. Spinning .

Sometimes you’re lucky enough to be reading something just when you need it. Or maybe it’s just that you read into it what you need to get out of it.

In The Black Monk, scholar and philosopher Andrey Vail’ich Kovrin, Master of Arts, is spending time with an old man and his daughter who place the orchard garden as the most important thing in the old man’s world, but whose high esteem for Kovrin allows him to encourage a marriage between his daughter and Kovrin as the least likely son-in-law to let the garden fall into disrepair and ruin after the old man’s death.

Kovrin is happy; he studies, he writes, he enjoys the beauty of the garden and he cares deeply for the old man and his daughter. He even tells her about a dream or memory of a legend of the black monk, though when it appears to him, he says nothing, fearing they will all think him mad. The monk convinces Kovrin that he is creative and a genius, and that he is one of the chosen few who are seek out the eternal truth through reason and beauty. Kovrin is able to enjoy all facets of his life until his wife notices him in discussion with the phantom monk and he is declared mentally diseased and treated with medications that dampen his whole being into mediocrity. A mediocrity, it is to be noted, that those around him happily accept, but which Kovrin finds abhorrent and soon he hates life and all those around him.

“Why, why do you make me have this cure? All sorts of bromatic preparations, idleness, warm baths, watching, poor-spirited, alarm for every mouthful, for every step–all this in the end will make a perfect idiot of me. I went mad, I had the mania of greatness, but for all that I was gay, healthy, and even happy; I was interesting and original. Now I have become more sober-minded and matter-of-fact, but in consequence, I am now like everybody else. I am mediocre, life is tiresome to me…”

Is the monk a metaphor for ego, self-confidence, creativity? So very much can be made of this simple story and its application to the social ways of the present. I wonder about the insistence that no one is superior, that we are all ‘special’; everyone is an artist, a writer, a poet. Often this is openly done by minimizing the value of the talented (many universities and high schools have dropped the valedictorian designation). Instead of setting higher standards of achievement, standards are lowered so that more people can claim achievement.

Even as Kovrin’s wife and father-in-law praised him, they did not manage to elevate his own self-esteem to the point of keeping him productive; the old man saw Kovrin more as insurance that his own accomplishments–the garden–would be safeguarded and maintained. The daughter saw him as a husband mentally and physically far superior to the local young men who wooed her.

I also find interesting Chekhov’s reference to the medications and means that are employed to change Kovrin’s mental state to one more ‘normal’ in their society. Kovrin realizes it has all dulled him into a mediocrity that is just like everyone else. Are we throwing this same water on the fires of creative difference of ideas by our insistence on drugs to combat what we’ve termed ADD or ADHD.

Are we, in our pursuit of equality and normalcy for all, turning ourselves into mere mediocrity?

You know, there’s nothing to compare to the old when it comes to story writing and someone such as Chekhov:

The gloomy pines, with their rough roots that but a year ago had seen him so young, joyful and hale, now did not whisper together, but stood motionless and dumb, just as if they did not recognize him.

There is a mood set here, a change of character, personification, imagery, tone. In this setting that Chekhov has placed his main character, we feel the changes as he recovers from what may have been madness in his hallucination of the black monk. Chekhov knows how to use setting to establish a base and then use it to involve the reader in its progression through the story.

Much different, maybe old-fashioned, but very satisfying in contrast to much of what is being touted as story these days.

Or perhaps just with his character of Egor Semenych, an elderly man whose love of his garden is his life’s passion. Who worries that when he is dead, his garden will go to ruin, and even the idea of his daughter, Tania, taking it over does not console him:

She gets married, children arrive, and then there’s no time to think of the garden. What I chiefly fear is that she’ll get married to some young fellow, who’ll be stingy and will let the garden to some tradesman, and the whole place will go to the devil in the first year! In our business women are the scourge of God!

I take offense; I who start grapevines from snips of wood, cut thousands of peaches into desserts, turned stubborn raspberries into wine, make sauce, jelly and wine from the crabapples other people rake up and throw away, coaxed the rocklike quince into jewels of jelly.

Scourge of God indeed!

Within this story of a man’s preferred connections to the literary communities there is a relationship between his sister and him that begs attention. A disillusioned and heartbroken woman, Vera Semyonovna spends her time pondering the meaning of life.

“I’ve been haunted by a strange idea since yesterday. I keep wondering where we should all be if human life were ordered on the basis of non-resistance to evil?”

An interesting thought, and her brother cannot come up with an answer that puts her mind at ease. She cannot forget it and a short time later,

“You are probably right, but it seems to me, I feel something false in our resistance to evil, as though there were something concealed or unsaid. God knows, perhaps our methods of resisting evil belong to the category of prejudices which have become so deeply rooted in us, that we are incapable of parting with them, and therefore cannot form a correct judgement of them.”

Her logic carries it to a conclusion:

“Perhaps man is mistaken in thinking that he is obliged to resist evil and has a right to do so, just as he is mistaken in thinking, for instance, that the heart looks like an ace of hearts.  It is very possible in resisting evil we ought not to use force, but to use what is the very opposite of force–if you, for instance, don’t want this picture stolen from you, you ought to give it away rather than lock it up.”

Chekhov has a knack for recognizing the diversity in human thinking. He makes the lady’s theory clear and concise, and yet while we may (or may not, granting that many believe this very thing) see it as illogical, it is presented in true and honest form, exactly as our adversaries do. What Chekhov is showing us is realism.

One thing I’ve always loved about Chekhov is how he homes in on the simplest aspects of human nature or human interaction and makes it important.

In The Kiss, with an entire army and a military scenario, the focus is upon a man’s loneliness and his dreams of love based on an instant in which a strange woman unknowingly kisses him rather than her lover as expected in a dark room. In Verotchka, we have a studious young man–though at 29 he doesn’t know love. The story opens with him enjoying the recall of good fortune in spending time with a family who has been more than good to him during his stay. As he is leaving, his kind thoughts of his host’s 21 year-old daughter are turned into mass confusion as she professes her love. It is so simple, so intimate, these problems that Chekhov’s writes about and yet they are something that while encompassing the nature of all mankind, need no drama of global war, famine, illness or strife of any kind over that one on one human connection.

One more thing I’ve realized is a tying together of two completely different stories and cast of characters by detail. In Verotchka:

Ivan Alexeievitch Ogneff well recollects an August evening when he opened noisily the hall door and went out on the terrace with a light cloak and a wide-brimmed straw hat–the very hat which now, beside his top-boots lies in the dust underneath his bed.

And from The Match, as the officials break into the bedroom of the suspected murder victim,Marcus Ivanovitch Klausoff:

Beside the bed, the little table, and the single chair, there was no furniture in the room. Looking under the bed, the inspector saw a couple of dozen empty bottles, and old straw hat and a quart of vodka. Under the table lay one top boot, covered with dust.

I, of course, wonder at the meaning of the hat and boots that Chekhov has brought into each story. Is it a detail that just has stuck itself into his mind and comes out in his writing? It would seem that the head to toe coverings might indicate something more metaphorical. Or it could just be where Chekhov normally stored his hat and boots when he slept.

I’ll need to do a bit of research to find out the dates these two stories were first written or published; that may bear some clue as to meaning or it may indicate no intent of any particular meaning at all.

Another thing I note here is that even as Ishiguro’s writing in The Unconsoled is something like Chekhov’s in it’s formality, I find Chekhov’s so much easier to read and find that my interest in the characters is more easily established even as nothing dramatic or fast-paced is happening.

Despite the length of Chekhov's stories and the intricate details he gives as he builds plot, there is a flawlessness in his manner of captivating the reader into feeling he/she understands exactly what's going on with the characters. There is an almost gossipy tone, or cattiness in the telling, so subtle yet the reader cannot miss it. It is tongue-in-cheek; truth hidden behind a mask of polite story.

It's amazing. With that simple opening we are already aware of the main character and the possible conflicts: Olga married someone she doesn't feel measures up to the standards of her friends; their opinions are very important to her; she is likely a petty, silly woman.

Chekhov then goes on to describe some of those friends, all are "considered celebrities" in some artistic field, artists, writers, musicians, singers, who in Olga's mind are of higher social importance than her husband, a well known doctor. Chekhov gives us insight into these people in a simple statement:

How skillfully Chekhov shows us that the husband Dymov understands his wife's friends' opinions and is a bit intimidated but still remains a gracious host, and where the group's concerns are with their self-centered egos and phony values.

Chekhov's female protagonists are very often a narcissistic fluff of a woman, over-dramatic and useless yet so passionate about their whims that they self-righteously believe that whomever is damaged in their efforts are fair wages of war. They recognize their selfishness, their blindness to the "good" man they have treated so horribly, but with a twist of the knife, Chekhov likes to make it just a few minutes too late for any redemption.

An amazing little story, very brief and to the point. An actress and her lover sitting at her home when there is a knock on the door. The man gets up and leaves the room as his mistress answers the door. A young, refined woman steps in, distressed, anxious. It is the man's wife.

The actress is calm, yet cannot help but be affected by the young wife's tears; it seems her husband has been accused of embezzlement and they are looking to arrest him. The woman then accuses the actress of being the cause of all her problems by accepting money and jewelry from her lover when he stole the money to pay for them and begs for her to give her 900 rubles to either repay the debt or see to herself and her children.

Despite the actress's claims that the man had given her very little of any value, she is persuaded by the woman's accusations and tears to give her all her jewelry, given to her not by the woman's husband, but by other men for her favors.

The woman leaves, the man comes out of hiding and in anguish over seeing his wife stoop so low to his mistress, leaves the apartment. The actress sits alone and cries.

Who then, is doing the acting? And what a wonderful twist on getting the reader's empathy when we read Chekhov's last lines:

Chekhov's stories usually have such a small twist at the end, and I may in fact be overimagining the concept that the husband and wife–if indeed they are even married–have pulled off a scam. However, even with straight reading we lean with sympathy towards the young hapless wife, forgetting that the actress is worthy too.

Read The Kiss a few days ago and what more could I write about Chekhov that hasn't already been said? His stories just leave you with an Awww feeling. The last story I read of his that I recall was at the Wesleyan Conference in a class under Roxana Robinson and I do recall that same response–though it was for a horse.

In this story (and no, with over 600 pages and millions of stories, I won't be commenting on each) a brigade of soldiers is invited to a landowner's home to dinner. One particular officer feels a bit awkward, is aware of his lack of social grace and absolute freedom of relations with ladies. In finding his way back through the rooms of the large home, he enters a dark room where he is kissed by a young woman who evidently has taken him for someone else. She, realizing her mistake, runs away.

Never having seen her, he speculates who among the women present may have been his kisser and this episode takes on greater meaning in his life as he daydreams about her and allows himself a liberty of feeling as if the kiss were meant for him. When his company is once again in the area, he sneaks up to the house, hoping to see her and foolishly believing he may be allowed in. He leaves disheartened, just having spied upon the closed windows. When he returns to camp, he finds that the other men have indeed been invited to the home and have all left. He must make a decision whether to go back or just be content with his dream.

Awww.

Oh man.  I was just in the mood for an old classic short story.  Had been reading constantly through some of those in the PBW Challenge and needed the old.  Read Chopin and one other, then a favorite, Chekov. 

Misery.  It’s beautiful, what else can I say?  I won’t even spoil its effect with the pointing out of metaphor (like the snow-covered man and his horse).

I am rejuvenated.  I am humbled.  I am elated by words once again.  And by the image of Chekov alongside his story…one hell of a good-looking man.