29 Works. Vol. 6. 140.
30 Translated by Constance Garnett.
31 Letopis’. 301. [March 29–30, 1887.]
32 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 53, 373. [To Leykin, April 30, 1887.]
Part 5: To the South and Back
1 Translated by Constance Garnett.
2 Translated by Sidonie K. Lederer. The Selected Letters of Anton Chekhov. 30. [To the Chekhov family, April 7–19, 1887.]
April 1887
1 Translated by Sidonie K. Lederer. The Selected Letters of Anton Chekhov. 25. [To the Chekhov family, April 7–19, 1887.]
2 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 53.
3 Translated by Constance Garnett.
4 The last four sentences are translated by Sidonie K. Lederer. The Selected Letters of Anton Chekhov. 31.
5 Letopis’. 303. [April 3, 1887.]
6 Translated by Yarmolinsky. Letters of Anton Chekhov. 46. [April 7, 1887 to Leykin.]
7 Letopis’. 305. [April 7, 1887.]
8 Translated by Constance Garnett.
9 Translated by Constance Garnett.
10 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 68. [To the Chekhov family, April 14–19, 1887.]
11 Ibid., 70. [To Leykin, April 17, 1887.]
12 Alexander Serebrov-Tikhonov, “About Chekhov”: “ ‘What a wonderful sport, fishing!’ Chekhov told me while baiting his hook. ‘It is a sort of quiet insanity. You are happy with life, you are happy with yourself, and you are not a danger to anyone. And the most marvelous thing is that life is good.’ ” In Memories of Chekhov: Accounts of the Writer from His Family, Friends and Contemporaries. 95.
13 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 71. [To Alexander Chekhov, April 20, 1887.]
14 Translated by Avrahm Yarmolinsky. The Unknown Chekhov. 131.
15 Letopis’. 307. [April 23, 1887.]
16 Translated by Constance Garnett. [To the Chekhov family, April 25, 1887.]
17 Translated by Sidonie K. Lederer. The Selected Letters of Anton Chekhov. 36–37.
18 Donald Rayfield supplies the Soviet-censored word “pee.” (Chekhov: A Life (2021). 177.)
19 Works. Vol. 2. 146–147.
20 Letopis’. 309. [April 29, 1887.]
21 Translated by Constance Garnett.
May 1887
1 Translated by Heim and Karlinsky. Anton Chekhov’s Life and Thought: Selected Letters and Commentary. 261. [To Suvorin, March 27, 1894.]
2 Letopis’. 310. [May 5, 1887.]
3 Translated by Constance Garnett.
4 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 98. [To Georgy Chekhov, June 23, 1887.] See also Letopis’, 310. [May 5, 1887.]
5 Translated by Constance Garnett. [To the Chekhov family, May 11, 1887.]
6 Translated by Constance Garnett.
7 Donald Rayfield. Chekhov: A Life (2021). 146.
8 M. P. Chekhova. Pis’ma k bratu A. P. Chekhovu. 18–19. [From Maria Chekhova to Chekhov, May 8, 1887.] Chekhova’s own notes on this letter: “Anton Pavlovich was at this time on a trip to Taganrog and sent us from the road a letter-diary, with his humorous descriptions of his impressions of Taganrog life, which he now saw by a more idiosyncratic way than when we ourselves lived there.” (This is the only surviving letter from Maria to her brother in these two years.)
9 “After the high demands that Maupassant placed on his art, it would be difficult to write anything after him, but one must work just the same,” Chekhov told Ivan Bunin. “We Russians must be particularly bold in our work. There are big dogs and little dogs, but little dogs must not fret over the existence of the big ones. Everyone is obligated to howl in the voice that the Lord God has given him.” Bunin introduces this quotation by saying Chekhov “often said.” (About Chekhov: The Unfinished Symphony. 20.)
10 Coope. Doctor Chekhov: A Study in Literature and Medicine. 21
11 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 84. [To Leykin, May 14, 1887.]
12 Magarshack. Chekhov: A Life. 114. [To the Chekhov family, April 7, 1887.]
13 Translated by Bartlett. Anton Chekhov: A Life in Letters. 108. [To Leykin, May 22, 1887.]
14 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 87–88. [To Leykin, May 22, 1887.]
June 1887
1 Eugene Vodolazkin, Solovyov and Larionov. Translated by Lisa C. Hayden. London: Oneworld, 2018. 184–185.
2 Dnevnik Alekseia Sergeevicha Suvorina [Diary of Aleksei Sergeevich Suvorin]. 72. [May 2, 1887.]
3 Ibid., 559–560.
4 Ibid., 560.
5 Works. Vol. 6. 536.
6 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 91. [To Leykin, June 4, 1887.]
7 Rayfield. Anton Chekhov: A Life (2021). 182.
8 Translated by Constance Garnett.
9 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 390.
10 Translated by Constance Garnett.
11 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 94. [To Leykin, June 9, 1887.]
12 Sergei Semenov: “When the first volume of the Complete Works of Chekhov was published by Marx, [Tolstoy] read and reread it. He enjoyed the Chekhovian humor, and came to call Chekhov one of the best humor writers. ‘Drama’ was Tolstoy’s favorite story from this collection. He recommended it to others, and sincerely laughed every time he read it.” (In Memories of Chekhov: Accounts of the Writer from His Family, Friends and Contemporaries. 83.)
13 Translated by Constance Garnett.
14 Translated by Constance Garnett.
15 Works. Vol. 6. 230–235.
16 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 98. [To Georgy Chekhov, June 23, 1887.]
17 Dina Rubina, “Preface: Chekhov’s Blotter.” In Chekhov’s Letters: Biography, Context, Poetics. 239–240.
18 The only translation into English is by Peter Constantine in The Undiscovered Chekhov.
19 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 100. [To Lazarev, June 27 or 28, 1887.]
20 Works. Vol. 6. 242.
21 Memories of Chekhov: Accounts of the Writer from His Family, Friends and Contemporaries. 86.
July 1887
1 To Elena Shavrova, June 20, 1891. Translated by Louis S. Friedland. Letters on the Short Story, the Drama, and Other Literary Topics. 77–78.
2 In Memories of Chekhov: Accounts of the Writer from His Family, Friends and Contemporaries. 47.
3 Translated by Constance Garnett.
4 Translated by Constance Garnett.
5 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 101.
6 Magarshack. Chekhov: A Life. 342 [To Olga Knipper, July 8, 1899.]
7 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 393.
8 Letopis’. 318. [July 15, 1887.]
9 Ibid., 364. Dated “1887–1888.”
10 Ibid., 318–319. [July 15, 1887.]
11 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 102–103. [To Leykin, July 17, 1887.]
12 Ibid., 393.
13 Letopis’. 319. [July 22, 1887.]
14 Translated by Constance Garnett.
15 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 394.
August 1887
1 Alexander Kuprin. Reminiscences of Anton Chekhov. 79–80.
2 Alexander Chekhov. Perepiska. [September 5, 1887.]
3 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 103. [To Lazarev, early August 1887.]
4 Chekhov would have read a discussion of this custom in Nikolay Leskov’s The Enchanted Wanderer (1873).
5 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 104 [To Alexander Chekhov, early August 1887.]
6 Pis’ma. 107. [To Leykin, August 11, 1887.]
7 Works. Vol. 6. 287.
8 Ibid., 290–292.
9 Translated by Constance Garnett.
10 This is a happier echo of Agafya’s fearful approach toward her deceived husband: “At one time she moved in zigzags, then she moved her feet up and down without going forward, bending her knees and stretching out her hands, then she staggered back.”
11 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 106–108. [To Leykin, August 11, 1887.]
12 Ibid., 109–110. [To Schechtel, August 12, 1887.]
13 Magarshack. Chekhov: A Life. 117. [Letter to Schechtel, August 12, 1887.]
14 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 109. [To Alexander Chekhov, August 12, 1887.]
15 Translated by Constance Garnett. For an eerily similar experience of hallucinations brought on by a brain tumor, see “A Passage to India” by Oliver Sacks in The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat.
16 Pis’ma. Vol. 2. 111–112.
17 Letopis’. 323. [August 20, 1887.]
18 Translated by Yarmolinsky, The Portable Chekhov. 90–97.
19 Translated by Constance Garnett.
20 Letopis’. 324–325. [“Summer.”]
September 1887
1 Magarshack. Chekhov: A Life. 383. [To Olga Knipper, April 20, 1904.]
2 Pis’ma. [September 2, 1887 to Leykin.]
3 Perepiska A. P. Chekhova i Al. P. Chekhova [Correspondence between A. P. Chekhov and Al. P. Chekhov]. Vol. 1. Moscow: Zhudozhestcennaya Literatura, 1984. http://az.lib.ru/c/chehowaleksandrpawlowich/text_0050.shtml.