To A. S. Suvorin, 7 January 1889. Moscow.
А. С. СУВОРИНУ, 7 января 1889 г. Москва.
Headnote
1 A brief business note of 7 January 1889 to Alexei Sergeyevich Suvorin, Chekhov’s publisher, friend, and frequent theatrical intermediary, written the same day as a much shorter note to Dyukovsky and close on the heels of the "Ivanov" casting correspondence of early January. Chekhov is sending along further revised passages – "variants" – for insertion into a play, to be routed through a Mr. Fyodorov-Yurkovsky, and promises further changes to Act IV once he has a copy of the script in hand.
2 The letter does not name the play, but the surrounding correspondence from this same week is preoccupied with the Petersburg (Alexandrinsky) revival of "Ivanov" and with Suvorin’s own play "Tatyana Repina," for which Chekhov had been ferrying corrected copies and monologue revisions to actors. Given the mention here of "Act IV" and a script copy still to arrive, this note most plausibly continues that same run of textual corrections, though the letter itself does not disambiguate between the two.