To A. S. Suvorin, 6 February 1891. Moscow.

A brief, miscellaneous letter to Alexei Sergeyevich Suvorin, written from Moscow the day after the previous one. Chekhov reports progress on his "great novel" (the novella "The Duel," then in progress, which touches on Goethe and Eckermann), self-mockingly cursing its length and formlessness and needling the critic Burenin in advance. He apologizes for having neglected to call on the poet Yakov Polonsky or to congratulate Suvorin’s wife, Anna Ivanovna, on her name day, blaming his own poor upbringing; identifies Bibikov as Polonsky’s Moscow informant; and dismisses an anonymous letter about a review of the playwright Yevtikhy Karpov as merely cynical, sketching Karpov’s vanity in the same breath. He praises Suvorin’s article on Tolstoy and a Maupassant story, "Françoise," in the same issue, noting that Tolstoy’s added remark about the sister slightly dulled the story’s freshness. He closes with a theatrical jab about the casting of Prince Lensky, a wry remark on his own encroaching middle age, and regards to Anna Ivanovna and the children.