To the Chekhovs, 24 April 1890. Kama, parokhod "Perm--Nizhny".
ЧЕХОВЫМ, 24 апреля 1890 г. Кама, пароход "Пермь--Нижний".
Headnote
it opens with a dateline and place, runs as one first-person address throughout to Chekhov’s family collectively, is signed and closed mid-letter ("Yours, A. Chekhov," section 15), and then continues with two further short paragraphs (16-17) added after the signature – an ordinary habit of Chekhov’s when he thought of something more to say before sealing the envelope, not a sign of a second, distinct letter. full sentences, sustained narrative voice, salutation-equivalent address ("Друзья мои тунгусы" – "My friends, my Tungus," his family’s private nickname for themselves), and a signed closing all argue against the telegram profile (bare surname, terse wire-style fragments, no salutation/closing) that applies to genuinely different items like.
Written three days into Chekhov’s journey east to Sakhalin, begun 21 April 1890, this is a travel letter home describing the second leg of the trip – by steamer down the Kama toward Perm, from where he would continue overland across the Urals. The tone is comic and deflationary in the manner of his letters to his own family: cold weather, bad food economy, gossip about fellow passengers, and mock-solemn asides about the "court" (a real circuit court traveling on the same steamer, whose idle courtroom banter he turns into a running joke – "the court has resolved: to demand tea").
Chekhov reports his position on the Kama (unsure exactly where, guesses near Chistopol), complains about the cold and the loss of scenic beauty, describes eating caviar and sterlet to excess out of boredom and thrift, regrets not having packed a tea-and-sugar bag, jokes about visiting relatives in Yekaterinburg for a handout, sketches fellow passengers (minor officials, merchants, a preening general, a would-be writer who lies about being published by Suvorin, two clerks who resemble people back home), and closes with a long string of greetings to family and friends before signing off. The postscript notes (16-17) apologize for writing only about food and describe the "court’s" jokes about the two traveling clerks.