood that we are not attempting to speak of this or that man in particular; we must turn to the general impression that remains after having considered a great number of people. Removing his individuality we will eliminate all that is accidental.135

133 Искусство есть непосредственное созерцание истины или мышление в образах (Belinsky PSS 4:585). 134 Отвлекая от этих бесконечно разнообразных и безконечно явлений природы их общие свойства, он доходит до сознания родов и видов, -- и нестройный хаос исчезает перед ним, уступая место совершенному порядку; миллионы случайных явлений превращаются в единицы необходимых явлений, из которых каждое есть навсегда остановившийся в своем полете момент воплощения развивающейся божественной идеи! (Belinsky PSS 4:589). 135 Rose 36.

If we replace ‘individual’ with ‘infinitely diverse and infinitely multiple phenomena of

nature’ then we have a similar process at work. What is accidental is shorn away to leave

a composite entity (alternately referred to as an average, a general impression, a few

necessary phenomena, and a type) that is of most interest.

Quetelet also provides an inroad to understanding Belinsky’s ‘divine idea.’ In addition to applying the mathematical process of averaging to sociology, Quetelet also applied the meaning attributed to averages. In astronomy, individual measurements were erroneous, whereas the average corrected these individual errors.136 Likewise, Quetelet “declared

that the individual person was synonymous with error, while the average person

represented the true human being.”137 So Quetelet viewed the average person as the ideal,

not in a Classical sense of what humanity should be but rather as the most perfect representation of what humanity is. As Rose states, “But for Quetelet, the Average Man was perfection itself, an ideal that Nature aspired to, free from Error with a capital ‘E.’

He declared that the greatest men in history were closest to the Average Man of their place and time.”138 Belinsky’s ‘divine idea’ is another way of referring to this concept of

the actual-ideal (as opposed to the aspirational-ideal). It is worth emphasizing that the

‘divine idea’ derives from a bottom-up approach. It begins with what is in actual fact and then builds from there, rather than starting from an idea of what should be (but isn’t) and then applying that to what is.

136 Regarding the use of averages in astronomy, Todd Rose explains that astronomers measured the speed of celestial objects by measuring the time it took for the object (for example, a planet) to pass between two parallel lines on the telescope glass. The problem with this method was that it did not yield uniform results. Different people would come up with different results. So eventually the astronomers began to average the individual measurements together to come up with a measurement that “more accurately estimated the true value of the measurement in question than any single observation” (Rose 25-26). 137 Rose 27. 138 Rose 28.

When we consider Belinsky’s aforementioned comments as a whole, in light of

Quetelet’s assertions, we can interpret them as follows. Typicality, which is a central feature of art, is an averaging process that arrives at the most complete and accurate representation of a phenomenon, that is the ideal conception of it. Importantly, the ideal in this context is rooted in the real (what actually exists), so the type combines the real and the ideal in itself. The type for Belinsky is infused with and guided by an idea. While

Belinsky also uses the term ideal to refer to this aspect of typicality, it is more customary to use the term ideological. Belinsky’s conception of the type aligns with that of the physiologie, but under his critical guidance it becomes explicitly ideological.

In his introduction to The Physiology of Petersburg, Belinsky distinguishes between works of genius and works of ordinary talent. The present volume, he claims, is of the latter sort. While he does not specifically say so, his other comments indicate that the physiological sketches in The Physiology of Petersburg are merely ordinary in part because they are not overtly ideological. Belinsky’s perspective notwithstanding, the type in the physiological sketch does have ideological potential. In the case of contributor

Dmitry Grigorovich (1822-1902), who became a well-known writer, the ideological aspect of the type goes from being implicit in his physiological sketch “Petersburg Organ

Grinders” to explicit as he retains the type as a mode of characterization within two novellas, The Village (Derevn’ia, 1846) and Anton the Wretched (Anton Goremyka,

1847). If Belinsky championed the ideological element of typicality within criticism,

Grigorovich put it into practice.

1.5. Dmitry Grigorovich: Typicality in Practice

The work of Dmitry Grigorovich provides a case study in the considerations of the present chapter: the visual/objective orientation of the physiological sketch; the type as a generalized, abstract subject; the importance of classification in the physiological sketch; the author’s role as a spokesman for the type; and the ideological agenda of the type in

Russian literature. In addition, this story demonstrates an aspect of the physiological sketch, the lack of plot, that has not yet entered into the discussion. The publication of

“Petersburg Organ Grinders” as a part of The Physiology of Petersburg established

Grigorovich’s reputation as a writer. It was one of the most well-received sketches in the collection. In it he popularized the type of the organ grinder.

Grigorovich originally aspired to a career in the visual arts and his writing is biased towards the visual, making him a natural candidate to compose a physiological sketch.

Throughout “Petersburg Organ Grinders” he invokes the visual mode through descriptions of material, objective phenomena. Consider the description of the organ grinder, with which the sketch begins.

Look at this person, moving slowly along the pavement; examine his figure attentively. His long hair is black as pitch; it sticks out in disarray from under a torn cap, overshadowing his thin, sunburned face. Also notice his jacket, without color or buttons; his worsted scarf, carelessly wound about his swarthy neck; his canvas trousers and tattered slippers; and finally, a huge musical organ, bending his figure with its weight. These items make up the property of one of Petersburg’s most abused artisans: the organ grinder.139

Equally notable is the process, from discrete elements to composite picture, by which the figure takes shape for the reader. Molly Brunson writes, “By presenting the visual

139 Взгляните на этого человека, медленно переступающего по тротуару; всмотритесь внимательнее во всю его фигуру. Разодранный картуз, из-под которого в беспорядке вырваются длинные, как смоль черные волосы, падающие ча худощавое загоревшее лицо, куртка без цвета и пуговиц, гарусный шарф, небрежно обмотанный вокруг смуглой шеи, холстинные брюки, изувеченные сапоги и, наконец, огромный орган, согнувший фигуру эту в три погибели, – все это составляет причадлежность злополучнейшего из петербургских ремесленников – шарманщика (Fiziologiia 51).

impression of the organ grinder in consecutive fragments, Grigorovich simulates the

process of analysis, perhaps his own artistic process, moving from the observation of a vaguely defined figure, to closer inspection, and, ultimately, to the typological classification of a Petersburg organ grinder.”140

This is an example both of Tseitlin’s description of the “dismembering” and subsequent synthesizing of the type and of Belinsky’s winnowing of accidental traits to

arrive at a characteristic, abstract entity. In his review of The Physiology of Petersburg,

Belinsky writes of Grigorovich’s sketch that “In it…is the ability to notice and grasp the

characteristic traits of phenomenon…”141 Additionally, the generic title of the sketch as

well as the absence of proper names in it underscore the type’s abstractness.

The referential nature of the type is present on two planes in the story. First, as

mentioned, the parts (hair, slippers, etc.) are configured as symbolic items that, taken

together, represent the organ grinder as a whole. Second, the organ grinder of the story is

presented as a representative for his entire class. Neither he nor his traits are primarily of

interest as things in and of themselves. Instead, they are important as referents to abstract

notions beyond themselves.

Grigorovich also lays bare the categorical component of the physiological sketch by

structuring it like a scientific treatise. It is divided into seven sections: Introduction,

Categories of Organ Grinders, Italian Organ Grinders, Russian and German Organ

Grinders, The Street Clown, The Organ grinder’s Audience, and Conclusion. This

structure, based on categories and classification, communicates the author’s intention to

fix the type of the organ grinder by establishing his genus and species.

140 Molly Brunson, Russian Realisms: Literature and Painting, 1840-1890 (Northern Illinois UP, 2016) 34. 141 В ней...умение подмечать и схватывать характеристические черты явлений...(Belinsky PSS 8:384).

While maintaining a scientific form and an objective style, the text is far from

ideologically neutral. First, the unenviable plight of the organ grinder critiques the

contemporary social system for creating the dismal conditions that rendered this figure

lowly, destitute, and unnoticed. The choice of subject is in line with the physiological

sketch writers’ claim that all strata of society should be included in literature. Their focus

on “Petersburg corners,”142 however, was motivated by more than literary egalitarianism.

They championed the cause of the downtrodden in literature as a veiled call for social reform. “Petersburg Organ Grinders” was understood as such.143

Second, the narrator sets himself up as an exemplary observer and, as such, a

spokesman for the type. Contrary to the public, who pays no heed to the organ grinder,

the narrator is convinced that “…the organ grinder’s personal and social life (read:

“street”) offers many things that are worthy of attention.”144 The narrator cites this

conviction as the motivating force behind the sketch. So, as is customary in the

physiological sketch, the narrator here becomes an advocate and a spokesman for the

organ grinder, thereby encouraging the reader to re-evaluate her assessment of this figure

to correspond to that offered by the narrator. Practically, this means that the organ grinder

does not speak for himself; instead, the narrator acts as the authority and interpretive lens

in the text.

142 Nekrasov’s story “Petersburg Corners” was an exposé of seedy aspects of Petersburg life. Thomas Marullo notes that this “sordid (and daring) picture of drunkards, prostitutes, and the like” was Belinsky’s most favored story in the collection (xlviii). The term “corners” became a short-hand reference to unpleasant aspects of society that had previously been considered unfit for literature. 143 Robert L. Strong, “Grigorovic’s The Village: An Étude in Sentimental Naturalism” The Slavic and East European Journal 12.2 (1968) 169-175. Molly Brunson, too, argues that by providing background information about the organ grinder the story “fulfills a didactic and social purpose” (39). 144 …в шарманщике, в его частной и в общественной, уличной жизни многое достойно внимания (Fiziologiia 52).

Very little happens in the text. Beginning and ending with a verbal picture of the organ grinder, it has a circular structure. The main movement of the text occurs within the reader’s understanding of the organ grinder, an outcome that is consistent with the expository aim of the genre. The narrative is therefore directed towards expanding the reader’s understanding of this segment of society rather than towards plot progression.

The sketch concludes with an ellipsis, signifying an inconclusive ending. It lacks intrigue, a hallmark of this genre: as Tseitlin notes, “The narrative in the physiological sketch is not constrained by any external demands, since in this genre there is no rigid, organized core or plot.”145

In Reading for the Plot: Design and Intention in Narrative Peter Brooks distinguishes

between plot (narrative events) and plotting (the shape of narrative events). A text’s vitality arises from plotting since it is “that which makes a plot move forward and makes

us read forward, seeking in the unfolding of a narrative a line of intention and a portent of

design that hold the promise of progress toward meaning.”146 While there are narrative events in “Petersburg Organ Grinders,” the paucity of plotting in it (and in the physiological sketch broadly) means that the reader must locate the text’s design and meaning elsewhere. The ordering process inherent in classification imparts design and determines the structure of the text. The text’s meaning resides in the exposition of the character and the life of the figure under scrutiny.

Both The Village and Anton the Wretched demonstrate the influential use of typed characters in a broader generic context than the physiological sketch. Similar to the way that, for Belinsky, typicality extends into art broadly, Grigorovich draws on the type as a

145 Повествование в физиологическом очерке не стеснено никакими внешними требованиями, поскольку в нем нет твердого и организующего стерженя, интриги (Tseitlin Stanovlenie 220). 146 Peter Brooks, Reading for the Plot: Design and Intention in Narrative (Harvard UP, 1992) xiii.

means of characterization beyond the physiological sketch. In other words, Grigorovich’s

later works are not physiological sketches, yet the characters in them are close relatives

of the type as found there. According to Robert Strong, Jr., during the process of writing

his sketches for The Physiology of Petersburg,147 Grigorovich developed a makeshift

“field study” technique that consisted of “mingling and talking with [his subjects],

observing their habits and behavioral modes, as well as listening to and noting down their

distinctive speech patterns.”148 Grigorovich also employed this strategy to research the

peasantry, the result of which was The Village.

This story is about Akulina, an orphan who undergoes a series of hardships that

predictably culminate in her premature death. In his controversial decision to place a peasant at the center of this story (as well as Anton the Wretched), Grigorovich followed the physiological sketch writers’ insistence on broadening the field of literary characters to include under-represented groups. He also positioned himself as a spokesman for the peasant characters in his texts. This is especially evident in The Village, in which Akulina barely utters a word throughout the text’s nine chapters. In this way, the relationship between the author-narrator of Grigorovich’s peasant stories and their respective artistic subjects (Akulina and Anton) resembles that of the author-narrator and the organ grinder in “Petersburg Organ Grinders.” All three of the characters are formed in accordance with their spokesperson’s ideological ends, with the difference that the social critique is more explicit and harsher in the later works than in the earlier one. The peasants in

Grigorovich’s stories illustrate the ideological potential of the type that Belinsky championed.

147 In addition to “Petersburg Organ Grinders” Grigorovich also contributed “The Lottery Ball” to The Physiology of Petersburg. 148 Strong 169.

Akulina and Anton exist on the outer limits of the typical. They continually face

extreme situations that epitomize and accentuate the hardships that befall peasants. Their

stories do contain plotting, yet the events are arranged to highlight their increasingly

bleak and dire situation rather than to provide a gripping narrative arc. For this reason these stories often were, and are, read as indictments of serfdom. The characters in the story are, therefore, not only representatives of their class but also ideological representatives of serfdom as a blight on society. Belinsky’s comments on Anton the

Wretched encourage such a reading of the story. In his final essay, a different section of which is quoted above, he writes, “Anton the Wretched is more than a tale, it is a novel in which everything is correctly built on an idea, everything relates to this idea, the establishment and resolution of the plot arise from the very essence of the matter.”149

Grigorovich penned the typical literature that Belinsky so enthusiastically called for, and Belinsky’s endorsement undoubtedly encouraged the further proliferation of typed characters into mainstream literature. In addition to being a noteworthy writer of types in the Russian literary tradition, Grigorovich was also an influential figure in Anton

Chekhov’s literary career. He was the first of the serious Petersburg literati to take active notice of the young writer’s work. In a letter dated March 25, 1886 Grigorovich wrote a letter to Chekhov, in which the former affirms that he had “true talent,” praising him for

“truthfulness in the depiction of characters…”150 Grigorovich’s aesthetic bent was

towards typicality and pathos so it is reasonable to assume that these qualities comprise

part of his conception of “truthfulness” in characterization. He singles out Chekhov’s story “The Huntsman” (“Eger’,” 1885) as especially commendable.

149 «Антон-Горемыка» – больше, чем повесть: это роман, в котором все верно основной идее, все относится к ней, завязка и развязка свободно выходят из самой сущостни дела (Belinsky PSS 10:347). 150 настоящий талант, правдивость в изображении действующих лиц...(Pis'ma 1:428).

While “The Huntsman” has a rich texture that points to Chekhov’s more mature work,

it can also be read as an example of typicality with a slight ideological bent. This begins

with the title itself, which identifies the character Egor in categorical terms, as a

huntsman. Furthermore, the title character’s name is quite similar to the Russian word for

huntsman: eger’. The story recounts a chance meeting between the title character and

Pelageya, a peasant woman. He is a freedom-loving, noncommittal character who resists

and resents attempts to constrain him within customary social parameters, such as marriage and settling into a life in the village rather than roaming nature. Pelageya, on the other hand, is a downtrodden peasant facing emotional and financial hardships. As the story progresses, the reader discovers that the two were married twelve years prior, but they have no relationship and have never lived under the same roof. So the story is also

one of unrequited love, which adds another layer of typicality to the story. Pelageya’s pitiable position can be read in ideological terms, as an argument against the current arrangement of society, in which peasants are still in dire straits several decades after serfdom was abolished.151

Like Grigorovich (and a host of others, including the physiological sketch writers),

Chekhov drew on typicality as a means of characterization with the aim of accurately

representing the world in terms that were accessible and comprehensible to the reader.

Unlike Grigorovich, as Chekhov matured as a writer he became more attuned to the

undesirable potential of the type to distort the truth of a person in the service of

151 Turgenev’s story “The Meeting” (“Svidanie”), which was part of the collection A Sportsman’s Sketches (Zapiski okhotnika, 1852), is a recognized influence on Chekhov’s story “The Huntsman” (PSS 4:476-78). Turgenev was a member of the Natural School, a literary movement that overlapped with the work of the physiological sketch writers. He wrote two stories (“Pomeshchik” / “The Landowner,” “Tri portreta” / “Three Portraits”) in the Petersburg Collection (Peterburgskii sbornik, 1846), published by Nekrasov a year after The Physiology of Petersburg. Like Chekhov, Turgenev worked within a framework of typicality, though Turgenev’s intentions were more overtly political.

comprehensibility, essentialism, power, and ideology. In his mature works, Chekhov retains the type as a deep structure, yet he also exposes and undermines the unethical distortion of truth that, from his vantage point, attends the straightforward type. He does so by complicating the type, which is a means of characterization that he works out within the journalistic context of his early to middle literary career.

CHAPTER TWO Convention and Innovation – Navigating the Journalistic Context of the ‘Small Press’ and Beyond

Typicality is present in Chekhov’s work from the outset. His literary debut was two-

fold. Two works appeared simultaneously (under different pseudonyms) in the March 9,

1880 edition of the weekly illustrated publication Dragonfly (Strekoza). The fictional

“Letter to a Learned Neighbor” (“Pis’mo k uchenomu sosedu”) focuses on the type of the

peasant bumpkin with an over-inflated sense of his own intellect and sophistication.

According to his brother Mikhail, this work grew out of Anton’s personal impression of a

“shabby professor, presenting his scientific discoveries to the public,”152 with which he regaled family friends and visitors to their home. The second work, “What Elements are

Most Often Found in Novels, Short Stories, Etc.?,” (“Chto chashche vsego vstrechaetsia v romanakh, povestiakh, i t. p.?”)153 parodies literary criticism while also drawing

attention to clichéd literary formulae. The first thing Chekhov includes is a list of types.

A count, a countess still showing traces of a once great beauty, a neighboring baron, a liberal man of letters, an impoverished nobleman, a foreign musician, slow-witted manservants, nurses, governesses, a German bailiff, a squire, and an heir from America. Plain faces, but kind and winning. The hero – whisking the heroine off a bolting horse – courageous and capable in any given situation of demonstrating the power of his fists.154

Although this piece delegitimizes select types for being hackneyed, typicality is woven

throughout Chekhov’s work. The typicality of his early years has a comic intention,

152 захудалого профессора, читавшего перед публикой лекцию о своих открытиях (1:558-59). 153 Cathy Popkin, whose translation I use, provides a slightly different title: “Elements Most Often Found in Novels, Short Stories, Etc.” 154 Граф, графиня со следами когда-то бывшей красоты, сосед-барон, литератор-либерал, обенявший дворянин, музыкант-иностранец, тупоумные лакеи, няни, гувернатки, немец- управляющий, эсквайр и наследник из Америки. Лица некрасивые, но симпатичные и превлекательные. Герой – спасающий героиню от взбешенной лошади, сильный духом и могущий при всяком удобном случае показать силу своих кулаков (1:17).

which distinguishes it both from the informative intention of the French physiological sketch and the ideological one of the Russian. Nonetheless, as in the physiological sketch,

Chekhov’s early works frequently rely on the straightforward type as the primary means of characterization. Also like the types of the physiological sketch, his straightforward types have ethical implications. We’ll begin with the typicality of the illustrated weeklies, which exerted an important influence on his artistic practice.

2.1. The Journalistic and Social Context of the Illustrated Weeklies

Like the physiological sketch discussed in the previous chapter, the illustrated weeklies are generic hybrids of text and image. Andrew Durkin writes that “Artwork and caption vied in them for dominance. These illustrated texts or pictures with explanations were often collaborative efforts from the start, the editor suggesting a topic to both the artist and the writer.”155 More pointedly, the images in the illustrated weeklies were caricatures,156 an art form that, like the types of the physiological sketch, centers on characteristic features of a phenomenon.

The physiological sketch comprises part of the literary lineage of the illustrated weeklies. As James von Geldern and Louise McReynolds explain, “Initially a high

155 Andrew R. Durkin, “Chekhov and the Journals of His Time,” Literary Journals in Imperial Russia, edited by Deborah A. Martinsen (Cambridge UP, 1998), 231. Iampolskii provides a similar description when he refers to them as “плод тесного сотрудничества литератора и художника” / “the fruit of an intimate collaboration between writer and visual artist.” I. G. Iampolskii, Satiricheskie i iumoristicheskie zhurnaly 1860-x godov (Izdatel’stvo Leningradskogo universiteta, 1973) 3. 156 The illustrated weeklies are often referred to, in Russian, as a journal with caricatures. Fragments includes the subtitle ‘weekly artistic-humorous journal with caricatures’ (еженедельный художественно- юмористический журнал с карикатурами) on the title page of the publication. In the outline of the journal Alarm Clock first presented to the censors, the journal is described as 'a satirical journal with caricatures' (сатирический журнал с карикатурами) (Iampolskii 94). Unlike the satirical journals that preceded them, such as Spark (Iskra), the satire of the illustrated weeklies was decidedly apolitical. After Alexander II's assassination in 1881, the censors were especially on guard against anything that hinted of a political message in illustrated publications. Durkin writes, “the censorship kept the popular weeklies on a short leash, ensuring that nothing in them could be construed as substantive satire directed against the government or prevailing social order” (230).

literary movement, physiologies quickly found their way into journalism and popular

graphics.”157 The ‘thick’ journals stand as an intermediary between the physiological

sketch and the illustrated weeklies (or the ‘thin’ journals, as they are sometimes called).

The ‘thick’ journals maintain immediate ties to the physiological sketch, namely through

Belinsky and Nekrasov. Several of the important critics in them [Nikolai Dobroliubov

(1836-61), Nikolai Chernyshevsky (1828-1889)] were disciples of Belinsky. Both

Belinsky and Nekrasov contributed to The Contemporary (Sovremennik). Although the illustrated weeklies differed in kind and in readership from the ‘thick’ journals, there is overlap between contributors to the two journalistic realms. Nikolai Leikin (1841-1906), a popular humorist during his lifetime, is an important link.

In 1882 Leikin became the editor of Fragments. Under his guidance it became one of the most popular illustrated weeklies of the time. Prior to this he published stories in the thick journals The Contemporary, Notes of the Fatherland (Otechestvennye zapiski), and

Spark (Iskra).158 He was a prolific and popular writer who made a name for himself through the creation of types drawn from the merchant class.159 In the 1870s Leikin developed and popularized the genre of the stsenka, which is a short ‘scene’ comprised mostly of dialogue, intended to characterize and often poke fun at various types.160

The actor Ivan Gorbunov (1831-1896) influenced Leikin in the creation of the stsenka.

Gorbunov, also a contributor to The Contemporary, Notes of the Fatherland, and Spark, had a gift for creating types by means of dialogue; his entry in Russian Writers (Russkie

157 Louise McReynolds and James Von Geldern, editors, Entertaining Tsarist Russia: Tales, Songs, Plays, Movies, Jokes, Ads, and Images from Russian Urban Life, 1779-1917 (Indiana UP, 1998) 105. 158 Nekrasov (the editor for The Physiology of Petersburg) invited him to contribute to these. 159 Leikin identified Evgenii Grebenka (1812-1848), a contributor to The Physiology of Petersburg, as a literary model. 160 For more information see Kenneth Alfred Lantz, Aspects of Chekhov’s Comedy: 1880-1887, Dissertation (University of Toronto, 1974) 35.

pisateli) states that he was able to “depict typical representatives of various strata of

Russian society…”161 His specialty was the cabbie.162 Translated onto the page, the

typicality at the center of Gorbunov’s artistry remains in Leikin’s stsenki, which became

a generic staple of the illustrated weeklies. Arguably, the stsenka gained prominence in the illustrated weeklies on account of its compositional affinity with the illustrations.

Kenneth Lantz notes that the brevity of the stsenka required the writer to “sketch characters in a few bold strokes.” He continues, “One can compare this technique with that used by the artists who drew the cartoons for the same magazine.”163

The types of the illustrated weeklies, like those of the physiological sketch, are set,

circumscribed entities. L. Myshkovskaia writes in reference to the merchant type in the

illustrated weeklies, “They consistently wrote about the merchant class in one and the

same tone, using pre-established, once and for all, hackneyed language.”164 The typicality

of the illustrated weeklies went beyond the character types in them to include their

generic offerings. While they included a variety of genres, such as humorous sketches,

stories, poems, caricatures, illustrated stories, and dramatic scenes,165 this variety is what

Durkin refers to as “surface diversity…that concealed the underlying uniformity of the

satirical journal.”166 The illustrated weeklies were highly (and happily) prescribed.

161 изображать типичных представителей разл. слоев рус. об-ва…(Russkie pistaeli “Ivan Gorbunov” 207). 162 James Von Geldern, “Life In-Between: Migration and Popular Culture in Late Imperial Russia” Russian Review 55.3 (1996) 371. 163 Lantz Aspects 35. 164 Писалось о купце всегда в одном и том же тоне и раз навсегда установленным штампованным языком (Myshkovaskaia 30). 165 The descriptive outline of Alarm Clock that was presented to the censorship committee for initial approval includes all of these aspects and more. See Iampolskii 94. 166 Satirical journal here refers to the illustrated weeklies. The satire found in these journals is apolitical and thereby distinct from previous satirical journals (Spark, for example). See footnote 188 for more information.

Another key prescriptive element was the thematic correspondence of the weeklies to

the seasons. Fall, for example, was the season of weddings, the beginning of the theatrical

season, and the arrival of famed artists to Moscow and St. Petersburg.167 They were so regularized thematically that Myshkovskaia claims one could guess the month (or at least the season) a story was published judging solely from the landscape and background

offered at the outset.168 So the illustrated weeklies were marked by prescribed formulae in

terms of illustrations, character construction, generic offerings, and the thematic content

of the publications.

In terms of intention, the types of the illustrated weeklies diverge from those of the

physiological sketch. The latter were descriptive and informative, created to help readers orient themselves in an unfamiliar world. The types of the illustrated weeklies, on the other hand, were comic. Their humorous effect relies on the reproduction of characteristic and identifiable features of characters that had already gained traction in the literary

and/or cultural imagination of the readers. They achieved this effect through parody,

satire, and/or exaggeration.169 They are often trite in a way that the physiological sketch

types were not.

A couple of examples from Chekhov’s work in the illustrated weeklies adequately

demonstrate the parodic/satirical/exaggerated characterization found in comic types. One

of his earliest stories, entitled “My Jubilee” (“Moi iubilei,” July 1880, Dragonfly), makes

167 Additionally, winter was the season of Christmas, New Year, the theater, Lent, and Maslenitsa, spring was Easter season, and summer was dacha and engagement season. 168 Myshkovskaia 68. 169 For a more detailed discussion of parody see Gary Saul Morson, The Boundaries of Genre: Dostoevsky’s Diary of a Writer and the Traditions of Literary Utopia (University of Texas Press, 1981) 107-13.

fun of the self-important writer. The text is in the form of a letter,170 written by a self- identified “prosaic poet” and generically addressed to young men and women. Clichés abound in it, starting with the first line.

Three years ago I felt the presence of that holy flame, on account of which Prometheus was chained to the rock…And for three years now with outstretched hands I send my works, which have passed through the purgatory of the aforementioned fire, to the far ends of my vast fatherland.171

Contrary to the expectations set by the title and the grandiose style, the jubilee in question

marks the writer’s 2,000th letter rejecting his work for publication. The story does not aim

to fix the type of the writer but rather pokes fun at an assumed characteristic – self- importance – of the writer as a type. An already recognizable feature of the type thus becomes the source of the joke.

Two more examples establish Chekhov’s facility in creating comic artist types.172

Both stories, “The Wallet” (“Bumazhnik,” May, 1885, Alarm Clock) and “Boots”

(“Sapogi,” June, 1885, Petersburg Gazette/Peterburgskaia gazeta), play off the negative reputation of actors. “The Wallet” references the stereotype of actors as insincere. In it three actors find a wallet full of money, enough to support all three for many years. After rejoicing over their discovery two of the actors send off the third (the youngest) with a bit of the money, to buy food and drink. On the way back he decides to poison the other two

170 This work is a parody of the epistolary form as well as of the self-important writer. The PSS note to Chekhov’s first published work, “Letter to a Learned Neighbor” (mentioned above), applies equally well to this story: “В малой прессе конца 70х – начала 80х годов пародийный жанр «посланий» и «писем» был распростанен широко” / “In the small press at the end of the 1970s and the beginning of the 80s, it was common to find parodies of the epistolary genre” (1:559). 171 Три года тому назад я почувствовал присутствие того священного пламени, за которое был прикован к скале Прометей…И вот три года я щедрою рукою рассылаю во все концы моего обширного отечества свои производения, прошедшие сквозь чистилище упомянутого пламени (1:34). 172 Chekhov excelled at the creation of various comic types, many of whom were not artists. Since my focus throughout the dissertation is on the artist in Chekhov’s work, I also focus on artists here. My argument vis-à-vis artists also applies to his comic types more broadly.

so that he can use all the money to start a theater in his hometown of Kostroma.

Meanwhile, the other two decide to kill the third upon his return as a way to save him

from the harm he will bring himself on account of acquiring such a sum of money in his

youth. All three carry out their plans, the result of which is that they all lay dead at the

end of the story. The narrator offers the following moral: “When actors, with tears in

their eyes, speak of dear friends, of friendship and mutual “solidarity,” when they hug

and kiss you, don’t get too carried away.”173 The story line is directly predicated on insincerity as a typical quality of the actor and the story strikes a decidedly light-hearted, humorous tone rather than a tragic one.

“Boots” is similarly reliant on another feature, promiscuity, associated with the actor as a type. It begins when a piano tuner exits his apartment and fails to find his shoes

outside, where the attendant for that floor should have put them the night before after

cleaning them. It eventually becomes clear that the floor attendant mistakenly placed the

shoes outside an adjacent room, where an actress lives. Further investigation reveals that

an actor, who visits the actress’ room every Tuesday, has the piano tuner’s boots. That

evening the piano tuner goes to the theater in search of the actor. When the piano tuner

locates the actor in the men’s dressing room, he explains the situation, mentioning the

apartment number outside of which his shoes were accidentally placed. The humorous

twist in the story comes when one of the other actors recognizes that apartment number

as his wife’s, inadvertently leading the characters and the reader to a revelation of sexual

impropriety.

173 …когда актеры со слезами на глазах говорят о своих дорогих товарищах, о дружбе и взаимной «солидарности», когда они обнимают и целуют вас, то не очень увлекайтесь (3:445).

As mentioned in the Introduction, types are especially amenable to comedy because they are easy to ‘control’ and fit into the overall function of the work. The previous stories illustrate this point. The characters in them easily satisfy the mandate of the illustrated weeklies: to provide light entertainment that does not disturb the status quo.

They were commercial enterprises with content dictated both by the requirements of the censors and by the demands of the readership. Many of their readers were literate, lower- class urban dwellers (as opposed to the cultural elite who read the ‘thick’ journals) living in a time of social and cultural upheaval. The typified characters of the illustrated weeklies countered the social dislocation of the contemporary moment by imaginatively offering a stable world. Durkin’s description of the fictional world expressed in the illustrated weeklies lends support to this view of them: “It is a closed world in which repeated actions are the norm, not an open world of continuous change; familiar types of characters in recognizable situations predominate.”174

Chekhov was gifted at creating comic types, and his popularity in the illustrated journals was due in no small part to this dimension of his literary talent. The examples cited illustrate a distinguishing feature of his comic talent, namely an ability to exploit a given characteristic of a type for comic effect in a way that exaggerates (and thereby maintains) that characteristic. His comic talent has other dimensions as well, including subversion that functions to disrupt or destabilize an established order. This occurs in relation to the characterization of the type as well as to conventional narrative arcs in

Chekhov’s work. A good example of this is present in “Reading” (“Chtenie,” March 24,

1884, Fragments), one of Chekhov’s depictions of that most Russian of types, the

174 Durkin 233.

chinovnik. While the story does not contain an artist type, per se, it concerns artistic

activity.

Merdyaev, the chinovnik of the story, is meant to recall Gogol’s Akaky Akakievich.

This is made explicit when his boss (Ivan Petrovich Semipalatov) refers to Merdyaev as a

Gogolian type in conversation with the local theater director (Galamidov).

You said we don’t have Gogolian types…just look here! A type in every way! Slovenly, elbows worn through, squint-eyed…never combs his hair…And look at how he writes! The devil knows what that is! He writes without proper grammar, without sense…like a shoemaker!175

Chekhov includes the final descriptor as a play on Akaky’s last name, Bashmachkin.

(Bashmaki are a kind of footwear.) This reference invokes the traditional treatment and expectations that surround the chinovnik type in the literary tradition as a character beaten down by society and in need of enlightenment. Galamidov represents this point of view

through his assumption that Merdyaev rarely reads and through his insistence that

Merdyaev should read in order to improve himself and his life. Galamidov acts on this

view when he brings in a stack of books the next day for Merdyaev and his associates.

Contrary to the expectations surrounding the chinovnik (that education will lead to

enlightenment), Merdyaev’s foray into reading negatively disrupts his life. He loses

weight, starts to drink, and eventually loses his wits, coming into work with overly

dramatic pleas for forgiveness after finishing Victor Hugo’s The Count of Monte Cristo.

The story revolves around characteristics associated with the chinovnik type

(downtrodden, in need of enlightenment), while the joke results from upending those

characteristics rather than maintaining them. “A Poor Story” (“Skvernaia istoriia,” June

175 Вы говорили, что у нас нет уже гоголевских типов...А вот вам! Чем не тип! Неряха, локти продраны, косой...никогда не чешется...А посмотрите, как он пишет! Это черт значит что! Пишет безграмотно, бессмысленно...как сапожник! (2:360).

26, 1882, Light and Shade/Svet i teni) follows a similar format in relation to the narrative

arc of a love story. The story revolves around Nogtev, an artist, and Lelia, a type drawn

from the world of romance. She is a beautiful woman now past her prime, jaded and unmarried at 26.

The text overtly creates expectations of a love story for the reader. The issue of

Lelia's marriageability is introduced at the outset. In conjunction with this, the narrative perspective is closely aligned with Lelia, who interprets Nogtev's interest in her along romantic lines, preparing herself for a marriage proposal. For example, when Lelia first sees Nogtev the narrative reads, “Oh, wondrous instant, it’s you!”176 This is a reference to

a well-known love poem by Pushkin, “К ***,” in which the poet refers to the first time he

saw his beloved as follows, “I still recall the wondrous moment:/ When you appeared

before my eyes,…”177 The narrative tension in the story grows until Nogtev finally builds

up enough courage to ask Lelia to be his artistic model, not his wife. Chekhov thus

employs characteristic elements of a romance to comically upend the conventional arc of

a love story.

We can also find examples in Chekhov’s early stories when he introduces an element

of pathos into this mechanism of subversion, such as in “The Hired Pianist” (“Taper,”

November 14, 1885, Alarm Clock). Pyotr, who has been hired to play piano at a wedding

reception, strikes up a conversation with a woman at the reception while waiting to

perform for the event. He is flattered and buoyed by the attention she shows him,

adopting an inflated pose and waxing philosophical about music. Initially receptive to

176 О, чудный миг, это ты! (1:216). 177 Я помню чудное мгновенье:/ Передо мной явилась ты, Translation taken from http://max.mmlc.northwestern.edu/mdenner/Demo/texts/iremember.htm. Accessed 19 Jan. 2017.

him, her demeanor towards him changes when she learns that he is the hired pianist for

the event. Pyotr is unaware of the reason for this shift until he overhears someone

explain, with mockery and disdain, that the woman had mistaken the hired pianist for a

guest. Although Pyotr reports that he was able to shake off this offense, his actions tell a

different story. His head begins to spin with thoughts of his own and his friends’

inadequacies and lost dreams, resulting in an attack of hysterics.

The inverted world of comedy, in which things are not as they appear to be, is present

in the story. Pyotr is not a hired pianist type, despite what the title and the wedding guests

suggest. Rather he is more than a hired pianist. However, the effect of this inversion is

more pathetic than humorous. Chekhov achieves this effect by introducing the reader to

Pyotr’s emotional landscape through his felt humiliation and self-loathing. At the

beginning of the story Pyotr returns home from the evening feeling dejected and deflated,

and the reader is given access to Pyotr’s internal experience. When he then recounts the

guests’ demeaning placement of a typical designation (hired pianist) onto him and

consequently treating him as inferior, it strikes the reader as unjustly reductive. This story provides an example of Chekhov moving from a straightforward type towards a complicated one. The following three sections will follow that trajectory, beginning with the straightforward type of the artist in his work.

2.2. Straightforward Artist Types in Chekhov

As a reader Chekhov was familiar with the conventions of the illustrated weeklies. His literary sensibility as a young writer was formed, in part, by his reading of pre-Fragments

Leikin.178 As a writer he mastered their formulae, marking the seasons and contributing

familiar characters such as the chinovnik.179 Within three years of first appearing in print,

Chekhov began publishing in Fragments,180 the most popular of the illustrated weeklies,

and by 1886 he was one of its most popular writers. Given the nature of the genre, it is

not surprising that Chekhov’s means of characterization during this time is often typical.

In his creation of straightforward types Chekhov was following the literary

conventions of the publication context. Is there, then, any information to be gained from

his types as regards his aesthetics at the time? Yes. First, even though Chekhov is

following a general trend of creating types, he is nonetheless deciding which

characteristics to emphasize. Second, satire expresses values, albeit indirectly. On this

point Kenneth Lantz makes the following observation regarding his early works.

Chekhov’s works do contain positive values, but in most instances these values are only suggested in an indirect manner. In other words, he presents negative values and counts, as he says, “fully on the reader” to arrive at the positive ones himself.181

Notably, the values Chekhov expresses in negative form in the following stories find

positive expression in the complicated type.

The Artist as a Type: Poverty

178 In a letter to Leikin dated after March 2, 1883 Chekhov refers to his previous self as “одним из ревностнейших читателей” / “one of your zealous readers” (Pis’ma 1:60). This is part flattery and part sincere statement. 179 For a more detailed account of Chekhov’s writing in the context of the journalistic seasons see Myshkovskaia. In addition to “Reading” (mentioned above) another chinovnik story is “The Death of a Chinovnik” (“Smert’ chinovnika,” 1883). 180 Chekhov’s first published story appeared on March 9, 1880. He first started publishing in Fragments in Nov. 1882. 181 Lantz Aspects 3-4.

Poverty is the characteristic most consistently associated with writers in Chekhov’s

early works.182 This is not surprising given that financial strain was a reality for Chekhov and for many writers and artists he knew.183 Being a writer, especially in the small press,

was not lucrative. It required publishing a lot, working quickly, and catering to the tastes

of the journal’s editor and readers. Poverty as a component of the artist as a type is, on

one level, a reflection of actual circumstances. Consider, for example, “Artists’ Wives”

(“Zheny artistov,” December 7, 1880, Minute/Minuta), which is one of Chekhov’s

earliest stories containing artists. It includes representatives from various branches of art

(a writer, a painter, an actor, an opera singer) all of whom live in the same hotel. In this story the writer’s destitution functions to identify him as a struggling, unsuccessful writer. Poverty thus plays a descriptive role and has little aesthetic import. Nonetheless, even when we approach poverty and the writer in strictly practical terms, it is relevant to

Chekhov’s own identity as a writer.

As is often remarked, Chekhov began writing for financial reasons, to support his family and himself while attending medical school in Moscow. Scholars have identified more than 51 pseudonyms Chekhov used throughout the course of his career, many of which he employed in the illustrated weeklies.184 According to Andrew Durkin, one of the reasons authors published with a pseudonym was to make more money. The adoption

182 In addition to the works addressed in this section, other examples include “Artists’ Wives” (“Zheny artistov,” 1880), “A Hopeless Situation” (“Propashchee delo,” 1882), “A Problem” (“Zadacha,” 1884), and “A Discovery” (“Otkrytie,” 1886). 183 Include in this list are his brothers Alexander, a writer, and Nikolai, a visual artist who contributed illustrations to the weeklies. 184 Cathy Popkin, “Zen and the Art of Reading Chekhov (“The Bishop”),” Anton Chekhov’s Selected Stories, Texts of the Stories, Comparison of Translations, Life and Letters, Criticism, edited by Cathy Popkin (W. W. Norton & Company, 2014) 671.

of various pseudonyms allowed them to publish more.185 Financial considerations are a

factor in Chekhov’s estimation of himself as a writer. In a letter to his brother Alexander

written in November 1883 (after he had become a regular contributor to Fragments), he

wrote, “To work for Fragments is to possess credentials…I have the right to look down

on Alarm Clock and now I’ll scarcely work just anywhere for a pittance: I’ve become more expensive.”186

The poverty of the writer also has aesthetic implications. It places the writer in an

easily compromised position. The need to cater to external circumstances is a

consequence of the austere economic conditions that writers frequently faced. The

illustrated weeklies were financial enterprises in which the writer’s work was dictated (or

at least heavily influenced) by editors, who themselves were driven by market demand.

The practice of writing for external appraisal is problematized in “A Writer” (“Pisatel’,”

November 11, 1885, Petersburg Gazette) and “Two Journalists” (“Dva gazetchika,”

October 5, 1885, Fragments). These stories contain an implicit criticism of writing solely

for financial gain.

After collaborating with a merchant to write a misleading advertisement about the

merchant’s store, the writer of “A Writer” is distraught by his actions. He expresses his

dismay as follows: “I’m deceiving Russia! All of Russia! I’m deceiving the fatherland for

a piece of bread! Ah!”187 It is worth noting that the problem is not strictly writing for

profit, but rather a situation in which doing it causes the author to engage in deception

and be untrue to himself. The writer’s sense of shame at his actions provokes sympathy

185 Durkin 230. 186 Работать в «Осколках» значит иметь аттестат...Я имею право глядеть на «Будильник» свысока и теперь едва ли буду где-нибудь работать за пятачок: дороже стал (Pis’ma 1:63). Alarm Clock is one of the lower tier illustrated weekly magazines where Chekhov published during his first few years. 187 Россию обманываю! Всю Россию! Отечество обманываю из-за куска хлеба! Эх! (4:212).

for him, relocating the criticism onto the system rather than the character. Chekhov

implicitly argues for a system in which the writer should be free to write according to

conscience and in accordance with personal conviction rather than strictly in the service

of the consumer.

“Two Journalists” also concerns the perversion of the writing profession. In it, one

writer (Schlepkin) witnesses a fellow writer’s suicide, at which point Schlepkin “sat at

the table and in one instant wrote: a note about suicide, Rybkin’s obituary, a feuilleton

regarding frequent suicides, a leading article about strengthening the punishment imposed

for suicide, and a few other articles on that theme.”188 That Schlepkin, unaffected, writes a string of works immediately after witnessing a suicide is improper both personally and professionally. The final line of the story uses irony to pointedly criticize Schlepkin.

“Having written all of that, he put it in his pocket and happily ran to the editorial office, where payment, glory, and readers awaited him.”189 Schlepkin exploits the circumstance for literary profit and increased readership, thereby profaning literature. Again, by arguing against its opposite, Chekhov presents literature as an endeavor that should respect situations and circumstances rather than exploit them.190 Both stories are

consistent with their publication context in that they are light-hearted. They are not overt

statements on Chekhov’s part nor should they be read as such. Yet they do demonstrate that there are improper, and by extension proper, ends in writing. That isn’t to say that

Chekhov thought it was improper to write for money. His own literary practice discredits

188 сел за стол и в один миг написал: заметку о самоубийстве, некролог Рыбкина, фельетон по поводу частых самоубийств, передовую об усилении кары, налагаемой на самоубийц, и еще несколько других статей на ту же тему (4:158). 189 Написав всë это, он положил в карман и весело побежал в редакцию, где его ждали мзда, слава и читатели (4:158). 190 Trigorin expresses a similar unease with his approach to lived experience as little more than fodder for literature in The Seagull.

such an interpretation. But market demands (money, increased readership) should never

negate the ethical demands that truth and human decency place on writing.

The depictions of these two writers are remarkably unfavorable. The timing of them in

relation to Chekhov’s career is worth noting. They were both written at the end of 1885, approximately three years into his intensive partnership with Fragments, and they express dissatisfaction with expedient writing as well as displeasure with a system in which a larger mandate curtails and distorts the artistic product. Chekhov’s own frustration with the stifling atmosphere of the illustrated weeklies is a factor.

This interpretation gains circumstantial support when we consider two later stories with writers, “A Radiant Persona: An “Idealist’s” Story” (“Svetlaia lichnost’: rasskaz

“idealista”,” September 25, 1886, Cricket/Sverchok) and “Easter Eve” (April 13, 1886,

New Times). Both stories were written after Chekhov began publishing beyond the

illustrated weeklies, in New Times. In “Easter Eve” the concern with writing for

profit/external approbation is missing altogether. In its place we find the closest Chekhov

comes to providing an ideal writer in his work. This story is discussed in more detail

below. In “A Radiant Persona” the problem of financial hardship is the basis for a

humorous twist. The idealist referred to in the subtitle is the narrator, who has fallen in

love with his neighbor after watching her heartfelt reaction to the newspaper day after

day. His idealism translates to an assessment of the world in typical terms, as we see in

his comment, “I regret that Auerbach, Speilhagen, or another such novelist searching for

“new people” doesn’t live in my apartment…They would avail themselves of my

stranger…”191 Regarding her husband, the narrator-idealist notes that every morning he

runs off somewhere and returns late at night with vodka and provisions.

When the main character eventually builds up enough courage to visit his neighbor he discovers that her response to the paper does not, as he assumed, emanate from an enlightened sensibility or a deep concern about the state of affairs in the world. Instead, in reply to his question of what is upsetting her, she says, “You judge for yourself: today we need to pay rent, and my idle husband only provided the newspaper 60 lines! Can we live on that? Yesterday his writing brought in roughly 11 roubles, 40 kopecks, and today

I can barely count three roubles! Am I not miserable?”192 The writer is peripheral to this

story yet his poverty and propensity to carouse, both of which his wife associates with his

job as a newspaper writer, create the conditions for the humorous misunderstanding that

results. The portrayal of the writer is unflattering, but it does not have the condemnatory

undertone of “A Writer” or “Two Journalists.”

The Artist as a Type: The ‘Artist/Writer’ as an Idea

Another of the considerations associated with the straightforward type of the artist in

Chekhov’s early work concerns the perception of the artist held by the public or an

aspiring artist. The focus in these stories is the idea of the artist that characters hold. The

meaning attributed to this idea is variable. One reason for this is that the artist does not fit

into the familiar structures of society, namely the Table of Ranks. “A Modern Guide to

Letter-Writing” (“Noveishii pis’movnik,” December 1, 1884, Fragments) is a parody of a

manual outlining the proper procedure for composing letters. Readers are advised to

191 Жалею, что в моей квартире не живет Ауэрбах, Шпильгаген или иной романист, ищущий «новых людей»...Они воспользовались бы моей незнакомкой...(5:310). 192 Вы посудите: сегодня нам нужно платить за квартиру, а мой балбес-муженек дал в газеты только 60 строчек! Ну, разве мы можем так жить? Вчера он написал ровно на 11 руб. 40 коп., а сегодня я едва насчитала три рубля! Ну не несчастна ли я? (5:311).

begin the letter with a polite form of address, using the recipient’s designation according

to the Table of Ranks, followed by the person’s title and name. Yet when addressing writers, litterateurs, and artists, readers are informed, “they don’t have ranks and titles, so a letter to such people simply begins: Dear Sir!”193 We find a similar sentiment in “A

Discovery” (“Otkrytie,” January 25, 1886, Fragments) when the main character

contemplates the life of an artist: “Proper people, they don’t given them ranks and orders…They stand outside all social and financial ranks…”194 Since the artist/writer falls outside the dominant social structure of the Table of Ranks, there is no fixed meaning attached to this figure.

Chekhov exploits this instability. “A Spineless Person” (“Triapka,” December 2,

1885, Petersburg Gazette) provides one such example. In it a secretary at a local newspaper misrepresents himself as a litterateur at a social function because he assumes this will elevate other’s perceptions of him. More specifically, his central aim is to impress a woman to whom he is attracted. He reasons to himself, “God, editorial secrets have such an effect on the ladies!”195 On his way to the gathering he assumes an air of

indifference and melancholy, which are traits that correspond to his perception of a

writer. Contrary to his expectations, he is denied entry at the door when he proudly

announces he is from the newspaper. It turns out the host is denying entry to writers from the newspaper on account of an unflattering review of a pageant in which the host’s daughter participated. The elevated evaluation that the main character attaches to the

193 чинов и титулов не имеют, а посему письма к этим лицам начинаются с простого: М. г.! (3:124). 194 Правы люди, что не дают им чинов и орденов…Они стоят вне всяких рангов и капитулов…(4:322). 195 Боже, а как действуют на женщин редакционные тайны! (4:239).

writer as a conceptual designation is thereby countered by the host’s unfavorable

evaluation of the same designation.

One of the recurring features that attends the straightforward type of the artist in

Chekhov’s work is a presentation of the designation of ‘artist’/‘writer’ as an exalted idea,

akin to a status symbol, that is removed from the actuality of being an artist. This is a

subset of the instability of the artist’s social position. This lack of harmony between

perception and reality finds comic expression in the story “A Confession, or, Olya,

Zhenya, and Zoya (A Letter)” (“Ispoved’, ili Olya, Zhenya, Zoya: pis’mo,” March 20,

1882, Alarm Clock). In recounting four (of fifteen) relationships that dissolved when they were on the verge of marriage, the central character Makar Baldastov proudly adopts the mantle of ‘writer’ as he relates the conditions under which he and Zhenya parted ways.

You, of course, are aware, my friend, that I am a writer. God lit a holy fire in my bosom, and I consider it my duty to take up the pen. I am a priest of Apollo…Every beat of my heart, every breath, in short – I have laid my whole self at the altar of my muse.196

Subsequently, it becomes clear that Makar’s claim upon the term ‘writer’ is inaccurate.

While he may write a lot, the story he sent for publication is rejected by the publication in

definitive terms. “You do not have even an ounce of talent. The devil knows what

nonsense you’ve written! Don’t waste your stamps in vain and leave us in peace.”197

Makar adopts the persona of a writer and considers himself as such, but in actual fact he is not. He is, however, so committed to this (misguided) view of himself that his

196 Вы, конечно, знаете, мой друг, что я писатель. Боги зажгли в моей груди священный огонь, и я считаю себя не вправе не браться за перо. Я жрец Аполлона…Все до единого биения сердца моего, все вздохи мои, короче – всего себя я отдал на алтарь муз (1:135). 197 Таланта у вас ни капельки. Чëрт знает что нагородили! Не тратье марок понапрасну и оставьте нас в покое (1:136).

relationship with Zhenya dissolves once she suggests that maybe he doesn’t have any

literary talent. In this light-hearted, epistolary story Makar is chided for his self-delusion.

“A Discovery,” too, is constructed around a rift between idea and actual fact, but it

adopts a more thoughtful and sensitive perspective. The action of the story consists entirely of Bakhromkin’s change in perspective regarding what it would mean to be an

artist. The discovery of the title comes about when Bakhromkin is mindlessly scribbling

on a piece of paper only to find that he has artistic talent. This leads him to consider how

his life would be different if he had learned this sooner. At first he envisions his life as an

artist as set apart in a desirable way, “unlike a million other lives. To compare it with the

lives of ordinary mortals is completely out of the question.”198 In this imaginative

rendering, the artist occupies an illustrious position in comparison to the lives of

“ordinary mortals.” In accordance with this conception, he recalls an episode from his

youth in which his mother enthusiastically kissed the hand of a drunken man they passed,

justifying her actions because the man was a poet. The life of an artist, as he envisions it,

is a life that is special. It is free, set apart, and accompanied by external recognition.

As he continues to speculate on the life of an artist, a different conception emerges. He

recognizes that great artists can’t afford many of the creaturely comforts or common

courtesies to which he is accustomed. In this regard, he imagines an artist walking along

who is “slight, in a reddish-brown coat, maybe even without galoshes…”199 The life of

the artist is still set apart but the valence has been reversed. Regarding the disconnect

198 не похожая на миллионы других жизней. Сравнивать ее с жизнями обыкновенных смертных совсем невозможно (4:322). 199 жалкенький, в порыжелом пальто, быть может, даже без калош…(4:323).

between the exalted idea of the artist and the lived experience of the artist, Bakhromkin concludes, “The title is held in respect, but the person is held in disregard…”200

“Talent” (“Talant,” September 6, 1886, Fragments) provides Chekhov’s most

ethically charged reflection on the disconnect between the idea and reality of the artist

within the context of the straightforward type of the artist in his work. In it the disconnect

between the two is detrimental to the actual practice of art. The would-be artists of the

story have very definite ideas about what it means to be an artist. Egor Savvich, for

example, cultivates his unkempt, shaggy appearance in accordance with his conception of

an artist. He refuses to get married because, as he says, “an artist, and in general anyone

living for art, is forbidden from marrying. An artist must be free.”201 In addition, he has a

clear vision of the life of an accomplished artist as one of ease. He imagines that it is a

simple matter for an artist to travel abroad. All the painter must do, Egor muses, is to

make a painting and sell it, as if this task involves nothing more than buying paints and a

canvas.

In the middle of the story Egor sits down with a glass of vodka and loses himself in a

daydream about his imagined future life as a well-known artist.

His imagination draws a picture of how he becomes renowned. He isn’t able to envision his future paintings, but he can clearly see how the magazines talk about him, how the stores sell his photographs, and his friends’ envy as they follow him with their eyes. He tries to imagine himself in an expensive drawing room, surrounded by lovely female admirers, but his imaginative picture is somewhat fuzzy and unclear due to the fact that he has never in his life seen a drawing room; the lovely female admirers don’t come out right either because, besides Katya, he has never seen even one female admirer, nor has he seen a proper lady.202

200 Имя в почете, но личность в забросе...(4:323). 201 художнику и вообще человеку, живущему искусством, нельзя жениться. Жудожник должен быть свободен (5:278). 202 Воображение его рисует, как он становится знаменитостью. Будущих произведений своих представить себе не может, но ему ясно видно, как про чего говорят газеты, как в магазинах продают его карточки, с какою завистью глядят ему вслед приятели. Он силится вообразить себя в

The authorial sarcasm in this passage is sharp and it undermines the validity of Egor’s

vision. He is imagining things of which he knows nothing (richly furnished reception

room, fame, admiring fans) and yet is unable to imagine what should be very familiar (his

own artwork). Egor’s conception of the artist is divorced from the practical and present act of creating art. This becomes more apparent when two artist friends visit him. When

Ukleikin, a landscape painter, asks what Egor has done over the summer all the latter has

to show is an unfinished portrait covered by cobwebs. Ukleikin, for his part, has done as

little work as Egor. When a third artist friend drops by we learn that he has only gotten so

far as coming up with a theme for his work.

Their lack of artwork, however, does not deter them from viewing themselves as

artists bound for success and renown. On the contrary, all night “They talk nonstop,

sincerely, warmly; all three are excited and inspired. If you were to listen to them, they hold the future, fame, and money in their hands.”203 Their conception of what it means to be an artist is replete with fame, followers, wealth, and freedom. It is, however, conspicuously devoid of the main component that makes an artist an artist: the creation of

art. In Russian and in English, the title of the story refers both to artistic talent and a

talented person. This dual meaning suggests that a talented person is not simply a

designation or category that you can bestow on someone, including oneself. It entails the

possession and application of skills. The title is ironic. Through it the reader is more keenly aware of the absence of both talent and talented people in the story. The characters

богатой гостиной, окруженным хорошенькими поклонницами, но воображение рисует ему что-то туманное, неясное, так как он ни разу в жизни не видал гостиной; хорошенькие поклонницы также не выходят, потому что он, кроме Кати, отродясь не видал ни одной поклонницы, ни одной порядочной девушки (5:278-79). 203 Они без умолку говорят, говорят искренно, горячо; все трое возбуждены, вдохновлены. Если послушать их, то в их руках будущее, известность, деньги (5:280).

in “Talent” are not true artists because they don’t make art. To reverse this statement, a

true artist is one who makes art. The idea of the artist is thereby misleading. In this story

Chekhov argues that a categorical, typical depiction of the artist is a lie.

As a way of being rather than a concept, an artist is rooted in a specific time and place.

Unlike Egor and his friends, an artist is sensitive and responsive to the specific reality of

life. In “Talеnt” Chekhov the author models what it is to be an artist even as the

characters fail in this task. The story begins with a description of nature. Portents of fall

are removing the final vestiges of summer, leaving behind a sense of melancholy.

This melancholic yearning of nature, if seen through the eyes of an artist, is beautiful and poetic in its own way, but Egor Savvich was not in the mood for beauty.204

Already the text suggests that Egor is not a true artist. Instead of approaching his

surroundings with the perspective of an artist he is gripped by existential boredom

(skuka) and a desire to return to the city. This existential boredom entails a failure to

engage with one’s surroundings.

By contrast, Chekhov attends to the scene as follows.

Heavy, awkward clouds covered the sky in layers; a cold, piercing wind was blowing, and the trees, with a mournful cry, were bending in one direction. The yellow leaves were visible as they twirled in the air and on the ground.205

The twirling leaves present a dynamic picture of change from moment to moment that

brings to mind the change of seasons from summer to fall. Presenting the change of

seasons in this manner emphasizes the fleeting nature of time. This, in turn, underlines

the singularity of the moment, which will soon be gone. Chekhov expounds on this idea

204 Эта тоска природы, если взглянуть на нее оком художника, в своем роде прекрасна и поэтична, но Егору Саввичу не до красот (5:277). 205 Тяжелые, неуклюжие облака пластами облекли небо; дует холодный, пронзительный ветер, и деревья с жалобным плачем гнутся все в одну сторону. Видно, как кружатся в воздухе и по земле желтые листья (5:277).

towards the end of the story when the three artists are excitedly discussing their bright

futures and the narrator comments, “It did not occur to even one of them that time is

passing, day by day life is approaching its end, they have often eaten strangers’ bread and

have not done anything themselves…”206 These artists are busy dreaming of a life that

will never be. In the meantime the actual circumstances of their life pass by unnoticed.

Their conceptual view of the artist is not simply inaccurate, it is also damaging. Chekhov

continues to explore the consequences of the idea of the artist throughout 1886 in stories

such as “My Rules for Household Order” (“Moi domostroi,” October 26, Alarm Clock),

“Hush!,” (“Tsss!,” November 15, Fragments), and “A Playwright” (“Dramaturg,”

November 27, Cricket).

The Artist as a Type: Playing a Part

Chekhov’s early performance artists – shallow, inauthentic, and manipulative – are some of his most unflattering depictions of characters. (This is only true of male performance artists, however; female performance artists in his early fictional work escape this condemnation.) The criticism leveled at actors, and the impetus for it, correlates to that brought against the writers who take advantage of circumstances and others. The actors misuse the tools of theatrical performance, applying them towards self- serving, improper ends. One foundation for criticism derives from theater’s ability to inspire the audience. This potential becomes problematic when an onlooker attributes the inspiration she or he feels to the actual performance artists, as happens in “The Tragic

Actor” (“Tragik,” October 3, 1883, Fragments).

206 И ни одном из них не приходит в голову, что время идет, жизнь со дня на день близится к закату, хлеба чужого съедено много, а еще ничего не сделано…(5:280).

In this story the district police officer’s daughter, Masha, visits the theater for the first

time and is emotionally captivated by the experience. This is not a problem. Her mistake

is to assume that the actors themselves are exalted and inspiring people because that is the feeling they imparted to her in the theater. When her father invites the actors to their house for a meal, Masha follows their every move and is overjoyed to be in the presence of “such intelligent, extraordinary people!”207 Masha’s exuberant assessment is brought

into question by the text. Limonadov’s surname, rooted in the Russian for lemonade, is

humorous, making it difficult to take him seriously. In addition, we are told he “smelled

strongly of burnt cigars” and “Fenogenov was wearing someone else’s tailcoat and boots

with crooked heels.”208 Such details suggest that the actors are not the inspirational people worthy of admiration that Masha takes them to be. Masha, however, is blind to

these details, and she marries Fenogenov. Unbeknownest to her, his motivation for marrying her was to get money from her father. When things don’t go as planned, he makes her life miserable.

Masha’s naiveté provides a cautionary tale, though the majority of the criticism falls on Fenogenov. The second level of criticism, connected to the first, occurs in relation to the actor using his acting ability in the service of deception. A talented performance artist, by definition, is able to convincingly inhabit and present a persona other than

himself. This is admirable on the stage but can pose a problem in life, when actors use

their facility as actors to manipulate others, as Fenogenov does. We also saw this lack of

authenticity in “The Wallet” (discussed previously). Through these representations of the actor, Chekhov argues against art that is acquisitive and calculating.

207 таких умных, необыкновенных людей! (2:185). 208 сильно пахло жжеными перьями / на Фенегове был чужой фрак и сапоги с кривыми каблуками (2:185).

The Artist as a Type: Promiscuity

“The Tragic Actor” presents promiscuity as another element of the performance artist

as a type. In it, the categorical accusation of sexual impropriety is only leveled at female

performance artists. Masha’s father extends an invitation to the theater company, saying,

“Everyone is welcome, except the female sex…Actresses are not wanted since I have a

daughter.”209 Of course, the irony of this statement is that one of the actors ‘corrupts’ his

daughter. Chekhov includes the perception of the actress as prostitute as a truism of the

contemporary cultural imagination, but he questions it. This is a central feature of

“Requiem,” discussed below.

In contrast to his depiction of actresses, Chekhov is willing to advance the

presentation of the actor as promiscuous as the basis for a comic plot. This is the case in

“Boots” (mentioned above). It is also true of “A Living History” (“Zhivaia khronologiia,”

February 23, 1885, Fragments). In it, a husband recalls the respective ages of his three children. He is able to remember the year in which each was born by noting that they coincide, respectively, with the appearance of a famous actor, a famous singer, and an artistic spectacle (which his wife helped stage) in the town. The reader becomes aware that the children’s ages correspond to these events because the visiting luminaries and local co-organizer had affairs with the man’s wife. While the intent of these stories is humorous, these stories nonetheless confirm the typical conception of the actor as

promiscuous.

2.3. Exploring the Inadequacies of the Type

209 Все приходите, кроме женского пола,…Актрис на надо, потому что у меня дочка (2:185).

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Even as Chekhov was mastering the conventions, such as straightforward types, of the

illustrated weeklies, he was sensitive to the potential disadvantages of the type. Several of

his stories prior to February 1886 are probing, intermediary ones in terms of typicality.

The characters are not straightforward types, yet neither are they complicated ones, though they gesture in that direction. In these stories he explores the ways in which the assumed benefits of the type become liabilities. In other words, he begins to uncover the shadow sides – reductive tendencies, misunderstandings, and incorrect assumptions – of the paradigmatic building blocks that make up the type.

Reductive Tendencies of the Type

“The Hired Pianist” introduces the reductive potential of the type as a problem. As previously mentioned, Pyotr is a hired pianist, so the problem is not that he is identified as such. The problem is that he is seen as only a hired pianist. This perception is inaccurate. “Revenge” (“Mest’,” December 31, 1882, Talk of the World/Mirskoi tolk) also directs the reader’s attention to the type as a reductive entity. The story centers on an interaction between an actress and an actor. Both characters are identified in accordance with the stock characters, ingénue and comic actor, they play onstage. It is important to note that neither character is actually onstage at any point during the story. This practice of identifying the offstage characters by means of their onstage roles signals typicality.

The story begins on the morning of the ingénue’s benefit performance. On a historical note, it was customary for actors and actresses to have annual benefit performances, in which they would choose a play for other actors and actresses to perform. These benefit performances were especially important for actresses, who relied on the revenue from them.

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The comic actor of the story is set to perform in the ingénue’s benefit performance and

has come to request (or demand, as it turns out) that she lend him a certain dressing gown

to wear in the performance that evening. The ingénue refuses. The dressing gown was her ex-lover’s and, while she admits that he treated her poorly, she also admits that she still loves him. She is emotionally attached to the dressing gown and is not willing to part with it, even just for the night. At this point the reader becomes aware that the actress character in the story is more complicated than the ingénue type accounts for. In keeping with the ingénue, the character displays a purity of heart and emotion. Unlike the ingénue, she is not naïve nor is her will malleable. She has experienced heartbreak, and as a result she has developed a robust resolve and depth of experience that distinguishes her from the type of the ingénue.

The comic actor is only able to see her in typical terms, as an ingénue. He is not able to properly appreciate her emotional pain or to accept her refusal. He assumes he can bend her will to his own, and when he fails to do so he takes revenge on her by going to the theater and placing a ‘Sold Out’ sign in the box office window. As a result, no one attends the benefit performance. If the comic actor had been able to see the actress as a person experiencing emotional distress rather than a type he may have been able to empathize with her. As it is, he reduces her to a type, which results in a pitiable outcome for her. Since the reader becomes aware of the actress character as a fuller character with emotional depth, the comic actor’s reduction of her to a type and action against her strike the reader as unjust. The comic actor also gains a deeper characterization than his type suggests. His action does not constitute a comic prank; rather, it arises from a feeling of being personally insulted. It is, as the title indicates, an act of revenge.

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Falseness is a significant semantic field in the story and is expressed in various ways.

The comic actor is folded into this field through the ‘Sold Out’ sign he places in the

window, “for the first and last time of its whole existence the cardboard sign hung above

the window and…lied.”210 More than an act of revenge, this is also an act of falsity. In

addition, the concept of false pretense occurs in a couple of ways. The first is in

connection to the cashier at the theater, described as “a German, posing as an

Englishman. The cashier is somewhat blind, dumb, and deaf, yet none of that keeps him

from listening to his colleague with due attention.”211 The second is in relation to the

theater itself.

It was painted a brick color. The paint was everywhere, except a gaping crack, which revealed that the theater was wooden. At one time the theater had been a barn…There wasn’t anything about the barn that merited turning it into a theater, rather it was chosen because it was the tallest shed in the city.212

This invocation of falsehood acts as an indictment against the comic actor. His view of the ingénue as a type rather than a full person is false and it leads to unethical actions.

Disparate Interpretations

Conventional forms, such as the type, constitute a realm of shared meaning, equally understood (presumably) by all parties involved. This is, in fact, a significant advantage of conventions. An implicit assumption of the type is that there is a codified meaning attached to it that everyone shares. In several of Chekhov’s stories, however, characters do not operate according to a shared interpretation. As we have seen, this leads to comic

210 картонный лист первый и последнний раз за всë время своего существования висел над окошечком и...лгал (1:466). 211 немец, выдававший себя за англичанина. Кассир подслеповат, глупи и глух, но всë это, однако, не мешает ему с должным вниманием выслушивать своих товарищей (1:465). 212 Он выкрашен в краску кирпичного цвета. Краска всë замазала, кроме зияющих щелей, показывающих, что театр деревянный. Когда-то театр был амбаром...Амбар был произведен в театры не за какие-либо заслуги, а за то, что он самый высокий сарай в городе (1:464-465).

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misunderstandings in “Reading” and “A Poor Story.” To consider “Reading” from a

slightly different vantage point than that offered above, the story presents a humorous

‘misreading’ of Merdyaev by Semipalatov and Galamidov due to the latter characters’

interpretation of the former through the lens of the chinovnik type. The meaning they

invest him with diverges from the meaning he assumes in the story.

In “A Woman Without Prejudices” (“Zhenshchina bez predrassudkov,” February

1883, The Spectator) a misunderstanding occurs on two levels, fictional and meta-

fictional. The main character, Maksim, is burdened by a secret that he feels obligated to

tell his beloved. Yet over the course of his courtship, engagement, and even up to the

wedding he cannot bring himself to tell her. The story recounts his inability to disclose this secret and the anxiety it causes him. It is only on the wedding night that he summons enough courage to do so. He was a circus performer. That is his secret.

The story draws on the unfavorable reputation circus performers (and performance artists more broadly) had within society. Maksim assumes that his wife’s perspective will conform to this view, and, consequently, that she will reject him once she knows this truth about him. Instead, she finds it a delightful and entertaining discovery. His wife’s interpretation of what it means to be a circus performer upends Maksim’s. The structure of the story is such that the reader is aware of the existence of the secret throughout the story but only discovers the content when Maksim tells his wife. On the meta-fictional plane, the reader’s interpretation as to the nature of the secret is also confounded. The reader has been privy to Maksim’s internal chastisement of himself on account of the secret as well as the fact that he is paying a friend to keep silent about it. As a result the reader assumes that the offense must be serious and grievous. Whatever readers might

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suspect the secret is, they are almost certainly imagining something much different than

his having been a circus performer. In each of these stories, a reliance on typicality leads

to disparate interpretations that indicate the insufficiency of the straightforward type.

Incorrect Assumptions

In terms of its meta-fictionality and its overt engagement with overly familiar forms

and generic conventions, “Maria Ivanovna” (“Mar’ia Ivanovna,” March 13, 1884, Alarm

Clock) is one of the most unusual stories of Chekhov’s early period. The story contains

two interdependent layers. The first is what appears to be a simple romantic story about a

man confessing his love to a woman. The second is a discussion of the story between a

fictional reader and the fictional author. The first several lines of the story illustrate this

multi-layered narrative structure.

In a luxuriously decorated drawing room, on а couch, upholstered with dark purple velvet, sat a young woman who was around twenty three years old. Her name was Maria Ivanovna Odnoshchekinaia. “What a hackneyed, stereotypical beginning!,” exclaims the reader. “These men always begin with luxuriously decorated drawing rooms!” I can’t take this! I beg the reader’s pardon and continue on.213

Taken together, the two threads constitute a commentary about typicality and readers’

expectations. The recourse to typicality in the story begins with the generic name of the

title character, Maria Ivanovna. The clichés continue with the opening scene, quoted

above, as the fictional reader draws the actual reader’s attention to the story’s typicality.

Central to my interest in this story is the term shablonnyi (stereotyped, trite,

formulaic), which refers here to a form devoid of worthwhile signification on account of

213 В роскошно убранной гостиной, на кушетке, обитой темно-фиолетовым бархатом, сидела молодая женщина лет двадцати трех. Звали ее Марьей Ивановной Однощекиной. -- Какое шаблонное, стереотипное начало! – восликнет читатель – Вечно эти господа начинают роскошно убранными гостиными! Читать не хочется! Извиняюсь перед читателем и иду далее (2:312).

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overuse. It broadly applies to conventions, with typicality as a subset. The Russian

nominal form of the term, shablon, is borrowed from the German schablone, which has

the same meaning as the Russian word, namely, template.214 The German derives from

the French échantillon, which refers to a representative sample. The variation in meaning

this word undergoes when translated from French into German parallels the development

of the type from the physiological sketch to the illustrated weeklies. Physiological sketch

writers sought to create characters that were representative samples of their kind, whereas

the types in the illustrated press are set, reproducible forms. In this transition from representative sample to template the type becomes (or at least has the potential to become) a hackneyed form. To be clear, Chekhov is not advocating for the dismissal of all conventions or typicality from literature. Such a work would be indecipherable. Rather he is arguing against conventions that are overused and overly familiar, those that render a work derivative rather than original.

The fictional reader’s protestations are fueled by the presumably hackneyed nature of the story. The fictional reader thereby addresses one of the potential downsides of the typical. It can become so familiar and predictable that it is easily dismissed. The fictional reader's assessment is complicated, however, by the ending of the story. It turns out that

Maria Ivanovna is an oil painting, not an actual person. This twist introduces another potential shortcoming with the typical. It can lead to incorrect assumptions. If we extrapolate the shortcomings of typicality, present in the story, to a broader aesthetic level, we can conclude that art requires originality (as opposed to being derivative) and it is a means of training the reader to be attentive and keep an open mind.

214 M. P. Fasmer, Etimologicheskii slovar’ russkogo iazyka (Progress, 1964-73).

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On its own, the story is informative regarding Chekhov’s perspective on the potential

drawback of typical forms. It is doubly important when the publication context is taken

into consideration. The story is quirky, with a modern, meta-fictional sensibility.

Chekhov sent it to Leikin in the middle of January 1884 for publication in Fragments.

Leikin was not impressed. He sent it back to Chekhov with the following note.

“I don’t find your story “Maria Ivanovna” to be suitable for publication in Fragments. Pardon me good sir, but it is too intimately written, and I avoid that in Fragments. In addition, it didn’t turn out well, it’s verbose and in the end isn’t about anything at all.”215

There are two relevant points to draw out from Leikin's assessment. The first is the claim

that the story is too “intimately written.” What does this mean? Unfortunately, Leikin

does not elaborate, so we must look to the story itself to answer this question. It is likely

that Leikin is responding to the defense the fictional author of the story mounts against

the fictional reader’s protests. The fictional writer refers to the burden placed on

professional writers to publish under duress. The writer also laments the lack of

appreciation from readers. In general, the fictional writer decries his pitiable position as a

professional writer. Leikin is arguably reacting against the subjectivity of the fictional

writer in this story, which he does not find appropriate to Fragments.216

The second point to draw out is that Leikin is not able to recognize, let alone

appreciate, the meta-literary aspect of the story. According to him, the story is about

nothing. In actual fact, the story is about typicality and art, which is very relevant to the

215 «Рассказ ваш «Марья Ивановна» я не нашел удобным поместить в «Осколках.» Простите великодушно, но он уж очень интимно написан, а я этого избегаю в «Осколках.» Да и не удался он Вам, растянут, а говорится в нем в сущности ни о чем» (2:540-41). 216 To be clear, the subjectivity expressed should not be confused with Chekhov’s own sense of self as a writer. I do not find any indication that the fictional writer of the story is a proxy for Chekhov, nor does Leikin. Instead there is a presentation of the character as a subjective entity, rather than a straightforward type.

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literary practice of Fragments even if Leikin assures Chekhov that his publication is not

the place to openly engage with these aesthetic concerns. Judging from his actions,

Chekhov didn’t agree with Leikin’s assessment that the story had no merit. Chekhov sent

the story to Alarm Clock for publication, where it appeared on March 13, 1884. “Maria

Ivanovna” therefore stands as a point of departure between the literary sensibilities of

Chekhov and Leikin, especially in regard to typicality and art. Further support for this

claim is found in the letter Chekhov wrote in response to Leikin’s rejection of “Maria

Ivanovna” (January 22, 1884). At his own request Chekhov had recently received two

years of back issues of the journal, which he reports to be “diligently” reading. In doing

so he makes the following evaluation:

“The journal is good, at least the best of the humorous journals…but doesn’t Fragments strike you as a bit dry? In my opinion, it’s dried out by the great multitude of feuilletons…Plus, all these feuilletons are endlessly repetitive, repeating banal forms [shablon] on banal themes…217

Chekhov's comments are directed towards improving the journal rather than dismissing

it. At this point in his career he is still very invested in Fragments. Yet it is noteworthy

that he expresses dissatisfaction with the journal.

Moreover, it is significant that he expresses his criticism in terms of shablon. This

brings Chekhov's evaluation of Fragments into conversation with “Maria Ivanovna,” a

story which overtly addresses the banality of outworn clichés and a story that Leikin

rejected for publication. Taken together, “Maria Ivanovna” and Chekhov’s comments on

Fragments suggest an aesthetic rift between Leikin and Chekhov. Where Leikin sees a

proven formula, Chekhov sometimes sees a stale form. In 1884 this difference of opinion

217 Журнал хороший, лучше всех юмор<истических> журналов по крайней мере...Но не кажется ли Вам, что «Осколко» несколько сухи? Сушит их, по моему мнению, многое множество фельетонов...И все эти фельетоны жуют одно и то же, жуют по казенному шаблону на казенные темы...(Pis’ma 1:98).

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is relatively minor. By May 1886 it has become more pronounced, from Chekhov’s

perspective at least. One of the artistic principles Chekhov gave his brother Alexander in

his letter of May 10, 1886 (after he has broken rank with Fragments and begun

publishing in New Times) is “courage and originality; flee the template [shablon].”218

Given the previously established association between shablon and Fragments, this statement becomes an oblique commentary on the journal. As Anton is advising

Alexander to free himself of oft-repeated, trite forms, he is simultaneously advising

Alexander to move towards bravery and originality. The context of the letter makes it clear that he locates these aesthetic values in New Times. Publication context is an important factor in understanding Chekhov's developing aesthetics and his engagement with typicality.

2.4. “Begi ot shablona”: Publication Context and Chekhov’s Aesthetics

Chekhov was sensitive to the conventions and aesthetic sensibilities of different publication contexts, and he fit his works to them. His writing advice to Alexander on two separate occasions reflects this particularly well. The first occurs in a letter dated

April 17/18, 1883 and the second in a letter dated May 10, 1886. The advice Anton provides in these letters is doubly contextualized. In both he is responding to a specific story of Alexander’s. Additionally, the advice occurs within the context of specific journals, Fragments and New Times, respectively, in which Anton is publishing regularly.

In the case of the first letter, the advice is explicitly directed towards writing stories for publication in Fragments.

218 смелость и оригинальность; беги от шаблона (Pis’ma 1:242).

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1) the shorter, the better 2) a bit of ideology and being up to date is à propos 3) caricature is welcome, but ignorance of official ranks and conventions regarding the seasons is not tolerated219

The third point picks up on a comment Anton makes about Alexander’s story. Anton

writes that he has sent it to Leikin after including the appropriate rank for one of the

characters. The need to identify the character in accordance with his rank points to

typicality as an aesthetic principle in Fragments. The typicality of characterization in

Fragments is further confirmed by Chekhov's recommendation to include caricatures. In this letter Chekhov writes about his partnership with Fragments as a point of pride. These artistic principles are not just expedient. They are his own. Part of his artistic credo at the time was to embrace typicality.

By way of contrast, the advice Anton gives Alexander in 1886 reads as follows.

1) absence of lengthy verbiage of a political, social, or economic nature 2) complete objectivity 3) truthfulness in depictions of characters and objects 4) exceptional brevity 5) courage and originality; flee the template [begi ot shablona] 6) affection220

His motto has changed considerably, from embrace typicality to “flee the template.” In

place of caricature he calls for truthful depictions. When comparing the 1883

(Fragments-based) advice and the 1886 (New Times-inspired) advice, only the demand

for brevity remains.

219 …1) чем короче, тем лучше, 2) идейка, современность, à propos, 3) шарж любезен, но незнание чинов и времен года не допускается (Pis’ma 1:63). The mention of “conventions regarding the seasons” refers to the regularized themes attached to the seasons, discussed previously. 220 1) отсутствие продлинновенных словоизвержений политико-социально-экономического свойства; 2) объективность сплошная; 3) правдивость в описании действующих лиц и предметов; 4) сугубая краткость; 5) смелость и оригинальность; беги от шаблона; 6) сердечность (Pis'ma 1:242). I explain my translation of сердечность as affection below. It might also be translated as warmth.

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The publication context is a significant factor in this shift. Towards the end of the

1886 letter he writes, “However, I have caused quite a stir in Petersburg with the five

stories published in New Times, from which I’ve gone mad, as if intoxicated.”221 Further confirmation is present in a letter he wrote to Alexander in the beginning of August 1887.

He begins by praising a recent story of Alexander’s and then writes the following:

The beginning wouldn’t be so trite if it was placed somewhere in the middle of the story and broken up; Also, Olya doesn’t work, just like all your women. You don’t know women at all! My dear, you can’t just constantly rely on one female type! Where and when in the world (I’m not talking about your school days) have you seen such a person as Olya? Wouldn’t it be more intelligent and display more talent to place a woman who is lovely, living (not a doll), who might actually exist next to such strange mugs as the Tatar and the papa….there is not one actual woman in any of your stories, they are all some kind of twitching custards, speaking in the language of a spoiled vaudeville ingénue. …Clean it up and don’t send it to print (in New Times) until you ensure that your people are living and that you don’t lie against reality. It’s fine to lie in the “Piggybank of Curiosities” but guard against this in the Saturday edition, which provides money and a name…222

This letter establishes two opposing semantic fields, one of which includes Fragments

and the other of which includes New Times. The “piggybank of curiosities” (kopilka

kur’eza), which Anton mentions, refers to a section in Fragments called “From the

Piggybank of Curiosities” (Iz kopilki kur’eza). Alexander was a contributor to this

section. Likewise, “in the Saturday supplements” (v subbotnikakh) is a clear but indirect

221 Впрочем, пятью рассказами, помещенными в «Нов<ом> времени», я поднял в Питере переполох, от которого я угорел, как от чада (Pis’ma 1:242). 222 Начало не было бы шаблонно, если бы было вставлено куда-нибудь в середину рассказа и раздроблено; Оля также никуда не годится, как и все твои женщины. Ты положительно не знаешь женщин! Нельзя же, душа моя, вечно вертеться около одного женского типа! Где ты и когда (я не говорю про твое гимназичество). видел таких Оль? И не умнее ли, не талантливее поставить рядом с такими чудными рожами, как татарин и папенька, женщину симпатичную, живую (а не куклу)., существующую?...ни в одном из твоих рассказов нет женщины-человека, а всë какие-то прыгающие бланманже, говорящие языком избалованных воделвильных инженю. ...Отделывай и не выпускай в печать («Нов<ое> вр<емя>»)., прежде чем не увидишь, что твои люди живые и что ты не лжешь против действительности. Врать можно в «копилках курьеза»...а в субботниках, которые дадут тебе деньги и имя, остерегись...(Pis’ma 2:104).

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reference to New Times. Chekhov contributed to the Saturday supplement of this

newspaper. We can further delineate the two fields.

“Piggybank of Curiosities” Saturday Edition

Fragments New Times

lie against reality not a lie against reality

Olya, puppet, female type, “twitching living character

custard,” pampered vaudeville ingénue

Chekhov’s maturation as a writer occurs in conjunction with his publication context.

Of present interest is the shift in his aesthetic sensibility when that context expands beyond the illustrated weeklies to include New Times. In the latter Chekhov holds himself and his brother to a standard of characterization that is less typical (in a straightforward sense) and conversely more alive. It is possible that Chekhov’s aesthetics would have developed along a similar line even if he hadn’t published in New Times, so the relationship between less typical characters and New Times is not necessarily causal.

Nonetheless, it was a milestone in his career.

2.5. A New Path

Leaving the question of causation aside, Chekhov’s publication in New Times marks a

transition to the complicated type. In December 1885 he made his first trip to St.

Petersburg. Upon his return he wrote a letter to Alexander, in which he describes his

experience in Petersburg as well as offers writing advice. The following excerpt from the

letter begins with his advice. Prior to this section of the letter he has mentioned that he

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stayed with Leikin (“He fed me splendidly, but the cad practically crushed me with his

lies”) and that he was treated “like the Persian shah”223 when he met with the editors of

Petersburg Gazette.

Most importantly, be vigilant, guard yourself, and slog away, rewrite for a fifth time, making it shorter, etc., remembering that all of Petersburg is following the work of the Chekhov brothers. I was amazed by the reception they showed me in Petersburg. Suvorin, Grigorovich, Burenin…the whole time welcoming me, singing my praises…and I became troubled that I wrote offhandedly, carelessly. If I had known that I was being read such [as a serious writer – A. A.], I wouldn’t have written on a by-order basis…Remember: people are reading you.224

Learning that he had a more distinguished readership than he realized, including Dmitry

Grigorovich and Aleksei Suvorin (1834-1912, a journalist, critic, and, most importantly

for the present discussion, publisher), deepened the responsibility Chekhov felt as a

writer. This awareness impacted his writing. Rosamund Bartlett notes this when she

refers to “Grief” (“Toska,” January 27, 1886, Petersburg Gazette) as an example of a

story that benefited from Chekhov’s recognition that “he was being read by the literary

community in St. Petersburg.”225 Anton’s exhortation to remember “people are reading

you” is not solely based on concern for his brother’s reputation. He is also thinking about

his own. (After all, they share the same first initial and last name.) Furthermore, this

directive is aimed at himself as much as it is at his brother.

223 Кормил он меня великолепно, но, скотина, чуть не задавил меня своею ложью / как шах персидский (Pis’ma 1:176). 224 Но самое главное: по возможности бди, блюди и пыхти, по пяти раз переписывая, сокращая и проч., памятуя, что весь Питер следит за работой бр<атьев> Чеховых. Я был поражен приемом, к<ото>рый оказали мне питерцы. Суворин, Григорович, Буренин...всë это приглашало, воспевало...и мне жутко стало, что я писал небрежно, спустя рукава. Знай, мол, я, что меня так читают, я писал бы не так на заказ...Помни же: тебя читают (Pis’ma 1:177). 225 Rosamund Bartlett, Chekhov: Scenes from a Life (Free Press, 2004) 138.

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The “by-order basis” is a commentary on the illustrated weeklies, Fragments especially.226 Fortunately for him, his trip to Petersburg was soon followed by an

invitation to begin writing for New Times. This new publication context provided

Chekhov with the confidence, impetus, and opportunity to flee the template and provide

truthful characterizations. How is this manifest in his literary practice? Three stories –

“An Actor’s Death,” “Requiem,” and “Anyuta” – are especially relevant in this regard. In

publication terms, they represent the three journals that were the most significant for

Chekhov at the time: Petersburg Gazette, New Times, and Fragments, respectively. They

were published within a two-week time span (February 10-22, 1886) during which time

Chekhov debuted in New Times. Each contains an artist and each complicates typical characterization. They act as an aesthetic statement (likely unconscious), codified in practice, regarding the direction Chekhov is headed as he begins to take himself more seriously as a writer. Another indication that this moment marks a shift in Chekhov’s practice is his willingness (albeit reluctant) to sign his actual name to “Requiem” in New

Times.

A complicated type is a dualistic entity in which a typical structure and an expansion of the type interact in a productive state of tension. It is worth emphasizing that the expansion of the type does not erase or dismiss the typical structure. We can look to

“Easter Eve” for a demonstration of this duality. It is no coincidence that Nikolai, the writer in this story, is the closest Chekhov comes to a model writer in his work. Nikolai is a complicated type of a monk. His artistic practice entails creating nuanced akathists,

226 His dissatisfaction with Fragments continues to increase after he has become a staple writer in New Times. In a letter to Alexander dated January 17, 1887 Anton writes, “Рад бы вовсе не работать в «Осколках,» так как мне мелочь опротивела. Хочеться работать покрупнее, или вовсе не работать” / “I would be quite glad to stop working at Fragments, since such trivial work has become loathsome to me. I’d like to do more important work or simply stop working altogether” (Pis’ma 2:15).

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which are hymns in the Orthodox tradition that follow a specific compositional template.227 He has just died, and it falls to the ferryman, Ieronim, to reflect on the artistry of his akathists.

The angel always comes first, and of course it’s got to conform. But what really matters is not so much the saint’s life or the conformity as the beauty and euphony. Everything must be balanced, concise yet comprehensive, every line smooth, gentle, and tender, no word coarse, harsh, or unmeet.228

Nikolai begins with a formulaic genre and works from there to create a work of artistic beauty. He does so by attending to the appropriateness and richness of each word, rather than simply following a template. As a result, Nikolai’s akathists communicate a sensibility of particularity, gentleness, and appreciation for the figure being praised. The template of the akathist remains but elements of specificity and particularity are added to it.

This approach to art is reflected in the telling of the story. The text begins with the narrator waiting on the ferry, an action that situates him in the moment-by-moment flow of the narrative and that affords him the opportunity to closely observe his environment.

His description of the natural surroundings is notable for its immediacy and its aim to

227 In terms of content, akathists are dedicated to Mary the Mother of God, Jesus, holidays, or saints. In terms of form, the Dictionary of Church Terms (Slovar’ tserkovnykh terminov) offers the following outline: “Состоит из двадвати пяти строф, каждые две уз которых, кроме последней, образуют смысловое звено. Первая строфа звена, называемая кондаком и более краткая, служит вступлением (кроме начального кондака акафиста остальные завершаются возгласом «Аллилуйя»). Второя строфа звена, называемая икосом и более пространная, содержит двенадцать преветствий, начинающихся со слова «радуйся». Последняя, двадвцать пятая строфа акафиста является молитвенным обращением к прославляемому” / “It is made up of twenty five stanzas. Every two stanzas, aside from the first, work as a pair to communicate an idea. The first stanza of the pair, the kontakion, is shorter. It serves as the introduction (all of them, besides the first, conclude with the exclamation “Alleluia”). The second stanza of the pair, the oikos, is more extensive. It contains twelve greetings, each beginning with the word “Rejoice.” The final stanza is a prayerful address to the blessed.” “Akafist,” Tolkovye slovar’: slovar’ tserkovnykh terminov, www.edudic.ru/psl/2/. Accessed 13 Dec. 2016. 228 Везде с ангела начинается. Конечно, без того нельзя, чтобы не соображаться, но главное ведь не в житии, не в соответствии с прочим, а в красоте и сладости. Нужно, чтоб всë было стройно, кратко и обстоятельно. Надо, чтоб в каждой строчеке была мягкость, ласковость и нежность, чтоб ни одного слова не было грубого, жесткого или несоответствующего (5:97).

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capture the particularity of the scene at that time (now/teper' zhe), as opposed to its more

common appearance (usually/v obyknovennoe vremia). The narrator’s attentive, appreciative gaze results in a specific, particularized description of the environment that includes references to sight (The world was lit by stars...The sky was mirrored in the water...) and sound (The air was warm and still...).229 In addition, by applying dynamic verbs to a scenic description the text immerses the reader in the present-ness of the scene.

In accordance with literary conventions, this story was published during Easter season. Also relevant is the fact that this story was published in New Times. The decision to publish ‘according to the seasons’ in a newspaper was likely Chekhov’s choice. The

thematic conventions of the illustrated weeklies thus serve a similar purpose for Chekhov

as the formal conventions of the akathists serve for Nikolai. They are a starting point

rather than a prescriptive restriction. Both Chekhov and Nikolai employ and complicate

set conventional structures (typicality) to create true works of art.

It is important to note that the complicated type construes characters as moral agents

in two ways. First, characters are held responsible for the way they conceive of (and

consequently treat) others, as types or as individuals. Second, characters incur

responsibility for their own actions. They are not bound by their type and thus are freer to

choose their course of action. In short, these stories construct an ethical framework in

which characters are responsible to others and for themselves.

“An Actor’s Death”

229 (Мир освещался звездами...,Небо отражалось в воде) / (В воздухе было тепло и тихо...) (5:92).

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The first of the three stories to be published was “An Actor’s Death,” on February 10,

1886 in Petersburg Gazette. The eponymous actor, Shiptsov, lives in a world of types

and is identified in typical terms at the beginning of the story. We are first introduced to

him by his role onstage, as a ‘noble father’ (blagorodnyi otets) and a ‘simpleton’

(prostak). In this story, though, Chekhov humanizes the actor by suggesting an inner life

of authentic emotion, thereby complicating a typed view of the actor.230

On the typical side, when we first meet Shiptsov his description and actions conform to his type as an imposing figure, “a tall, thickset older man, celebrated not only for his theatrical gifts but also for his extraordinary physical strength, had a major quarrel with

the theater director during a performance…”231 The field of additional characters is also

populated in accordance with stock theatrical roles: the comic actor, the jeune-premier,

the tragic actor, the theater director.232 Overlaid on this framework of types is the

emergence of Shiptsov’s emotional life, which first appears during his heated argument

with the theater director. Shiptsov “suddenly felt as though something was torn apart in

his chest.”233 The nature of the ‘something’ that strikes Shiptsov is unclear, though its

effect is serious enough that he takes to his bed, where the various theatrical visages

parade through his room, each doing their part to return him to health and to the stage.

230 For a complementary reading of this story focused more on the psychology of the main character see Lantz Aspects 119-122. 231 …высокий, плотный старик, славившийся не столько сценическими дарованиями, сколько своей необычайной физический силой, «вдрызг» поругался во время спектакля с антрепренером (4:345). 232 While the characters are identified interchangeably in the story both by their theatrical roles and their names, the theatrical roles are used more often for all of the characters except Shiptsov (who is more often identified by his name). This is another marker that his subjective, individual identity is becoming more pronounced. 233 вдруг почуствовал, что у него в груди что-то оборвалось (4:345).

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The specific cause of Shiptsov’s illness remains unknown. What we do know,

however, is that in explaining his situation he says, “Nothing hurts, but I…feel…”234

“I…feel” (Ia chuvstvuiu) here echoes the use of “felt” (pochuvstvoval) in the initial

description of Shiptsov’s mysterious illness. In fact, feeling itself is the problem or,

rather, the complicating factor. Feeling indicates a subjective, inner experience that is

dynamic rather than static. As such, feeling is an experience that is inexplicable and

invalid in a world of types. The others continue to operate with a typical understanding of

the world and, therefore, are baffled by the emergence of an emotional life that is

inconsistent with their world of types. For example, the comic actor remarks, “Well, I

never expected this from you…Lanky fellow with the height of a watchtower, and here

you are crying. Certainly it’s not fitting for an actor to cry, is it?”235

The emergence of Shiptsov’s inner, emotional life fuels a desire to return to his

hometown, Viazma. Bemoaning his fate he states, “No wife, no children…If only I

hadn’t become an actor, and instead lived in Viazma! My life, Semyon, has been wasted!

Oh, to be in Viazma!”236 The shift in characterization in this story leads to a more living

character and a truer vision of personhood in its moral and ethical facets. In conjunction

with the appearance of an inner emotional life, which creates a three-dimensional

character, Shiptsov is invested with a history. He is held responsible for the choices he

made that occasioned a diminished life, including his emotional and relational isolation.

234 Ничего не болит, но я…чувствую…(4:347). 235 Не…не ожидал от тебя!...Верзила, с каланчу ростом, а плачешь. Нешто актеру можно плакать? (4:350). 236 Ни жены, ни детей…Не идти бы в актеры, а в Вязьме жить! Пропала, Семен, жизнь! Ох, в Вязьму бы! (4:350). It is ironic that Shiptsov is bemoaning his lack of children when his onstage persona is a ‘noble father.’ This draws further attention to the emptiness of the typical forms in this story.

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This story thus addresses one of the two planes of ethical and moral responsibility, responsibility for oneself.

The verb that Shiptsov uses to denounce his life as an actor, wasted (propala), also means to vanish or disappear. Shiptsov’s jolt of feeling awakens him to a world of outward appearances lacking in inner substance and authenticity. As a result the world of types has vanished and is no longer viable for him. A complementary interpretation is that with the emergence of an inner life he has vanished from the world of types, which is to say he is no longer a straightforward type and therefore is not intelligible to that world.

As Shiptsov transitions from a straightforward type to a complicated one, the framework of types is no longer adequate to express the deeper, hidden layers of his person and his experience. The only existence the world of types will grant him is as a ‘noble father’ and

‘simpleton.’ When he defies these categories the only option the world of types affords him is death, which is how the story ends.

“Requiem”

“Requiem” was Chekhov’s debut story in New Times, published on February 15,

1886. It exhibits the second plane of moral and ethical responsibility that arises from complicating the type: responsibility to others. More specifically, it concerns the responsibility to view and interact with another person as a unique entity. Whereas “An

Actor’s Death” relies on the familiar presentation of performance artists as insincere,

“Requiem” is constructed around the association between sexual promiscuity and performance artists. More directly, the story addresses the conflation of actress and prostitute as a categorical identity.

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Andrei Andreich’s daughter Maria, an actress, has recently died. One of the central

conflicts of the story concerns Andrei’s use of the word ‘harlot’ (bludnitsa) in reference to her when requesting a requiem on her behalf. It is this appellation and its categorical source (Maria as actress) that is of interest in the present discussion.237 Andrei

Andreeich’s name recalls repetitive names in the physiological sketch, frequently used to

mark a character as a type. Instead of presenting him as a type, the story uses this device as an indication of his perspective. The second paragraph describes his appreciation, or lack thereof, of his surroundings, “His swollen, sluggish eyes are trained on the

iconostasis. He sees the long familiar faces of the saints…All this he has seen a million

times before, and knows as well as the five fingers on his hand…”238 Andrei’s lazy and

swollen eyes, in addition to his assumed familiarity with the surroundings, prevent him

from attending to his environment. Instead he interacts with his environment according to

prior experience and preconceived ideas.

Andrei’s limited vision and his resultant lack of appreciation is brought into greater

relief when he is compared to his daughter. Maria is described as a girl with “meditative

eyes, as big as kopecks.”239 She is attentive and sensitive to the world around her.

Compare her response to the natural landscape of her hometown with her father’s

response. During a walk along the bank she is enamored with the scene, exclaiming,

“What wonderful scenery you have here!...Such beautiful ravines and marshes! Heavens,

237 Appellations and their meanings constitute a central theme of the story. As regards this point, Savelii Senderovich writes that the story, “трактует как раз проблему наименования человека как проблему смысловую” / “interprets the issue of a person’s designation as a semantic issue.” Savelii Senderovich Chekhov – s glazu na glaz 178. 238 Его заплывшие, ленивые глаза обращены на иконостас. Он видит давно уже знакомые лики святых...Всë это давно уже видано и перевидано, как свои пять пальцев (4:351). 239 большими, как копейки, задумчивыми глазами (4:354).

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I had forgotten how lovely my birthplace is!”240 Andrei does not see what she sees and

therefore cannot understand her response. He thinks to himself, “These places just take up space…You get as much profit from them as milk from a billy goat.”241 Since Andrei is not attentive to the world around him, he is not able to appreciate it for what it is.

The story can be divided into two sections, the first of which occurs in the present and the second of which consists of recollections of the past. Andrei is a focalizer throughout much of the story. This formal structure allows for an exploration of Andrei’s present actions and categorical perspective in light of his past experience. Andrei’s master raised

Maria. While Andrei still had some interaction with her, this situation meant that, essentially, she was taken from him. His categorical approach to life developed as a survival mechanism to help him manage the pain that accompanied her removal as well as the insecurity of his position as a lackey. In response to such difficulties, he became an authority on church rules and Scripture. Presumably, the definitiveness of church rules established a sense of order and meaning for him that allowed him to manage the difficult circumstances of his life.

Yet this reliance on a categorical framework, which enabled Andrei to cope at an earlier point in life, is an impediment to his relationship with his daughter later.

According to his own admission, when Maria first told Andrei that she was an actress he became embarrassed to be seen with her in full view of honest people. The category

‘actress’ for him is a designation that is synonymous with harlot. His categorical approach does not leave room for him to appreciate his daughter or interact with her

outside of this designation.

240 Какие чудные у вас места!...Что за овраги и болота! Боже, как хороша моя родина! (4:355). 241 Эти места только место занимают…От них корысти, как от козла молока (4:355).

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The nuanced portrayal of Andrei’s approach indicates that the problem is not a

categorical approach per se but rather its rigidity, which motivates Andrei to

indiscriminately rely on, and over-apply, a categorical framework. His reliance on church

rules was arguably necessary for emotional and psychological survival earlier in his life, but it is not appropriate for the situation with his daughter later. A categorical understanding of the world is almost by definition impervious to the specificities of a situation. It is also at odds with a personal relationship, which necessitates that people

relate to one another as individuals rather than categories.

The tension at the heart of Andrei’s story is between externally imposed categories

(Maria as an actress/harlot) and individuality (Maria as his daughter). This tension is inherent in his request for a requiem to commemorate Maria. The request is motivated by his concern for his daughter, while the wording of the request is dictated by his perception of her as an actress and harlot. At the same time that the story sensitively and

sympathetically reveals the underlying motivation for Andrei’s disparaging vision and

treatment of his daughter, it holds him responsible and faults him for his perspective and

actions towards his daughter. In this way the story considers the ethical and moral

responsibilities people have to one another.

The present discussion focuses on the ethical motivation behind Chekhov’s

characterization. This story also demonstrates that the ethics of form in Chekhov’s work

extends beyond characterization and includes narrative structure. The first part of the

story follows an anecdotal, stsenka pattern. It relies heavily on dialogue to depict a

miscommunication with a humorous overtone. As the second part of the story deepens

the characterization of the father, it also switches to a lyrical, contemplative mode. This

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tonal shift complements and occurs in conjunction with the more complex

characterization of Andrei and Maria.

“Anyuta”

The third story under consideration (“Anyuta,” published in Fragments February 22,

1886) was written before the previous two stories were published but was held up for

several weeks by the censors.242 It chronicles the dismissive treatment of the title

character by Fetisov (an art student), with whom she lives, and Klochkov (a medical

student). The two men perceive, and consequently treat, Anyuta as a stand-in for an

abstract idea.243 The story exemplifies both planes of moral and ethical responsibility, responsibility for oneself and responsibility to another.

The two male characters are described in terms that parallel one another and can be interpreted as one unit in terms of the criticism leveled against them. Both have encountered difficulties in their respective pursuits, and both call upon Anyuta for help.

The similarity between the two is underscored further by the manner in which each

describes his predicament. When Klochkov runs into difficulty memorizing the position

of the ribs he says, “I’ll have to study up on a skeleton and on a living person.”244 Anyuta becomes his living skeleton. Klochkov, who is having trouble realizing his artistic vision of Psyche, comments, “I keep having to use different models.”245 He then asks to borrow

242 Chekhov sent the story to Leikin on February 3 (4:515). 243 Cathy Popkin’s reading of “Anyuta” is useful as a complement to my own. Many of her insights are applicable even as they are directed towards a discussion of Chekhov’s epistemology. Especially relevant is her recognition that by staking a claim on Anyuta both Klochkov and Fetisov commit acts of violence against her. Cathy Popkin, “Historia morbid and the ‘Holy of Holies’,” Anton P. Cechov, Philosophische und Religiose Dimensionen im Leben und im Work: Vortrage des Zweiten International Cechov- Symposiums, Badenweiler, 20-24. Oktober 1994, edited by V. B. Kataev et al. (O. Sagner, 1997) 365-73. 244 Придется поштудировать на скелете и на живом человеке...(4:340). 245 приходится всë с разных натурщиц писать (4:342).

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Anyuta as his model. The passive formulation obscures responsibility of the two men as active agents.

The problem with abstract generalizations is especially evident in Klochkov’s interaction with Anyuta. He is dismissive of Anyuta’s physical reaction when his cold hands cause her to shiver while he feels for her ribs. He outlines them with chalk to see them better, reducing her significance to the lines drawn on her chest. He becomes so engrossed in tapping her chest that he fails to “notice Anyuta’s lips, nose, and fingers turning blue with cold.”246 This last sentence draws special attention to the problem with

Klochkov’s treatment of Anyuta. He doesn’t notice her.

Although we do not get as detailed an account of Anyuta’s experience with Fetisov we can assume it is analogous. Klochkov agrees on Anyuta’s behalf that she will sit as a model for Fetisov. She meekly protests against being handed off from one person to another, but complies. When she returns, she resembles a corpse. “Anyuta had come back from the artist’s exhausted and drained. Posing for so long had made her face look thin and sunken, and her chin sharper than ever.”247 Like the doctor, the artist ‘kills’ her.

Neither Klochkov nor Fetisov take note of Anyuta as an individual. Both look past her and, as a result, both treat her unethically. As a relevant aside, it is worth highlighting the interesting pairing of art and medicine in this story. Given Chekhov’s dual careers as a doctor and a writer there is nothing unusual about this combination. Yet the parallel that he draws between the two is uncommon. Chekhov demonstrates that depersonalization can happen in art just as in medicine, but it is not proper to either.

246 не заметил, как губы, нос и пальцы у Анюты посинели от холода (4:341). 247 Анюта вернулась от художника такая утомленная, изнеможенная. Лицо у нее от долгого стояния на натуре осунулось, похудело, и подбородок стал острей (4:343).

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The first and most apparent ethical facet in the story is the responsibility to view

another as an individual. In their failure to do so both Klochkov and Fetisov are

implicated in Anyuta’s dire situation. The second ethical facet is that Klochkov and

Fetisov also fail to take responsibility for themselves. When Fetisov draws Klochkov’s

attention to the squalid conditions of his apartment, Klochkov blames Anyuta rather than

himself. The phrasing that both of the characters use to justify their use (and abuse) of

Anyuta (I have to248) implies a lack of personal responsibility, a re-direction of

responsibility onto the circumstances.

…pora brosit’ tseremonit’sia

Of the three stories above, “Anyuta” provides the most pointed critique of a typical

framework. The harshness of this criticism is a result, in part, of Chekhov’s

dissatisfaction with Fragments. The repetitive, formulaic practice of Klochkov and

Festisov is congruent with the literary practice of Leikin’s journal. In the letter

accompanying “Anyuta” Chekhov wrote, “I’m sending along a story…it touches on

students but there’s nothing liberal about it. Besides, it’s time to stop being so

ceremonious.”249

Chekhov is most immediately referring to the demands of the censors. In October

1885 Leikin was called before the president of the Censorship Committee and told that

Fragments would be shut down unless it changed its course. Leikin responded by being

extra vigilant in removing content that might be questionable to the censors. Practically,

this meant avoiding liberal tendencies. Chekhov learned of the increased censorship

248 The imperfective/perfective pair is used: приходиться/ прийтись. This is a passive construction in Russian. 249 Шлю рассказ...В нем тронуты студиозы, но нелиберального ничего нет. Да и пора бросить церемониться (4:515).

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demands placed on Fragments from Leikin. Chekhov initially responded with sadness

and sympathy, yet in the letter accompanying “Anyuta” he expresses a tone of defiance

with an underlying call for artistic freedom. This sentiment is also expressed in the story.

This defiance extends beyond censorship concerns to encompass the formulaic practice

of Fragments. Seeds of the complicated type are found throughout Chekhov’s early work.

For a while he employed typicality, investigating it and testing its limits. Now ‘it’s time to stop being so ceremonious’ and move beyond the straightforward type.

2.6. From Theory to Practice: “The Bishop”

Chekhov remains interested in typical designations, both their usefulness and their

limitations, throughout his career. His next-to-last work of published prose, “The Bishop”

(“Arkhierei,” 1902, Journal for All/Zhurnal dlia vsekh), illustrates this continued interest.

The title character provides a practical example of Chekhov’s theoretical call for

“truthfulness in the depiction of characters.” The story is rich and the present analytical

aim regarding the story is modest: to consider the bishop as a complicated type in order to

further illuminate both it and the story.

On one level, “The Bishop” is a character study. It opens with the bishop presiding

over a church service on the eve of Palm Sunday. The setting (church service) and the

timing (beginning of Easter week) accord comfortably with the bishop as a type. Soon,

though, the complication of this type begins as a split emerges between the professional

title and the individual, Pyotr, who occupies that title. Palm Sunday commemorates

Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Though it ushers in the most somber week of the

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Christian calendar, the day itself is celebratory. Pyotr’s experience, by way of contrast, is

not.

How stuffy it was, how hot! How long the service had been going on! Bishop Pyotr was tired. His breathing was heavy, rapid, and dry, his shoulders ached with tiredness, his legs were trembling. And it disturbed him unpleasantly that a holy fool was occasionally crying out in the gallery.250

The reader soon learns that Pyotr is ill, more so than even he realizes. He will die before

the week is out. Death carries with it a dynamic tension between generality and

specificity, similar to the dynamics of the complicated type. As the lot of every person it

is a generalized phenomenon, yet its actual occurrence in a person’s life is unique. In this

story Chekhov presents Pyotr’s death as a subjective, lived experience. In doing so he

characterizes Pyotr in a manner that is largely outside of categorical distinctions, as a

unique, living being.251

The story vacillates between Pyotr’s professional identity and his personal experience.

Descriptions of his duties as a bishop are interspersed with recollections from his past.

There is a porous relationship between the two. Both his ‘bishop-ness’ and his

personhood contribute to making him who he is. These two elements remain distinct even

as they interact with each other. An example of this interplay is present early in the story.

Pyotr has just returned to the monastery, where he lives, and has learned that his mother

(whom he hasn’t seen in nine years) had come by to see him.

The Bishop got changed and started saying his prayers before bed. He said the old, long-familiar prayers attentively, and at the same time thought about his mother…The Bishop remembered her from his early childhood, almost from the

250 Как было душно, как жарко! Как долго шла всенощная! Преосвященный Петр устал. Дыхание у него было тяжело, частое, сухое, плечи болели от усталости, ноги дрожали. И неприятно волновало, что на хорах изредка вскрикивал юродивый (10:186). 251 Cathy Popkin also considers the role of rank, and its erasure, in the story. However, she argues that the story moves away from individuality and towards universal merging, Popkin “Zen and the Art of Reading Chekhov.”

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age of three, and how he had loved her!...And now his prayers mingled with his memories, which flared up ever more vividly, like a flame, and the prayers did not prevent him from thinking about his mother.252

In this instance the professional (prayers) and personal (memories of his mother) enrich

one another. They interact (meshalis’) without detracting (ne meshali) from each other.

Elsewhere, the professional and personal have more of an oppositional relationship,

which is apparent in the name change the character undergoes. His given name is Pavel,

but as a bishop he is rechristened Pyotr. The name derives from the Greek petros, which means stone. Stone, of course, is rigid and firm. In the story the name Pyotr is never used on its own, it is always paired with Bishop. Taken together, ‘Bishop Pyotr’ is an indication of a set entity or a type, so to speak. This is contrasted with the other name given to this character, Pavlusha. Unlike Pyotr, Pavlusha is not associated with any professional designation. It indicates personhood, and as a diminutive it signifies personal connection.

The discord between these two aspects of the character (personal/Pavel and professional/Bishop Pyotr) is evident in his mother’s interaction with him. When he first reconnects with his mother, she is not sure how to relate to him, as a bishop or as her son.

And despite the affection with which she said this, it was noticeable that she felt shy, as if she did not know whether to be formal with him or not, whether to laugh or not…253

After he expresses tenderness towards her, she “beamed” but then quickly pivoted and

“pulled a serious face.”254

252 Преосвященный переоделся и стал читать молитвы на сон грядущим. Он внимательно читал эти старые, давно знакомые молитвы и в то же время думал о своей матери…Преосвещенный помнил ее с раннего детства, чуть ли не с трех лет и – как любил!...И теперь молитвы мешались с воспоминаниями, которые разогорались всë ярче, как пламя, и молитвы не мешали думать о матери (10:188). 253 И несмотря на ласковость, с какою она говорила это, было заметно, что она стеснялась, как будто не знала, говорить ли ему ты или вы, смеяться или нет...(10:191).

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He looked at his mother and could not understand where this deferential, timid expression on her face and in her voice came from, what it was for, and he did not recognize her.255

Later he sees in his mother the same demeanor towards him that he remembers from her

interaction with a church dean when he was a child. This memory indicates the degree to

which others, including his mother, perceive him in terms of his role.

He was also quite unable to get used to the fear which he aroused in people, without wishing it himself and despite his quiet, modest disposition…Everyone was timid in his presence, even old archpriests, everyone “plopped down” at his feet, and one suppliant, the old wife of a rural priest, had recently been unable to get out a single word through fear and had thus gone away with nothing…In all the time he had been here, not a single person had talked to him in a sincere, straightforward way, like a human being; even his old mother no longer seemed the same, not the same at all!256

This perception is reductive. The character’s backstory helps correct this incomplete

perception. The unexpected visit from his mother recalls memories from the distant past,

including priests he was acquainted in his youth and how he once followed the procession

of a wonder-working icon. He was, at the time, “without a hat on, barefoot, with a naïve

faith, with a naïve smile, endlessly happy.”257 The reader also becomes acquainted with

his ecclesiastical path, from seminary, to teaching Greek, to taking his vows. In addition, he spent eight years abroad. Chekhov does not expand upon these points, which could

form the basis for numerous other stories. A mere mention of them is enough to signal to

the reader that there is more to that character than his role as bishop.

254 просияла / сделала серьезное лицо (10:192). 255 Он смотрел на мать и не понимал, откуда у нее это почтительное, робкое выражение лица и голоса, зачем оно, и не узнавал ее (10:192). 256 Не мог он как привыкнуть и к страху, какой он, сам того не желая, возбуждал в людях, несмотря на свой тихий, скромный нрав...В его присутствии робели все, даже старики протоиереи, все «бухали» ему в ноги, а недавно одна просительница, старая деревенская попадъя, не могла выговорить ни одного слова от страха, так и ушла ни с чем...За всë время, пока он здесь, ни один человек не поговорил с ним искренно, попросту, по-человечески; даже старуха мать, казалось, была уже не та, совсем не та! (10:194). 257 без шапки, босиком, с наивной верой, с наивной улыбкой, счастливый бесконечно (10:189).

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The categorical perspective of those around Bishop Pyotr obscures the fact that he is

also a person who needs and longs for personal connection. As Pyotr’s physical frailty

becomes more pronounced, he is more desirous of personal companionship. The narrator, projecting Pyotr’s internal experience, states, “Oh for just one person to whom he could talk and unburden his soul!”258 There is an especially marked contrast between his

memory of his mother when he was a child (“When in his childhood or youth he had

been unwell, how gentle and sensitive his mother had been!”259) and her stilted, unnatural

presence now. Only when he is on his deathbed does she interact with him as her son:

“...she no longer remembered that he was a bishop, and kissed him like a child, a very

close one, her own.”260

The character’s identity as a bishop does not supplant his personhood; neither does his

personhood supersede his identity as a bishop. The forms of the church dictate the shape

of his life and of his experience. Throughout the story, the bishop presides over the Palm

Sunday service, celebrates Mass, receives supplicants, and attends vespers. He is moved

to tears more than once during church services. It is love, rather than merely duty, that

draws him to a life in the church, “…His love for church services, the clergy, for the

ringing of bells was innate in him, deep, ineradicable; in church, especially when he was

himself playing a part in the celebration, he felt active, vigorous, happy.”261 While his

professional roles in the church, which culminate in his position as a bishop, do not

258 Хоть бы один человек, с которым можно было бы поговорить, отвести душу! (10:199). 259 Когда в детстве или юности он бывал нездоров, то как нежна и чутка была мать! (10:188). 260 …она уже не помнила, что он архиерей, и целовала его, как ребенка, очень близкого, родного (10:200). 261 ...любовь его к церковным службам, духовенству, к звону колоколов была у него врожденной, глубокой, неискоренимой; в церкви он, особенно когда сам участвовал в служении, чувствовал себя деятельным, бодрым, счастливым (10:198).

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capture the fullness of the character, they do communicate significant and enduring truths

about him.

Pyotr dies just before dawn on Holy Saturday (the day between Good Friday and

Easter Sunday). The text immediately moves on to Easter Sunday, with its joyous church bells and festive air. Just as the bishop’s illness puts his internal disposition out of sync with the celebratory, anticipatory nature of Palm Sunday, the bishop’s death calls for grief on the most joyous day of the Christian calendar. There is a mismatch between his

death and the conventions of his profession. In addition, according to the cycle of nature

and literary conventions spring is the season of birth. Pyotr is conventionally misaligned.

Importantly, his death does not erase these conventions. In fact, the poignancy of his life

and his death is predicated on the validity and endurance of these conventions. Likewise,

the type of the bishop endures even as the story complicates and extends the character

beyond the bounds of that type.262

Conclusion

Not only do the aesthetic statement stories highlight the complicated type as a feature

of Chekhov’s artistic practice, they also reflect on Chekhov’s practice through a

comparison between him as author and the artists in them. “An Actor’s Death”

narrativizes the complication of the type. In doing so it corrects the typification of

Shiptsov that occurs in the fictional world of the text.

Likewise, “Requiem” corrects Andrei’s inaccurate vision of Maria. In contrast to

Andrei, the text is less categorical when it comes to Maria. There is no textual indication

262 Another facet of typicality in the story is Christ, whose death and resurrection is the centerpiece of Easter (and the whole of the Christian faith). This layer of typicality strengthens the Bishop’s chracterization as a holy man, though it does not promote any clear argument related to the afterlife.

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that she was a prostitute. Instead the image of Maria that emerges from the text is of a

vibrant woman, sensitive and attentive to the world around her. The narrator provides a

final, evocative image in the text. It acts as the sympathetic testament to Maria’s life that

Andrei is unable to provide.

A ribbon of blueish smoke rises from the censer and basks in the broad, slanting ray of sunlight cutting across the dark and lifeless emptiness of the church. And it seems that the soul of the deceased girl is being drawn up into that sunbeam together with the smoke. Twisting like a child’s curls, the thin streams of smoke rise up towards the window as if dispelling all the pain and sadness that poor soul contained.263

The movement of smoke as it ascends is the most fleeting of phenomenon, existing only

as a particular phenomenon in the present moment. As such it provides a fitting tribute to

the sensitivity and awareness she demonstrated as well as to a life that was, like all life,

unique unto itself.

In “Anyuta,” too, the story interacts with and reverses what occurs in the fictional

world of the text. For example, the text not only states that Klochkov did not notice

Anyuta’s situation, it also describes what Klochkov did not notice. In doing so the author

of the story succeeds where Klochkov and Fetisov fail, by attending to her as a unique

entity. Moreover, the authorial treatment of Klochkov and Fetisov is typical. Their

generalizing, reductive approach towards Anyuta on the narrative level is applied to them

on the formal level.

Fetisov’s and Klochkov’s efforts to “eliminate any particularity and distill out only the

most typical structures”264 in their interactions with Anyuta is met with a restrictive and

263 Из кадила струится синеватый дымок и купается в широком косом луче, пересекающем мрачную, безжизненную пустоту церкви. И кажется, вместе с дымом носится в луче душа самой усопшей. Струйки дыма, похоже на кудри ребенка, кружатся, несутся вверх к окну и словно сторонятся уныния и скорби, которыми полна эта бедная душа (4:355). 264 Popkin “Historia morbid” 367.

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flat characterization of them in the text. Most pointedly, Klochkov and Fetisov are

associated with repetition. E. G Potapova notes that the story has a circular structure. It

begins and ends with Klochkov in the same place, doing the same thing.265 Not only is

this the case, the opening scene itself is comprised of repetitive activities. Klochkov is

walking back and forth, reciting the same information. In fact, his repetitive recitation, or

learning by rote (zubrit’ and its derivations), is a constant refrain throughout the text.266

In addition, prior to Klochkov, Anyuta was similarly involved with five other men and her relationship with each followed the same pattern. “They had all finished their studies and gone out into the world, and of course, as respectable people, they had long since

forgotten her.”267 Klochkov is just one more in this string of relationships. Fetisov, for his

part, is painting Psyche, a clichéd and often-repeated subject. Anyuta’s familiarity with

the conditions at Fetisov’s apartment suggests her experience sitting as a model for him is

a repeated occurrence. In making repetition a defining characteristic of Fetisov/Klochkov,

Chekhov places a typical structure onto them as a way to communicate the deficiency of

their perspective and treatment of Anyuta.

Conversely, Anyuta is invested with individuality through her characterization in the

text. While she does recall the type of the poor, mistreated woman, she does not

disappear into typical anonymity. First, the title of the story construes her as an individual

rather than a category or a representative of a type. This degree of titular specificity is

somewhat unusual for Chekhov. Consider, for example, the categorical nature of the titles

previously mentioned in this section (“An Actor’s Death,” “Requiem”) or titles such as

265 V. B. Kataev, editor, A. P. Chekhov: Entsiklopediia (Prosveshchenie, 2011) 57. 266 It is mentioned nine times. 267 покончали курсы, вышли в люди и, конечно, как порядочные люди, давно уже забыли ее (4:341).

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“The Chorus Girl” (“Khoristka,” July 5, 1886, Oskolki) or “The Chemist’s Wife”

(“Aptekarsha,” June 21, 1886, Oskolki). It is unusual for Chekhov to include a proper

name in a title. Second, the title positions Anyuta as the main character, a place of

prominence and attention that overturns the dismissive attitude and actions of Fetisov and

Klochkov.

The specificity of detail in the initial description of Anyuta is also notable, “On a stool

by the window with ice-crystal patterns around the edges sat the girl who shared his

[Klochkov’s, A.A.] room – Anyuta…”268 While it is a small detail, the mention of the ice

crystals along the edge of the window creates an aura of specificity around her that

neither Klochkov nor Fetisov receive in the text. Other subtle yet significant

contributions to Anyuta’s characterization as an individual include mention of interiority

such as, “She said very little in general; she was always silent, thinking and

thinking…”269 The reader does not have access to Anyuta’s thoughts but the mention of

them creates a fuller, deeper character. In addition, Anyuta’s response to Klochkov’s

decision to dissolve their relationship indicates a depth of internal experience and pathos.

“She said nothing in answer to the student’s words, only her lips began to tremble.”270

Neither Klochkov nor Fetisov receive such treatment in the text.

Each of these stories has a comparative, reflexive quality. In Chekhov’s subsequent stories with artists, this quality assumes a more central position. It is to these stories and this aspect that we turn in the remaining two chapters.

268 У окна, подернутого у краев ледяными узорами, сидела на табурете его жилица, Анюта...(4:340). 269 Она говорила вообще очень мало, всегда молчала и всë думала, думала...(4:431). 270 В ответ на слова медика она ничего не сказала, и только губи у нее задрожали (4:343).

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CHAPTER THREE The Visual Artist – Seeing Artistically

The visual artists in Chekhov’s later stories, like those in “An Actor’s Death,”

“Requiem,” and “Anyuta,” maintain a reflexive relationship to artistic form. Through

them he outlines an artistic way of seeing. In 1890 Chekhov went on an arduous, lengthy

journey to the penal colony of Sakhalin Island, an undertaking that had personal,

professional, and humanitarian significance for him.271 He took his responsibility vis-à-

vis Sakhalin seriously. He prepared extensively before the trip and worked intensively

while there.272 Referring to the time he spent in the north of Sakhalin, Chekhov wrote,

I saw everything; so the question as it now stands is not what I saw but how I saw… I don’t know how things will work out but the amount of work I’ve done is not insignificant. There’s probably enough for three dissertations. I woke every day at 5 am, went to bed late…Now that I’ve already finished with the penal colony, I have this feeling as if I’ve seen everything but failed to notice the elephant.273

This excerpt includes two important points that form the basis for the analysis of the

visual artist in this chapter. The first is that Chekhov frames his responsibility in terms of

seeing rather than doing. By his own admission, Chekhov had done a lot during his two

months on the island, but his major concern is with what he saw. In other words, seeing is

an ethical act of great importance, according to Chekhov. The second point is that

Chekhov distinguishes the ‘how’ of seeing from the ‘what’ of seeing, construing the first

271 Kataev A. P. Chekhov 357-58. 272 Cathy Popkin notes the preparation he undertook prior to his trip. Cathy Popkin, “Chekhov as Ethnographer: Epistemological Crisis on Sakhalin Island” Slavic Review 51.1 (1992) 37. As regards his workday, Chekhov outlines it in the letter to Suvorin. 273 Я видел всё; стало быть, вопрос теперь не в том, что я видел, а как видел…Не знаю, что у меня выйдет, но сделано мною немало. Хватило бы на три диссертации. Я вставал каждый день в 5 часов утра, ложился поздно…а теперь, когда уже я покончил с каторгою, у меня такое чувство, как будто я видел всë, но слона-то и не приметил (Pis’ma 4:133). The idiom 'to see everything but fail to notice the elephant' derives from Ivan Krylov's fable “A Curious Person” (“Liubopytnyi”). In it a person recounts everything he saw during a trip to the Kuntskamera museum only to discover that there is an elephant he failed to notice.

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as fundamental to the second. While it is true that Chekhov’s work on Sakhalin was more

science than art, these points are relevant to his artistic practice.

As his contemporaries noted, his work is highly visual. Providing what he meant as a

damning commentary on it, the critic P. Pertsov claimed, “Chekhov operates like a

photographer.”274 In addition, both Dmitry Merezhkovskii and Lev Tolstoy referred to

Chekhov as an Impressionist, a term that originates (and is more common) in painting.275

In his letters Chekhov advocates for literary descriptions that are visually evocative. In the May 10, 1886 letter to Alexander discussed earlier, he writes, “When describing nature one needs to pick out the small details, grouping them in such a way that, if someone closed their eyes while reading, they would see a whole picture.”276 He

expresses a similar sentiment in a letter to Alexander Zhirkevich dated April 2, 1895. He writes, “Above all else, the description of nature must be pictorial, such that if the reader closes his eyes while reading, he can immediately envision the depicted scene.”277 So the

visual aspect of Chekhov’s work is intentional. It is also well executed. Chekhov was a

master at painting a picture with words. Consider, for example, his description of the

natural world awakening from its winter slumber in “In the Spring” (“Vesnoi”).

The sun is shining brightly, and its rays, playful and smiling, are splashing in the puddles along with the sparrows. The river is high and dark; it has already

274 Quoted in Popkin The Pragmatics of Insignificance 20. 275 Gol’denveizer reports that Tolstoy referred to Chekhov as an impressionist. A. B. Gol’denveizer, Vblizi Tolstogo (Khudozhestvennaia literature, 1959) 68-69. In the article “O prichinakh upadka i novykh techeniiakh sovremennoi russkoi literatury” (“On the Reasons for the Decline and New Currents in Contemporary Russian Literature”) Dmitry Merezhkovskii applies the term impressionist to Chekhov as well as other authors. 276 В описаниях природы надо хвататься за мелкие частности, группируя их таким образом, чтобы по прочтении, когда закроешь глаза, давалась картина (Pis’ma 1:242). 277 Описание природы должно быть прежде всего картинно, чтобы читатель, прочитав и закрыв глаза, сразу мог бы вообразить себе изображаемый пейзаж (Pis’ma 6:47).

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awoken and in the next day or two will begin to roar. The trees are barren, but alive and breathing.278

Attention to the visual aspect of Chekhov’s work is an enduring thread of the critical legacy surrounding his oeuvre. In Seeing Chekhov: Life and Art Michael Finke inverts

Chekhov the author’s interest in seeing to look closely at Chekhov the man, to see

Chekhov. In the enduring classic Chekhov’s Poetics, A. P. Chudakov considers another facet of visuality in Chekhov, narrative point of view. Chudakov’s quantitative analysis reveals that throughout his career Chekhov experimented with narrative perspective.

More specifically, he increasingly relied on those within the narrative world rather than those (ostensibly) outside it. The ‘how’ of seeing connects to a larger field of visuality that reverberates in numerous ways throughout his work. Moreover, the visual artist, arguably the ultimate seer, provides a productive medium for analyzing it. While not necessarily the one who is most adept at seeing in Chekhov’s work, the visual artist is nonetheless a figure around whom the concept of seeing intensifies and coalesces.

The role of visuality in Chekhov’s work indicates ways in which he diverges from

Realism. First, according to Peter Brooks, “the world viewed” in Realism often leads to

“the world comprehended.”279 In Chekhov, by contrast, the world is rarely (if ever)

comprehended. His wariness of making pronouncements about life is a hallmark of his

literary practice. Second, Chekhov also parts ways with the Realist enterprise to create

278 Солнце светит ярко, и лучи его, играя и улыбаясь, купаются в лужах вместе с воробьями. Речка надувается и темнеет; она уже проснулась и не сегодня-завтра заревет. Деревья голы, но уже живут, дышат (5:52). 279 Peter Brooks Realist Vision 3. Also consider the implicit value of comprehensibility in the physiological sketch. Louise McReynolds and Cathy Popkin make a similar claim regarding two related tenets upon which Realist literature rests. The first is “the capacity of knowledgeable individuals to encapsulate the experience and desire of entire societies,” and the second is “the possibility of absolute factual knowledge.” See Louise McReynolds and Cathy Popkin, “The Objective Eye and the Common Good,” Constructing Russian Culture in the Age of Revolution: 1881-1940, edited by Catriona Kelly and David Shepherd (Oxford UP, 1998) 57.

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“scale models of the real” as a way to “master the real world.”280 Chekhov is wary of

attempts at mastery, as “Anyuta” demonstrates.

The Realist tradition is focused on providing an authoritative picture of the ‘what’ of

seeing, while Chekhov is equally interested in the ‘how.’ Recall the distinction between

Andrei and Maria when they survey the Russian countryside in “Requiem.” Andrei’s gaze, with his puffy, lazy eyes and his economic lens, leads him to see a uniformly worthless collection of natural phenomena. Maria’s gaze, with her large eyes, opens up a scene of beauty and wonder. Both Andrei and Maria are looking at the same countryside but ‘what’ is determined by ‘how’ they see.

Vladimir Kataev’s critical analysis of Chekhov’s work provides a variation of this

theme. Kataev writes, “[Chekhov] is basically interested not so much in phenomena per se as in our conceptions of them – the possibility of different conceptions of the same phenomena, how these conceptions come to be formed, and the nature of illusion, delusion, and false opinion.”281 At the core of Chekhov’s artistic practice is a conviction

that a person’s reality is (at least partially) a construct of her or his view of the world.

Whereas Kataev presents Chekhov’s interest as a more or less neutral exposition of characters’ perceptions of the world, I argue that Chekhov attaches value judgments to these. Not all ways of seeing in Chekhov are equal.

The “truthful depictions of people and things,” which Chekhov advocates for in the

May 10, 1886 letter to his brother Alexander, are an example of the ‘what’ of seeing in literature. Underneath this is a way of seeing that renders truthful depictions. We’ll call this an artistic perspective. In order to determine the contents and contours of an artistic

280 Brooks Realist Vision 1. 281 V. B. Kataev If Only We Could Know! 23.

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perspective according to Chekhov, I analyze the visual artists in his later works, namely

“The Grasshopper,” “House with a Mezzanine: An Artist’s Story,” and “The Fiancée.”

3.1. Constructing an Artistic Perspective: Three Stories With Artists

Chekhov never provides a concise formulation of an artistic perspective. Instead, in

“The Grasshopper,” he outlines it in negative terms, by presenting what it is not. In

“House with a Mezzanine: An Artist’s Story” and “The Fiancée” there are a number of components (serdechnost’, temporal and sensory specificity, indeterminacy) that coalesce into a composite artistic perspective. My analysis of these stories, and their presentation of an artistic perspective, follows a thematic structure rather than a story-specific one.

The following discussion of the stories provides the necessary background for the subsequent thematic analysis.

“The Grasshopper”

On one level “The Grasshopper” is a tale of adultery centered on three characters:

Olga Ivanovna, her husband (the doctor Osip Dymov), and her lover (the landscape painter Riabovsky). The story is notorious as a fictionalized account of a real-life love affair between Isaac Levitan, an artist and friend of Chekhov, and Sofia Kuvshinnikov.

The latter, like the fictional Olga, frequently hosted gatherings of artists and her husband was a doctor. Critics have also investigated additional areas of overlap between the story and real life, including real-life prototypes for other characters.282 The critical legacy surrounding the characters in this story exemplifies a humanistic, biographical approach to characters in literature, which is to say an overemphasis on the human over the constructed nature of the characters, resulting in an unbalanced and incomplete analysis

282 See PSS 8:429-36.

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of the text. In contrast, I approach the characters as textual constructs whose significance is much greater than any defamation or exploitation of real-life people or circumstances.

“The Grasshopper” is highly saturated with references to sight. It is also an exploration of two opposite ways of seeing and interacting with the world, that of Dymov and that of Riabovsky. Olga’s perspective is more closely aligned with Riabovsky,

though she does display elements of Dymov’s. The story opens with Olga justifying her

marriage to a group of artist friends (on her wedding day, no less).

All of Olga Ivanova’s friends and acquaintances went to her wedding. “Look at him – there is something about him, isn’t there?” she said to her friends, nodding towards her husband – apparently anxious to explain how it was that she had married a commonplace, in no way remarkable man.283

The juxtaposition between the two is established at the beginning and is predicated on

Dymov’s ordinariness. Dymov is not afforded a proper physical description, other than to

say that despite his tall height and broad shoulders he appears foreign, superfluous, and

small in the artists’ company. By contrast, Riabovsky is young, blond, and attractive.

Dymov is a doctor with a middling rank (tituliarnyi sovetnik, Rank IX) whose private

practice brings in only 500 roubles a year. Riabovsky is a celebrated painter whose last

painting alone sold for 500 roubles. The contrast between the two is a structural

component of the text.

The story is divided into eight sections, which chart Olga’s relationship with Dymov

as well as her affair with Riabovsky. Seeing is emphasized in the story. Two pivotal

scenes illustrate this point. The first is Olga and Riabovsky’s first kiss in section IV. The

second is Dymov’s announcement of his successful dissertation defense to Olga in

283 На свадьбе у Ольги Ивановны были все ее друзья и добрые знакомые. – Посмотрите на него: не правда ли, в нем что-то есть? – кивая на мужа и как бы желая объяснить, почему это она вышла за простого, очень обыкновенного и ничем не замечательного человека (8:7).

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section VI. Both scenes are potential turning points in the story, the first as the catalyst to

Olga’s affair with Riabovsky and the second as a means of Olga making amends with

Dymov. The potential is realized in the first scene but remains unrealized in the second.

In both, the visual interplay between the characters is telling.

The first scene takes place on a quiet, moonlit July night as Olga and Riabovsky are

floating down the Volga on a steamship, a perfectly conventional setting for a forbidden

rendezvous. Riabovsky fixes his gaze firmly on Olga and declares his love for her, setting off an uneasy visual exchange. Olga closes her eyes in a feeble attempt to deflect his advances and then hides her face in her hands as she mentally consents. Subsequently, she looks Riabovsky in his tear-filled eyes as she verbally consents. She looks away, glancing around before kissing him. Overcome with emotion, he looks upon her with adoring and grateful eyes but then closes them. His eyes remain closed as this section concludes. Both Olga and Riabovsky spend as much time looking away as they do looking at one another and both turn a blind eye (literally and figuratively) to the full reality of their situation.

In contrast, the short, ultimately abortive exchange between Olga and Dymov at the end of section VI has the potential to resolve the complications introduced by the affair.

Here, too, the visual dynamics are telling. Dymov, excited to share his good news with

Olga, enters his wife’s bedroom and attempts to connect by looking her in the eyes. Olga, however, fails to reciprocate, preoccupied instead with her own image. As Dymov tells

Olga of his successful dissertation defense, she remains focused on her own reflection in the mirror. He adjusts his position to see her through the mirror but to no avail. She does not see him, neither the joy in his face nor his willingness to make amends and start

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anew. Dymov’s attempt to connect with Olga, signified by his visual behavior, is one- sided and thus unsuccessful. Also in relation to seeing, consider the way the text

punctuates the description of Dymov’s body at the moment of death: “And the half-shut

eyes gazed, not at Olga Ivanovna, but at the blanket.”284

As a final introductory point, I interpret the text as being critical of Riabovsky’s way

of seeing, which Olga adopts.285 The text’s criticism of Olga and Riabovsky is present by

means of the narrator’s sarcastic tone. This was readily apparent to the story’s initial

readers. Recognizing himself in the character of Riabovsky, Levitan was offended by the

text’s disparaging portrayal of his fictional counterpart, wanting to challenge Chekhov to

a duel and ceasing communication with him for several years.286 In addition, the title of

the story identifies Olga as a flighty grasshopper. The title recalls Ivan Krylov’s fable

“The Dragonfly and the Ant,”287 itself an adaptation of Aesop’s fable “The Grasshopper

and the Ant.” In both versions, the grasshopper/ dragonfly is irresponsible, lacking

foresight to properly envision or prepare for the future. While this story, as I interpret it,

is far from a simple moral fable, it does criticize Olga/Riabovsky’s way of seeing.

Consequently, while Dymov is not a model character, his way of seeing is preferable.

“House with a Mezzanine: An Artist’s Story”

284 И полуоткрытые глаза смотрели не на Ольгу Ивановну, а на одеяло (8:31). 285 The text is ambiguous in its evaluation of the main characters. For arguments that view Olga and Riabovsky in a more favorable, or at least neutral, light see Carol Apollonio, “The Scenic Storytelling in Chekhov’s Grasshopper” The Bulletin of the North American Chekhov Society XVI (2008) 2-19.; Douglas J. Clayton, “The Importance of Perception: Cechov’s Story The Grasshopper (Jean de La Fontaine: La Cigale et la Fourmi; I. A Krylov),” Anton P. Cechov: Werk und Wirkung: Vortrage und Discussionen eines internationalen Symposiums in Badenweiler im Oktober 1985, edited by Rolf-Dieter Kluge (Otto Harrassowitz, 1990) 591-604. 286 Rayfield Anton Chekhov: A Life 269. 287 The Russian title of Chekhov’s story is “Poprygun'ia.” The first line of Krylov’s fable in verse form reads, “Попрыгунья [Poprygun’ia] стрекоза” / “A fidgety dragonfly.”

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“House with a Mezzanine: An Artist’s Story” is a first-person narrative that chronicles

the growth and dissolution of a relationship as recalled by an unnamed artist. He meets

two sisters, Lida and Misius, who are staying in the eponymous house with a mezzanine,

and he becomes romantically involved with the latter. The central conflict of the story is

the tension between Lida, an activist with strong ideological convictions, and the artist,

whose life and art lack these. It finds its full expression in an argument between them, the

fallout of which is that the sisters (along with their mother) move out of the house at

Lida’s insistence. The motivation for this move is to break up the relationship between

the artist and Misius. Artistically, the story is at its strongest in the lyrical and strikingly

visual description of place, namely the house itself.

Though less explicit than in “The Grasshopper” the concept of seeing in this story is

still fundamental. Chudakov’s survey of Chekhov’s oeuvre shows that his overwhelming

preference in the third period, to which this work belongs, is for indirect discourse

encompassing a variety of characters in addition to a personified narrator who expresses value judgments. The first person narrative of this story is therefore unusual and, by extension, worth further consideration. This is a story about an artist and told by one. My analysis attends to how the artist sees the world and people around him.

My approach differs from most others. Critics have sought to determine Chekhov’s position regarding the various ideological positions expressed in the story. Maybe his sympathies lie with Lida in her humanitarian efforts to ease the plight of the poor and disadvantaged? Or maybe he is aligned with the artist in advancing more of an art-for- art’s-sake position? An exception to this tendency in scholarship is Carol Flath’s288 article

288 See Carol Flath also under Carol Apollonio.

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“Art and Idleness: Chekhov’s ‘House with a Mezzanine’,” in which she makes the

concept of art central to the text. In her analysis, the story presents art as a result of the

creative tension between industriousness (represented by Lida) and idleness (represented

by Misius). Like her, I approach the story as an exploration of the concept of art. My

discussion diverges from hers, though, by focusing on the artist’s way of seeing as a

means of contemplating the nature of art itself.

“The Fiancée”

“The Fiancée” was the last story Chekhov published. It chronicles Nadia’s geographic

and personal transition from a young woman in the provinces whose greatest dream is to

get married to her abandonment of that dream in favor of life as a student in St.

Petersburg. At the beginning of the story she has recently become engaged to Andrei

Andreich, who represents her personal and geographic point of origin. Sasha, a family

friend and so-called artist, acts a catalyst for the change she undergoes.

Because it was written in 1903, in a time of present and impending social upheaval,

critics have read Nadya as a revolutionary heroine, successful or otherwise.289 Leaving

questions of politics aside, she does undergo a significant change. My present interest in

the story is in the perspectival shift that enables this. Among the three stories I am

discussing, the concept of seeing is less apparent in this one, yet it becomes more

discernible when it is analyzed within the context of the others.

3.2. The Makings of an Artistic Perspective (I): Non-Categorical

289 Robert Louis Jackson takes issue with critics who view Nadia as an exemplary revolutionary heroine. Robert Louis Jackson, “The Betrothed: Chekhov’s Last Testament,” Anton Chekhov Rediscovered: A Collection of New Studies with a Comprehensive Bibliography, edited by Savelii Senderovich and Munir Sendich (Russian Language Journal, 1987).

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At the outset of “The Grasshopper” Olga is already under the sway of Riabovsky and the circle of artists. Throughout the majority of the narrative her perspective, first and

foremost categorical, is indicative of theirs. It is this categorical perspective that Chekhov criticizes. To establish Riabovsky as a representative of it, I begin with the structural relationship between him and the artists.

In section I the artists are introduced en masse. The text goes on to differentiate

individuals in the group, each one in typical terms. Most are identified solely by their

profession: actor, opera singer, painter, cellist, writer. Aside from Riabovsky, the only

outlier in this regard is also marked by typicality. His name is Vasily Vasilich. Riabovsky

is simultaneously a part of this circle and distinguished from it. For one thing, his name is

more personal than typical. Raised from typical anonymity, he nonetheless represents the

artists and their categorical perspective.

The artists’ categorical notions are further operative in the description of them. After a brief characterization of Dymov, which concludes dismissively (“What more is there to say about him?”290), the text reads as follows:

…Olga Ivanovna and her friends and acquaintances were by no means ordinary people. Each of them was distinguished in some way or other, and not altogether unknown, having already made a name and gained a certain celebrity, or, if not exactly celebrated yet, all gave promise of a brilliant future.291

As Chudakov notes, this description of the artists is not a statement of fact delivered by

the narrator. Instead, the narrator “speaks of them in another voice,” by which he means a

290 Что еще можно про него сказать? (8:7). 291 ...Ольга Ивановна и ее друзья и добрые знакомые были не совсем обыкновенные люди. Каждый из них был чем-нибудь замечателен и немножко известен, имел уже имя и считался знаменитостью, или же хотя и не был еще знаменит, но зато подавал блестящие надежды (8:7).

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voice other than that of a neutral narrator.292 More pointedly, this is the artists’

assessment of themselves. As they see it, there are two types of people in the world,

extraordinary/renowned/famous (the category to which they belong) and ordinary (the

category to which Dymov belongs).

Olga wholeheartedly embraces this way of seeing. She prefers people who are labeled

extraordinary and remarkable, a tendency that is especially prominent in her supreme

“talent.”

But in nothing did her talents display themselves so vividly as in her ability to strike up lightning friendships and get on intimate terms with celebrated folk. The moment anyone distinguished himself in the very slightest degree, or got himself talked about, she scraped up an acquaintance with him, made friends instantly, and invited him to her house.293

The implied author criticizes Olga’s categorical way of seeing the world, both through

the unfavorable characterization of Olga throughout the text and, more specifically,

through a narrative interjection that occurs at the end of another passage detailing Olga’s

penchant for people of renown.

She worshipped [bogotvorila] the famous, she was proud of them, she dreamed of them every night. She thirsted for celebrities and could never slake this thirst. Old friends disappeared and were forgotten, new ones came to take their place, but she soon grew tired of these, too, or they disappointed her, and she began eagerly seeking new friends, new celebrities, and, when she had found them went looking for others. Whatever for?294

292 A. P. Chudakov, Chekhov’s Poetics, translated by Edwina Jannie Cruise and Donald Dragt (Ardis Publishers, 1983) 55-61. 293 Но ни в чем ее талантливость не сказывалась так ярко, как в ее уменье быстро знакомиться и коротко сходиться с знаменитыми людьми. Стоило кому-нибудь прославиться хоть немножко и заставить о себе говорить, как она уж знакомилась с ним, в тот же день дружилась и приглашала к себе (8:10). 294 Она боготворила знаменитых людей, гордилась ими и каждую ночь видела их во сне. Она жаждала их и никак не могла утолить своей жажды. Старые уходили и забывались, приходили на смену им новые, но и к этим она скоро привыкала или разочаровывалась в них и начинала жадно искать новых и новых великих людей, находила и опять искала. Для чего? (8:10).

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In reference to this passage Chudakov writes, “Except for the last phrase, the excerpt is

presented in the non-judgmental manner of a neutral narrator. But the question

“Whatever for?” contains a judgment, and furthermore one which does not belong to the

heroine.”295 Instead, this judgment belongs to Chekhov as the author. This explicit

criticism of her activities is also an implicit criticism of her way of seeing.296 The literal

meaning of the Russian verb bogotvorit' (idolize) is to create a god out of something. For

Olga to conceptually transform people into something “extraordinary” is a creative act.

This is her counterpart to Riabovsky’s creative activity.

Not only does the text criticize the artists and Olga for their categorical perspective, it

also indicates the problem with it. For one thing, the hierarchical nature of a categorical

perspective enables (maybe even necessitates) a power imbalance that allows one person

to dominate another. Recall the visual exchanges that occur between Olga and Riabovsky

as they begin their affair. While a certain amount of ‘cat-and-mouse’ is expected at the beginning of a relationship, it is significant that Olga and Riabovsky don’t look each

other in the eyes for any sustained amount of time. Such an act would suggest

equivalence. Instead Riabovsky bookends their visual exchange by looking at Olga (in

Russian literally onto her, gliadel na nee), placing her in the object position rather than as

an equivalent subject.297

295 Chudakov 59. 296 In my reading of the story, Olga is not redeemed at the end, even though she reportedly sees that her evaluation of Dymov was inaccurate. The problem, as I see it, is not that Olga misjudged Dymov as an ordinary man when he was really extraordinary. The problem is the existence of the categories, which remain intact even at the end. 297 This formulation is common in Russian and on its own is not very noteworthy. However, it gains greater significance when compared to the scene wih Dymov at the end of Section VI, in which we read that Dymov “кротко улыбался и, как прежде, радостно смотрел жене прямо в глаза” / “gently smiled and, as before, joyfully looked his wife in the eyes” (8:24).

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Moreover, as Riabovsky makes his declaration of love, the text states, “there was

something terrible in his eyes, she was afraid to look at him.”298 What are we to make of

the something terrible in Riabovsky’s eyes, and why is Olga afraid to look at him? One

reason is that Olga recognizes the implications (marital infidelity) of what Riabovsky is

saying. That may explain her fear but it doesn’t explain Riabovsky’s frightening eyes. I

propose that they threaten her because his declaration of love is an assertion of power

motivated by a desire to dominate.

In the lead-up to their first kiss, the text invokes power (vlast') twice. While reflecting

on Riabovsky’s presence and the philosophy of life he has just espoused, Olga thinks to

herself, “He had his own special language for describing the shadows, the hues of

evening, the brilliance of the moonlight, and the charm of his power [vlasti] over nature

was almost irresistible.”299 Riabovsky is established as one who exercises dominance and

power over his environment. Subsequently, as Riabovsky is declaring his love, he says, “I

feel I am in your power [vlasti]. I am a slave.”300 At the moment, Riabovsky feels

subservient to Olga because she has not yet succumbed to his advances, and he seeks to

reverse the power dynamic by bringing her under his power. Further support for viewing

this interaction as a struggle for dominance (at least from Riabovsky’s perspective) is his

reaction to Olga’s admission of love.

The artist, pale with agitation, sat down on a bench looking at Olga Ivanovna with adoring, grateful eyes, and then shut his own, and said with a weary smile: “I’m tired.”301

298 глаза его были страшны, и она боялась взглянуть на него (8:16). 299 О тенях, вечерних тонах, о лунном блеске он говорит как-то особенно, своим языком, так что невольно чувствуется обаяние его власти над природой (8:15-16). 300 Я чувствую себя в вашей власти. Я раб (8:16). 301 Художник, бледный от волнения, сел на скамью, посмотрел на Ольгу Ивановну обожающими, благодарными глазами, потом закрыл глаза и сказал, томно улыбаясь: - Я устал (8:17).

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This is the self-satisfied smile of a victor, and the tiredness of one who has been engaged

in a struggle and has successfully dominated.

The arc of their relationship makes it even clearer that Riabovsky does not love Olga

as a singular being. He approaches her as a muse to win over and then discard, at which

point he will (and does) find another muse. In this way, Riabovsky’s treatment of Olga is

analogous to her cycling through people of renown. For both Olga and Riabovsky, people

are replaceable because they are viewed within a categorical context. As mentioned in

Chapter One, categorization imparts power to the one who categorizes. In itself, this is

ethically neutral. Through Riabovsky, Chekhov demonstrates that this power differential

becomes a problem when the act of categorizing is used as a tool for domination and

subjugation.

The second problem of a categorical perspective is the ease with which Riabovsky and

Olga negate Dymov's very existence. Just as the division of people into ordinary and

extraordinary allows Olga to replace one person with the next without respect to the

actual, specific people involved, her relegation of Dymov to the category of ordinary

enables her to erase his autonomous existence. To this end, Riabovsky speaks him out of

existence in his attempt to win over Olga. Olga initially deflects Riabovsky's declaration

of love by mentioning Dymov. Riabovsky replies as follows:

What does Dymov matter? Why Dymov? What have I to do with Dymov? The Volga, the moon, beauty, my love, my ecstasy, but no Dymov [nikakogo net Dymova]…302

Following Riabovsky’s lead, Olga also questions Dymov’s reality, though she doesn’t go

so far as to linguistically negate his existence.

302 Что Дымов? Почему Дымов? Какое мне дело до Дымова? Волга, луна, красота, моя любовь, мой восторг, а никакого нет Дымова...(8:16).

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And after all – what did Dymov matter? Why Dymov? What had she to do with Dymov? Was there really such a person [sushchestvuet li on], wasn’t he just a dream?303

The “problem” of Dymov’s existence is present even earlier in the text. To begin with, we could read Olga’s justification of her marriage to Dymov as an attempt to establish

the validity of his existence. As she maintains, “there is something about him.”304 The artists remain unconvinced. Referring to the weekly soirees, the text states, “Dymov was never in the drawing-room, and nobody so much as remembered his existence.”305 The

artists are reminded of his existence only when he calls them to the dinner table. In other

words, the artists only acknowledge his being when it serves them to do so. Or, as the text

states, as a doctor Dymov is only relevant to their lives when they are sick.

Amidst this artistic, liberal society, these favorites of fortune, who, while perfectly urbane and well-bred, remembered the existence [o sushchestvovanii] of doctors only when they were ill, and in whose ears the name of Dymov was equivalent to such common names as Sidorov or Tarasov, Dymov seemed like a stranger, superfluous, small, though he was actually very tall and broad- shouldered.306

Riabovsky’s negation of him is the culmination and the clearest expression of the artists’

tendency to negate him because of his ordinary status.

A categorical perspective is also problematic in “House with a Mezzanine: An Artist’s

Story.” The artist believes that Lida is judging him because “I was a landscape painter

303 В самом деле: что Дымов? почему Дымов? какое ей дело до Дымова? Да существует ли он в природе и не сон ли он только? (8:16). 304 в нем что-то есть (8:7). As regards the phrase “что-то есть” / ”there is something” and broader questions of existence, I am indebted to Carol Apollonio (Flath), who brings these together in her discussion of The Seagull (Carol A. Flath “The Seagull”). 305 Дымова в гостиной не было, и никто не вспоминал об его существовании (8:11). 306 Среди это артистической, свободной и избалованной судьбою компании, правда, деликатной и скромной, но вспоминавшей о существовании каких-то докторов только во время болезни и для которой имя Дымов звучало так же безразлично, как Сидоров и Тарасов, -- среди этой компании Дымов казался чужим, лишним и маленьким, хотя был высок и широк в плечах (8:8).

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and did not depict the poverty of the peasants in my pictures…”307 This affront introduces

an oppositional stance between the two, according to which each sees the other as a

foreign ‘other’ rather than a fellow human being. The artist expresses Lida’s perspective,

at least as he experiences it.

I remember once riding along the shores of Lake Baikal and meeting a Buryat girl on horseback, dressed in a shirt and blue cotton trousers; I asked whether she would sell me her pipe and while we were talking she looked scornfully at my European face and my hat, and all of a sudden she got tired of talking to me, let out a whoop, and galloped away. And Lida despised me in just the same way for being alien [chuzhogo].308

Lida’s disdain finds an equivalent response in the artist’s criticism of her humanitarian

work. So the categories that the artist and Lida place onto each other (morally indifferent

portrait painter, misguided humanitarian) impede their ability to connect. According to

Chekhov an artistic perspective is not categorical.309 The next three subsections highlight

the qualities that are missing from a categorical perspective and are necessary to an

artistic one.

3.3. The Makings of an Artistic Perspective (II): Serdechnost'

Throughout “The Grasshopper” Olga has adopted the artists’ categorical perspective to such a degree that she exemplifies it. However, this perspective cannot account for her

decision to marry Dymov. That decision belongs to the pre-history of the text, and a

different perspective governed it. Her split emotional allegiance (to Dymov and

307 я пейзажист и во своих картинах не изображаю народных нужд...(9:178). 308 Помнится, когда я ехал по берегу Байкала, мне встретилась девушка бурятка, в рубахе и в штанах из синей дабы, верхом на лошади; я спросил у нее, не продаст ли она мне свою трубку, и, пока мы говорили, она с презрением, смотрела на мое европейское лицо и на мою шляпу, и в одну минуту ей надоело говорить со мной, она гикнула и поскакала прочь. И Лида точно так же презирала во мне чужого (9:178). 309 This isn’t to say that categories aren’t part of an artistic perspective. Instead it means that categories are neither primary nor sufficient. They must be balanced and held in tension by means of other ways of seeing besides a categorical perspective.

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Riabovsky) highlights the operation of Riabovsky’s categorical perspective and Dymov’s

affective one. While there is no tidy evaluative opposition between the two, Dymov’s

corrects some of the problems of Riabovsky’s.

Serdechnost’ is the final artistic principle Chekhov advances in the May 10, 1886

letter to Alexander. He echoes and expands on this advice many years later in a letter to

E. M. Shavrova (February 28, 1895). In response to a story she had sent him, he writes,

“S [syphilis – A. A.] is neither a vice nor the product of an evil will. It is an illness, and

syphilis patients are also in need of warm, affectionate treatment.”310 “Affectionate

treatment” (serdechnyi ukhod) and “affection” (serdechnost')311 as concepts make more

intuitive sense in the context of medicine (Chekhov would advocate for it there, too), but

what do they mean in relation to narrative? To answer this question let’s consider

Chekhov’s objection to Shavrova’s characterization of the syphilitic character.

Chekhov considers Shavrova’s presentation of syphilis uninformed and simplistic. She uses it as a categorical marker that diminishes the humanity of the character under

consideration. Chekhov goes on to write, “It’s not good for a wife to leave her ill

husband, alleging that the illness is contagious or shameful. While she can decide for

herself how to act, the author must nevertheless be humane from head to toe.”312 Taken together, these statements group affectionate treatment and being a humanitarian on one end of a continuum and the dismissal of a character on the other. Shavrova’s characterization of a syphilitic is akin to the hypothetical wife who runs away from her

310 S [syphilis – A.A.] есть не порок, не продукт злой воли, а болезнь, и больные S также нуждаются в теплом, сердечном уходе (Pis’ma 6:30). 311 I explain my translation of сердечцность as affection below. 312 Нехорошо, если жена бежит от больного мужа, ссылаясь на то, что болезнь заразная или скверная. Она, впрочем, может относиться к S, как ей угодно, но автор должен быть гуманен до кончика ногтей (Pis’ma 6:30).

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syphilitic husband. Shavrova “runs away” from the character by allowing a physical

illness and its implications to define him in toto, which obscures his individuality and

humanity. Inversely, not running away entails a commitment to portraying the whole

truth of the character. To be a human is to be an individual rather than simply a collection

of categorical markers. Affection as an artistic principle entails a full exploration of the

character with a full recognition of the character’s humanity, that is to say with an appreciation for the complexity and nuance of every individual.

My understanding of affection (and in fact my decision to translate serdechnost’ as

affection) draws, somewhat unexpectedly, on Wendell Berry’s work as a cultural critic

and environmental activist. While Berry is focused on the role of affection in contributing

to one’s perspective and valuation of place, his insights are equally applicable to the

creation of an affective perspective in relation to other people. Affection, in his

formulation, is a way of perceiving and behaving that focuses on each manifestation of

the natural world as unique. Such a view runs counter to a categorical perspective, as

Berry notes.

Affection requires us to break out of the abstractions, the categories and confront the creature itself in its life in its place…For things cannot survive as categories but only as individual creatures living uniquely where they live.313

Berry’s reference to survival in the above quote is relevant to “The Grasshopper.”

Survival entails the continued existence of an entity. As previously mentioned, Dymov’s existence is questioned and negated in the text. Olga’s initial protestation that “there is

something about him” introduces the alternative possibility that there is “nothing” to him,

which is to say that in a meaningful sense he “isn’t.” Through this statement Olga

313 Berry 41.

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demonstrates that she is torn between a categorical perspective and an affective one in relation to her husband. He has a meaningful existence to her personally but she is unable to justify this meaningful existence when placed within the extraordinary/ordinary categorical perspective, in which only the extraordinary holds ontological value.

Therefore, she maintains that there is “something” to him but she is not able to say what

because his significance to her (as Dymov, a unique person) does not have a correlate in

the artists’ categorical perspective.

What undergirds Olga’s connection to Dymov? The answer to this lies in the pre-

history of the story. In the opening scene, at their wedding, Olga provides a fuller

explanation to one of the artists as to why she married Dymov.

I must tell you, my father and Dymov worked in the same hospital. When poor father fell ill Dymov watched by his bedside day and night. Such self- sacrifice!...Such self-sacrifice, such sincere sympathy.314

Olga is drawn to Dymov because he cared for her father. It is worth noting that a misguided notion of extraordinariness does not appear as a factor in Dymov's devotion to

Olga's father. Instead, acting according to an affective perspective, Dymov takes care of him as a friend. Olga's initial conception of Dymov is outside the categorical distinction

of ordinary and extraordinary. It is guided by affection, first for her father and second in

response to the concern Dymov displays on behalf of her father.

Olga is touched by Dymov’s self-sacrifice on her father’s account, not because her

father was an extraordinary man or an extraordinary father but because he was her father,

a unique and irreplaceable entity. Affection establishes a personal connection, between

Olga and her father, between Dymov and her father, and between Olga and Dymov. Yet

314 Надо вам сказать, что отец служил вместе с Дымовым в одной больнице. Когда бедняжка-отец заболел, то Дымов по целым дням и ночам дежурил около его постели. Столько самопожертвования!...Столько самопожертвования, искренно участия! (8:8).

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when placed within the artistic milieu of the story, an affective perspective is

insubstantial. Therefore, Olga tries to translate her connection to Dymov into terms the

artists will understand. After describing the circumstances that brought them together, she

says the following to the artists: “There is something strong, something powerful,

bearish, about him, isn’t there, now? He’s three-quarter face to us now, the light’s all

wrong, but when he turns full face just have a look at his forehead.”315 From the context

it is apparent that Olga thinks Dymov’s forehead will impress the artists. This is a nod to

physiognomy, which, as discussed in Chapter One, is a categorical approach to understanding people.

Olga’s steady replacement of one person of renown with another indicates a lack of affection, as does Riabovsky’s rotation of lovers/muses. Berry writes, “Nothing insists that one place is not interchangeable with another except affection.”316 The argument also

applies to people. Recall that this tendency of Olga’s elicits authorial judgment. Olga and

Riabovsky are missing affection, which is a key component of an artistic perspective, and

Chekhov criticizes them for it.

It is worth noting that affection, as I am presenting it within the context of Chekhov’s

works, doesn’t mean only presenting the character in a positive light. Instead it means

being committed and true to the complexity of the character, portraying the truth of the

character as faithfully and completely as possible. To put it in the terms of the May 10,

1886 writing advice to Alexander, affection (point six) consists of fleeing the template

(point five) in order to create truthful descriptions of persons (point three).

315 Не правда ли, в нем есть что-то сильное, могучее, медвежье? Теперь его лицо обращено к нам в три четверти, плохо освещено, но когда он обернется, вы посмотрите на него лоб (8:8-9). 316 Berry 43.

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3.4. The Makings of an Artistic Perspective (III): Temporal Specificity and Sensory Experience

Prior to her first kiss with Riabovsky, Olga’s thoughts proceed as follows:

The turquoise water, which was like nothing she had ever before seen, the sky, the banks, the black shadows, and the unaccountable joy filling her soul, all told her that she would one day be a great artist, and that somewhere, beyond the distance, beyond the moonlit night, in infinite space, there awaited her success, glory, the love of the people…When she gazed long and unblinkingly into the distance she seemed to see crowds, lights, the sounds of solemn music, cries of enthusiasm…317

In analyzing this passage it is once again worth mentioning the principle of irony operating in the text, according to which we can arrive at affirmative statements from the critique of their opposite. Olga’s concept of greatness emerges from the matrix of her categorical perspective. So this imagined future greatness is implicated in the authorial critique of her categorical division of the world. In other words, this vision is untrue and dishonest. It has no basis in the actual circumstances of her life. One of the most striking features of her way of seeing in this excerpt is that it is temporally nonspecific (she gazed long and unblinkingly). Moreover, this way of seeing results in a vision of the future that is geographically indistinct (somewhere, beyond the distance...in infinite space).

“House with a Mezzanine: An Artist’s Story” provides a more sustained meditation on temporal and geographic specificity as an aspect of artistic vision. Recall that the first- person narrator of the story is a landscape artist. What does the artist-narrator attend to in this tale of the house with a mezzanine and its environs? From the outset, references to light abound.

317 Бирюзовый цвет воды, какого она раньше никогда не видала, небо, берега, черные тени и безотчетная радость, наполнявшая ее душу, говорили ей, что из нее выйдет великая художница и что где-то там за далью, за лунной ночью, в бесконечном пространстве ожидают ее успех, слава, любовь народа...Когда она, не мигая, долго смотрела вдаль, ей чудились толпы людей, огни, торжественные звуки музыки, крики восторга...(8:15).

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Once as I was making my way back home, I happened to stray onto an unfamiliar estate. The sun was already dipping below the horizon and evening shadows stretched across the flowering rye…It was quiet, dark, and only somewhere high in the treetops did the golden light quiver and shimmer like a rainbow in the spider webs. The strong smell of pine needles was almost suffocating….last year’s leaves plaintively rustled underfoot and shadows stole among the trees in the dusk.318 (Italics mine.)

Attention to light is woven throughout the story, and references to it parallel the artist’s

relationship with the inhabitants of the house with a mezzanine. For example, in the

opening scene quoted above, the scene is barely illuminated. Throughout the course of

section I the artist-narrator first glimpses, then learns about, and finally meets the

Volchaninov family, who live in the house with a mezzanine. The partial illumination of

the estate complements his initial introduction to the Volchaninovs, at which point they

are still relatively unknown to him.

In comparison, the first line of section II reads, “I became a frequent visitor at the

Volchaninovs.”319 In accordance with this familiarity the references to light are ones of

full illumination.

…the green garden, still damp with the dew, shines in the sun…320

At that moment Lida had just returned from somewhere and, standing near the porch holding a whip, graceful and pretty, illuminated by the sun…321

The conflict between the artist-narrator and Lida then culminates in section III. Tellingly,

it does not include any references to light. Their connection has “gone dark.”

318 Однажды, возвращаясь домой, я нечаянно забрел в какую-то незнакомую усадьбу. Солнце уже пряталось, и на цветущей ржи растянулись вечерние тени....Было тихо, темно, и только высоко на вершинах кое-где дрожал яркий золотой свет и переливал радугой в сетях паука. Сильно до духоты пахло хвоем...прошлогодняя листва шелестела под ногами, и в сумерках между деревьями прятались тени (9:174). 319 Я стал быть у Волчаниновых (9:178). 320 …зеленый сад, еще влажный от росы, весь сияет от солнца...(9:179). 321 В это время Лида только что вернулась откуда-то и, стоя около крыльца с хлыстом в руках, стройная, красивая, освещенная солнцем...(9:180).

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Subsequently, once the relationship between the artist-narrator and the Volchaninovs

has been irreparably damaged, the references to dim light and falling stars in the final

section (IV) also reflect this state of affairs. The section begins, “Outside it was

quiet…there was not a single light to be seen, only the soft glimmer of the stars’ pale

reflection on the pond.”322 As the artist-narrator is walking alongside Misius “…the

moon, obscured by a crimson cloud, was rising and just barely lit the path and dark fields of winter crops on either side. There were a great many shooting stars.”323 The artist- narrator’s final glimpse of Misius is also significant. First she is veiled and then she is no longer visible. After parting with her for the night (and forever, as it turns out) he slowly turns back to the house.

I stood for a moment deep in thought and then made my way back so that I could have another look at the house where she lived; the dear, naïve old house seemed to be watching me with its mezzanine windows as though they were eyes, understanding everything…In the windows of the mezzanine, where Misius had her room, a bright light flashed, followed by a cozy green – the lamp had been covered with a shade. Shadows began to move about… About an hour passed. The green light went out and the shadows could no longer be seen.324

The invocation of light in this story is often precise (lengthening shadows, the glow of

a cross from the setting sun, falling stars), indicating temporal specificity. The artist-

narrator’s description of light doesn’t simply provide background as with a stage set (i.e.

322 На дворе было тихо...не было видно ни одного огонька, и только на пруде едва светились бледные отражения звезд (9:187). 323 …покрытая багровым облаком, восходила луна и еле-еле освещала дорогу и по сторонам ее темные озимые поля. Часто падали звезды (9:188). 324 Я постоял немного в раздумье и тихо поплелся назад, чтобы еще взглянуть на дом, в котором она жила, милый, наивный, старый дом, который казалось, окнами своего мезонина глядел на меня, как глазами, и понимал всë...В окнах мезонина, в котором жила Мисюсь, блеснул яркий свет, потом покойный зеленый – это лампу накрыли абажуром. Задвигались тени... Прошло около часа. Зеленый огонь погас, и не стало видно теней (9:189).

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the sun is shining). Instead, it places the characters and the reader within a specific

moment and place, such as shimmering gold light casting a rainbow on a spider web.

This specificity of time and space is characteristic of Chekhov’s work and the

employment of light in this story recalls the French Impressionists’ privileging of light in

their work, an area of overlap that deserves further consideration. While it is a scholarly

commonplace to refer to Chekhov’s work as impressionistic, the term is often used

indiscriminately.325 Nonetheless, there is an impressionistic quality to Chekhov’s work,

the analysis of which highlights temporal and sensory specificity as key components of

his artistic practice.

I am not suggesting that the French impressionists directly influenced Chekhov.

Rather, I posit comparable elements in each that further our understanding of his

aesthetics. John House’s study, Impressionism: Paint and Politics, informs my

understanding of this trend in visual art. Especially striking is the similarity between

Chekhov and Édouard Manet (1832-1883), a French painter associated with

Impressionism. A contemporary critic wrote of Manet, “His present vice is a sort of

pantheism that places no higher value on a head than on a slipper…which paints

everything almost uniformly.”326 This is similar to the complaint Mikhailovskii leveled

325 There have been several attempts to systematically and analytically consider what it might mean to refer to Chekhov’s works in terms of impressionism. These include the following: Charanne Carroll Clarke, “Aspects of Impressionism in Chekhov’s Prose,” Chekhov’s Art of Writing: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Paul Debreczeny and Thomas Eekman (Slavica, 1977); Paul Debreczny, “Chekhov’s Use of Impressionism in The House with a Mansard,” Russian Narrative & Visual Art: Varieties of Seeing, edited by Roger B. Anderson and Paul Debreczny (University Press of Florida, 1994); Thomas Eekman, “Chekhov – An Impressionist?” Russian Literature 15.2 (1984) 203-22; Nadezhda Katyk-Lewis, “Sketch as Impressionist Technique in the Prose of Cechov” Russian Literature 48.4 (2000) 367-88; Savely Senderovich, “Chekhov and Impressionism: An Attempt at a Systematic Approach to the Problem,” Chekhov’s Art of Writing: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Paul Debreczeny and Thomas Eekman (Slavica, 1977); and Peter H. Stowell, Literary Impressionism: James and Chekhov (University of Georgia Press, 1980). 326 John House, Impressionism: Paint and Politics (Yale UP, 2004) 24.

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against Chekhov (also mentioned in the Introduction), “To Chekhov it’s all the same: a

man, or just his shadow, a little bell, or a suicide.”327

Both artists created works that offended contemporary, conventional sensibilities and

they did so in similar ways, by unsettling established norms that implicated an easily

identifiable value system. The label ‘impressionist’ was applied to this set of painters,

according to House, “because their vision depended on sensory experience alone.”328 As such, their notion of vision was one that renounced “the authority of prior abstract knowledge.”329 This is manifest in the Impressionists’ distinctive application of paint on

the canvas, a prevalent feature of which was the tache, “the distinct coloured touch or

mark.”330 This was an important break from conventional form. As House explains,

academic theory prior to the Impressionists prioritized line over color as “a visible

realisation of the superiority of abstract ideas over sensory experience.”331 The

Impressionists’ technique, in which the tache dominated over line, directly challenged

traditional practice, re-calibrating the importance of abstract thought and rationality as a

mode of engagement with the world. Through their artistic method they diminished

abstract thought, elevating sensory experience instead.

In Chekhov’s narrative world, too, sensory experience commands a dominant position.

True, this is manifested differently in Chekhov’s work than in painting. As a rationally

mediated sign system, literature is, after all, located at a greater remove from pure

sensory experience. Rather than directly impacting the senses, literature refers to sensory

327 See footnote 4. Quote from Cathy Popkin, The Pragmatics of Insignificance: Chekhov, Zoschchenko, Gogol (Stanford UP, 1993) 20. 328 House 2. 329 House 2. 330 House 145 331 House 146.

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experience. Such references abound in Chekhov’s works. Take, for example, the excerpt

from section I of “House with a Mezzanine,” quoted above. In addition to the references to light, the passage invokes smell (strong smell of conifers) and sound (rustling leaves; birdsong).332

Why does Chekhov include references to sensory experience? If the goal is to

transpose the experience from a sensory mode to a verbal one, the task is futile. Nor is

there any indication that Chekhov was operating according to a theoretical interest in the

“sister arts.” Another potential claim is that such references establish the narrative world

as realistic, but that does not fully account for their significance or their impact in the

narrative. I maintain that Chekhov includes them as a way to model an awareness and appreciation of the present moment.333 To be attentive to one’s sensory experience is to

necessarily be attuned to the present moment.334 In this regard, too, the French

Impressionists’ practice is pertinent. Speaking of the artistic method employed during the

early phases of Impressionism, House writes, “The effect is one of specificity, precision

even, as if the artist is insisting ‘I was there, at that moment, and it looked just like

that’.”335

332 The passage continues, “Направо, в старом фруктовом саду, нехотя, слабым голосом пела изволга, должно быть, тоже старушка” / “On the right, in an old fruit garden, an oriole sang inadvertently, with a weak voice. It seems that it, too, was old.” 333 This claim assumes that sensory perception is malleable and impacted by attentiveness. The following New York Times article provides support for such an assumption: T. M. Luhrmann, “Can’t Place That Smell? You Must Be American,” The New York Times, 5 Sep. 2014, www.nytimes.com/2014/09/07/opinion/sunday/how-culture-shapes-our- senses.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=1. Accessed 13 Dec. 2016. 334 A memory of a sense experience, which can be accessed at various points in time, is distinct from the experience itself. 335 House 150. This understanding of Impressionism as a practice directed towards precise, distinct images (however temporary) is not uniform. For example, Nadezhda Katyk-Lewis defines Impressionism, and Chekhov’s affinity with it, in terms of vagueness. Katyk-Lewis and I cover some of the same conceptual ground, including the painting technique of the Impressionists and Chekhov’s interest in fleeting moments, but we diverge in our overall conclusions vis-à-vis Chekhov’s artistic practice.

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The temporal specificity of “House with a Mezzanine” comes into greater relief when

compared to its opposite, routine time. The latter characterizes Olga in “The

Grasshopper.”

Olga Ivanovna got up around eleven every day…336

After dinner Olga Ivanovna paid calls, then she went to the theatre or a concert, and did not get home until after midnight. And this went on every day.337

She woke up every morning in the worst possible spirits…338

Once she said to Riabovsky of her husband: “That man oppresses me with his magnanimity.” This phrase pleased her so much that upon meeting any of the artists who know about her affair with Riabovsky, every time she would mention her husband, saying, with a powerful gesture: “That man oppresses me with his magnanimity.”339

Their routine of life went on just the same as the preceding year.340

(Italics mine throughout.)

The degree to which Olga’s activities and experience of time are routinized is unusual

and encourages the reader to regard this as a quality of her character. As previously

mentioned, throughout much of the text, the narrative is filtered through her

consciousness. The quotes above are examples of this narratological structure. In these

examples her days are presented as non-specific and undifferentiated. Did she really do the same exact things at the same exact time day after day? This is unlikely. It is more

336 Ежедневно, вставши с постели часов в одиннадцать...(8:9). 337 После обеда Ольга Ивановна ехала к знакомым, потом в театр или на концерт и возвращалась домой после полуночи. Так каждый день (8:11). 338 Каждое утро она просыпалась в самом дурном настроении…(8:22). 339 Однажды она сказала Рябовскому про мужа: - Этот человек гнетет меня своим великодушием! Эта фраза ей так понравилась, что, встречаясь с художниками, которые знали об ее романе с Рябовским, она всякий раз говорила про мужа, делая эенергический жест рукой: - Этот человек гнетет меня своим великодушием! (8:23). 340 Порядок жизни был такой же, как в прошлом году. (8:23).

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likely that it simply seemed that way to her because she did not have the appropriate

vision to differentiate her days. This provides further confirmation that Olga Ivanovna is

no artist.

In the fourth excerpt quoted above, she turns a singular event into a generalized

occurrence. The directionality is from singularity/specificity (odnazhdy) to generality

(vsiakii raz). Chekhov as author, on the other hand, moves from generality to specificity

in the act of storytelling. Consider the description of Olga’s actions in section VI as she

feels unappreciated and overlooked in her relationship with Riabovsky (the first line of

which is also quoted above).

She woke up every morning in the worst possible spirits, to the thought that she no longer loved Riabovsky, and that it was all over between them, thank God. But after she had had a cup of coffee she would remind herself that Riabovsky had robbed her of her husband and that she was now left without a husband, and without Riabovsky. Then she would remember that her friends were speaking of some marvelous picture Riabovsky was finishing for a show…She remembered, moreover, that the last time he had come to see her he had worn a gray coat with silvery threads in it and a new tie…341

The narrative begins with generality, but in the telling of the story Chekhov moves

towards specificity.

The mature Chekhov excels at the presentation of sensory experience. Take, for

example, “The Bishop,” analyzed from a different perspective in Chapter Two. As a story

about the last week of a bishop’s life, we might reasonably expect a story built around a

philosophical meditation on the meaning of life. Instead the story luxuriates in the

sensory experience of the bishop, beginning with his indistinct, blurred vision of the

341 Каждое утро она просыпалась в самом дурном настроении и с мыслью, что она Рябовского уже не любит и что, слава богу, всë уже закончено. Но, напившись кофе, она соображала, что Рябовский отнял у нее мужа и что теперь она осталась без мужа и без Рябовского; потом она вспоминала разгоровы своих знакомых о том, что Рабовский готовит к выставке нечто поразительное...И вспоминала она также, что в последний раз он приходил к ней в каком-то сером сюртучке с искрами и в новом галстуке...(8:22).

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congregants as an indication that he is unwell. Death pares down life to its most essential

elements. In relation to the bishop we are left with his memories and his lived (often

sensory) experience during that final week.

This appreciation of sensory experience is arguably a way in which the Orthodox

Church resonates in Chekhov’s work. While Chekhov does not espouse its tenets, he

maintains a profound sensitivity to the material forms of the church. We see this in the

haunting image of smoke rising from the incense in “Requiem.”342 We also see it in the

many church bells that ring across the whole of his work. Chekhov is reported to have

told Alexander Vishnevsky, “The Church bells of Easter Sunday are all that I have left of

religion.”343 He never made a clean break from those bells, in writing or in life.344 As

Donald Rayfield writes, “During his adult life, right up until his death, Anton would

rarely spend an Easter night in bed; instead he would wander the streets, listening to the

church bells.”345

Chekhov’s impressionism is not just visual. It encompasses all of the senses. There are

many examples from his work that illustrate this point. The one below is from the story

“The Kiss,” which places physical sensation at the center of the story. While attending a

party with his military brigade, the main character (Riabovich) receives an unexpected

kiss on the cheek, in the dark, from an unidentified woman. The sensation of the kiss lingers “on his left cheek near his moustache, where the unknown lady had kissed him

342 Smoke is also related to death in “The Grashopper.” Dymov’s surname comes from the Russian word for smoke, дым (dym). 343 Rayfield Anton Chekhov: A Life 14. 344 There are five references to church bells ringing in “The Bishop” (“Arkhierei”) the next to last story Chekhov published. 345 Rayfield Anton Chekhov: A Life 13.

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there was a slight tingling, a delightful chill, as from peppermint drops…”346 Prior to this encounter, the narrator describes the scene with references to sound, smell, and the body's

physiological response to alcohol.

Someone began to play the piano; the melancholy strains of a waltz floated out through the wide-open windows...They all became aware of the fragrance of young poplar leaves, of roses, and lilacs. Under the influence of the music, Ryabovich began to feel the brandy he had drunk...347

As far as we can speak of it, the meaning of life according to Chekhov is found in the living of it, which is a matter of one’s physical experience in the present moment. One of his early critics commented that his stories are like taking a walk.348 This comment was

meant as a disparaging critique. Nonetheless it is partially accurate. As with a walk, it is

difficult to determine the meaning of Chekhov’s works even as there is much that is

meaningful in them. Chekhov’s artistic practice provides an indirect argument for the

value of paying attention to the world around you as you access it through the most

immediate means available, the senses. I suspect this is one of the reasons Chekhov was

drawn to the theater, since it is more of an immersive sensory experience than literature.

His work has an effect that often outpaces any explanation the reader can provide for it.

There is an immediacy to his work that results, in part, from his privileging sensory

experience over abstract thought.349

This interest in specificity is also present on the structural level in Chekhov’s work.

For example, each of the eight sections in “The Grasshopper” recounts, for the most part,

346 на щеке около левого уса, куда поцеловала незнакомка, дрожал легкий приятный холодок, как от мятных капель…(6:412). 347 Загремел рояль; грустный вальс из залы полетел в настежь открытые окна...Все почувствовали, что в воздухе пахнет молодой листвой тополя, розами, и сиренью. Рябович, в котором под влиянием музыки заговорил выпитый коньяк...(6:410). 348 See footnote 6. 349 The free indirect discourse of Chekhov’s mature period is another element that contributes to immediacy in his work.

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a discrete event.350 They join together to make a whole that is bigger than the parts even as the parts remain distinct. Nils Nilsson refers to this structure, in which the accumulation of scenes over time coalesce into a larger narrative scheme, as a “bloc technique.”351 Here, too, the idea of the tache resonates. Each scene is deliberate and

attended to in its own right, but a more comprehensive picture emerges when the reader

steps back and views their interaction. The principle of particularity within a formulaic

framework, which informs the complicated type, is also present in the structure of the story. The first half, consisting of the first four sections, is a mirror image to the second half, consisting of the final four sections.352

To return to “House with a Mezzanine,” as already mentioned the artist-narrator in the

story sees the eponymous house and its environs through the evocation of light.

Overlayed onto this is the ideological clash between the artist-narrator and Lida. Scholars have mostly been interested in parsing Chekhov’s authorial point of view as regards the

content of the clash. This is a difficult and ultimately unfruitful task. It is more

instructive, then, to view this clash in accordance with what occasions it, Lida and the

artist-narrator’s recourse to categorical perspectives vis-à-vis one another.

Recall that the artist-narrator is a landscape artist. As such he excels in seeing.

However, his vision is more problematic when it comes to the way he sees the other characters. In his interaction with the Volchaninovs the artist-narrator sees and acts in accordance with the way he is seen. From the outset, the sisters see the artist-narrator

350 Sections II and VI veer into generality but both still contain specific events that stand out: Dymov becoming ill for a week and his close encounter with blood poisoning in section II, and his attempt to reconcile with Olga after his dissertation defense in section VI. 351 Nils Ake Nilsson, Studies in Cechov’s Narrative Technique: ‘The Steppe’ and ‘The Bishop’ (Universitetet, 1968) 63-4. Nilsson is specifically referring to “The Bishop,” but he presents this technique as applicable to Chekhov’s work more broadly. 352 I am grateful to Ralph Lindheim for this insight.

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differently. Of Lida (whose name he doesn’t yet know) he states, “One of them…scarcely

bothered to notice me.”353 Misius, on the other hand, “with large eyes, looked at me in

surprise.”354 Throughout the text the artist-narrator highlights the fact that Lida does not

attend to him, either by overlooking him (as in the previous quote) or seeing him within a

categorical framework, as for example her perception of him as a “landscape artist” who

fails to provide an ideological argument on the peasantry in his work. Consequently, he

views her as a narrow-minded ideologue. “Lida could only love a zemstvo deputy who

gets as carried away with hospitals and schools as she does…”355

The clash between the two is less about the content of their respective arguments and

more about the fact that they see each other as categories of people rather than specific

ones. More to the point, the artist-narrator is agitated by the way Lida views him, in

response to which he sets himself firmly against Lida and in the process his own vision,

heretofore governed by specificity through the evocation of light, goes dark. As

previously stated, there is no mention of light in this section. So the artist-narrator is in

his element and seeing “rightly” when it comes to descriptions of the landscape broadly

conceived (the environment as well the people within the scene) but this way of seeing is

interrupted and derailed during his stand-off with Lida. While the argument between the

artist-narrator and Lida is an important plot point, the artistry of the text is in the

descriptions of the house with a mezzanine, including its inhabitants. The narrator-artist

succeeds in seeing artistically in his capacity as a narrator even though he fails to see

properly in relation to Lida.

353 Одна...на меня едва обратила внимание (9:175). 354 с большими глазами, с удивлением посмотрела на меня (9:175). 355 Лида может полюбить только земца, увлеченного так же, как она, больницами и школами...(9:183).

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3.5. The Makings of an Artistic Perspective (IV): Indeterminacy

An aura of indefiniteness pervades Chekhov's final published work in prose, “The

Fiancée.” This indefiniteness is imparted through various means: grammatical (the

pervasive use of the indefinite particle –to), characterological (the character of Sasha),

and titular (the concept of nevesta, fiancée). To begin with, the text is saturated with

instances of the indefinite particle –to.356 Moreover, it is front-loaded in this regard, with

seven instances occuring on the first page. The effect is an increased attention to the

concept of indeterminacy as it relates to the thematic and narrative structure of the text.

This indeterminacy is encoded in the character of Sasha, who is first introduced as kto-

to (someone). Several lines later we read that “For some reason [pochemu-to] he was

spoken about as a great artist…”357 The use of –to here indicates there is a reason, though

it either isn’t known or isn’t disclosed. The reader is left to ponder it. I propose it is a

result of his role as an agent of instability. An additional factor related to his

indeterminacy in the text is the fact that he is dying.358 He is in-between life and death

and eventually dies.

There is no indication that Sasha is engaged in the creation of art. I suggest, instead,

that his artistry is expressed in his role as a catalyst in shifting Nadia’s way of seeing

from a static/closed/categorical vision of life to a dynamic/open one. Further support for

this is present in the motif of eyes in the text. Sasha’s “big eyes” are a notable and

356 “The Fiancée” includes 39 instances of –то and is approximately 5,625 words. For a point of comparison, “House with a Mezzanine: An Artist’s Story” includes 21 instances of –то and is approximately 5,609 words. 357 Почему-то про него говорили, что он прекрасный художник...(10:203). 358 Sasha has tuberculosis. While Sasha is far from an autobiographical cameo of Chekhov, it is not insignificant that Sasha dies of the very illness that was actively plaguing Chekhov (and which led to his death the following year).

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distinctive trait. In contrast to him is Nadia’s mother. When Nadia admits that she has

been depressed, her mother says, “But when I can’t sleep, I close my eyes really, really

tight…”359 Sasha and Nadia’s mother are also set in opposition through his protestations

against the status quo, which she maintains. Initially Nadia falls in line with her mother’s

example. When Sasha begins to preach his familiar message in opposition to the status

quo, Nadia sits silently, “with her eyes closed.”360 Yet, Sasha’s protestations eventually unsettle her and impact her own vision of herself and her future. She reports, “My eyes

have been opened, I see everything now.”361 Her new way of seeing causes her to leave

her provincial hometown and study in St. Petersburg.

There is another so-called artist in the story (Andrei Andreich, Nadia’s fiancé) who is also set in contrast to Sasha.362 Andrei Andreich, like Nadia’s mother, represents the

status quo, against which Sasha rebels and from which Nadia flees. To evaluate Sasha’s

role in Nadia’s life, and in the text, we must first recognize the problematic nature of the

status quo. Nadia has dreamed of marriage since the age of 16 and, at 23, she is now engaged, yet “there was no joy.”363 Something is amiss. The problem lies in the life she is

about to enter into. More specifically, the problem is in the stasis, or prescribed nature, of

this life: “And for some reason it seemed that life would just go on and on this way

forever from now on, without change, without end!”364 (This provides another example of

routine time.)

359 А когда я не сплю по ночам, то закрываю глаза крепко-крепко...(10:207). 360 закрыв глаза (10:208). 361 У меня открылись глаза, я теперь всë вижу (10:213). 362 Regarding Andrei, the text states, “полный и красивый, с вьющимися волосами, похожий на артиста или художника” / “full-bodied and beautiful, with curly hair, resembling an artist” (10:204). 363 радости не было (10:202). 364 И почему-то казалось, что так теперь будет всю жизнь, без перемены, без конца! (10:202).

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By means of his name Andrei Andreich exemplifies this (potentially) endless

repetition. The art that Andrei chose for their apartment is also telling. First, there is a

large photograph of Andrei’s father replete with indicators of his social position.

Photography signals reproducibility here.365 Second, a large painting of a naked woman

holding a broken vase is hanging on the wall. Andrei is particularly pleased with the

painting while Nadia is disturbed by it. Its gilded frame is a metaphoric representation of

her felt sense of confinement, and the naked woman recalls her submissive position as an

object within a life she doesn’t want rather than as an active agent.

Both Andrei Andreich and Nadia’s mother live in accordance with fixed patterns.

Sasha is an agent of instability in this life, heralding a different, less determined path.

Significantly, it is only when Nadia herself steps into an indefinite status, as a fiancée

(nevesta), that she is responsive to Sasha’s alternate vision. He has been saying the same

thing to her for years without effect. To be a ‘nevesta' is to be in an officially

indeterminate position between single and married. Related to this point, Fasmer lists

‘neizvestnaia’ (unknown) as a possible etymological root of 'nevesta' since the status of

the betrothed is undefined or unknown.366 While in this state Nadia is at a remove from

the fixed provincial life she was in before and that she is heading towards in the future.

She is now able to assess it because, for the time being, she is outside of it. In evaluating

this life from a remove, she finds it wanting. So she chooses to flee it. The neighborhood

365 Stephen Hutchings focuses more on Chekhov’s view of photography as transient when he claims a general aversion to photography on Chekhov’s part, in keeping with Benjamin’s disparaging formulation of “the copy” (or photograph in Chekhov’s case) as transient and reproducible. My reading of “The Fiancée” diverges from Hutchings, but I maintain his connection between photography and reproducibility. Stephen Hutchings, Russian Literary Culture in the Camera Age: The Word as Image (RoutledgeCurzon, 2004) 44- 47. 366 Fasmer “neizvestnaia.”

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boys call out to her – “Fiancée! There’s the fiancée!”367 – long after she has broken off

her engagement with Andrei and is no longer technically a fiancée. Still the designation

fits. By fleeing she has chosen to open her life to the unknown and, consequently, to

extend her indefinite status into the future.

A central interpretive question in “The Fiancée” is how to understand the final line of

the story, which is, perhaps not inconsequentially, Chekhov’s final published line of

prose.

She went upstairs to pack, and the next morning she said her farewells and alive, happy, left the town behind – as she thought, forever.368

How far does the “gently ironical qualification”369 of “as she thought” (kak polagala)

extend, and might it signal anything other than a sarcastic quip regarding the inaccuracy

of Nadia's presumptions regarding the future? As to the first part of this question, Robert

Louis Jackson conceives of this final pronouncement in the story as causing “distress” to those who would interpret Nadia as a “positive heroine marching off to a bright future.”370 He also sees it as indication that Nadia has exchanged one misguided set of

illusions for another. This is a corrective to interpretations of the story that read Nadia as

a model heroine. Jackson’s analysis of Nadia is part of his attempt to identify the

authorial perspective on Nadia’s and Sasha’s visions of life, neither of which, according

to Jackson, the author endorses.

367 невеста! невеста! (10:219). 368 Она пошла к себе наверх укладываться, а на другой день утром простилась с своими и, живая, веселая покинула город – как полагала, навсегда (10:220). 369 Jackson “The Betrothed” 57. 370 Jackson “The Betrothed” 51.

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Sasha is, in Jackson’s words, an “impotent prophet of change.”371 My interpretation,

however, diverges from this complete dismissal of the character, who does change Nadia.

He is instrumental in propelling her out of a static, fixed life into a dynamic one. Nadia’s

current conception of the future may be misguided, but that is less important than the fact that her life is on an open rather than closed trajectory. After all, as long as one is moving

“along the spiral path of experience and knowledge,”372 which Jackson contends is true of

Nadia, then the potential for a different, more accurate perception of the world still exists.

Instability and indeterminacy are integral components of dynamic movement. Such

movement, as opposed to stasis, brings with it the possibility of something new and

unforeseen. That is the hope that Nadia and her status as a “fiancée…forever”373 impart

to the story.374

Nadia’s progress in life is helical, not linear, and should be assessed accordingly.

Jackson recognizes this non-linear movement of Nadia’s life. “Nadya is anything but a

person without illusions at the beginning of the story, and she is full of them at the end,

even though the order of illusions has changed and we find her, in the spiral movement of

her life, at a more advanced stage of her journey.”375 She has not simply replaced one set

of illusions for another. Granted, she is still full of illusions, but she is on a path that takes

her closer to what is true. As an example, consider the ease with which she is able to see

Sasha from a more realistic vantage point after studying in Petersburg.

371 Jackson “The Betrothed” 58. 372 Jackson “The Betrothed” 60. 373 Невеста....навсегда (10:202,220). 374 Nadia is a diminutive form of Nadezhda, which means hope. I owe Jackson (“The Betrothed”) the insight of collapsing the story between the first and last words into an ellipsis (56). Jackson reads this as an indication of Nadezhda being “stuck” as a character in this endless loop, whereas I see it as opening into possibility, based on the interpretation of ‘nevesta’ as a space in-between that holds possibility. 375 Jackson “The Betrothed” 54.

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The concept of liminality as an artistic, creative space emerges from my analysis of this story. Nadia is able to create a less determined path in life because she was in an in- between space as a 'nevesta.' Moreover, instability and indeterminacy are companion concepts to liminality in the story. A 'nevesta' is one whose identity as a wife is projected but not yet certain. Her identity is indeterminate. It is also unstable. It depends on an impending marriage, the fulfillment of which will erase it. The ending of the story fits comfortably into the framework of instability and indeterminacy. The “as she thought” places a question mark at the end of the text (will she or won’t she be back to her hometown in the future?), thereby extending the indeterminacy of the fictional world to the formal plane of the text. Inconclusive endings are customary for Chekhov. This is because for him art is an agent of instability. It should challenge and destabilize the reader’s expectations and preconceived notions.

3.6. From Theory to Practice: “Lady with a Dog”

The elements of an artistic perspective outlined above (serdechnost’, temporal specificity, indeterminacy) are woven throughout Chekhov’s story “Lady with a Dog”

(“Dama s sobachkoi”) arguably his most well-known story. Analyzing it within the context of these elements is doubly fruitful, further illuminating them as well as providing insight into the story itself. There are three formal planes along which the aforementioned aspects of an artistic perspective unfold: character, plot, and setting. I will consider each in turn.

At the beginning of the story, Gurov and Anna (the two main characters) are cast in a categorical light as womanizer/misogynist and adulteress, respectively. They both become more individualized and more sympathetic by its end. The characterization of the

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lady with a dog has an inter-textual aspect in addition to a textual one. Even before she is

given a name (several pages into this short story), she is placed within a context of

adultery as a woman who “belonged to decent society, was married, in Yalta for the first

time, and alone…”376 Gurov is the focalizer of the story, so we can attribute this

description to him. This association (lady with a dog/adulteress) is furthered strengthened

once she is named, Anna Sergeevna. Her first name, of course, recalls another famous

Anna in Russian literature, Anna Karenina.377 Through Anna in “Lady with a Dog,”

Chekhov engages with the categorical tendency on the fictional level (Gurov’s

perspective vis-à-vis Anna) and the meta-fictional one (the reader’s expectations, which

are set by invoking Anna Karenina as an intertext).

Over the course of the story Gurov’s view of Anna evolves from a categorical to an

affectionate perspective. Initially nameless, Anna’s existence as a unique individual is

obscured by a string of general descriptions in section I. In the first paragraph alone she is

referred to in three ways, each of which is slightly more detailed than the last but all of

which are categorical: “new face; lady with a little dog”…”young woman, not very tall,

blond, in a beret.”378 The reader soon learns that Gurov groups all women into a single

category, “inferior race.”379

In section II, after Anna and Gurov consummate their affair, the characterization of

her gains a new categorical marker: “fallen woman.” The text reads that “…she sat

376 из порядочного общества, замужем, в Ялте в первый раз и одна...(10:129). 377 Tolstoy presents Anna Karenina as much more than a “sinful woman.” Yet the act of framing is relevant because it fixes a set identity. For further considerations of Anna Karenina as a sub-text for “Lady with a Dog” see Caryl Emerson, “Chekhov and the Annas,” Life and Text: Essays in Honour of Geir Kjetsaa on the Occasion of his 60th Birthday, edited by Erik Egeberg et. al. (Universitetet i Oslo, 1997) 121-32. Lyudmila Parts, “The Lady with a Dog: No More Illusions,” The Chekhovian Intertext: Dialogue with a Classic (Ohio State University Press, 2008). 378 новое лицо; дама с собачкой...молодая дама, невысокого роста блондинка, в берете (10:128). 379 низшая раса (10:128).

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pondering in a dejected pose, like the sinful woman in an old painting.”380 At this point in

the story the “fallen woman” is the dominant framework through which Gurov, as

focalizer, sees Anna. Importantly, the reference to painting highlights that it is a set

identity. As Parts writes, “Seeing Anna as a woman in a picture, Gurov frames Anna, just

as Tolstoy frames Anna Karenina, several times in the course of his novel.”381 The reader

is also encouraged to perceive Anna in this light, as a “fallen woman,” especially given

the resonance between this scene and its analogue in Anna Karenina.382 Such a view is

problematic. Parts notes, “Every description of Anna’s portraits in Tolstoy’s novel

represents someone’s vision of her, someone’s version of her essence. Gurov’s gaze too

denies Anna individuality and voice.”383 Yet the problem is not strictly that Gurov

perceives Anna but rather how he perceives her. Chekhov corrects Gurov’s categorical

perspective, which diminishes Anna’s “individuality and voice,” by supplanting it with

an affectionate one.

By the time that Gurov has settled back into life in Moscow, after parting ways with

Anna in Yalta, he has come to see her as just one more woman with whom he has had an

affair. This category, however, proves insufficient to contain her. She begins to inhabit

his mind and to become imaginatively intertwined with his everyday life. The apex of

this perspectival shift is marked as follows, when Gurov travels to the town where Anna

lives, in hopes of reconnecting with her.

380 …она задумалась в унылой позе, точно грешница на старинной картине (10:132). 381 Parts 145. 382 Parts notes several ways that the two texts are similar. Both seduction scenes occur “resolutely after the fact,” both women respond with self-recrimination, and both texts use the verb “cut” in reference to the actions of the male protagonists (Chekhov literalizes Tolstoy’s metaphoric use of the term). As Parts mentions, however, the men of the two stories respond differently, providing an early indication to Chekhov’s readers that his story is on a different trajectory (143-44). 383 Parts 144-45.

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She sat in the third row, and when Gurov looked at her, his heart was wrung, and he realized clearly that there was now no person closer, dearer, or more important for him in the whole world; this small woman, lost in the provincial crowd, not remarkable for anything, with a vulgar lorgnette in her hand, now filled his whole life, was his grief, his joy, the only happiness he now wished for himself; and to the sounds of the bad orchestra, with its trashy local violins, he thought how beautiful she was.384

This passage oscillates between the categorical and the affectionate. Categorically, there

is little to recommend Anna. There is nothing remarkable about her. Yet, she has become

an irreplaceable entity to Gurov. Since the reader’s perspective is dependent on Gurov’s,

the reader also comes to appreciate her as a unique entity rather than a derivative version

of Anna Karenina.

In addition, there is a change in Gurov’s characterization over the course of the story.

In the beginning the reader is introduced to him as someone who has been unfaithful to his wife frequently and for a long time. His misogyny is distancing and off-putting, as is his initial indifference to Anna’s suffering in their post-coital scene.

“It’s not good,” she said. “You’ll be the first not to respect me now.” There was a watermelon on the table in the hotel room. Gurov cut himself a slice and unhurriedly began to eat it. At least half an hour passed in silence.385

By the end of the story he has broken out of this familiar encasement to fall in love, truly,

for the first time in his life. In the final section the reader encounters him walking his

daughter to school, a scene which expands his characterization. So does the scene in the hotel room in Moscow that follows. Once again Anna is experiencing emotional distress,

384 Она села в третьем ряду, и когда Гуров взглянул на нее, то сердце у него сжалось, и он понял ясно, что для него теперь на всем свете нет ближе, дороже и важнее человека; она, затерявшаяся в провинциальной толпе, эта маленькая женщина, ничем не замечательная, с вульгарною лорнеткой в руках, наполняла теперь всю его жизнь, была его горем, радостью, единственным счастьем, какого он теперь желал для себя; и под звуки плохого оркестра, дрянных обывательских сприпок, он думал о том, как она хороша (10:139). 385 -- Нехорошо, -- сказала она. – Вы же первый меня не уважаете теперь. На столе в номере был арбуз. Гуров отрезал себе ломоть и стал есть не спеша. Прошло, по крайней мере, полчаса в молчании (10:132).

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but this time Gurov moves toward her in a gesture of patience and presence instead of indifference.

She could not speak because she was crying. She turned away from him and pressed a handkerchief to her eyes. “Well, let her cry a little, and meanwhile I’ll sit down,” he thought, and sat down in an armchair. Then he rang and ordered tea; and then, while he drank tea, she went on standing with her face turned to the window…386

In coming to see and relate to Anna through an affectionate perspective, Gurov also

receives a more favorable characterization.

Geographic and temporal markers indicate the specificity of Anna and Gurov’s

relationship as unique unto itself. The story is initially set in Yalta, which further

reinforces the conventional “adultery” script. It is appropriate there, expected even, for a

married man to become acquainted with a woman who is there without her husband and

without friends. “If she’s here with no husband or friends,” Gurov reflected, “it wouldn’t

be a bad idea to make her acquaintance.”387 Presumably, both Gurov and Anna are in

agreement on this point, “…it must have been the first time in her life that she was alone

in such a situation, when she was followed, looked at, and spoken to with only one secret

purpose, which she could not fail to guess.”388

386 Она не могла говорить, так как плакала. Отвернулась от него и прижала платок к глазам. Ну, пускай поплачет, а я пока посижу, -- подумал он и сел в кресло. Потом он позвонил и сказал, чтобы ему принесли чаю; и потом, когда пил чай, она всë стояла, отвернувшись к окну...(10:142). 387 Елси она здесь без мужа и без знакомых, – соображал Гуров, – то было бы не лишнее познакомиться с ней (10:128). 388 ...должно быть, это первый раз в жизни она была одна, в такой обстановке, когда за ней ходят и на нее смотрят, и говорят с ней только с одною тайною целью, о которой она не может не догадываться (10:130).

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As Anna sits in Yalta at a table beside Gurov, just before he first makes her

acquaintance, the setting provides the perfect backdrop for the romantic tales he distrusts

yet nonetheless recalls.

In the stories about the impurity of local morals there was much that was untrue, he despised them and knew that these stories were mostly invented by people who would have eagerly sinned themselves had they known how; but when the lady sat down at the next table, three steps away from him, he remembered those stories of easy conquests, of trips to the mountains, and the tempting thought of a quick fleeting liaison, a romance with an unknown woman, of whose very name you are ignorant, suddenly took possession of him.389

While in Yalta, Anna and Gurov’s relationship follows the script that accords with the

place. Theirs is a light affair in the sense that neither expects it to survive the end of their summer holiday. When they part, Anna assures Gurov that it is forever and upon returning to Moscow Gurov assumes that Anna will predictably fade into nothing more than a memory: “A month would pass and Anna Sergeyevna, as it seemed to him, would be covered by mist in his memory and would only appear to him in dreams with a touching smile, as other women did.”390

But while the beginning of their love affair proceeds in accordance with the location,

it does not continue as such. Rather than fade from view, Anna’s image becomes more

prominent once Gurov resumes his life in Moscow. When the two reconnect and solidify

their relationship it does not jibe with the setting, first in the midst of a sub-par theater in

a provincial town and then in secret in Moscow. As the setting becomes more confined,

their love becomes more authentic and expansive. This uneasy pairing between the locale

389 В рассказах о нечистоте местных нравов много неправды, он презирал их и знал, что такие рассказы в большинстве сочиняются людьми, которые сами бы охотно грешили, если б умели, но, когда дама села за соседний стол в трех шагах от него, ему вспомнились эти рассказы о легких победах, о поездках в горы, и соблазнительная мысль о скорой, мимолетной связи, о романе с неизвестною женщиной, которой не знаешь по имени и фамилии, вдруг овладела им (10:129). 390 Пройдет какой-нибудь месяц, и Анна Сергеевна, казалось ему, покроется в памяти туманом и только изредка будет сниться с трогательной улыбкой, как снились другие (10:136).

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and the nature of the relationship signals that their relationship is a departure from the

conventional Yalta love affair. They find love in their own place and at their own time.

An indication of the temporal specificity of their relationship occurs in section IV

when Gurov is caught off guard by his reflection in the mirror. He has aged and gone

gray. Yet that is not all that has changed: “And only now, when his head was gray, had he really fallen in love as one ought to – for the first time in his life.”391 His aging body is

out of context with his new, youthful love.

The setting is one means by which a projected narrative arc is set for the reader. The invocation of Anna Karenina as a subtext is another. The description of Gurov’s past experiences with women is a third way the text shapes the reader’s expectations regarding the plot. As previously mentioned, Gurov has repeatedly been unfaithful to his wife. His numerous affairs have all followed a similar trajectory.

Repeated experience, and bitter experience indeed, had long since taught him that every intimacy, which in the beginning lends life such pleasant diversity and presents itself as a nice light adventure…grows into a major task, extremely complicated, and the situation finally becomes burdensome. But at every new meeting with an interesting woman, this experience somehow slipped from his memory, and he wanted to live, and everything seemed quite simple and amusing.392

However, when it comes to Anna, this pattern no longer applies. Against all expectations

and narrative conventions, Gurov and Anna fall in love and enter into a committed

relationship (albeit one that is undefined and unrecognized by society). Equally

significant is that this relationship enriches them both. The story fails to conform to the

391 И только теперь, когда у него голова стала седой, он полюбил, как следует, по-настоящему – первый раз в жизни (10:143). 392 Опыт многократный, в самом деле горький опыт, научил его давно, что всякое сближение, которое вначале так приятно разнообразит жизнь и представляется милым и легким приключением,...неизбежно вырастает в целую задачу, сложную чрезвычайно, и положение в конце концом становится тягостным. Но при всякой новой встрече с интересною женщиной этот опыт как-то ускользал из памяти, и хотелось жить, и все казалось так просто и забавно (10:129).

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projected narrative arcs established at the outset, thereby upending readers' expectations.

More pointedly, the text overtly invokes select narrative conventions in order to overturn

them. The story, thereby, destabilizes the conventional love plot.

The text also enacts indeterminacy, coupled with the subversion of narrative

conventions, through its ending. The last line reads, “And it seemed that, just a little more

– and the solution would be found, and then a new, beautiful life would begin; and it was

clear to both of them that the end was still far, far off, and that the most complicated and

difficult part was just beginning.”393 Linguistically the story ends with a beginning, which

opens into uncertainty. This beginning is present as an imperfect verb, which extends the

action of beginning as an ever-present reality into the future. Regarding this ending,

Nabokov writes, “The story does not really end, for as long as people are alive, there is

no possible and definite conclusion to their troubles or hopes or dreams.”394 While this

may be true of life, it is rarely true of literature. In “Lady with a Dog” Chekhov views a

love affair through a lens of specificity, affection, and indeterminacy. In doing so he

creates an original work of art that “flees the template” and continues to challenge and

connect with readers.

393 И казалось, что еще немного – и решение будет найдено, и тогда начнется новая прекрасная жизнь; и обоим было ясно, что до конца еще далеко-далеко и что самое сложное и трудное только еще начинается (10:143). 394 V. V. Nabokov, Lectures on Russian Literature, translated by Fredson Bowers (Bruccoli Clark, 1981) 263.

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CHAPTER FOUR “Ia – aktrisa” – Authority, Agency, and the Actress

Two of the three aesthetic statement stories discussed in Chapter Two focus on

performance artists. Like Shiptsov (“An Actor’s Death”) and Maria (“Requiem”) the

actress Nina Zarechnaia in The Seagull indicates an aspect of Chekhov’s aesthetics, in

this case the author’s moral responsibility to preserve the personal agency of the ‘other.’

The ‘other’ is a philosophically loaded term, and I want to be clear in saying that my use

of it is modest and straightforward. I am simply referring to someone who is not you. The

present chapter focuses on the actress in Chekhov’s work, building towards an exposition

of Nina Zarechnaia. Central to this analysis is the way that he invests her with authority

to speak on her own behalf.

One hallmark of Chekhov’s poetics is the concealment of his authorial presence.

This aspect of his writing is deliberate. Consider his advice to Lydia Avilova.

…when you depict unfortunate and ill-fated souls and you want to move the reader to pity, then try to be colder – that gives their pity a background, as it were, against which it can stand out in greater relief.395

Here the overt absence of an authorial presence is a strategic choice that enables

increased engagement on the part of the reader. As a follow-up to this advice he writes

the following:

At some point, I told you that you need to be indifferent when you are writing sad stories. You misunderstood me. You may cry and moan over a story, you may suffer along with your heroes, but I think you should do that in such a way that the reader does not notice. The more objective you are, the stronger the impression you create. That’s what I wanted to say.396

395 …когда изображаете горемык и бесталанных и хотите разжалобить читателя, то старайтесь быть холоднее — это дает чужому горю как бы фон, на котором оно вырисуется рельефнее (Pis’ma 5:26). 396 Как-то писал я Вам, что надо быть равнодушным, когда пишешь жалостные рассказы. И Вы меня не поняли. Над рассказами можно и плакать, и стенать, можно страдать заодно со своими героями, но, полагаю, нужно это делать так, чтобы читатель не заметил. Чем объективнее, тем сильнее выходит впечатление. Вот что я хотел сказать (Pis’ma 5:58).

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Objectivity refers to the diminished presence of the author, as a subjective, feeling entity

in the work. The interplay between objectivity and subjectivity expressed here is central

to Chekhov’s work. This abdication on the part of the author is directed towards creating

space for the reader’s subjective experience of the reader. If a work draws the reader’s

attention to the author’s emotions then it distracts the reader from her own. In his memoir

about Chekhov, Ivan Bunin recalls the celebrated author offering him similar advice, that

one should only sit down to write when one is “cold as ice.”397 Chekhov’s artistic practice

of restraining the authorial presence is thus not simply a byproduct of a subconscious

aversion to public exposure (though such a dynamic may be at play).398 Neither is it an

end in itself, nor a straightforward attempt to imitate reality without mediation. Instead, it

is consciously constructed artifice.

Might the subdued authorial presence in Chekhov’s work have other functions, not

overtly articulated in his correspondence but nonetheless animating his literary practice?

This question underlies the present chapter. More specifically, I consider his authorial

restraint as it relates to authority and competing centers of personal agency. Chekhov’s

characterization of actresses argues for (and models) self-limiting authority on the

author’s part in favor of the personal agency of others.

At first glance the authority of the author in a fictional text may seem an irrelevant

point of consideration. After all, as the originator and creator of the fictional world and

the characters in it, he occupies an authoritative position. Yet the issue of authority in a

literary text, in relation to both thematic and formal properties, is fertile ground for

397 Ivan Bunin, About Chekhov: The Unfinished Symphony, edited and translated by Thomas Gaiton Marullo (Northwestern UP, 2007) 21. 398 Michael Finke explores this interpretive angle. Michael C. Finke, Seeing Chekhov: Life and Art (Cornell UP, 2005).

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discussion. Consider, for example, Foster’s assertion that fictional characters arrive on the scene “full of the spirit of mutiny” and “often engaged in treason against the main idea of the book.” In fact, it is not uncommon for writers to experience their characters as independent (or at least semi-independent) agents.

The tension between author and character arises from competing mandates that govern the literary text, artifice and reality. Without exception, the literary text is artifice, which is to say that the author is tasked with creating a text whose threads are woven together into a satisfying pattern. Authors also aim to create a work that evokes and resembles the world in which we live.399 Characters are central to this endeavor, even as they

complicate it. In order to create a coherent narrative, a character must be made to fit

harmoniously into a larger structure. Yet the more a character resembles an actual person,

the more she will exercise her will independent of the structure within which she is

placed. So to create a character that is true to life challenges the overall coherence of the

text. Or, to use James Phelan’s scheme, the mimetic dimension of the character threatens

to diminish the narrative whole by failing to align with it.

D. A. Miller’s work The Novel and the Police provides another way of thinking about

the issue of authority in relation to literature. Miller argues that the novel has a “policing

function” in society, functioning in much the same way as Foucault’s panopticon. Miller

finds support for his argument in the ‘omniscient narrator’ (all-seeing, all-knowing,

situated on a higher visual and epistemological plane) historically assumed to be a

fundamental aspect of the Realist novel. While the concept of omniscience in narrative

399 I’m broadly referring to the literary legacy Chekhov inherited as well as his contemporary literary context. Certainly there are authors and literary traditions much less concerned (or not at all concerned) about reality in this sense. Such authors and traditions are beyond the scope of the present argument.

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has been convincingly called into question,400 the phenomenon of a narrator, who surveys

the scene from an elevated epistemological, and often geographical, vantage point and

who posses a super-human ability to access the internal experience of one or more

characters, remains. The narrator of the nineteenth-century Realist novel often stands in authority over the characters.

I am interested in Miller’s presentation of narrative perspective and authority in literature as a point of comparison to Chekhov’s artistic practice. Miller’s insights,

however, derive from his analysis of the novel as a genre. To what extent are they

applicable to Chekhov’s work, given that the latter wrote plays and short stories? Miller’s argument remains relevant, first, to the relationship between Trigorin (a writer) and Nina in The Seagull. Trigorin assumes a dominant position over Nina as he attempts to “write” her life story for her. Blurring the boundary between life and text, he extends the authorial-authoritative mandate Miller describes into the life he leads. Chekhov engages with this dynamic on the fictional plane of the drama.

Second, Miller’s argument, broadly speaking, concerns authority in literature relevant to authors of all genres of fictional texts (novels, dramas, short stories). As Jonathan

Culler writes, many of an author’s declarations have “performative authoritativeness…which seem to bring into being what they describe.” When the author writes that Jane, a fictional character, is short with brown hair, he is not describing something that is true outside of the statement itself. The same is true when a dramatist writes a dialogue between Maria and Sergei. In both instances, the author’s declaration of it makes it so. This performative authority of the author in fictional texts is a definitive

400 Jonathan Culler, “Omniscience” Narrative 12.1 (2004) 22-34.

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and inescapable component of literature, yet a continuum exists according to which the

author chooses to indulge and flaunt this authority or to obscure and minimize it.

The issue of authority is not exclusive to the nineteenth-century novel. Yet a

characteristically prominent feature of the genre is the concentration of authority in the

narrator, which has the desired effect of establishing and maintaining order (thus Miller’s

recourse to the police as an analogue to the novel). Drama, of course, dispenses with the

narrator. Is there an equivalent locus of authority in drama by which order is established

and maintained? In comedy one way this historically occurred was through stock

characters.401 Such characters orient the reader/audience and impart stability to the text.

By the time Chekhov arrived on the scene as a playwright in the late nineteenth

century, the tradition regarding stock characters in comedy had become more relaxed.

Typicality remains as a component of the characters, but it no longer imparts the same

degree of order to the text. The task of establishing order, traditionally fulfilled (at least

in part) by stock characters, was redirected elsewhere. One such place was an

overarching theme or idea. Within this formal scheme characters are subservient to the

theme. In other words, the thematic dimension of the characters is dominant. Since the

author sets the theme of the drama, he maintains authority. Artists and Admirers

(“Talanty i poklonniki,” produced 1881) by Alexander Ostrovsky (1823-1886), a popular

dramatist, illustrates this argument. In addition, it treads similar ground as The Seagull.

Ostrovsky’s texts are arguably the most pertinent point of comparison for Chekhov’s own

401 Comedy is relevant here given that Chekhov referred to The Seagull as a comedy in four acts. For more information on the historical use and development of stock characters see Ian Ruffell, “Character Types,” The Cambridge Companion to Greek Comedy, edited by Martin Revermann (Cambridge UP, 2014) 147-67. Domenico Pietropaolo, The Science of Buffoonery: Theory and History of the Commedia Dell’Arte (Dovehouse Editions, 1989).

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dramatic works. My interest at present is the way in which Ostrovsky concentrates

authority in the thematic sphere of this drama.

An overarching theme of Artists and Admirers is the role of corruption in the

theatrical enterprise. Theater itself as an art form is not the problem. Instead, the problem

is the system, in which money holds more sway than talent. Moreover, the money is

consolidated in a group of wealthy male patrons (the eponymous admirers) who exercise

power over the actresses. One such patron is Velikatov, an estate owner. This theme is

expressed most forcefully through the main character, Negina, a talented young actress.

The text opens with her mother, Domna, who sets the parameters of Negina’s character

for the reader/audience. Negina is talented, virtuous, and poor. Most of the drama serves

to expound one or more of these traits, until the final scene in which Negina agrees to be

Velikatov’s mistress in order to continue her work as an actress.

Negina’s circumstances change significantly by the end of the play. Yet this shift simply confirms the accuracy of the status quo set forth at the outset. Talent is insufficient to ensure success on the stage. Only money can do that. Whether destitute

and virtuous in the first act or a kept woman in the final act, Negina’s character serves the same overarching theme. The theme of the play is akin to Miller’s omniscient narrator since order is established and enacted by it. On the other hand, what we find in

Chekhov’s drama (and short stories) are competing centers of authority that coexist and contradict one another.

My conceptual assertions regarding narrative authority and the agency of the other in

Chekhov have arisen from close readings and analyses of his work. The best expression of these concepts is found in the texts themselves, and the character of Nina in The

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Seagull provides Chekhov’s most compelling artistic reflection on them. In order to more

fully appreciate the dynamics at play in that drama, it is useful to consider the cultural,

social, and literary pre-history of the figure of the actress.

4.1. Contextualizing the Figure of The Actress (I): Nineteenth-Century Social and Cultural Perceptions

The figure of the actress has historically been stigmatized and marginalized in society.

This is largely because actresses have traditionally been associated with prostitution, an

association that is due in part to the actresses’ perceived (and often actual) role as

“eroticized objects intended primarily for male delectation.”402 There is a sobering reality

of sexual exploitation and disempowerment of women in the theater at the root of this

stereotype. The reasons for characterizing the actress as a prostitute, however, are not the concern of the present discussion. More pertinent is the reverberation of this idea in the cultural and literary imagination in the eighteenth and, especially, nineteenth centuries.

On the one hand, the conflation of actress and prostitute was still active in the Western

imagination in the nineteenth century. Writing about the perception of the actress in

Victorian culture, Tracy Davis states, “For the middle classes, an acting career was a

version of The Fall from virtue.” Or, consider Flaubert’s Dictionary of Received Ideas, a

satirical work written in the 1870s. His entry on ‘Actresses’ reads, “The ruin of the son of

the family. Of frightful lubriciousness, go in for orgies, get through millions of francs,

end up in the workhouse. Though there are some who make good mothers of families.”403

402 Robyn Asleson, Notorious Muse: The Actress in British Art and Culture, 1776-1812 (Yale UP, 2003) 5. 403 Quoted in Rayfield Anton Chekhov: A Life 471.

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Even after accounting for the satire of this piece, Flaubert’s “definition” of the actress

attests that the figure continued to be marginalized.

On the other hand, the public position of the actress in a society where women were

confined to the private sphere invested the actress with a unique form of social capital because of her exposure and influence in public. As Asleson writes of the actress in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Britain, “The exhibitionism that was fundamental to

their profession enabled them to court publicity with relative impunity…As a result,

actresses were essentially the only group of women in Georgian Britain with both the

power and the license to orchestrate public perceptions of themselves.”404 Davis makes a similar assertion in identifying actresses as “symbols of women’s self-sufficiency and independence…”405

In Russia, too, the figure of the actress was invested with this dual nature,

simultaneously stigmatized and exalted. Catherine Schuler attests to the low status

attached to the actress in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. She also adds that “serf

actresses were clearly subjected to sexual exploitation.”406 Women in Russia also

managed to enter the public sphere through the stage, as actresses,407 though this occurred

later there (during the second half of the nineteenth century) than in the West. The actress

in Russia came into her own during the Silver Age.

404 Asleson 1. 405 Tracy C. Davis, Actresses as Working Women: Their Social Identity in Victorian Culture (Routledge, 1991) 69. 406 Catherine Schuler, Women in Russian Theater: The Actress in the Silver Age (Routledge, 1996) 26. One difference between the Russian and Western contexts was that unlike in the West, women were never excluded from the stage in Russia. Still, the cultural gender gap in Russian was at play in the theater. For example, Schuler writes, “the contractual regulations governing pregnancy were quite disadvantageous to the actress” (30). 407 Schuler writes, “Many emerging professional women, including actresses, used the rhetoric of social service to describe – and perhaps justify – their presence in the public sphere” (7).

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Notably, the “apogee of the actress”408 in Russia coincided with the rise of the

“woman question” (zhenskii vopros). Schuler contends that the two realms (the public prominence of the actress and the “woman question”) are mutually implicated. She writes that “[c]hallenges to traditional sex/gender ideology and the reactionary posturing that followed positioned actresses firmly in the center of a heated debate over the proper role of women in society.” The questioning of traditional gender identity that accompanied the “woman question” in Russia resulted in a “gradual disintegration of barriers between actresses and “respectable” women.”409 In other words, a central concern attached to the

“woman question” was the expansion of a woman’s place from the private to the public

sphere. The actress, as a figure who had already made this transition, became a

figurehead in the discussion. Moreover, increased attention to the “woman question”

encouraged and enabled women other than actresses to exert themselves in the public

sphere. In doing so, the boundary between the private and public spheres vis-à-vis

women became more porous. Actresses became less of a threat to social propriety and as

a result the social status of the actress shifted in the latter part of the nineteenth century

away from actress-as-harlot to actress-as-independent-woman.

So the figure of the actress in Russia in the second half of the nineteenth century was

also a surrogate for questions regarding the role of women in society. The “woman

question” in Russia was also strongly related to the question of emancipation. On this

point Richard Stites says that “[w]riters of the radical camp always tended to look at the

woman question as only a portion of the entire human question; and their first concern in

408 The designation belongs to Grinevskaia, who made this pronouncement in 1908 at the first Russian Women’s Congress. As Schuler is quick to point out, this statement was part fact and part wish fulfillment. Grinevskaia goes on to complain that the stage is still controlled by men (2). 409 Schuler 17.

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those days was the imminent emancipation of the serfs.” Historically, a loose associative

chain (actress  woman question  emancipation of serfs) connects the figure of the

actress to the call for emancipation. The short story “The Thieving Magpie” (“Soroka-

vorovka”) by Alexander Herzen (1812-1870), a writer and important social thinker,

makes an explicit connection between the two. This story also provides a point of entry to

the representation of the figure of the actress in Russian literature.

4.2. Contextualizing the Figure of the Actress (II): Russian Literature

Both the unfavorable evaluation of the actress in nineteenth-century Russian culture

and her disadvantaged position in society reverberate in the literature of the time.410 It is

reflected in the typical characterization of the actress.

The pure-souled, lone, provincial actress, prey to the jealousy of colleagues, the importunities of admirers, the blandishments of the wealthy, the exploitation of managers, and the scorn of society, had early become another avatar of the Poor Liza type.411

As Laurence Senelick demonstrates here, the typicality of the actress is expressed

through familiar plot points. In addition, there is customarily a prescribed narrative

trajectory associated with the actress in Russian literature. Whether she begins in

hardship or relative prosperity, she ends in personal ruin, pitiable and broken by her

circumstances. We can look to the following three works as examples: “The Thieving

Magpie,” The Golovlyov Family (Gospoda Golovlyovy) by Mikhail Saltykov-Schedrin, a

writer and journalist, and Artists and Admirers. I begin with The Golovlyov Family, a

410 It is worth noting that in the Russian literary tradition the fallen woman is treated more with compassion than contempt. Arguably, this precedent results in a more nuanced treatment of the actress, who is viewed as more of a victim of society than a threat to it. 411 Laurence Senelick, “The Lake-Shore of Bohemia: The Seagull’s Theatrical Context” Educational Theater Journal 29.2 (1977) 210. Senelick is referring to Karamzin’s story Poor Liza (Bednaia Liza).

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novel in which the twin sisters Lubinka and Anninka illustrate the typical narrative arc of

the figure of the actress as well as the social bias against her.

As a work with a strongly satirical bent Saltykov’s novel outlines regnant perspectives

and cultural biases. The overt view of actresses expressed in it is not to be confused with

the author’s own perspective. Instead, it reflects the characteristic treatment of the actress

in cultural discourse. From the first mention of an actress, acting is set in opposition to a

righteous life. When the girls’ grandmother overhears them talking of the theater she

tempers their excitement by informing their cousin, “So, my friend, the monastery is the

place for them, not the theatre…”412 Their grandmother further expresses her position a

couple of lines later when she says, “My friend, thеy should not have pleasure on their

mind, but rather godliness.”413

The association between sexual promiscuity and actresses is made at several points in

the novel. For example, when a priest tells Anninka that the most important thing in life

is for her to guard her treasure, his wife adds, “It seems that to preserve your treasure in

the acting profession is unlikely.”414 In time, Anninka does in fact lose her ‘treasure’ at

the insistence of Lubinka, who ridicules the notion of it as a precious commodity to be guarded. Anninka and Lubinka both become kept women, confirming (at least on the superficial level) the stereotype of actresses as adherents to a socially improper sexual code of conduct.

Shchedrin’s novel chronicles the decline of a gentry family. Lubinka and Anninka fit into the overarching scheme of the book by choosing a path (becoming actresses) directly

412 так им, мой друг, не по театрам ездить, а в монастырь...(Shchedrin PSS 13:84). 413 У них, мой друг, не удовольствия на уме должно быть, а божественное (Shchedrin PSS 13:84). 414 И вот это-то сокровище, мнится, в актерском звании соблюсти – дело довольно сомнительное (Shchedrin PSS 13:170).

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opposed to traditional piety. At the beginning of their time as actresses Lubinka and

Anninka enjoy moderate success on- and off-stage. Their relative personal and professional prosperity, however, is short-lived and is followed by a sharp decline. Theirs

is a typical path for the actress in the cultural imagination. Lubinka’s despair drives her to commit suicide, after which time Anninka returns to the family estate, defeated and without hope for the future. To reiterate a point mentioned above, Saltykov-Schedrin is not attempting to make an argument about the figure of the actress. Instead, he uses the typical representation of the actress, already familiar to the reader, to illustrate a larger narrative structure of familial ruin.

Several decades earlier, in 1846, Alexander Herzen also published a work, “The

Thieving Magpie,” that weaves together sexuality and the actress. This text is worth analyzing in greater detail both for its portrayal of power dynamics, structurally and thematically, in relation to the actress and as a point of comparison for the character of

Nina Zarechnaia in Chekhov’s The Seagull. The frame narrative of Herzen’s story exposes serfdom as a blight on Russian society. As a result the embedded narrative, which focuses on an actress, is directed beyond itself towards the political context of the frame. The actress is, therefore, characterized on two planes, as herself (in the embedded narrative) and as an object lesson in support of an ideological argument (in the frame narrative).

The story recounts the pitiable situation of a serf actress who is made to suffer after rebuffing the sexual advances of her owner. It is reportedly based on a real-life event, related verbally to Herzen by Mikhail Shchepkin, a well-known actor born in 1788 as a

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serf and later granted his freedom.415 Herzen was an outspoken critic of serfdom and thematically this story aims to undermine it. The story accomplishes this, however, by

impinging on the authority of the actress to speak for herself. Structurally, then, the

power dynamics of the text are more complicated. The story argues in her favor by

exposing the injustice with which she is treated while at the same time it perpetuates

gender inequality by entrusting the telling of her experience to a man.

The text begins in media res during a conversation about theater conducted by three

men. The opening line of the story is delivered by a young man acting as a buffer

between a Slavophile and a Westernizer.

...have you ever noticed that, although it is rare, we do have great actors but great actresses are practically nonexistent, and the name Semenova is only preserved in legend; this is not without reason.416

The nonexistence of talented actresses in Russia is accepted as a truism and each man

offers an explanation of this void in line with his political leanings. The Slavophile

maintains that Russian women rightly know their place is in the home. The Westernizer

says that in order to act on-stage a person needs a full range of personal experience. Since

Russian women are denied this they are not personally equipped to be successful on the

stage.

In the patriarchal, male-dominated culture of nineteenth-century Russia a woman is a

cultural other to men such as these characters. Significantly, this otherness does not hinder them from speaking authoritatively about women’s motivations and what is best

415 See Richard Stites, “The Misanthrope, the Orphan, and the Magpie: Imported Melodrama in the Twilight of Serfdom,” Imitations of Life: Two Centuries of Melodrama in Russia, edited by Louise McReynolds and Joan Neuberger (Duke UP, 2002) 44-5. 416 …заметили ли вы, что у нас хотя и редки хорошие актеры, но бывают, а хороших актрис почти вовсе нет и только в предании сохранилось имя Семеновой; не без причины же это (Gertsen PSS 4:213).

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for them. A woman’s perspective is missing in this conversation in a way that parallels

her muted presence on the stage. The story structurally and thematically reflects the

power differential between men and women in Russia at the time.

The next character to enter the scene, a “famous artist,” denies that there are no

talented Russian actresses. At the same time he sounds a new note in the reigning power

dynamic of the story by allowing a woman, an actress even, to speak somewhat on her

own behalf. The words are her own, but they are mediated through his telling. The

actress’ actions in the story are an additional means of empowerment. She refuses her

owner’s unwanted sexual advances. Richard Stites refers to this refusal as a “defiant act

of self-expression.”417

As the narrator, the actor draws attention away from the actress’ story and towards his

reaction to it, a tendency that becomes more pronounced as the story progresses. In describing his initial acquaintance with the actress while she is performing on stage, he attends to her talent in a variety of different ways. Yet he interweaves these comments

with descriptions of his personal response.

Suddenly I was startled by a weak female voice… …I didn’t really hear her words, but rather her voice…Even now, after twenty years, I can hear that heart-breaking cry. I was amazed, startled…418

The actress becomes an occasion for the actor to detail his own experience. In part, these

comments construe the actress as instrumental, and thereby subservient, to the actor’s

own emotional landscape.

417 Stites 46. 418 Вдруг меня поразил слабый женский голос...... Я почти не слушал ее слов, а слушал голос...Теперь, через двадцать лет, я слышу этот раздирающий крик. Я был изумлен, поражен...(Gertsen PSS 4:221).

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Moreover, in the actor’s telling, the actress’ personal identity is subsumed by her

onstage character, Aneta in The Thieving Magpie. It is reasonable to expect that contemporary readers of Herzen’s story would have been familiar with the plot of The

Thieving Magpie, either through its incarnation as a play (La pie voleuse in the French

theater, Soroka-vorovka in the Russian theater) or an Italian opera by Rossini (La gazza

ladra).419 The plot structure and its realization in all three works is, as the actor in

Herzen’s story notes, melodramatic. A servant girl, Aneta, is wrongly accused of stealing

from the house where she works, she is taken to court, and just prior to sentencing she is

proven not guilty. Aside from the melodramatic denouement of the ending, which

reverses Aneta’s bad fortune, the story is one of injustice, full of a sense of despair for the

servant girl.

In Herzen’s story, the actor repeatedly refers to the actress as Aneta, even outside the

context of the stage. In fact, the reader never learns her real name. Aneta’s story dovetails

with the actress’ story, and the actor over-identifies the actress with her onstage persona.

On the one hand, the injustice of the play heightens and highlights the injustice the

actress of the story experiences. On the other, it also has the effect of diminishing the

actress’ personal identity.

Her face, which was beautiful but already exhausted, expressed a frightening tale: in every feature you could read the confession that sounded in her voice the previous day. It wasn’t necessary to add much to this face and these features: a few personal names, a few occurrences, dates; everything else was already expressed clearly.420

419 In Herzen’s text the actor refers to the opera. Stites mentions the opera as well as the two plays (40-42). 420 Лицо ее, прекрасное, но уже изнеможенное, было страшное сказанье: в каждой черте можно было прочесть ту исповедь, которая звучала в ее голосе вчера. К этим чертам, к этому лицу прибавлять много не было нужды: несколько собственных имен, несколько случайностей, чисел; остальное было высказано очень ясно (Gertsen PSS 4:227).

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The “confession that sounded in her voice the previous day” is a reference to her onstage

performance, which the actor conflates with her offstage person. As a relevant aside, the actor extracts knowledge about the actress from external features of her face, which is not surprising for a work published in 1846. It recalls the physiognomic mode of characterization in the physiological sketch. The actor assumes interpretive power over the actress in a way that is similar to physiological sketch writers positioning themselves as spokesmen for the types under consideration.

This claim to authoritative knowledge about the actress continues as the actor says to her, “…I could tell you your story without hearing a word from you or anyone else…I know it.”421 He knows her story because it is the same familiar story (without the happy

ending) of the play she is in and of so many stories featuring the pure-hearted heroine

weighted down by the burden of circumstance.422 On the stage and in the world of the

text, the actress is a character with a prescribed role, which she follows. In fact, her role

overshadows her personal being, as demonstrated by the actor’s claim that he “delighted

in her as in a work of art.”423

At the same time, the actress speaks for herself as she recounts the cruel turn of fate

that has led her to her present, intolerable situation. What is most pertinent in her story is

the way in which the term actress encodes a sense of agency and self-determination.

421 …я бы мог вам рассказать вашу историю, не слыхав ни от вас, ни от кого другого ни слова...я ее знаю (Gertsen PSS 4:228). 422 The actress spurns her owner’s sexual advances, thereby insisting on at least a modicum of personal rights. At first this plot turn may seem an outlier as regards the type of the actress as prostitute. I would argue that it still applies. First, the fact that the character is an actress is relevant to her owner’s sexual advances. While serf owners sexually coerced female serfs who weren’t actresses, the fact that she is one provides additional encouragement to her owner. It also highlights the sexualized nature of the actress in the cultural imagination. Second, the actress worsens her situation by engaging in a sexual liaison in strict defiance of her owner’s commands. So sex, both her refusal and engagement of it, is directly responsible for her fate. 423 …восхищался ею как художественным производением (Gertsen PSS 4:228).

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Initially, under the care of a kind owner, she readily applies it to herself: “…my personal

sense of self told me that I’m an actress…”424 Being an actress is more than a means of

amusement; it is a calling. This testifies to a sense of purpose that emanates from within

rather than a claim placed upon her from without. In other words, in claiming the term

actress for herself, she assumes personal agency and authority over her own being.

After this owner dies suddenly and unexpectedly, she comes under the ownership of a much less charitable man who views her as an object for his amusement, stripping her of

her self-determination. After she refuses his sexual advances, he proclaims, “I say, you

are no actress; you’re my serf girl, not an actress…”425 She continues to rebuff her

owner’s advances, yet he succeeds in defeating her inner sense of self as an actress. At the end of her life she cannot even manage to refer to herself as an actress. Instead, the onus of that pronouncement falls on the actor. Her parting sentence trails off, “Remember sometimes that in me…” The actor finishes it: “…a great Russian actress died.”426 The

story incorporates the dual nature of the actress’ cultural standing. She transgresses

cultural norms by defying her owner’s wishes, yet her willful conduct leads to a pitiable

demise. The use of the term actress as a proxy for agency and self-determination is a

counterpoint to its use as a code for prostitute. Nonetheless, by the end of the story the

actress is not able to claim the term for herself, so it does not invoke a sense of triumph.

The actress figure in this story becomes less of a self-determining agent throughout

the course of the story. In the end her story becomes the property of someone else, the

actor-narrator. He uses it as a direct rebuttal to the claim that there are no talented

424 …мне собственное сознание говорило, что я – актриса...(Gertsen PSS 4:228). 425 Я, дескать, актриса, нет, ты моя крепостная девка, а не актриса...(Gertsen PSS 4:231). 426 Вспоминайте иногда, что и во мне... /…Погибла великая русская актриса (Gertsen PSS 4:233).

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actresses in Russia. In addition, the author (Herzen) uses her story within the context of

the frame narrative as a polemical tool to argue against serfdom. The actress’ story, then,

is not her own.

In Ostrovsky’s drama Artists and Admirers, the term actress also has semantic

resonance for the text as a whole. Of specific interest is Negina’s use of it in justification

of her choice to leave Meluzov (her tutor and lover) to become Velikatov’s mistress.

Throughout the drama, Meluzov is credited with teaching Negina how to conduct herself

virtuously. Yet, virtue is placed in tension with her desire to be an actress. The tension

builds to a crisis point, and Negina chooses the stage. In conversation with Meluzov she

says, “I’m an actress, that’s all, but according to you, I should be some sort of heroine.

But can any woman really be a heroine? I’m an actress, Petya.”427 The term actress, as

Negina configures it, has an element of passion for the stage but it also falls into the more

traditional notion of the actress as a morally compromised figure. In The Seagull Nina’s

application of the term in reference to herself redefines it. Before analyzing this text,

however, it is useful to consider Chekhov’s engagement with the figure of the actress

over the span of his career.

4.3. The Figure of the Actress in Chekhov

Sympathy

As previously mentioned, Chekhov acknowledges the social stigma attached to the

figure of the actress, but he doesn’t adhere to it, not even in his early stories. As we have

seen, two early actress stories are “Revenge” and “The Tragic Actor.” I summarize and

comment on these in Chapter Two, so I will just briefly mention them here. At the end of

427 Ведь я актриса; а ведь, по-твоему, нужно быть мне героиней какой-то. Да разве всякая женщина может быть героиней? Я актриса...(Ostrovsky PSS 8:295).

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“Revenge,” after the comic actor takes revenge by placing the Sold Out sign in the box office window, the reader is led to feel sympathy for the actress, whose pitiable situation is two-fold: a broken heart and an empty theater. In “The Tragic Actor,” the father’s pointed exclusion of actresses as part of his dinner invitation to the acting troupe implies that actresses would be a bad influence on his daughter because of their moral failings, which is code for sexual promiscuity. We find further confirmation of this stigma when the father disowns the daughter after she marries one of the actors and becomes an actress herself.

Unlike the father of the story, Chekhov demonstrates sympathy, albeit muted, for the daughter-turned-actress. The humorous, ironic twist in the story is that the father’s invitation leads to the exact thing he was trying to avoid through the exclusion of actresses in the invitation. The daughter is portrayed as being treated unjustly both by her father and by her actor-husband. In “Requiem,” Chekhov extends his sympathetic treatment of the actress and adds a new way to conceptualize the actress, as an artist.

Chekhov’s sensitivity to the exploitative power dynamics of the theater informs his sympathy towards the actress. In “Theater Manager Under the Sofa” (“Antreprener pod divanom”) the theater manager takes advantage of the power differential between himself, a male superior, and an actress. In doing so, he exposes and further solidifies the inequality between them. The actress in the story is initially appalled, and feels violated, upon discovering the theater manger hiding underneath the couch in her dressing room as she prepares to change between acts. He is doing so in order to hide from his mistress’ husband, who (according to the theater manager) has shown up at the theater and to kill him. Within this cultural and theatrical context actresses were at the mercy of theater

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managers, especially in relation to benefit performances, which were often a mainstay of

an actress’ income.428 In this story the power differential is momentarily reversed, as it is

the theater manager who is reliant on the actress to help him. He offers to put on a full

benefit performance for the actress if she will let him stay in her dressing room. She

agrees.

When the actress sees him after that night’s performance she learns that the theater manager was mistaken. The man he had seen was not, in fact, his mistress’ husband.

With the power differential back in its original configuration the theater manager refuses to honor his promise, citing the mistaken identity as the reason. The more basic reason, however, is that the power differential means that the theater manager can treat the actress unjustly and she has no recourse to compel or convince him to do otherwise. In this story an imbalance of power enables an unjust system, which disadvantages the actress.

“A Boring Story” includes Chekhov’s most traditional depiction of the actress in

Katya, whose love for the theater appears early in life, around the age of fourteen. At that time, she idealized the theater as something “greater than the classroom, greater than books, greater than anything in the world.”429 She embarks on her acting career “taking

along lots of money, high hopes, and an aristocratic view of her situation.”430 As with

Lubinka and Anninka, Katya’s life in the theater proceeds splendidly for a while. Slowly,

though, she becomes disillusioned with her fellow troupe-members and her personal

decline follows according to script. Her lover betrays her, she attempts suicide, her baby

428 Catherine Schuler notes that “actresses could receive half their yearly earnings from a single benefit performance.” Catherine Schuler, Women in Russian Theater: The Actress in the Silver Age (Routledge, 1996) 28. 429 выше аудиторий, выше книг, выше всего на цвете (7:270). 430 увезя с собою много денег, тьму радужных надежд и аристократическое взгляды на дело (7:271).

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dies, and she returns home. All of this provides the background for her character in the story, against which she emerges as a compassionate presence in the hero’s life. While the stereotypical outline of her life as an actress situates her within a familiar context, it does not define her.

Melodrama

The above outline of Chekhov’s sympathetic treatment of the actress in his fictional work may surprise those who are familiar with his unflattering comments about actresses in his personal correspondence. Frequently cited is his letter to Suvorin dated December

17, 1888 in which he writes, “Actresses are cows who fancy they are goddesses…Machiavelli in a skirt.”431 In fact even in his published work he is not singularly sympathetic to the figure of the actress, though his criticism is confined to his journalistic writing about Sarah Bernhardt (1844-1923), a French actress who performed in Russia in 1881, and her fictional counterpart, Arkadina in The Seagull. While

Chekhov's advocacy for the actress Maria in “Requiem” and the actress Nina in The

Seagull expresses aesthetic concerns, so does his exposition of Sarah Bernhardt and

Arkadina.

In 1881 Chekhov wrote two articles in short succession about the celebrated French actress: “Sarah Bernhardt” (“Sara Bernar”) and “Once Again on Sarah Bernhardt”

(“Opiat’ o Sare Bernare”). In both, Chekhov’s scathing and dismissive critique of

Bernhardt finds fault with the melodramatic mode of her performances. In a seminal work on melodrama, The Melodramatic Imagination: Balzac, Henry James, Melodrama, and the Mode of Excess, Peter Brooks broadly defines it as a descriptive term that entails

431 Актрисы – это коровы, воображающие себя богинями...Маккиавели в юбке (Pis’ma 3:87).

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the mode of excess. The catalogue of devices that attend melodrama include “hyperbolic

figures, lurid and grandiose events, masked relationships and disguised identities,

abductions, slow-acting poisons, secret societies, and mysterious parentage.”432

Bernhardt’s performances, which “broke with tradition by emphasizing gesture and the

mimetic,”433 fit comfortably within this mode.

In “Sarah Bernhardt,” Chekhov introduces his readers to the French actress, providing

a brief biography of her as an actress and of her reception in France, London, and

America. The genius of the article is the way in which Chekhov relates this information.

He invokes the melodramatic mode through the rhetorical excess of the piece, a satirical

attempt to mirror (and undermine) the furor with which Bernhardt is being met in

Moscow.

Two days ago, Moscow only knew of four elements, now it is ceaselessly talking about a fifth. Muscovites knew seven wonders, now not even thirty seconds passes without them talking about an eighth wonder.434

The hyperbolic, grandiloquent style of the article parallels the persona Bernhardt projects

on- and off-stage.

Chekhov hints at the problem with Bernhardt’s inflated persona when he claims that

much that has been written about her is a lie. More directly, albeit tucked away in a

footnote, he admits, “As soon as you begin to write about Sarah Bernhardt, you

432 Peter Brooks, The Melodramatic Imagination: Balzac, Henry James, Melodrama, and the Mode of Excess (Yale UP, 1976) 3. While Brooks does not discount these as formal properties of the melodramatic mode, he does counter the idea that such devices are vulgar and hollow. 433 Heather McPherson, “Sarah Bernhardt: Portrait of the Actress as Spectacle” Nineteenth-Century Contexts 20.4 (1999) 412. 434 Два дня тому назад Москва знала только четыре стихии, теперь же онанеугомонно толкует о пятой. Она знала семь чудес, теперь же не приходит и полминуты, чтобы она не говорила о восьмом чуде (16:7).

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experience a desire to lie.”435 While his first article is far from exalting Bernhardt,

Chekhov relegates his substantive critique of Bernhardt to his second article. His

conclusion in it is as follows.

Tomorrow, again Sarah Bernhardt…oh! I will not, however, write any more about her, even if an editor paid me fifty kopecks a line. I’ve written as much as I can! That’s enough!436

Chekhov kept his word. He didn’t write anything more of note about Sarah Bernhardt.

What he did write in this article is instructive as regards his developing aesthetic sense.

Specifically, what was it about Bernhardt’s performance that called forth such a damning

response from the young author? She is all show and no substance. She is the epitome of

empty form, yet her superior mastery of the form obscures its emptiness. It is, therefore,

left to Chekhov to expose it for what it is, a masterfully executed trick.

Every breath Sarah Bernhardt takes, her tears, her dying convulsions, her whole performance – it is none other than an impeccably and intelligently learned lesson. A lesson, reader, and nothing more…Every step of hers is a deeply deliberate, accentuated trick.437

According to Chekhov, Bernhardt’s performance is prescribed and mechanical. Drawing

on Chekhov’s first article for insight, we can see that the problem with Bernhardt’s

performance is that it is not true. It is a lie.

In addition, Chekhov voices displeasure with Bernhardt’s aim as he sees it. “In her

acting she does not aim to be natural, but rather to be extraordinary. Her goal is to

435 Как только начнешь писать про Сару Бернар, так и хочеться что-нибудь соврать (16:11). 436 Завтра опять на Сару Бернар...ох! Писать, впрочем, про нее больше не буду, даже если редактор заплатит мне по полтиннику за строчку. Исписался! Шабаш! (16:18). Chekhov wasn’t the only one to oppose her. There was an anti- Bernhardt faction in the journals. 437 Каждый вздох Сары Бернар, ее слезы, ее предсмертные конвульсии, вся ее игра – есть не что иное, как безукоризенно и умно заученный урок. Урок, читатель, и больше ничего...Каждый шаг ее глубоко обдуманный, сто раз подчеркнутый фокус (16:15).

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amaze, to surprise, to dazzle…”438 The problem is not that she seeks to have an effect on

her audience. Instead, it is that she seeks effects that are inconsistent with the varied,

often mundane aspects of normal lived experience. Chekhov’s description of Bernhardt’s

performance falls into line with Brooks’ discussion of the rhetoric, diction, and acting

style of the melodramatic mode, all of which he describes as “inflated and unreal” and

“forced toward the grandiose.”439

Overall, Chekhov finds fault with Bernhardt on two related accounts. First, she lacks the interiority to authenticate her performance. Her output as an actress is methodically crafted to fit a predetermined form rather than arising from an inner disposition. In his words, “…she doesn’t have the spark, which is the only thing able to move us to bitter tears and fainting.”440 The externality of Bernhardt’s performance is a mark of the

melodramatic mode, with its characters’ “lack of interiority” and plastic emotions.441

Second, her performance is overwrought. After a mediocre performance she comes forward to take a bow, “precisely like a high priest before an offering.”442 At another

point Chekhov speaks of Bernhardt as one who “for a minute before death lets the public

know, by means of energetic convulsions, that she is dying now.”443 She relies on the

grandiosity to validate the otherwise empty forms. Brooks’ discussion of the

melodramatic mode is helpful in conceptualizing this relationship between the two. His

438 Играя, она гонится не за естественностью, а за необыкновенностью. Цель ее – поразить, удивить, ослепить...(16:17). 439 Brooks Melodramatic Imagination 41. 440 ...в ней нет огонька, который один в состоянии трогать нас до горючих слез, до обморока (16:15). 441 Brooks Melodramatic Imagination 11. 442 точно maximus pontifex пред жертвоприношением (16:14). 443 за минуту до смерти энергичнейшими конвульсиями дает публике знать, что она сейчас умрет (16:15).

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discussion also introduces the concept of signification, which is also important in The

Seagull.

The melodramatic mode in Brooks’ formulation is an outgrowth of the desacralization

of the modern world with its accompanying loss of an overarching myth articulating the

terms of good and evil. This loss, however, does not mitigate the fact that we are drawn

to a grand moral drama as a way to structure our lives and impart them with meaning.

The melodramatic mode thereby becomes the formal means by which the material,

desacralized world is elevated to the level of a grandiose moral drama. As Brooks writes,

“Things cease to be merely themselves…they become the vehicles of metaphors whose

tenor suggests another kind of reality.”444 He also maintains, “If we come perilously

close, in reading these novelists, to a feeling that the represented world won’t bear the

weight of the significances placed on it, this is because the represented world is so often

being used metaphorically, as a sign of something else.”445

Chekhov is reacting to the melodramatic mode of Bernhardt’s theatrical

performance.446 Brooks highlights signification as a potentially problematic issue in

melodrama when he defines the mode of excess, central to it, as, “the postulation of a

signified in excess of the possibilities of the signifier, which in turn produces an

excessive signifier, making large but unsubstantial claims on meaning.”447 More

specifically, the over-burdened sign becomes a hallmark of the melodramatic mode. The seagull of Chekhov’s drama of the same name is one such over-burdened sign. Brooks’ analytical framework allows us to consider Chekhov’s treatment of this controversial bird

444 Brooks Melodramatic Imagination 9. 445 Brooks Melodramatic Imagination 11. 446 Chekhov is not unique in this. It is a commonplace to refer to Bernhardt in terms of melodrama. 447 Brooks Melodramatic Imagination 199.

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in conversation with his journalistic commentary on Sarah Bernhardt and his portrayal of both Arkadina and Nina in The Seagull. Before turning to an analysis of this work, however, one additional piece of critical foundation is needed.

Sensationalism

One of the frequent recipients of Chekhov’s satire was Mikhail Lentovsky (1843-

1906), an actor, singer, and theater manager. As a protégé of actor Mikhail Shchepkin,

Lentovsky was drawn to the emotional potency of the stage, and as an actor he was always prepared to “overact” (pereigryvat’).448 When he became a theater manager his interest in the sensational potential of the stage was manifest in an (over-)stimulating experience for the audience, with frequent use of “pyrotechnical display, explosions, fires, collapsing bridges.”449 His theater was oriented towards excessive sensory experience. The term sensationalism captures the spirit of his aesthetic sensibility.

References to Lentovsky and his sensationalism, both direct and oblique, abound in the feuilleton column, “Fragments of Moscow Life” (Oskolki Moskovskoi zhizni),

Chekhov wrote for Fragments. In addition, Chekhov wrote two short skits parodying

Lentovsky’s theatrical practice, “Unclean Tragedians and Leprous Dramatists”

(“Nechistye tragiki i prokazhennye dramaturgi”) and “Disorder in Rome” (“Kavardak v

Rime”). The first of these is of present interest because of the connection between prescribed forms, melodrama, sensationalism, and authorial control found in it. The title foregrounds Lentovsky and his theater. It refers to a play, The Clean and the Leprous

(Chistye i prokazhennye), that had recently premiered there.450 The subtitle of Chekhov’s

448 Iurii Arsen’evich Dmitriev, Mikhail Lentovskii (Iskusstvo, 1978) 43. 449 Laurence Senelick, The Chekhov Theatre: A Century of the Plays (Cambridge UP, 1977) 10. 450 The play was re-worked from the original German.

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skit, A Horribly-Dreadfully-Excitingly-Desperate Trrragedy (Uzhasno-strashno-

vozmutitel’no-otchaianaia trrragediia), parodies Lentovsky’s artistic bent. It prepares the

reader for the affected and excitable tone throughout the short text.

The overwrought nature of the subtitle is carried over into the introductory scene. It

opens with an unusual setting, the crater of a volcano, where Tarnovsky (a writer for

Lentovsky’s theater) is sitting at a table. It is a scene of gratuitous gothic horror tropes: a

skull in place of a head, sulfur emanating from Tarnovsky’s mouth, little green devils,

witches, a prophecy of universal destruction. This scene is identified as an “epilogue,” an

intentional misnomer that indicates disarray and inversion. We soon learn that the

expectations Lentovsky places upon Tarnovsky are equally grandiose. Tarnovsky

complains, “You have given me too hard a task! You want my play to freeze the

audience’s blood, an earthquake to take place in the hearts of the merchant’s wives from

across the river, my monologues to make the lamps go out.” Lentovsky’s answer – “More

gunpowder, Bengal lights, highfa-lutin monologues…”451 – confirms the extravagance of

the expected result.

Classic melodrama is added to this sensationalism. Consider, for example, the

formulaic suggestions Lentovsky provides Tarnovsky as ideas for a play, “The prisoner’s

beloved is forcibly married to the villain…” and “the triumph of virtue.”452 On that

account, towards the end of the skit Karl XII (the King of Sweden), “comes out of the

451 Уж слишком трудную задачу задали вы мне! Вы хотите, чтобы от моей пьесы стыла у публики кровь, чтобы в сердцах замоскворецких купчих произошло землетрясение, чтобы лампы тухли от моих монологов. / Побольше пороху, бенгальского огня, трескучих монологов (2:320). 452 Возлюбленная заключенного насилием выдается замуж за злодея... / торжество добродетели (2:320).

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dressing room and orders the virtuous to triumph over vice,”453 in response to which even

the moon and stars smile.

The skit also recognizes the reliance on prescribed forms in Lentovsky’s theater.

Lentovsky advises Tarnovsky, “In short, concoct something hackneyed, the way the

Rocamboles and Counts of Monte-Cristo concoct things.”454 As Chekhov presents it, the

plot of Lentovsky’s plays consist of familiar, hackneyed forms. These are insufficient to

excite the audience, which is why he incorporates sensationalism.

As with Bernhardt’s acting, Chekhov construes Lentovsky’s theatrical endeavors as dishonest trickery. In January 1883 Chekhov published a series of short anecdotes in Talk of the World entitled “Mummers” (“Riazhenye”). The title refers to a folk tradition where

people don masks and costumes during festive holidays such as Advent, Christmas, and

Mardi Gras in celebration of the occasion. Chekhov uses this premise in “Mummers” to

outline a variety of different people or situations that are ‘dressed up’ to appear different

than they actually are. The final anecdote of “Mummers” includes a fictional theater

whose proposed intention (“Satire and Morality”), like that of Lentovsky’s Hermitage

theater,455 is at cross purposes with its actual existence: “If you take away ‘Satire and

Morality’ then it will be easy to read: ‘Cancan and Mockery’.”456 The fictional theater,

and by association Lentovsky’s theater, is a “costumed temple” (khram riazhenyi). Sarah

Bernhardt is not a true actress and Lentovsky's sensational extravaganza is not real theater.

453 Является из уборной Карл и повелевает добродетели торжествовать над пороком, (2:322). 454 Одним словом, стряпайте по шаблону, как стряпаются Рокамболи и графы Монте-Кристо (2:320). 455 Dmitriev 114. 456 Если вы снимете «Сатиру и мораль», то вам нетрудно будет прочесть: «Канкан и зубоскальство» (2:8).

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One of the most intriguing parts of Chekhov’s parodic skit “Unclean Tragedians and

Leprous Dramatists” is the interaction between the fictional characters and their creators

(Lentovsky and Tarnovsky). First, in it the characters lay bare their function as plot devices. The character of Karl XII is fully aware of himself as purely instrumental to the conventional plot. After ordering Delagardi to go to prison, Karl says to the Baroness,

“You love Delagardi and have a baby by him. In the interests of the plot I’m not supposed to know about that incident and am supposed to marry you off to a man you don’t love. Marry General Ehrenswerd.”457 After fulfilling his necessary plot duties he

says, “Well, now I’m free right up to the fifth act. I’ll go to my dressing room!”458

Chekhov is pointing out, in a playful way, the instrumental function of characters in a conventional plot.

Second, the characters recognize the authority Tarnovsky claims over them, and they object to it. Karl XII complains to Tarnovsky that “[i]n your heart-rending play you have

made me endure an extra ten years!”459 As a consequence Karl XII throws Tarnovsky in

prison. Two other characters, the young count and Burl, who refer to Tarnovsky as the

“Octopus” (Sprut), voice their dissatisfaction with him.

YOUNG COUNT. And I love you, Stella, but I implore you in the name of love, tell me, why the hell did Tarnovsky get me mixed up in this godawful mess? What does he want from me? What’s my relationship to this plot?

BURL. Why, it was all Sprut’s doing! Thanks to him I wound up in the army. He beat me, dogged me, bit me…460

457 Вы любите Делагарди и имеете от него ребенка. В интересах фабулы я не должен знать этого обстоятельства и должен отдать вас замуж за нелюбимого человека. Выходите за генерала Эренсверда (2:321). 458 Ну, теперь я свободен вплоть до пятого действия. Пойду в уборную (2:321). 459 Вы в вашей раздирательной пьесе заставили меня прожить лишних десять лет! (2:321). 460 Молодой граф. И я вас люблю, Стелла, но, заклинаю вас во имя любви, скажите мне, на кой чëрт припутал меня Тарновский к этой канители? На что я ему нужен? Какое отношение я имею к фабуле?

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Both characters hold Tarnovsky responsible for the course of their lives and the events

that occur within them. As an act of rebellion against Tarnovsky and the authority he has

claimed over them, a couple of the characters plot against him. When planning her father’s prison break Stella says, “I’ll save you father! But how can it be done so that

Tarnovsky won’t escape with us? If he escapes from prison, he’ll write a new melodrama!”461 Nevertheless, Tarnovsky escapes along with the others, at which point

Burl chases, captures, and chokes him to death.

This is a highly unusual work, written during the early years of Chekhov’s writing

career and directed towards eliciting a laugh from the readers. It is not meant as a serious

meditation on art. Yet considerations appear in this work that continue to weave their

way through Chekhov’s thoughts on art and his practice of it, namely authorial control as

expressed through conventional forms and the melodramatic mode. These threads find a

more sophisticated expression in The Seagull.

4.4. The Seagull

The Seagull is, as critics have remarked, a self-conscious meditation about art. Harai

Golomb writes that “It is a play about plays, and a piece of theater about the theater; a

work of art about art, a work of fiction about fictionality.”462 There is less critical consensus regarding what it has to say about art. As is customary with Chekhov, the play is full of ambiguity. One of the unresolved questions of the play is how to interpret the

Бурль. А всë это Спрут наделал! По его милости я попал в солдаты. Он бил меня, гнал, кусал...(2:322). 461 Я спасу тебя, отец...Но как сделать так, чтобы с нами не бежал и Тарновский? Убежав из тюрьмы, он напишет новую драму! (2:322). 462 Harai Golomb, “Referential Reflections Around a Medallion: Reciprocal Art/Life Embeddings in Chekhov’s The Seagull” Poetics Today 21.4 (2000) 706.

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concept of the seagull in it? Metaphorically? Literally? As a symbol it seems overly

heavy-handed for the understated mastery of Chekhov. Yet the title and seagull references throughout the text imbue it with greater importance than customarily accompany an object of realia. Various characters invest the object with their own meaning. I suggest we approach it as a signifier without a set signified, a slippery signifier.

Andrew Wachtel provides an interpretation of the seagull resonant with mine when he writes that “the seagull’s meaning is not fixed in Chekhov’s play.”463 He notes that

various characters invest the seagull with different meanings throughout the course of the

play, and all of these imparted meanings adhere to the seagull to make it a “multivalent symbol.”464 This multivalent aspect of the seagull is as important as the meanings

attributed to it.

In The Seagull each character creates and recreates meaning for the bird. It isn’t that there is a ‘right’ meaning, but the various meanings interact with each other, that is what is of most interest.465

Like Wachtel’s, my reading focuses on points of intersection between the characters and the seagull rather than on the “right meaning” of the seagull. Unlike him, I concentrate on

the relational dynamics, manifest through seagull references, on the Nina-Trigorin and

Nina-Treplev axes.

Golomb proposes a “discontinuous medallion scene” delimited by the physical object

of the medallion in the play.466 “The scene starts with the object’s first appearance and

463 Andrew Wachtel, “The Seagull as Parody: Symbols and Expectations,” Plays of Expectations: Intertextual Relations in Russian Twentieth-Century Drama (Herbert J. Ellison Center for Russian, 2006) 29. 464 Wachtel 40. 465 Wachtel 45. 466 Golomb 684.

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ends when the suggestion for direct action embedded in the object has been followed and

its direct role terminated.”467 The sections of the play occurring between this beginning and endpoint that aren’t directly related to the medallion are not included as part of the

scene.

Following Golomb’s lead, my analysis centers on a “discontinuous seagull scene,”

charting the accumulated significance of the seagull in the text. The first mention of the

seagull belongs to Nina in the opening act of the drama.

Father and his wife won’t let me come here. They say this place is bohemian…they’re afraid I might become an actress…But I’m drawn here to the lake, like a seagull…468

Nina establishes the initial interpretive field for the seagull as confinement/lack of

freedom. This field is expressed in two ways: first, the prohibition against visiting the

“Bohemian” estate issued by her father and stepmother; second, the passing formulation

of her admission that she is drawn to the lake, suggesting that it is not an act of volition.

Furthermore, Nina establishes a connection between the seagull and the figure of the

actress. Both terms are placed in the final position of their respective sentences, and both

apply to Nina. A crucial difference is that Nina’s father and stepmother call her an

actress, whereas the seagull is a metaphorical identity she claims for herself. The term

actress here coincides with its typical, historic use, referring to a woman of questionable

moral and social standing. It is a derogatory label. Her father and stepmother are afraid

she will become an actress.

The metaphorical image of the seagull then gains material form when Treplev appears

with a seagull he has shot and killed. As he lays the seagull at Nina’s feet she understands

467 Golomb 684. 468 Отец и его жена не пускают меня сюда. Говорят, что здесь богема...боятся, как бы я не пошла в актрисы...А меня тянет сюда к озеру, как чайку...(13:10).

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this as a symbolic act, one that adds another layer of meaning onto the seagull:

destruction, including the destruction of agency. Killing is the ultimate act of destroying

the agency of the other. However, in this case whose agency is unclear. At first, Treplev’s

act seems to confirm Nina’s identity as the seagull. After all, her proclamation of herself

as it was addressed to him, and subsequent to that he lays the seagull at her feet. Yet he

unexpectedly relocates it as a signifier onto himself when he says, “I’ll soon kill myself

the very same way.”469 This is the first instance of slippage.

When Trigorin appears shortly thereafter, he re-attaches the seagull as a signifier to

Nina. Upon noticing the dead bird, he jots down the outline for a story idea, which he then relates to Nina.

Subject for a short story: on the shores of a lake a young girl grows up, just like you; loves the lake, like a seagull, is happy and free, like a seagull. But by chance a man comes along, sees her, and, having nothing better to do, destroys her, just like this seagull here.470

Trigorin does not traffic in nuance or subtlety. He is claiming authority to speak for Nina

and to tell her story. Of the seagull, J. L. Styan writes, “It also reflects the hold which

Treplev and Trigorin both selfishly try to exert on her [Nina, A.A.].”471 Trigorin’s “story”

is a prescription for Nina’s life. As he places the seagull as a signifier onto Nina, she fully

embraces it. She is willing to let him determine, or write, her life story. In their next

scene together Nina presents Trigorin with a medallion, engraved with a reference to a line in one of his books, “If ever my life is of use to you, come and take it.”472 Not only does the content of this statement invite Trigorin to claim her, the means of this invitation

469 Скоро таким же образом я убью самого себя (13:27). 470 Сюжет для небольшого рассказа: на берегу озера с детства живет молодая девушка, такая, как вы; любит озеро, как чайка, и счастлива, и свободна, как чайка. Но случайно пришел человек, увидел и от нечего делать погубил ее, как вот эту чайку (13:31). 471 J. L. Styan, Chekhov in Performance: A Commentary on the Major Plays (Cambridge UP, 1971) 18. 472 Если тебе когда-нибудь понадобится моя жизнь, то приди и возьми ее (13:41).

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(“confessing her love for him through his own published words”473) replaces her voice

with his, preemptively claiming his authority over her.

The narrative arc Trigorin prescribes for Nina is a familiar cliché of innocence

destroyed. It is the traditional plotline of the actress (as, for example, Anninka in The

Golovlyov Family). It is also the shape of Nina’s life during the two-year interim between

Acts III and IV of the drama. She runs off with Trigorin and becomes an actress; she has

a baby; the baby dies; and Trigorin leaves her. In short, to quote Treplev, “…Nina’s

private life has not been a roaring success.”474 Concurrent with this familiar, prescribed

life, Nina fully identifies herself as a seagull. Speaking of the letters he received from

Nina, Treplev says, “She would sign herself The Seagull. In that play of Pushkin’s, the miller says that he’s a raven; that’s how she’d keep repeating in all her letters that she was a seagull.”475

Nina’s embrace of the seagull as a signifier indicates that she has allowed others to

determine her identity. She has forfeited her agency. A reversal occurs on this point when

the audience/reader, along with Treplev, next encounters her in the drama. Treplev is at

his desk, preparing to write and reflecting on his own writing process. There is a knock at

the window. He goes out to investigate and enters with Nina. A crucial question at this

point in the drama concerns how we are to assess her. Without a doubt, she has been

damaged as the “victim of the predatory needs of another”476 and bitter experience has

taught her that her previous vision of the artistic life was an illusion. Still, is she fully broken and unhinged at the end of the drama or has she weathered the storms of her life

473 Golomb 681. 474 …личная жизнь Нины не удалась совершенно (13:50). 475 Она подписывалась Чайкой. В «Русалке» мельник говорит, что он ворон, так она в письмах все повторяла, что она чайка (13:50). 476 Styan 86.

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and emerged wiser and more mature? In other words, as a character is she hopeful or

despairing at this point in the drama? Our understanding of Nina at this juncture

significantly impacts our interpretation of the drama as a whole.

The text doesn’t provide an unequivocal answer to the above question. On the one hand, Nina appears somewhat unstable. She is quick to dissolve into tears and is initially paranoid that someone else (namely Arkadina or Trigorin) will come into the room. On the other hand, she offers one of the most balanced and sane perspectives in the whole drama.

Now I know, understand, Kostya, that in our work – it doesn’t matter whether we act or write – the main thing isn’t fame, glamour, the things I dreamed about, it’s knowing how to endure. I know how to shoulder my cross and I have faith. I have faith and it’s not so painful for me, and when I think about my calling, I’m not afraid of life.477

Styan provides an interesting and convincing reading, arguing that Nina “offers a muted

hope.”478 He arrives at this conclusion by comparing her repeat performance of lines from

Treplev’s play at the end of the drama with her performance at the beginning.

…we remember that in shame she had refused Masha her request to quote from the play two years before. Now, although sometimes struggling with her emotions in recalling the occasion, Nina speaks the lines spontaneously and with an assurance we didn’t hear on Treplev’s stage in Act I. It is a new Nina. Before, her simpler, hesitant, mechanical rendering reduced the words almost to nonsense; now, the ‘cycle of sorrow’ matches her experience as well as our sense of Chekhov’s mood, and, astonishingly, Treplev’s supernatural portrait of a desolate world rings true.479

It is within this interpretive context of Nina as a character who demonstrates an element

of regeneration and a “modicum of hope” that I return to the seagull as a signifier. During

477 Я теперь знаю, понимаю, Костя, что в нашем деле – все равно, играем мы на сцене или пишем – главное не слава, не блеск, не то, о чем я мечтала, а уменье терпеть. Умей нести свой крест и веруй. Я верую и мне не так больно, и когда я думаю о своем призвании, то не боюсь жизни (13:58). 478 Styan 85. 479 Styan 86.

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this emotionally-charged conversation between Nina and Treplev, she repeats the

following formulation three times (with slight variations), “I’m a seagull…No, that’s not

it.”480 The familiar designation, seagull, no longer quite fits and in freeing herself from

this designation she opposes Trigorin’s earlier attempt to claim authority over her and

“write” her story.

Nina exercises her agency and self-determination further as she replaces an externally

imposed identity with an internally determined one. Her second iteration of the seagull

dismissal reads, “I’m a seagull…That’s not it. I’m an actress. Ah, yes!”481 Through this

statement, Nina de-couples the terms actress and seagull. The seagull alone, which she

casts off, now represents confinement and a lack of freedom. In rejecting the seagull as a

form of identification, Nina dismisses others’ attempts to label her and, instead, claims

authority over her life. On the meta-fictional level, the seagull of the play’s title

represents the appropriation of another’s agency and self-determination. As a signifier,

though, the seagull is slippery, devoid of a consistent signified. Nina’s rejection of the

term in reference to herself marks a shift in her status as an agent in the text and it also marks a culmination in Chekhov’s portrayal of the actress throughout his work.

Moreover, Nina’s statement is a performative speech act. Through it she doesn’t simply announce her ability to speak for herself, she enacts it. After the third iteration of the phrase she provides a fuller picture of what she means by calling herself an actress, the bulk of which is quoted above. The only additional point is that she associates it with

a growth in spiritual strength. Nina thereby creates a new semantic field around the term

actress. She wrests it away from the prescriptive, categorical meaning applied to it in the

480 Я – чайка...Нет, не то (13:57). 481 Я – чайка...Не то. Я – актриса. Ну, да! (13:58).

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beginning of the drama by her father and stepmother and invests it with a sense of

internal inspiration. It has become, for her, a calling. Her use of the term diverges from its

initial use in the drama as a derogatory label or a term denoting a familiar script of

personal and moral ruin. In Nina’s usage at the end of the drama, an actress is one with

the inner conviction and grit to handle the circumstances of life, whatever they may be. In this formulation an actress becomes an artist, that is to say an active agent who creates.

At the end of the drama Nina exemplifies a truth about being an artist that Treplev is

just beginning to understand. During his musings right before Nina arrives in the last act,

Treplev says to himself, “Yes, I’m more and more convinced that the point isn’t old or

new forms, it’s to write and not think about forms, because it’s flowing freely out of your

soul.”482 True art is born from an internal impulse rather than the imposition of external

form. Recall, for example, Chekhov's complaint that Bernhardt lacks the fire of a true artist even as he concedes that she has mastered the external trappings. Likewise, the term

'actress' for the more mature Nina is a designation that arises from within rather than a label applied from without. In claiming the term for herself, Nina resists the attempts of others to determine who she will be. This is evident in her refusal of Treplev’s plea to be his ‘savior.’

The meanings attached to the term actress in Herzen’s “The Thieving Magpie” and

Ostrovsky’s Artists and Admirers provide an interesting point of comparison to The

Seagull. There is significant overlap between the unnamed actress in “The Thieving

Magpie” and Nina in The Seagull. Both characters approach acting as a calling, both oppose men who exercise power over them, and each has a child outside socially

482 Да, я все больше и больше прихожу к убеждению, что дело не в старых и не новых формах, а в том, что человек пишет, не думая ни о каких формах, пишет, потому что это свободно льется из его души (13:56).

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accepted bounds of moral propriety. The trajectories of these two women’s stories in

relation to personal agency, however, are reversed. We have just seen that others attempt

to determine Nina’s story until she claims authority over her own life. By contrast, the

unnamed actress of “The Thieving Magpie” begins with personal agency and self-

determination, which she loses over the course of the story. The ideological structure is such that her character is established as an object lesson in a polemical debate from the outset. This situation reflects an additional way in which others (both the actor who relates her story and Herzen himself as the author) claim authority over her and her story.

Nina and Ostrovsky’s Negina resemble one another in the beginning of their respective dramas. They are innocent, full of youthful exuberance, and drawn to the stage. For a while they remain on this relatively similar track, but Nina eventually outpaces Negina. She makes the rebellious decision to run away to be an actress at the end of Act III, while Negina makes an analogous decision (to run away and become

Velikatov’s mistress) at the end of the drama. In terms of narrative arc, Negina’s position at the end of her drama roughly maps onto Nina’s position at the end of Act III of her drama. The sense that Negina imparts to the term actress (a morally compromised position that allows her to pursue her passion for the stage) is similar to the meaning Nina attributes to the term in the beginning of The Seagull. The difference is that Negina never has the opportunity to redefine the term as Nina does.

Through the character of Nina Zarechnaia, Chekhov both unsettles the traditional depiction of the actress and touches on the ethical mandate of literature. He neither speaks for her nor uses her in the service of an ideological cause. He distances himself from the example of Trigorin, who is all too eager to claim representational authority

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over Nina in his attempt to apply a familiar, typical plot onto her life. Ostrovsky’s play

provides a useful example of this dynamic in drama, a genre that is devoid of the more

direct authoritative relation between author and character (via the narrator) present in

prose. Ostrovsky constructs the events of Negina’s life according to typicality. Chekhov,

by contrast, writes Nina in a way that breaks with the traditional depiction of the actress.

The Seagull, however, is not a one-sided valorization of the actress. It addresses the pitfalls as well as the desirable potential of art. There is another actress in this drama,

Arkadina. The two actresses (Nina and Arkadina) are structural opposites in several ways. On the relational level, they are situated on either side of Treplev, who is caught between them and looks to each at different times for validation. Additionally, both vie for Trigorin’s affection. They are also competitors on a professional level, according to

Arkadina at least. She views Nina’s performance in Treplev’s play as a threat. In the first act she enters the scene with a dramatic flourish, of which Styan writes, “Her show is already in direct competition with Nina’s anticipated performance.”483 By the end of the

drama, by contrast, Nina eschews the elements that motivate Arkadina’s artistic career,

namely fame and splendor. This shift in Nina’s aspirations further entrenches the

oppositional stance between the two actresses.

Whereas Nina’s Chekhovian lineage includes Maria in “Requiem” and Katya in “A

Boring Story,” Arkadina is related to Chekhov’s writing on Bernhardt and his more

abrasive commentary on actresses. Senelick attributes Chekhov’s negative judgment of

the theatrical milieu and its participants (which becomes “more embittered, more caustic,

483 Styan 31.

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and more exasperated”484 in the late eighties) to his increased familiarity with it. In other

words, as Chekhov became friends with performance artists and as he himself ventured

onto the scene as a playwright, his experience “bred contempt in him.”485 Presumably this

is because he became intimately familiar with the milieu. While this is no doubt a

contributing factor, I propose an additional reason. As Chekhov invested more of himself

and his professional career in the theater, he became more sensitive to the state of it and

more critical of its participants. In short, he is both more familiar with the theatrical

milieu in the late eighties (and beyond), and has more at stake in it.

If we consider his disparaging statement about actresses being cows in context, we can

see that it is not a wholesale dismissal of them. The statement is occasioned by his

interaction with an actress playing a role in Suvorin’s drama Tatiana Repina. Chekhov

was enamored with this drama and committed to its success on stage. Senelick notes,

Chekhov “became embroiled in the Moscow rehearsals” and “he became an intercessor

between the actors and the author.”486 His frustration is thus born out of a great respect

for the theater and high expectations of actresses as integral to its success.

As mentioned, Bernhardt is part of Arkadina’s heritage, which also includes

Lentovsky. Arkadina’s character obliquely references both. As Senelick writes, Arkadina is “a stage name based on Arcadia…Arcadia was also the name of a popular amusement park in St. Petersburg, managed by Lentovsky and famous for its zoo, magicians, and

484 Senelick “The Lake-Shore of Bohemia” 204. 485 Senelick “The Lake-Shore of Bohemia” 204. 486 Senelick “The Lake-Shore of Bohemia” 207.

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quick-change artists. So Arkadina’s nom-de-théâtre emblazons the flashiness of her style.”487 This coded reference to Lentovsky highlights Arkadina’s sensationalist bent.

In addition, one of Arkadina’s favorite plays is La Dame aux Camélias, which, as

Senelick notes, is a reference to Bernhardt.488 Although we never see Arkadina on stage within the fictional world of the drama, she performs in life in a way that gives us a sense of her style onstage. Her first appearance on the stage is, in the words of Styan,

“‘theatrical’ in the traditional way,” which is to say that she is highly melodramatic. Two scenes in particular highlight her tendency toward grandiloquent expressions of emotion: when she is pleading with Trigorin not to leave her and when she is apologizing to

Treplev (who is her son) after her angry outburst. Arkadina’s heightened emotional expression establishes an affinity between her and Bernhardt.

By placing Arkadina in the same strain as Bernhardt and Lentovsky, Chekhov indicates dissatisfaction with her as an artist. Just as Nina receives favorable treatment as a self-determining agent by means of relational dynamics, Arkadina’s significance is also worked out through the way she relates to others. She imagines herself as the center of the world, which means that everyone else plays supporting roles in the story of her life.

Consequently, she reacts strongly when others attempt to exert their own agency in defiance of her centrality. Her pleas with Trigorin to stay with her (one of her finest performances) is above all an exertion of her will. Trigorin indicates as much when he concedes, “I’ve got no will of my own…” to which Arkadina says to herself, “Now he is mine.”489

487 Senelick “The Lake-Shore of Bohemia” 204. 488 Senelick “The Lake-Shore of Bohemia” 205. 489 У меня нет своей воли... / Теперь он мой (13:42).

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Arkadina’s artistry is suspect because it is a means of control that does not allow for the agency of the other. This is forcefully expressed in her argument with Treplev in which she proclaims him to be a ‘nonentity’ (nichtozhestvo). As Carol Apollonio (Flath) argues, “Arkadina’s ‘non-entity’ will function as a kind of imperative, an expression of a tabooed desire by which Arkadina wills her son into non-being.”490 As Apollonio also

notes, Treplev is a threat to Arkadina artistically (as a member of the next generation of

artists) and personally (as her grown son, he is a reminder of her lost youth). So while

Nina spends most of the drama as a victim of others' determination of her significance,

Arkadina attempts to erase Treplev's existence for her own benefit.

The Seagull does not present the life of an artist as a privileged sphere. Treplev’s

inability to realize his grand schemes, and thereby gain external approval, casts a pall

over his life that leads to suicide. Arkadina is jealous and insecure. Trigorin experiences

his own writing as an unpleasant compulsion. Nina is taken advantage of and disowned

by her family. This play firmly counters the Romantic notion that artists constitute a

higher and more enlightened class of people. Nina expresses this sentiment well.

I thought that famous people were proud, inaccessible, that they despised the public and their own fame, their celebrity was a kind of revenge for blue blood and wealth being considered more respectable…But here they are crying, fishing, playing cards, laughing, and losing their tempers, like anybody else…491

Art does not guarantee an enlightened existence for these characters. Yet it is not the

source of the problem. The problem is that they are directed towards fame. The characters

(including Nina for most of the drama) are reminiscent of the visual artists in “Talent,”

490 Flath “The Seagull” 496. Apollonio focuses on Treplev’s passivity as a result of his mother’s activity (she is making active claims on him and is an actress). 491 Я думала, что известные люди горды, неприступны, что они презирают толпу и своею славой, блеском своего имени как бы мстят ей за то, что она выше всего ставит знатность происхождения и богатство. Но они вот плачут, удят рыбу, играют в карты, смеются и сердятся, как все...(13:27).

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who dream of acclaim but display little interest in the creation of art. Yet, within the play,

and presumably outside of it according to Chekhov, fame is not synonymous with good

art. Take Trigorin, for example. He is a celebrated author, yet the play does not celebrate him. On the contrary, his own description of his writing construes it as an act of violence.

…I feel that I’m devouring my own life, that to give away honey to somebody out there in space I’m robbing my finest flowers of their pollen, tearing up those flowers and trampling on their roots.492

As Trigorin presents it, his writing is an attempt at mastery and control. It leads him away

from life rather than towards it. In the process he harms those around him (Nina, for example). Trigorin provides a cautionary tale regarding the potential damage art can bring about, both to the world and to the artist. Trigorin may be famous, but he is not a

morally good artist.493

One reason a hierarchical framework based on fame and acclaim is detrimental is that

it engenders competition. In addition to setting an artist’s sights on being famous, this

framework directs an artist’s attention towards being more famous than another artist.

Every other artist then represents a threat rather than a unique entity with a unique

contribution. Trigorin underscores the lack of efficacy in a competitive structure: “But

there’s room enough for everyone, isn’t there? New and old – what’s the point in

shoving?”494 Treplev perceives himself to be in competition with Trigorin artistically. He

also views himself in competition with Trigorin for Arkadina and Nina.

492 ...я чувствую, что съедаю собственную жизнь, что для меда, который я отдаю кому-то в пространство, я обираю пыль с лучших своих цветов, рву самые цветы и топчу их корни (13:29). 493 This is not to say that Chekhov completely dismisses him. Chekhov treats Trigorin as he does most of his characters, as a multifaceted entity. On the complimentary side, Chekhov invests him with a noteworthy autobiographical trait: Chekhov also loved to fish. In fact, fishing enables Trigorin to access the present moment and engage more fully with life. If we were to broadly define art we might say that Trigorin is a more successful artist in the realm of fishing than he is in literature. 494 Но ведь всем хватит места, и новым и старым, – зачем толкаться? (13:34).

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While Treplev is motivated by external approval (especially his mother’s), he is also

driven by a concern – new forms – that is close to the heart of Chekhov’s artistic practice.

Chekhov is credited with innovation, especially in his drama. Yet he chides Treplev’s

attempt at a new form by having him author a play that is so esoteric as to be nonsensical.

How might we fit together Chekhov’s own inclination towards new forms with the fact

that he satirizes Treplev’s attempt in this vein? Dorn, whose consistent voice of reason

and relative neutrality is closest to the author’s own, is a useful interpretive mediary. In his assessment, Treplev’s play has merit. He remarks to himself, “I don’t know, maybe

I’m confused or I’m crazy but I liked the play. There’s something in it.”495 At the same

time he tells Treplyеv, “Every work of art ought to have a clear, well-defined idea. You

ought to know what you’re writing for, otherwise if you travel this picturesque path

without a well-defined goal, you’ll go astray and your talent will destroy you.”496

Dorn implies that innovation for the sake of innovation is misguided and ultimately

unfruitful. Treplev’s search for new forms has potential but not as an end in itself. New

forms should be in the service of another aim. Chekhov’s forms are often discomfiting,

which is the intent. He aims to stretch the reader beyond her comfort zone in order to get

her to pay attention. His innovation is directed to this end.

495 Не знаю, быть может, я ничего не понимаю или сошел с ума, но пьеса мне понравилось. В ней что-то есть (13:18). 496 В произведении должна быть ясная, определенная мысль. Вы должны знать, для чего вы пишете, иначе, если пойдете по этой живописной дороге без определенной цели, то вы заблудитесь и ваш талант погубит вас (13:19).

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CONCLUSION

My first encounter with Chekhov’s work occurred almost fifteen years ago. The story was “Gooseberries” (“Kryzhovnik”). It relates a vision of the good life, conceived and eventually brought to fruition by the storyteller’s brother (Nikolai Ivanovich): to own a small estate in the country, in which there are gooseberries. What I remember, all these years later, is the image of Nikolai, satisfied and smiling while biting into hard and sour gooseberries. The image has stayed with me this long because of the question that attended it. Should we feel pity for Nikolai because his lived experience is an inferior version of his original vision or should we admire that Nikolai is able to be contented and pleased with what he has? Both seem true, and yet neither seems true. So the image remains in my mind’s eye, its meaning unresolved.

Chekhov’s work stays with you. It is like the image of Anna Sergeevna in “Lady with a Dog,” growing more prominent and vivid over time, to the point that it begins to haunt you. (Or maybe it only reaches the point of haunting if you’re writing a dissertation on him.) He is subtle, unassuming, and understated. His stories and plays are often unspectacular on the narrative plane. In one, an actor takes ill and dies (“An Actor’s

Death”); in another, a bishop takes ill and dies (“The Bishop”). Yet out of these ostensibly mundane details about everyday life Chekhov addresses larger questions.

What does it mean to live well? Do people have the capacity to change and if so, how?

What is the nature of love? My academic study of Chekhov as an author was born of a desire to better grasp the way he created profound works out of seemingly pedestrian material.

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My interest in Chekhov also rests on a conviction that there is an ethical element to

literature. It is probably not possible to prove that engagement with literature impacts

who we are and what we do, but I take it as a matter of faith that it can and often does.

This is not to say that the impact is simple to ascertain, only that it exists. I assume this is

true in relation to Chekhov even though he was reticent to make affirmative statements

regarding ethics and literature. I am not alone in this assumption. Citing a 2013 research

study, the title of an article in The New York Times reads, “For Better Social Skills,

Scientists Recommend a Little Chekhov.”497 I am not in a position to discuss the merits

of this psychological study on a scientific basis. I refer to it to note that the researchers

chose Chekhov as one of the authors for the research presumably because they had an

internal conviction, as do I, that his work has ethical significance.

My initial intention at the start of my dissertation work was to provide a typology of

the artist in Chekhov’s work. As I began to identify and analyze the artist characters, I

discovered that only a portion would fit my desired scheme. To quote Forster out of

context, many of the artist characters were “full of the spirit of mutiny” against my

proposed project. That insight became the foundation on which the present dissertation

was built. Chekhov’s artists seemed typical on the surface yet they broke with the type in

ways I couldn’t understand. In order to make sense of them it became necessary to

understand the nature and aesthetic underpinnings of the type as a means of

characterization. In Chapter One I analyze the type as found in the French physiologie

and the Russian fiziologicheskii ocherk. In both traditions the type was a set categorical

497 Pam Belluck, “For Better Social Skills, Scientists Recommend a Little Chekhov,” The New York Times, 3 Oct. 2013, well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/03/i-know-how-youre-feeling-i-read-chekhov/, accessed 13 Dec. 2016.

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entity that enabled writers and readers to comprehend, order, and arguably master their

social world. Especially relevant to the subsequent study of Chekhov’s work are the

following considerations: the type as a static entity; the author as a spokesman for and

authority on the type; and Vissarion Belinsky’s formulation of the type as an ideological entity.

Against this backdrop, in Chapter Two I argue that the complicated type constitutes

Chekhov’s mature means of characterization. Whereas the type informs Chekhov’s characterization of the artist, he departs from the stasis found in the physiological sketch as well as from the ideological function championed by Belinsky. The complicated type

is a dualistic entity that includes both a typical framework and an expansion beyond the type. This creates a dynamic character that is difficult to categorize. The concept of the complicated type accounts for and explains the problem I experienced regarding the first iteration of the dissertation. This complicated type applies to artists in three stories (“An

Actor’s Death,” “Requiem,” and “Anyuta”) that mark Chekhov’s progression towards maturity as a writer. Each of the stories purposefully invokes types in order to complicate them. In this chapter I also demonstrate that Chekhov’s debut in New Times allows and encourages him to develop in the direction of complicated types.

The field of artist characters in Chapter Two is undifferentiated according to specialty.

The remaining two chapters focus on two important categories of artists, the visual artist

(Chapter Three) and the actress (Chapter Four), from Chekhov’s later works. Chapter

Three concerns the qualities associated with a proper artistic perspective, which is fundamental to artistic production. These qualities include affection, attentiveness to temporal specificity and sensory experience, and indeterminacy. As an author Chekhov

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relies on these elements in his texts to create works that are immersive and that challenge

the reader. These are some of the qualities that cause Chekhov’s stories and plays to stick with readers and audiences long after they first encounter them. These qualities also

continue to reward readers and audiences when they revisit works already known to

them. Chapter Four addresses Chekhov’s objectivity and subdued authorial presence,

both of which become means of respecting the agency, self-determination, and subjectivity of the other. Throughout these four chapters I provide a broad analysis of the artist as literary character in the works of Anton Chekhov. I offer readings of many works

by Anton Chekhov: some very well-known (“Lady with a Dog,” The Seagull), some less

well-known (“Requiem”), and some quite obscure (“Maria Ivanovna”). These works

interact with each other and are woven into an investigation that deepens our

understanding of this highly enigmatic writer.

Chekhov’s treatment of the type is akin to a kaleidoscope in its defiance of

definitiveness. The ‘shape-shifting,’ paradoxical nature of the artist in his work applies to

it more broadly. This presents a special conundrum to the literary critic. Criticism is akin

to typology. It is a matter of making general statements from a specific set of

information. How, though, do you make general statements about texts that challenge

generality as a matter of aesthetic principle? It is difficult to say anything definite about

Chekhov’s work. A broad statement about it, even one that is well-informed, may seem

accurate but not fully so. It sometimes feels that every claim requires qualification. My

research into Chekhov’s work has significantly increased my appreciation for the

multivalent nature of literature. There is not one right way to interpret Chekhov’s texts.

There are many. Chekhov invites his readers to become co-creators. This is less in a

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Tolstoyan or even a Nabokovian sense, in which the reader is included in the process but is nonetheless expected to arrive at a desired interpretation set by the author. Chekhov’s texts, by way of contrast, have more of a “choose your own adventure” interpretive framework. That is a part of their charm. That is also why I continue to contemplate them, almost fifteen years later.

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APPENDIX ONE English and Russian Names of Journals, Short Stories, Etc.

Journals

Alarm Clock – Будильник The Contemporary – Современник Cricket – Сверчок Dragonfly – Стрекоза Notes of the Fatherland – Отечественные записки Fragments – Осколки Fellow Traveler – Спутник Journal for All – Журнал для всех Light and Shade – Свет и тени Minute – Минута New Times – Новое время North – Север Northern Herald – Северный вестник Petersburg Gazette – Петербургская газета Spark – Искра The Spectator – Зритель Talk of the World – Мирской толк

Chekhov Stories

English Translation Russian Original Journal Where It Translation Used498 Was Published About Love О любви Russian Thought An Actor's Death Актерская гибель Petersburg Gazette Anyuta Анюта Fragments Cathy Popkin Art Художество Petersburg Gazette Constance Garnett Artists' Wives Жены артистов Minute The Bishop Архиерей Journal for All Cathy Popkin Boots Сапоги Petersburg Gazette A Boring Story Скучная история Northern Herald The Chemist's Wife Аптекарша Fragments

498 If the box is left blank, it either means that I translated the passage(s) myself or that I don’t include quotes from the story.

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The Chorus Girl Хористка Fragments A Confession, or Исповедь, или Оля, Alarm Clock Olya, Zhenya, Zoya: Женя, Зоя: письмо A Letter A Discovery Открытие Fragments Disorder in Rome Кавардак в Риме Alarm Clock What Elements are Что чаще всего Dragonfly Cathy Popkin Most Often Found in встречается в Novels, Short Stories, романах, повестях и Etc.? т. п.? The Fiancée Невеста Journal for All Cathy Popkin Gooseberries Крыжовник Russian Thought The Grasshopper Попрыгунья North Ralph E. Matlaw Grief Тоска Petersburg Gazette The Hired Pianist Тапер Alarm Clock A Hopeless Situation Пропащее дело Fellow Traveler House with a Дом с мезанином: Russian Thought Cathy Popkin Mezzanine: An рассказ художника Artist's Story The Huntsman Егерь Petersburg Gazette Hush! Тссс! Fragments In the Spring Весной Petersburg Gazette The Kiss Поцелуй New Times Cathy Popkin Lady with a Dog Дама с собачкой Russian Thought Cathy Popkin Letter to a Learned Письмо к ученому Dragonfly Neighbor соседу A Living History Живая хронология Fragments Maria Ivanovna Марья Ивановна Alarm Clock A Modern Guide to Новейший Fragments Letter-Writing письмовник Mummers Ряженые Talk of the World My Jubilee Мой юбилей Dragonfly My Rules for Мой домострой Alarm Clock Household Order On Easter Eve Святою ночью New Times Cathy Popkin Once Again on Sarah Опять о Саре The Spectator Bernhardt Бернаре A Playwright Драматург Cricket A Poor Story Скверная история Light and Shade A Problem Задача Fragments A Radiant Persona: Светлая личность: Cricket An “Idealist's” Story рассказ «идеалиста» Reading Чтение Fragments Requiem Панихида New Times Cathy Popkin Revenge Месть Talk of the World Sarah Bernhardt Сара Бернар The Spectator The Seagull Чайка Premiere: Laurence Senelick Alexanderinskii Theater, St.

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Petersburg A Spineless Person Тряпка Petersburg Gazette Talent Талант Fragments Steppe Степь Northern Herald Theater Manager Антрепренер под Fragments Under the Sofa диваном Two Journalists Два газетчика Fragments The Tragic Actor Трагик Fragments Unclean Tragedians Нечистые трагики и Alarm Clock Laurence Senelick and Leprous прокаженные Dramatists драматурги The Wallet Бумажник Alarm Clock A Woman Without Женщина без The Spectator Prejudices предрассудков A Writer Писатель Petersburg Gazette

Additional Works

Anton the Wretched – Антон-Горемыка

“Military Valet” – «Денщик»

“Petersburg Organ Grinders” – «Петербургские шарманщики»

The Physiology of Petersburg – Физиология Петербурга

“The Portrait” – «Портрет»

Artists and Admirers – «Таланты и поклонники»

The Village – Деревня

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