O X F O R D VVORLD S CLASSICS
Anton Chekhov Early Stories
THE WORLD'S CLASSICS
CHEKHOV: EARLY STORIES
Anton Chekhov was born in 1860 in the south of Russi a, the son of a poor grocer. At the age of 19 he followed his family to Moscow, where he studied medicine and helped to support the household by writing comic stories for popu- lar magazines. By 1888 he was publishing in the leading literary monthlies of Moscowand St Petersburg: a sign that he had already been recognized as a master of Russian fiction. During the next 15 years he wrote the 50 or so short stories on which his claim to world pre-eminence in the genre is based. His plays, especially those of his later years, are also highly original and have proved extremely influential. He was closely associated with the Moscow Art Theatre and married the actress Olga Knipper in 1901. In 1898 he was forced by ill-health to move to Yalta, where he wrote his two greatest plays, Three Sisters and The Cherry Orchard. The premiere of the latter took place on his forty-fourth birth- day. Chekhov died six months later, on 15 July (2 July Old Style) 1904.
Patrick Miles has worked on the early stories in Chekhov's archives in Taganrog and Moscow, directed Ivanov, The Cherry Orchard, and Chekhov's vaudevilles at the Edinburgh Fringe, and translated Turgenev, Bulgakov, and Vampilov for the Royal National Theatre. He is the editor of Chekhov on the British Stage (Cambridge, 1993) and Russian Lector at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge.
Harvey Pitcher was Assistant Lecturer at Glasgow University and then started the Russian Department at the University ofSt Andrews. Since 1971 he has been a freelance writer and translator. His books include The Chekhov Play: A New Interpretation (London, 1973) and Chekhov's Lead- ing Lady (London, 1979), a biographical portrait of Olga Knipper. He has also written widely about the British in Russia before the Revolution.
THE WORLD'S CLASSICS
ANTON CHEKHOV
Early Stories
Translated with an Introduction and Notes by
PATRICK MILES and
HARVEY PITCHER
Oxford New York
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 1994
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Introduction, Translation, and Notes © l'atrick Miles and Haroey Pitcher IY82 Stlect Btbltography © Patrtck Miles 1982 Chronology@ Oxford Untuti'Stty Press 1984
Ftrst publuhed as a Wtjrld's Cl.usics paperback 1994
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British Library Catalogumg m Pubhcation Data Data available
Library of Congress Cataloging in PubhCJtion Data Chekhov, Anton Pavlovich, 1860-1904. {Short stories. English. Stlectionsf Early stories / Anton Chekhov ; translated with an introduction and notes by Patnck Miles and Haroey Pitcher. p. cm. — rThe World's classics) lncludes bibliogrophical references. l. Chekhov, Anton Pavlovich, 1860-1904—Translations into English. I. Miles, Patrick. U. Pitcher, HarveyJ. Hl. Titte. IV. Series. PG34S6.AISM5 1994 89l.73'3-dc2O 93-4S73 ISBN 0-19-282814-2
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Contents
/ntrodttction 1
/88J Rapture 9
The Death of a Civil Savant 11
An Incident at Law 14
Fat and Thin 16
The Daughter of Albion 18
1884 Oysters 22
A Dreadful Night 26
Minds in Fermcnt 32
The Complaints Book 36
The Chameleon 37
/885 The Huntsman 41
The Malefactor 45
A Man of Ideas 49
Sergeant Prishibeyev 53
The Misfortune 57
1886 Romance with Double-Bass 62
The Witch 68
Grisha 79
Kids 82
Revenge 88
Easter Night 92
The LiHle Joke 102
The Objet d'Art 106
The Chorus-Girl 110
Dreams 115
The Orator 123
Vanka 126
Verochka 130 A Drama 142 Typhus 147 Notes from the Journal of a Quick-Tempered Man 153 The Reed-Pipe 162 The Kiss 170
No Comment 187 Let Me Sleep 191
Notes 197
Select Bibliography 201
A Chronology of Anton Chekhov 204
Introduction
I write under the most atrocious conditions. My non-literary work lies before me Aaying my conscience unmercifully, the offspring of a visiting kinsman is screaming in the next room, in another room Father is reading aloud The Sealed Angel to Mother ... Someone has just wound up the musical box and it's playing La Belle Helene . . . I'd like to clear off to the country, but it's already one in the morning . . . Can you conceive of more atrocious surroundings for a literary man? My bed's taken up by the visiting relation, who keeps coming over to me and engaging me in medical conversation. 'My daughter must have colic, that's why she's screaming . . . ' I have the great misfortune to be a medic, so every man-jack feels duty hound to 'talk medicine' with me. And when they've had enough of talking medicine, they start on literature .. .
Letter from Chekhov to Leykin, August 1883
By contrast, The Huntsman (1885) was written in the peace of the countryside ... scribbled out by its author as he lay on the floor of a bathing-house, and posted off to the editor just as it was.
Yet it was in those hectic early years, when literature was still competing with medicine, that Chekhov the writer was at his most prolific -with so many members of the family to support financially, he had to be. Of all his published fiction, 528 items were written between 1880 and March 1888, and only 60 in the period 1888-1904. This is a striking imbalance, even given that many of the earlier works are short ephemera. And these 528 items do not include his weekly column of Moscow gossip, his reporting, theatre notices and other occasional journalism.