To V. N. Davydov, 4 January 1889. Moscow.

1 A brisk New Year’s business letter of 4 January 1889 from Moscow to Vladimir Nikolayevich Davydov, the actor for whom Chekhov had written the title role of "Ivanov." The Alexandrinsky Theatre in Petersburg was reviving the play (Chekhov jokes that his "late ’Ivanov’" has been "dug up out of its grave" for fresh casting review), and the letter is mostly consumed by the practical scramble over who will play whom: Davydov, it seems, now wants to play Lebedev rather than the title role he had earlier been slated for, and Chekhov – learning this secondhand via a telegram from his publisher and friend Alexei Suvorin ("A. S.") – is happy to accommodate him, even though he had already provisionally given Lebedev to another actor, Konstantin Varlamov, on Davydov’s own earlier advice.

2 Having settled (or tried to settle) the casting question, Chekhov worries aloud about who will now play Ivanov himself, since the actor Nikolai Sazonov is said to be committed elsewhere; asks, in an apparent aside, whether Davydov really performed Chekhov’s one-act farce "The Bear" at a private gathering at one "Hamburger’s"; gives his own travel plans (arriving in Petersburg around 20-22 January); passes on a greeting to a third party (Ananyev); and closes with brief personal news – bitter cold, no money, hemorrhoids, and the declining fortunes of the Korsh Theatre – before sending thanks and greetings to Davydov’s family and household, a nod to one Pavel Pavlovich, and a signature with his Moscow street address.