Chekhov was a man!!

Simon Karlinsky is, of course, a treasure to the world of literature. His knowledge of Russian history and literature is profound -- and you will find this book utterly fascinating if only because of its scathing analysis of 19th-century Russian critics, the most myopic of men -- and the unwitting forerunners of the even more myopic partisans of "Socialist Realism." It was against these titanic mental pygmies that Chekhov had to make his artistic way -- and the pygmies misunderstood and and libelled him every step of the way.

Chekhov was a highly original literary genius whom the world is still discovering. Enjoy this book, and enjoy your invitation to the even greater pleasure of reading Chekhov himself. The Modern Library has published three volumes of his stories, and they are wonderful. The plays are also superb.

Highest recommendation!

"The Party & Other Stories," volume 4 of The Ecco Press edition, contains eleven stories written during the period from the mid-1880s to the mid-1890s. These are stories from Chekhov's so-called "middle period," the years after Chekhov had finished his medical studies and began writing and publishing the longer, more serious psychological studies whose characteristics became a universal ascription for short stories of that sort: "Chekhovian." As Harold Bloom has written, "the formal delicacy and somber reflectiveness [of Chekhov's stories] make him the indispensable artist of the unlived life, and the major influence upon all story-writers after him."

Every one of the stories in this volume is a remarkable example of Chekhov's ability to write in simple, straightforward fashion, while, all the time, illuminating with almost microscopic precision the internalized, psychological lives of his characters. As one commentary on Chehov's writing during this period has noted, apropos of the stories in this volume (and in contrast to Chekhov's early humorous stories): "Characters are no longer perceived satirically, as social archetypes, but seen from within. And the inner life revealed is often an unhappy one, the characters' 'real life' being in sharp contrast with their 'world of desire,' reached only through memory or fantasy."

The stories range from long to short, each a near-perfect model of the short story, worthy of enjoyment and careful study. The longest of the stories, "A Woman's Kingdom," tells of Anna Akimovna, the daughter of a factory owner who, as a young girl, mingled with the working classes, only to find herself the lonely, single, middle-aged heiress and proprietor of those same factories later in life. It is a remarkable exploration of Anna's loneliness and of her yearning to return to the life of her childhood, as well as of the separation between owner and worker in an industrialized Russia. As Anna says, longingly: "Yes, I'll go and get married. I will marry in the simplest, most ordinary way and be radiant with happiness. And, would you believe it, I will marry some plain working man, some mechanic or draughtsman."

In the title story, "The Party," Chekhov brilliantly probes the mind, the thoughts, the silent unhappiness and dissatisfaction of Olga Mihalovna, a pregnant, married woman who clearly does not like her philandering, brash husband or her social obligations. In a passage that strikingly illustrates both the luster of Chekhov's art and the deep-seated discontent of the character of his story, Olga stands watching her guests, the partygoers of the story's title, glide by in boats:

"Olga Mihalovna looked at the other boats, and there, too, she saw only uninteresting, queer creatures, affected or stupid people. She thought of all the people she knew in the district, and could not remember one person of whom one could say or think anything good. They all seemed to her mediocre, insipid, unintelligent, narrow, false, heartless; they all said what they did not think, and did what they did not want to. Dreariness and despair were stifling her; she longed to leave off smiling, to leap up and cry out, 'I am sick of you,' and then jump out and swim to the bank."

These are just two of the stories. The volume also contains "The Kiss," a story that no less a literary arbiter than Bloom considers the best of Chekhov's early stories (written in 1887, when Chekhov was 27 years old). And the rest are equally good, demonstrating why Chekhov is considered among the greatest practitioners of the story-writer's art.

If you can, find this volume and the others in The Ecco Press's wonderful edition of Chekhov and read them all. If you can't, then find another edition. Just read Chekhov. You will not be disappointed.

"The Party & Other Stories," volume 4 of The Ecco Press edition, contains eleven stories written during the period from the mid-1880s to the mid-1890s. These are stories from Chekhov's so-called "middle period," the years after Chekhov had finished his medical studies and began writing and publishing the longer, more serious psychological studies whose characteristics became a universal ascription for short stories of that sort: "Chekhovian." As Harold Bloom has written, "the formal delicacy and somber reflectiveness [of Chekhov's stories] make him the indispensable artist of the unlived life, and the major influence upon all story-writers after him."

Every one of the stories in this volume is a remarkable example of Chekhov's ability to write in simple, straightforward fashion, while, all the time, illuminating with almost microscopic precision the internalized, psychological lives of his characters. As one commentary on Chehov's writing during this period has noted, apropos of the stories in this volume (and in contrast to Chekhov's early humorous stories): "Characters are no longer perceived satirically, as social archetypes, but seen from within. And the inner life revealed is often an unhappy one, the characters' 'real life' being in sharp contrast with their 'world of desire,' reached only through memory or fantasy."

The stories range from long to short, each a near-perfect model of the short story, worthy of enjoyment and careful study. The longest of the stories, "A Woman's Kingdom," tells of Anna Akimovna, the daughter of a factory owner who, as a young girl, mingled with the working classes, only to find herself the lonely, single, middle-aged heiress and proprietor of those same factories later in life. It is a remarkable exploration of Anna's loneliness and of her yearning to return to the life of her childhood, as well as of the separation between owner and worker in an industrialized Russia. As Anna says, longingly: "Yes, I'll go and get married. I will marry in the simplest, most ordinary way and be radiant with happiness. And, would you believe it, I will marry some plain working man, some mechanic or draughtsman."

In the title story, "The Party," Chekhov brilliantly probes the mind, the thoughts, the silent unhappiness and dissatisfaction of Olga Mihalovna, a pregnant, married woman who clearly does not like her philandering, brash husband or her social obligations. In a passage that strikingly illustrates both the luster of Chekhov's art and the deep-seated discontent of the character of his story, Olga stands watching her guests, the partygoers of the story's title, glide by in boats:

"Olga Mihalovna looked at the other boats, and there, too, she saw only uninteresting, queer creatures, affected or stupid people. She thought of all the people she knew in the district, and could not remember one person of whom one could say or think anything good. They all seemed to her mediocre, insipid, unintelligent, narrow, false, heartless; they all said what they did not think, and did what they did not want to. Dreariness and despair were stifling her; she longed to leave off smiling, to leap up and cry out, 'I am sick of you,' and then jump out and swim to the bank."

These are just two of the stories. The volume also contains "The Kiss," a story that no less a literary arbiter than Bloom considers the best of Chekhov's early stories (written in 1887, when Chekhov was 27 years old). And the rest are equally good, demonstrating why Chekhov is considered among the greatest practitioners of the story-writer's art.

If you can, find this volume and the others in The Ecco Press's wonderful edition of Chekhov and read them all. If you can't, then find another edition. Just read Chekhov. You will not be disappointed.

Examples of pieces in the book: "First Aid" is a short story in which the inepitude of the civil service/nobility kills a drunk "drowning" victim through folk medicine (tossing on a rug) and vague "CPR" instructions.

"From the Diary of an Assistant Bookkeeper" is a tale of perpetual hope of promotion based on the demise of the current bookkeeper given in the form of a diary.

"Questions Posed by a Mad Mathematician" presents the worst fears for a mathmatics test. Example: "I was chased by 30 dogs, 7 of which were white, 8 gray, and the rest black. Which of my legs was bitten, the right or the left?"

"Confession - or Olya, Zhenya, Zoya: A Letter" is a bachelor's explanation of why he has never married - the disasters (from hiccups up) that have foiled each proposal.

The remaining pieces are as diverse and entertaining. The pieces are the best of over 400 short pieces available from the early period. Even if you don't generally read Russian literature you will enjoy these pieces.

Even here, the shortest of stories, is as powerful as his most popular plays. And while the story shares similar themes and environs; the lonely country estate, a beautiful orchard, family angst, malaise, boredom, nature, madness, creativity and the interesting-and invigorating-visitor who comes to stay, there's even more here.

Call it the supernatural, insomnia-induced hallucination or the madness & joy of creative genius, Chekhov stumbled onto something new here. A column of smoke, a dark tornado, a monk robed in black. Our protagonist, Andrey Kovrin, tells Tanya Pesotskaya, the estate-owner's daughter, about the black monk, imparting him as a legend, a story "not distinguished for its clarity." Andrey soon thereafter meets the monk, who comes first as a force of nature, later preceded by violins and singing. As deep as Andrey's conversations with the monk later come to be, the surrounding tale of Andrey and the estate-owner's daughter is classic Chekhov and stands on its own, x-file or no x-file.

I loved this story. Hope you like it too.

In Chekhov's stories, marriage is hardly a bed of roses, usually resulting in discontentment, depression, and adultery; nowhere is this more perfectly executed than in "The Lady with the Dog," which ends with the two transgressors not contrite over their sins, but resolving to carry on their affair in the face of uncertainty. In "The Party," a young married couple's disharmony culminates in a tragedy that underscores their need to love each other. Chekhov's characters tend to marry for the wrong reasons, like societal pressure, false hopes of marital bliss ("The Helpmate," "Betrothed"), and convenience and mutual benefit ("Anna on the Neck"). His characters usually are people who mean well but do the wrong things: In "At a Country House," a cultural elitist has a habit of scaring off the very men he wants his daughters to marry.

Chekhov also touches on themes of pure, often unrequited, love. "The Beauties" is a plaintive tale of infatuation, of a boy's enthralling first discovery of intangible feminine beauty. His lonely characters, such as in "The Schoolmistress," "A Doctor's Visit," and "The Darling," are often prisoners of their own inhibitions, obsessions, and self-obligations.

Other topics are covered, often exhibiting a world-weary cynicism. In the amusing fable "The Shoemaker and the Devil," the protagonist's conclusion is not the cliched lesson to be thankful for the few things he has in life, but rather that there is nothing in life worth selling his soul to the devil for. "Rothschild's Fiddle" is like a Marc Chagall painting set to prose, portraying the futility and bitterness of life offset by the beauty of art, while "Whitebrow" is a fuzzy parable. Chekhov also displays a talent for drawing comical characters, such as the talkative blowhard in "The Petchenyeg" and the prudish protagonist of "The Man in a Case." A mark of Chekhov's style is that these people often are oblivious to their own idiosyncrasies, a touch that injects as much comedy as tragedy into the stories.

These stories might leave one with the impression that Chekhov was pessimistic about love and marriage, and even life, but in my opinion they emphasize a fundamental truism about fiction -- much as in comedy, where failure is funnier than success, even though "good" love is what makes the world go around, "bad" love is more interesting to write about.

Chekhov is a master, but I almost wish he'd never existed. His prose is so deceptively simple that it will make everyone reading him, be they caterers, kids, or Senate whips, think "I can do that!" Needless to say, they can't.

This doesn't mean anyone will ever stop trying. Chekhov fans the flames of megalomania in what Sartre called the "Sunday writer", dilettantes like Mathieu in The Age of Reason. Almost every short story written now is in either the style of Raymond Carver or Chekhov, and Carver was just the first to graft Chekhov's style onto American subjects. What is that style? It's not as instantly recognizable as Kafka's or Joyce's -- two terminal figures who can't be imitated -- but if you want an example of it, grab any New Yorker that might be lying around the house and flip to the short story. Got one? Okay, now notice how it doesn't end with a swordfight or an orgy. Instead, it will most likely hinge on a simple misunderstanding, such as a man making an offhand comment that causes his wife to lose all respect for him, or else some kind of sudden revelation; like an interior monologue where, after seeing two schoolgirls share a bologna sandwich, a professional woman realizes her entire life is corrupt and shallow. Shocks of recognition, mundane realism, and a muted climax ( this last is especially crucial; the professional woman above wouldn't throw off her worldly chattels and move to India, but would simply go back to her office, maybe even with a little excitement to get to work on a new ad campaign ) -- these are the hallmarks of Chekhovian writing.

The bad news is that we can look forward to an eternity of these pale imitations. Because the times are always changing, Chekhov's journalistic style -- remember he started out as a newspaperman -- ALWAYS APPLIES. It's a nightmare. But that's no reason to keep you, as it kept me for so long, from the original. All of Chekhov's best stories are here, or in the other two volumes of the Modern Library series ( where the nitpicker below can find the other stories whose absence he laments, except "Gusev," which is in this one. )