Yours,
A. Chekhov
1 A writer who had gone to school with Chekhov in Taganrog.
To VLADIMIR YAKOVENKO
january 30, /8g7, Melikhovo
Dear Vladimir Ivanovich,
Having read your letter in "The Physician," I wrote to Mos- cow to have them send you my "Sakhalin Island." There you will find a bit about corporal punishment and transportation for crime, and some comments, incidentally, on Yadrintsev, which I recommend to you. . . .
It may be pointed out, relevantly, that jurists and penologists consider as corporal punishment (in its narrow, physical sense) not only beating with birch rods, switching or hitting with the fist, but also shackling, the "cold" treatment, the schoolboy "no dinner," "bread and water," prolonged kneeling, repeated touching of the forehead to the ground and binding the anns.
This inventory has made me suffer. Never yet have I had so little time.
I wish you all the best and warmly clasp your hand.
Yours,
A. Chekhov
. . . The reaction of corporal punishment upon physical health can be noted in the doctors' records, which you will find in the proceedings on tortures.
"Since 1884 I have been spitting blood every spring. . . ." In the spring of 1897, as Chekhov sat down to dinner with Suvorin in a Moscow restaurant, he suddenly collapsed. He ^^ carried to Suvorin's room, became critically ill during the night and was taken to a hospital the following morning. The diagnosis was tuberculosis of the upper lungs. For several weeks he lay in bed barely able to move or speak. His sister, Maria, and his brother, Ivan, came immediately—Chekhov forbade them to tell his mother and father the nature of the illness—but friends and admirers were barred from the room. Tolstoy, however, managed to get by the nurses: he came to soothe the patient with sickroom small talk, but he stayed to argue that a work of art only fulfilled its function if an uneducated peasant could understand it. That must, indeed, have been a scene: the great man pacing the floor, the sick man trying to answer from his bed. By the time Tolstoy left, the patient had had a dangerous relapse.
When he recovered enough to travel, Chekhov went to Nice. (From now on he was to live not where and how he chose, but where and how the disease dictated.) All of France, even the refugees and pleasure lovers of the Riviera, was in ferment over the Dreyfus case. Chekhov was convinced of Dreyfus' innocence and his warm defense of Zola's brave position got him into a fight with Suvorin. For many years Chekhov had disliked the politics and the anti-Semitism of Suvorin's newspaper, but he had managed to avoid an open row with Suvorin. Now he could no longer stomach Suvorin's position in the Dreyfus case, and he said so in sharp words. They were never again to be close friends.
The months of invalid exile in Nice were not lonely—the south of France has always had a large Russian colony—and one has the feeling that France was good for Chekhov. But, as always, the time came when he was desperate to go home. The doctors would not allow him to live in Moscow: they insisted that he move to a milder climate. And so began the last years, the Yalta years.
The Moscow Art Theatre was founded in 1895 by Nemirov- ich-Danchenko and Konstantin Stanislavski in revolt against a theatre of stale domestic plays and foreign fripperies, of rhet- oric and rant, a theatre where the star actor manipulated every- thing to suit his own style and fancy. These two men and their associates believed in a more natural style of acting—they called it "spiritual realism." They believed that every side of stage production, direction, costuming, lighting, music, was of equal importance and should be carefully integrated into an artistic whole. The ideas of this new group were so fresh, their meth- ods so interesting, and their productions so remarkable that the Moscow Art Theatre became the greatest theatre influence in modern times. Our stage still works from the prompt books of Stanislavski, although it sometimes treats the books as if they were the Bible in bad translation. \Vhenever and wherever it is curtain time in the \Vestern world, Stanislavski and Nemirov- ich-Danchenko are still in the theatre.
Chekhov was attracted by this new theatre group and when they came to him he was pleased at the possibility of working with them. Nemirovich-Danchenko had always been a great admirer of The Seagull and now he proposed to include it in the opening repertory program. But he had a hard time per- suading Chekhov to allow the performance and an even harder time persuading Stanislavski and the other actors. Stanislavski said he didn't like the play and, at the first few meetings, didn't like the playwright, either. He thought Chekhov arrogant and insincere, which are two quite remarkable words from Stanis- lavski about Chekhov. The actors of the company, in the early meetings, were also bewildered and irritated by Chekhov. \Vhen one of them asked him how a part should be played Chekhov said, "As well as possiblc." This remark is still quoted as the charmingly naive statement of a writer who didn't know any- thing about the stage. It is, of course, the statement of a writer who knew a great deal about the stage but who refused to deal in the large words of stagc palaver.
The Moscow Art Theatre opened its door with an initial success, but then went financially down hill. As the group ap- proached the Nemirovich-Danchenko production of The Sea- gull they were at the end of their resources. Nemirovich-Dan- chenko had never intended the play to carry that much of a burden. The rehearsals and the opening night were as dramatic as they were comic. The company had enough trouble without the sudden appearance of Maria Chekhova, who came to plead with them to cancel the performance: she said the almost cer- tain failure of the play would be dangerous to her brother's health. Fortunately, Nemirovich-Danchenko was a man of sense who knew more about Chekhov than his sister and he refused to cancel the performance. But the sister's last-minute dramatic plea, thrown at people who were already frightened that their theatre was about to collapse, was enough to cause a panic. Stanislavski said that "an inner voice"—an inner voice is as much a part of every theatre as is the curtain or the lights— told the cast that if they did not act well, if the play should fail, they would be the executioners of their beloved Chekhov. (This was, indeed, a romantic picture of a writer who had always taken failure and success with calmness and serenity.) The cast fortified their inner voices with valerian drops, and got ready. Stanislavski's left foot, which had taken to violent and mysteri- ous jerkings all on its own, was finally put under control, and Olga Knipper and the other actors throttled down the hysterics in plenty of time to get dressed. The curtain went up, the cur- tain came down. The play was a great success. The Seagull had saved the Moscow Art Theatre. To this day, a seagull is painted on the curtain of their theatre, in gratitude to Chekhov.
Chekhov had rewritten—the date of rewriting is not clear— Wood Demon and renamed it Uncle Vanya. Provincial reper- tory companies had already picked up the play and were per- forming it—Gorki wrote to Chekhov that he had seen it in Nizhni-Novgorod—before the Moscow Art Theatre was ready with its production in the autumn of 1899. Chekhov, who Stan- islavski thought would be killed by the failure of The Seagull, went to bed in Yalta without realizing that Uncle Vanya was opening in Moscow. The new production of Uncle Vanya was not a brilliant success, although it was certainly not the failure that Olga Knipper made it in her excited report to Chekhov. It was enough of a success to convince the Moscow Art Theatre that their future lay in the hands of their new playwright and, because it was difficult for him to come to Moscow, they ar- ranged a Crimean tour in the hope of encouraging him to write more plays. It was a gay and charming troupe that came south and the triumph of their tour and the pleasure of their com- pany gave Chekhov a happy time. He sat down to write The Three Sisters for them.