Tinyakov is an extreme example, but not an exceptional one. Many thought as he did; it's just that other cultural figures didn't say it out loud. And their behavior didn't look as outrageous. Tinyakov promised in his poems to "lick his enemy's heels" for some food. Many cultural figures could have repeated Tinyakov's proud cry, · but they preferred to keep silent and licked heels in silence.
The psychology of my contemporary intelligent had changed utterly.
Fate made him fight for his existence, and he fought for it with all the fury of a former intelligent. He no longer cared who was to be glorified and who vilified. These trifles no longer mattered. The important thing was to eat, to tear off as sweet a hunk of life as possible while you're still alive. Calling this cynical is not enough-this is the psychology of a criminal. I was surrounded by many Tinyakovs; some were talented, others weren't. But they w:orked together. They were working to make our era cynical and they succeeded.
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I REALLY love Chekhov, he's one of my favorite writers. I read and reread not only his stories and plays, but his notes and letters. Of course, I'm no literary historian and I can't give a proper assessment of the work of the great Russian writer, who I feel has not been thoroughly studied and certainly not always correctly understood. But if I were suddenly expected to write a dissertation on an author, I would choose Chekhov, that's how close an affinity I feel for him. Reading him, I sometimes recognize myself; I feel that anyone in Chekhov's place would react exactly as he did in confronting life.
Chekhov's entire life is a model of purity and modesty-and not a modesty for show, but an inner modesty. That's probably why I'm not a fan of certain memorial editions that can only be described as a spoonful of pitch in a barrel of honey. In particular, I'm quite sorry that the correspondence between Anton Pavlovich and his wife was ever published; it's so intimate that most of it should not be seen in print. I'm saying this with respect for the strictness with which the writer approached his work. He did not publish his works until he 1 78
brought them to the level that he considered at least decent.
On the other hand, when you read Chekhov's letters you gain a better understanding of his fiction; therefore I am ambivalent on the question. Sometimes I feel that Chekhov would not . have liked to see his letters in print, but at other times I think that he would not have been upset by it. Perhaps I'm prejudiced because I feel so possessive of what Chekhov has written, including his letters.
It was Chekhov who said that you must write simply, write about how Pyotr Semyonovich married Maria lvanovna; and he added,
"That's all." Chekhov also said that Russia is a land of greedy and lazy people who eat and drink prodigious amounts and like to sleep during the day and snore while they sleep. People marry in Russia to keep order in the house, and take mistresses for social prestige. Russians have the mentality of a dog-when they're beaten, they whimper softly and hide in the corner, and when they're scratched behind the ear, they roll over.
Chekhov didn't like talks on lofty topics, they nauseated him. A friend came to him once and said, "Anton Pavlovich, what can I do?
Reflection is destroying me!" Chekhov replied, "Drink less vodka." I remembered his answer and used it often. When Zoshchenko and I used to meet at Zamyatin's house, he kept telling me about his reflections, giving a detailed account of why he was depressed and confiding his complicated plans for overcoming his reflectiveness. And I would say, "Just drink less vodka."
Zoshchenko also kept pestering me, wanting to rid me of my melancholy, saying, "Why are you so glum? Let me explain it to you, and you'll immediately feel better." To which I replied rudely, "Why don't we play some poker instead?"
I was a mentally healthy person, quite skeptical actually, with a healthy skepticism, but Zoshchenko kept on with his refrain: "Melancholy is characteristic of youth. Don't be melancholy." He kept exhorting me to look inward to chase away my melancholy, and so on. He didn't take offense when I cut him short, and he wasn't off ended by my persistent mental health.
Zoshchenko reminded me of Chekhov except for one thing. Even though he had been so many things-a shoemaker and a policeman (I wrote "March ofthe Soviet Police" in his honor)-he missed medi-1 79
cine. But Chekhov was a doctor and that's why he despised medicine in all forms. He used to say, "What does it mean to heal according to the laws of science? We have the laws, but not the science." But Zoshchenko, on the other hand, had great respect for medical science. A mistake. Doctors are sure that all diseases come from colds. Chekhov said that too.
I'm delighted that Chekhov was a man free from hypocrisy .. For instance, he wrote without embarrassment that when it came to girls, he was a pro. And in another letter, he describes how he and a professor from Kharkov decided to get drunk. They drank and drank and then gave up. Nothing happened and they awoke in the morning fit as fiddles. Chekhov could drink an entire bottle of champagne and then some cognac and not get drunk.
I read Chekhov greedily, because I know that I'm about to find some important thoughts on the beginning and the end. I remember that once I accidentally came across Chekhov's thoughts on how the Russian man only lives a real life until he's thirty. We rush when we're young, we think that everything is ahead, we hurry, pouncing on everything. We fill our soul with whatever comes our way,. But after thirty our soul is filled with gray rubbish. That's amazingly true.
And Chekhov had sensible thoughts about the end. He thought that immortality, life after death in any form, was all nonsense, because it was superstition. He said we had to think clearly and daringly. Chekhov wasn't afraid of death. "As I was alone in life, so will I lie alone in the grave."
Now, Gogol died from a fear of death. I first heard about that from Zoshchenko. I checked it later, and it really was so. Gogol did not resist death, in fact he did everything he could to hasten it. The people around him noticed it and many reminiscences of Gogol mention it.
Fear of death may be the most intense emotion of all. I sometimes think that there is no deeper feeling. The irony lies in the fact that under the influence of that fear people create poetry, prose, and music; that is, they try to strengthen their ties with the living and increase their influence on them.
These unpleasant thoughts did not bypass me. I tried to convince myself that I shouldn't fear death. In that sense, I followed Zoshchenko's ideas, I tried to find help in them, but they seemed rather naive to me. How can you not fear death? Death is not considered an appro-1 80
priate theme for Soviet art and writing about death is tantamount to wiping your nose on your sleeve in company. That's where titles like An Optimistic Tragedy come from. Even though that's nonsense-a tragedy is a tragedy and optimism has nothing to do with it.
But I always thought that I was not alone in ·my thinking about death and that other people were concerned with it too, despite the fact that they live in a socialist society in which even tragedies receive the epithet "optimistic." I wrote a number of works reflecting my understanding of the question, and as it seems to me, they're not particularly optimistic works. The most important of them, I feel, is the Fourteenth Symphony; I have special feelings for it.