those who suffered, or his charity in the face of forgivable weakness.
A writer who did perceive and appreciate these qualities was Gorky, whose star had just begun to rise in the literary firmament. In Nizhny Novgorod he and his wife at this time were reading Chekhov's stories aloud to each other, and Gorky sent him two volumes of his own tales with a covering letter in which, in characteristic fashion, he poured forth his admiration: "How many marvelous moments I've spent over your books, how many times have I wept and been vexed by them, like a wolf in a trap, and how sadly and long have I laughed!"
A first letter from Chekhov on November 16 begged forgiveness for not answering sooner, welcomed his friendship, and promised a longer reply once he had read his books. Before the promise could be fulfilled, however, another and quite remarkable letter came from the impetuous Gorky. He had seen a provincial performance of Uncle Vanya, wept like a girl, and had gone home "stunned, exhausted by your play. . . . You have an enormous talent." Gorky's further criticism of Uncle Vanya, which he clearly recognized as "an entirely new kind of dramatic art," is quite intuitive rather than reasoned, and this, as well as his personal comments on his own literary outlook as compared with that of Chekhov, reveal at once the sharp difference between his typical artistic visceral abandonment and Chekhov's artistic restraint. Will you write more plays? he eagerly asks at the end of his letter.
Chekhov replied in a long letter that set the tone for their future close relationship: "In general, I react coldly to my plays, have long since lost touch with the theater, and now I don't care to write for it any more." In answer to Gorky's request for an opinion on the tales he had sent him, Chekhov, with his customary generosity toward younger writers and literary rivals, praised his "genuine, immense talent," especially as reflected in Gorky's story On the Steppe, which he envied, he said. "You are an artist and a wise man. You feel superbly. You are plastic — that is, when you describe a thing, you see it and touch it with your hands. That is real art." It was not easy to speak about his defects, Chekhov continued. "To speak about the defects of talent is like speaking about the defects of a fine tree growing in an orchard; the chief consideration is certainly not a question of the tree itself but of the tastes of the person who is looking at it. . . . I'll begin by saying that in my opinion you have no restraint. You are like a spectator in a theater who expresses his rapture so unreservedly that he prevents himself and others from hearing. This lack of restraint is especially felt in descriptions of nature with which you interrupt your dialogues; when one reads these descriptions one would like them to be more compact, shorter, let us say two or three lines. The frequent reference to voluptuousness, whispering, velvet softness, and so forth, color these descriptions with a cerain rhetorical quality and monotony and they chill the reader, almost fatigue him. This lack of restraint is also felt in your descriptions of women. . . ." After more of this kind of sharp observation about Gorky's faults as a writer, Chekhov advised him to get out of the provinces and live for a time with literature and literary people, "not in order to learn, to crow like the rest of our cocks, or to become more skillfull, but rather to plunge headlong into literature and fall in love with it." (December 3,1898.)
While in Yalta Chekhov had to shift most of the burden for the construction of the Melikhovo school, which was scheduled to start in the spring, to the capable shoulders of Masha. Amidst various demands to send him items of clothes he had forgotten were requests to see that the right kind of lumber for the school was delivered and to take care of the annoying complaints of the Talezh teacher about the lack of desks and firewood. For the time being he had assigned virtually all the income from his plays as a contribution to the fund he had to raise for the Melikhovo school, and when the peasants of Novoselki refused to pay their share for the school he had built in their village — a sum which he was counting on for the Melikhovo structure —he threatened to take them to court. In general, affairs back home worried him since his father's death, especially his mother's health and her grief over the loss of her husband. He sent her gifts and brief but tender notes, and to Masha he wrote: "Tell Mother . . . that after summer winter must come, after youth old age, after happiness unhappiness, or the contrary; man cannot be healthy and cheerful all his life, bereavements always await him, he cannot avoid death even though he were Alexander of Macedon — therefore, one must be prepared for anything and accept it as unavoidable and necessary, however sad it may be. According to one's strength, one must fulfill one's duty and nothing more." (November 13,1898.)
From his brother Ivan, who visited him during the Christmas season, Chekhov learned more in detail about the state of things at home. No •doubt they also talked about Ivan's hope.to achieve the rank of Collegiate Registrar. One of the difficulties was the lack of official government rank in the family, with which went certain privileges. Ivan's years of service as a teacher did not entitle him to climb the hierarchical ladder. In this matter, Chekhov obtained the assistance of his old student, A. S. Yakovlev, whose father was a senator; but not even this degree of influence could succeed unless Ivan was willing to apply for a regular government post.
Chekhov's third move in Yalta to rented rooms was to the house of Kapitolina Ilovaiskaya — "Catherine the Great" he nicknamed her — the consumptive wife of a retired general. Her excellent cuisine compensated for her insistence on discussing with him her favorite subject, homeopathy. He was relatively comfortable in this combination of private home and pension, where many fine people called and conversed on interesting subjects. Here too he entertained his own friends, such as the Shavrovs, the tuberculous Dr. I. G. Vitte, who had come from Serpukhov for treatment, the former Moscow tenor D. A. Usatov, who either discoursed on borsch or gossiped like a wench, the Moscow lawyer A. I. Urusov, a special favorite of Chekhov and a great admirer of his plays, and from the Ukraine Natalya Lintvareva, whom Chekhov encouraged to buy a house in Yalta.
However, Varvara Kharkeevich, the headmistress of the local girls' school and a lover of literature, seemed to attract Chekhov most in a social way. He liked to visit her, introduced Masha to her, and there was some talk of his sister taking up a post as a teacher in the school should she decide to leave Moscow and join her brother at Yalta. Such a step would have pleased him, but it was one which he cautioned her to consider from every angle. In his notebook Chekhov gives an account of attending a large birthday party in honor of the headmistress, where there was much feasting and dancing: "I chattered happily with neighbors and drank wine. Tbe atmosphere was lovely. Suddenly N. arose with a grave face, exactly like that of a public prosecutor, and announced a toast in my honor: 'Magician of words, ideals, in our time when ideals had become tarnished . . .' I had the feeling at first that a nightcap I had on had been removed, and that now they were all staring at me. After the toast there was a clinking of glasses, then silence. The merriment vanished. 'You must now say something,' a neighbor remarked. But what was I to say? I would willingly have let him have it ■with a bottle. So home to bed with a draft in my soul."
Chekhov was totally unequal to a situation of this sort. It was not merely his innate modesty or shyness in crowds, or his fear of being undressed, as it were, in public, but also an abiding sense of the futility and insincerity of such performances. A. N. Leskov, son of the famous writer, tells in his recollections of a similar siege of embarrassment that overtook Chekhov at a New Year's Eve party at the girls' school. Here there were many toasts in his honor. He silently bowed at the conclusion of each, appalled at their monotony, and at the first favorable opportunity withdrew from the crowd.