figure
Stepan Arkadyich Oblonsky
Stiva Oblonsky
also: Стива Облонский, Stiva, Prince Stepan Arkadyich Oblonsky
Anna Karenina's charming, genial, easily-forgetful brother-in-law in Tolstoy's novel; Chekhov borrows the name here as a joking nickname for Suvorin himself, a tag for amiable forgetfulness, not a reference to any third person.
Reading notes
- To A. S. Suvorin, 6 March 1889. Moscow. §8 Stiva Oblonsky
Prince Stepan Arkadyich Oblonsky, the charming, easygoing brother-in-law of the title character in Tolstoy's "Anna Karenina"; Chekhov applies the name jokingly to Suvorin as a tag for genial forgetfulness, not to any third person. The "boats" joke that follows is not otherwise elaborated here and would need cross-referencing against neighboring letters to resolve.
- To A. S. Suvorin, May 1889. Sumy. §4 Stiva hasn't sent the boats
Chekhov's joking nickname for Suvorin himself, borrowed from Stepan Arkadyich "Stiva" Oblonsky, Anna Karenina's amiably forgetful brother-in-law in Tolstoy's novel -- the same joke ("Стива Облонский забыл про лодки") appears earlier in this corpus at, confirming that a boat-related lapse is Chekhov's standing tag for Suvorin's genial forgetfulness. Not a reference to any third person; see crossrefs.json.