A peculiar biography that justifies its addition to an overcrowded
shelf by focusing on the landscapes most important to the Russian
writer. It's a good idea-for a magazine article or an academic
monograph. Drawn out to book length, this geographical survey
eventually palls as the text wanders from Taganrog, where Chekhov
was born in 1860, through Moscow and St. Petersburg to Melikhovo,
his country home outside Moscow, and Yalta, the Crimean resort to
which he relocated in a vain attempt to stem the progress of his
tuberculosis. British scholar Bartlett (Russian/Univ. of Durham;
Wagner and Russia, not reviewed) admits to taking "an
impressionistic approach," and early chapters provide atmospheric
context for his work by the evoking flat, unpopulated steppe,
dotted with ancient Scythian burial mounds, of his childhood; and
the arcadian meadows, forests and rivers he enjoyed when summering
in a dacha outside Moscow. But her occasional schematic linking of
these vistas to a particular story through lengthy quotes merely
serves to underscore how little information this book provides
about Chekhov's literary life, apart from his surprising friendship
with reactionary St. Petersburg magazine publisher Alexei Suvorin.
The plays in particular get very short shrift here; in a typical
passage, the author writes, "When [Chekhov] returned to Nice for
that last visit, he spent the first week of his stay putting the
final touches on Three Sisters"-which has hardly been mentioned
before. Happily, we learn a good deal more about Chekhov the man
than Chekhov the writer. He quietly improved every place he lived,
treating the local peasants long after he had given up practicing
medicine and raising funds for local schools and post offices. The
chronology of his existence, largely abandoned for long stretches,
reasserts itself in the final chapters about his slow decline and
death at a German spa in 1904, which make the previous emphasis on
the physical terrain seem even more arbitrary. Some interesting
material on hitherto unexplored aspects of Chekhov's life, but this
one's strictly for specialists. (Kirkus Reviews)
From his teenage years in provincial Russia to his premature death
in 1904, Anton Chekhov wrote thousands of letters to a wide range
of correspondents. This fascinating new selection tells Chekhov's
story as a man and a writer through affectionate bulletins to his
family, insightful discussions of literature with publishers and
theatre directors, and tender love letters to his actress wife.
Vividly evoking landscapes, people and his daily life, the letters
offer revealing glimpses into Chekhov's preoccupations ? the onset
of tuberculosis, his dual careers as doctor and writer, and his
ambivalence about his growing reputation as Russia's foremost
playwright and author. This volume takes us inside the mind of one
of the world's great writers, and the character that emerges from
these pages is resilient, generous, charming and life enhancing.
This is the first uncensored edition of the letters in any
language, including previously unpublished material from the
Russian archives, and the translation conveys the humour and warmth
of Chekhov's prose.
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