Betrothed (short story)
| "Betrothed" | |
|---|---|
| Author | Anton Chekhov |
| Original title | "Невеста" |
| Country | Russia |
| Language | Russian |
| Published in | Zhurnal Dlya Vsekh (1903) |
| Publisher | Adolf Marks (1903, 1906) |
| Publication date | December 1903 |
"Betrothed" (Russian: Невеста), translated also as "The Fiancee", is a 1903 short story by Anton Chekhov, first published in the No.12, December 1903 issue of Zhurnal Dlya Vsekh.
Publication
Chekhov came up with the story's title apparently some time before he started writing it. On 20 October 1902, answering the 8 October 1902 Viktor Mirolyubov's telegram, in which the journal's editor asked what exactly could he promise his subscribers, Chekhov wrote: "If what you want from me is the story's title, let it be The Fiancee, although later it might be changed."
On 23 January 1903 he informed Olga Knipper: "I am writing now a story for Zhurnal Dlya Vsekh, in a slightly archaic manner, the 1870s style. No idea what may come out of it." On 30 January he wrote to her again, saying: "It's all getting so slow, a spoon per hour, maybe because there's too much characters in it, or could it be that I've lost the knack and have to learn to do it again?"
The author was well aware of the possible censorial interference. "I am afraid my Fiancee will be hard done by those suitors who are there to control your journal's chastity," he wrote to Mirolyubov on 9 February. On the 27th Chekhov sent the story to the journal. Asking to forgive him for several delays, he added: "My health fails me, and it's hard for me now to work in the ways I used to do, I get tired very soon."
In March and June, while reading the proofs, Chekhov subjected the text to serious revisions. Finally, it was published in the December issue of Zhurnal Dlya Vsekh. In a slightly revised version, it was included into Volume 12 of the 1903, second edition the Collected Works by A.P. Chekhov, published by Adolf Marks. It then appeared in Volume 11 of the posthumous, 1906 third edotion.[1]
Reception
The story was received with great eagerness by bot the critics and the public and caused discussion which had started even before the publication. Vikenty Veresayev remembered: "The day before [on 22 April 1903] at the Gorky's we were reading Chekhov's story "The Fiancee". Anton Pavlovich asked me: 'So what? How's my story for you?' I felt uncomfortable, but decided to speak in all honesty. 'Anton Pavlovich, this is not the way girls join the revolutional movement. And girls like your Nadya do not go this way at all.' He looked at me with harsh alertness. 'There are different ways for them to go,' he said."[2]
Sergey Elpatyevsky remembered how Chekhov asked him to read the story before it was published. "I did. This happened to be Nevesta in which for the first time the new, more cheerful moody motives seemed to appear. For me it became obvious that there was a change in Chekhov's whole mindset, his artistic vision, and that it hailed the start of the new period in his creative life.[3]
Several reviewers expressed the same opinion, pointing at the story's more optimistic, life-affirming overtones. Once and for all the notion of Chekhov as a cool, passive analyst of life, went overboard. "Decidedly all Chekhov's stories point to an artist of a lofty ideal, it's just that it is so high that before it our life seems dreary and trivial," wrote V. Botsyanovsky in Rus.[4]
"[For the heroine] to leave the city means to abandon the thought of an egotistic existence... of life's banalities and join the shiny road of selfless labour," Maximilian Voloshin wrote in Kiyevskiye Otkliki. He compared Nadya favourably to Turgenev's girls, noting that while the latter were engaged mostly in the quest for love, Chekhov's heroines were longing for the meaning of life.
Positive reviews came from Mir Bozhy (Angel Bogdanovich, writing in the January 1904 issue) and Pravda magazine (I. Johnson, May 1904). Among several reviewers who thought this new Chekhov's optimism was nothing but a glimpse, were Mikhail Gershenzon (Nauchnoye Slovo, January 1904) and in particular the Marxist critic Viktor Shulyatikov (Courier, No. 226, 24 December) who, while pointing to some positive moments in the story, still opined that for a true Marxist Chekhov was an 'unreliable fellow traveller'.[1]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Rodionova, V.M. Commentaries to Невеста. The Works by A.P. Chekhov in 12 volumes. Khudozhestvennaya Literatura. Moscow, 1960. Vol. 8, pp. 563-572
- ↑ А.П. Чехов в воспоминаниях современников. Гослитиздат. 1960, стр. 675
- ↑ Chekhov Remembered by the Contemporaries // А.П. Чехов в воспоминаниях современников. Гослитиздат. Москва. 1960. Стр. 581
- ↑ Русь, 1904, №22, 3 января
External links
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