Reminiscences of Anton Chekhov

by Maksim Gorky; Ivan Alekseevich Bunin; A. I. Kuprin

But his jokes never left any bitterness any more than he consciously ever caused the slightest pain to any living thing.

After dinner he would keep some one in his study for half an hour or an hour. On his table candles would be lit. Later, when all had gone and he remained alone, a light would still be seen in his large window for a long time. Whether he worked at that time, or looked through his note-books, putting down the impressions of the day nobody seems to know.

VI

It is true, on the whole, that we know nearly nothing, not only of his creative activities, but even of the external methods of his work. In this respect Anton Pavlovitch was almost eccentric in his reserve and silence. I remember him saying, as if by the way, something very significant:

—“For God's sake don't read your work to any one until it is published. Don't read it to others in proof even.”

This was always his own habit, although he sometimes made exceptions for his wife and sister. Formerly he is said to have been more communicative in this respect.

That was when he wrote a great deal and at great speed. He himself said that he used to write a story a day. E. T. Chekhov, his mother, used to say: “When he was still an undergraduate, Antosha would sit at the table in the morning, having his tea and suddenly fall to thinking; he would sometimes look straight into one's eyes, but I knew that he saw nothing. Then he would get his note-book out of his pocket and write quickly, quickly. And again he would fall to thinking….”

But during the last years Chekhov began to treat himself with ever increasing strictness and exactitude: he kept his stories for several years, continually correcting and copying them, and nevertheless in spite of such minute work, the final proofs, which came from him, were speckled throughout with signs, corrections, and insertions. In order to finish a work he had to write without tearing himself away. “If I leave a story for a long time,”—he once said—“I cannot make myself finish it afterwards. I have to begin again.”

Where did he draw his images from? Where did he find his observations and his similes? Where did he forge his superb language, unique in Russian literature? He confided in nobody, never revealed his creative methods. Many note-books are said to have been left by him; perhaps in them will in time be found the keys to those mysteries. Or perhaps they will forever remain unsolved. Who knows? At any rate we must limit ourselves to vague hints and guesses.

I think that always, from morning to night, and perhaps at night even, in his sleep and sleeplessness, there was going on in him an invisible but persistent—at times even unconscious—activity, the activity of weighing, defining and remembering. He knew how to listen and ask questions, as no one else did; but often, in the middle of a lively conversation, it would be noticed, how his attentive and kindly look became motionless and deep, as if it were withdrawing somewhere inside, contemplating something mysterious and important, which was going on there. At those moments A. P. would put his strange questions, amazing through their unexpectedness, completely out of touch with the conversation, questions which confused many people. The conversation was about neo-marxists, and he would suddenly ask: “Have you ever been to a stud-farm? You ought to see one. It is interesting.” Or he would repeat a question for the second time, which had already been answered.