To A. S. Suvorin, 4 March 1890. Moscow.

Written from Moscow on 4 March 1890 to Aleksei Sergeyevich Suvorin (1834–1912), the wealthy newspaper publisher (Novoye Vremya) and Chekhov’s closest literary confidant and correspondent through the late 1880s and 1890s. This is an ordinary private letter of the kind Chekhov wrote Suvorin constantly at this period – brisk, mixing literary business, gossip about mutual acquaintances, a weather complaint, and an update on the Sakhalin project Chekhov was then preparing for (he would depart for Sakhalin Island a few weeks later, in April 1890). are the dateline (given twice, in full and abbreviated, as is standard for this edition’s letter headers and matches the pattern already seen in this same batch, e.g. and); are literary/business matters (submitted manuscripts, a manuscript’s disclaimer, retrieving a mislaid play text); is a weather aside; continues literary business (books received/to be sent); is a substantial aside on Chekhov’s early work on his Sakhalin research and his self-deprecating admission about citing sources at second hand; is a joking note about an honorarium; return to Yezhov and close the letter. it has a discursive, multi-topic body, no bare-signature terseness, and a normal epistolary close ("Do not forget us sinners" / "Your A. Chekhov").

Chekhov reports sending Suvorin two submitted stories (one by Filippov, one by the writer Nikolai Yezhov) while disclaiming any endorsement of their quality. He describes Yezhov visiting him in distress, weeping because his young wife has developed consumption (tuberculosis) and needs to be taken south urgently. Chekhov asks Suvorin to return his own vaudeville "The Wedding" ("Свадьба"), which had accidentally ended up tucked inside a volume of Shakespeare through the playwright/critic Sumbatov’s mistake. He complains briefly about foul, sniffly weather. He mentions having received Suvorin’s own travel book "Asie" and gives a mixed, mostly unflattering assessment of a book by Golitsynsky he is partway through. He then describes beginning to draft the historical/geographical sections of what would become his book on Sakhalin, admitting frankly – and self-mockingly, calling it "sheer swindling" – that he is citing foreign-language sources secondhand while writing as though he commands all those languages himself. He passes along a joking instruction about an honorarium payment from the Society of Dramatic Writers, tells Suvorin the tears of the visiting Yezhov darkened his own mood, and closes with a standard warm sign-off.