To F. O. Shekhtel, 8–9 February 1886. Moscow.

1 A short note from Chekhov to the architect and family friend Fyodor Shekhtel, written in Moscow in early February 1886. It concerns practical publishing details for Chekhov’s forthcoming collection "Motley Stories" (Pestrye rasskazy), including the book’s title, a vignette design that the humor journal Oskolki (its editor Nikolai Leikin) wanted credited on the cover, and paper received from the printer Golike. The letter closes with an informal aside about a visiting priest and a dinner, then a postscript inviting Shekhtel to join Chekhov’s household on the coming Tuesday along with the theater figure Vladimir Begichev and the Kiselev family.

2 The letter is a good example of Chekhov’s brisk, joking epistolary manner with intimates: business and gossip mixed in the same breath, a French tag tossed off for effect, and an easy familiarity that captures the social world around the "Oskolki" circle just as his first book was taking shape.