To M. Ye. Chekhov, 18 January 1887. Moscow.

January 18, 1887. Moscow.

The 18th.

Dear Uncle

Mitrofan Egorovich!

Yesterday I had the pleasure of receiving a dear gift: a letter from you and from Georgy. Both letters are so fine and affectionate that I am not putting off my answer and am writing at once.

First of all, I congratulate you on the New Year and offer my great thanks for remembering your sincere admirer, and for the leniency with which you treat my stubborn silence. I am immeasurably at fault before you and your family. My only excuse is that I am worn out with a mass of writing work and business correspondence. Several times I meant to write you, but it never came off. For your name-day I went with my sister to Petersburg, where I lived a whole week and, in the whirl of worldly bustle, did not have a single free minute; over the holidays I was so buried in work that at my mother’s name-day I nearly collapsed from exhaustion.

I must tell you that in Petersburg I am now the most fashionable writer. This is plain from the newspapers and magazines, which at the end of 1886 occupied themselves with me, bandied my name about in every key, and extolled me beyond my deserts. The consequence of this growth in my literary reputation is an abundance of commissions and invitations, and, following on those, redoubled toil and weariness. My work is nervous, agitating, demanding strain... It is public and carries responsibility, which makes it doubly hard... Every newspaper notice of me agitates both me and my family... In December, for instance, in the journal Russkoye Bogatstvo there was an article by the critic Obolensky entitled: "Chekhov and Korolenko," in which, over fifteen or twenty pages, the critic exalts me to the heavens and proves that I am higher and better than another young writer, Korolenko, who is making a great noise in both our capitals. This article caused an uproar in our house. Novoye Vremya and Peterburgskiye Vedomosti – two big Petersburg newspapers – are likewise bandying Chekhov about... My stories are read aloud in public at evening gatherings, everywhere I go people point fingers at me, acquaintances have overwhelmed me with their abundance, and so on, and so on... There is not a peaceful day, and every minute one feels as though sitting on pins. And so you do me a great kindness in not holding my silence against me... God willing, we shall meet and make up in conversation what has been missed in our infrequent correspondence.

The Pushkin promised by Luch is not worth 6 roubles. It is a publisher’s trick. If you have not yet managed to subscribe to Luch, then write to me: I will send you the complete Pushkin (as a gift to Georgy for his letter). My good acquaintance Suvorin, the publisher of Novoye Vremya, is putting out a Pushkin for sale on the 29th of January at a fabulously cheap price – 2 roubles with postage. Such things can be managed only by so great a man and so clever a one as Suvorin, who spares nothing for literature. He has five bookshops, one newspaper, one journal, a colossal publishing house, a fortune in the millions – and all of it earned by the most honest, agreeable labor. He is by birth from Voronezh, where he was once a teacher at the district school. Every time we meet, we get to talking about Olkhovatka, Boguchar, and so on. I see him twice a year, when I am in Petersburg. He pays me a hundred roubles for a single story. As proof I enclose the editorial account, by which I received 111 roubles for a Christmas story.

Georgy asks me for the papers I work for. I would gladly fulfill his request, but alas! I scarcely work for the humor magazines any longer, and besides they are not fit reading. I do not care for them. My most serious work is in Novoye Vremya. It would cost nothing to send this newspaper, but the trouble is that it is awkward for me to trouble Suvorin with a request. In December he made me so many presents that now my hand will not rise to ask him even for a trifle... Let Georgy be patient. If you have not subscribed to Luch, then I will certainly send the Pushkin. I give my word. Let that be a comfort to Georgy. Along with the Pushkin I will send you my book – a collection of my unserious little trifles, which I gathered not so much for reading as for a remembrance of the beginning of my literary career. Father will be sending the books, so should they fail to arrive you must apply to him: hold him to it.

What is worth liking in my book I will mark in the table of contents with a blue pencil. The rest deserves attention only as a sample of the ballast one is sometimes forced to produce under the pressure of having no money.

Volodya is right. It is more sensible to write the word Vladimir with и, and not with i. That is a wholly superfluous letter. If it were up to me, I would abolish both yat, and fita (a foolish letter!), and izhitsa, and i. These letters only hinder schooling, throw business people into confusion who have no time to learn grammatical niceties, and constitute an entirely unnecessary ornament of our grammar. One cannot possess mir (the world) spelled with i, that is true. Nor can one possess mir (peace) spelled with и, but one can call a man the master of the mir (world). Tell Volodya that out of a feeling of gratitude, out of reverence, or out of rapture before the merits of the best people – those merits which make a man extraordinary and bring him nearer to the divine – nations and history have the right to extol their chosen ones however they please, without fear of insulting the majesty of God or exalting man to the level of God. The point is that in a man we do not extol the man, but his merits, precisely that divine principle which he has managed to develop in himself to a high degree. For instance, outstanding tsars are called "great," though in bodily stature they are no taller than I. I. Loboda; the Pope is called "His Holiness," the patriarch was called ecumenical, though besides the earth he had no acquaintance with any other planet; Prince Vladimir was called lord of all the mir (world), though he possessed only a scrap of land; princes are called illustrious and most serene, though a Swedish match is a thousand times more serene than they are, and so on. In using these names we do not lie, we do not exaggerate, but express our delight, just as a mother does not lie when she says to her child, "My golden one!" It is the sense of beauty speaking in us, and beauty cannot endure the commonplace and the vulgar; it compels us to make such comparisons as Volodya, reasoning it out, will criticize thoroughly, but which his heart will understand. For instance, it is customary to compare black eyes to the night, blue eyes to the azure of heaven, curls to waves, and so forth – even Holy Scripture is fond of such comparisons, for example: "thy belly is wider than the heavens," or "the sun of righteousness has risen," "the rock of faith," and so on. The sense of beauty in man knows no bounds or limits. That is why a Russian prince may be called lord of the Mir; and this same name may be borne by my friend Volodya, because names are given not for merit but in honor and remembrance of remarkable people who once lived... If your learned man does not agree with me, then I have one more "little hook" that will surely catch him: in exalting men even unto God, we do not sin against love, but on the contrary, express it. One must not humiliate people – that is the main thing. Better to say to a man "my angel" than to hurl "fool" at him, though the man is more like a fool than an angel.

That is all. And with that accept from me the expression of my most sincere devotion. Give my regards to auntie, to the sisters, the brothers, to Irinushka, and to all our acquaintances.

Your A. Chekhov.

My address: Moscow, Kudrinskaya Sadovaya, the Korneev house.

At the same time I am sending a letter to Georgy.

Yesterday I had a great many guests. Among others was A. A. Dolzhenko, a player of the violin and the zither; he has turned out a most excellent fellow. He calls on us about twice a week and is very attached to us. He is remarkably witty, honest, and decent. The poor fellow is thrown off only by yat, fita, and i... He writes abominably and grieves not a little over it. He is as talented as the late Ivan Yakovlevich.