Note-Book of Anton Chekhov

by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

  * * * * *

  What wonderful names: the little tears of Our Lady, warbler, crows-eyes.[1]

  [Footnote 1: The names of flowers.]

  * * * * *

  A government forest officer with shoulder straps, who has never seen a forest.

  * * * * *

  A gentleman owns a villa near Mentone; he bought it out of the proceeds of the sale of his estate in the Tula province. I saw him in Kharkhov to which he had come on business; he gambled away the villa at cards and became a railway clerk; after that he died.

  * * * * *

  At supper he noticed a pretty woman and choked; a little later he caught sight of another pretty woman and choked again, so that he did not eat his supper—there were a lot of pretty women.

  * * * * *

  A doctor, recently qualified, supervises the food in a restaurant. "The food is tinder the special supervision of a doctor." He copies out the chemical composition of the mineral water; the students believe him—and all is well.

  * * * * *

  He did not eat, he partook of food.

  * * * * *

  A man, married to an actress, during a performance of a play in which his wife was acting, sat in a box, with beaming face, and from time to time got up and bowed to the audience.

  * * * * *

  Dinner at Count O.D.'s. Fat lazy footmen; tasteless cutlets; a feeling that a lot of money is being spent, that the situation is hopeless, and that it is impossible to change the course of things.

  * * * * *

  A district doctor: "What other damned creature but a doctor would have to go out in such weather?"—he is proud of it, grumbles about it to every one, and is proud to think that his work is so troublesome; he does not drink and often sends articles to medical journals that do not publish them.

  * * * * *

  When N. married her husband, he was junior Public Prosecutor; he became judge of the High Court and then judge of the Court of Appeals; he is an average uninteresting man. N. loves her husband very much. She loves him to the grave, writes him meek and touching letters when she hears of his unfaithfulness, and dies with a touching expression of love on her lips. Evidently she loved, not her husband, but some one else, superior, beautiful, non-existent, and she lavished that love upon her husband. And after her death footsteps could be heard in her house.

  * * * * *

  They are members of a temperance society and now and again take a glass of wine.

  * * * * *

  They say: "In the long run truth will triumph;" but it is untrue.

  * * * * *

  A clever man says: "This is a lie, but since the people can not do without the lie, since it has the sanction of history, it is dangerous to root it out all at once; let it go on for the time being but with certain corrections." But the genius says: "This is a lie, therefore it must not exist."

  * * * * *

  Marie Ivanovna Kladovaya.

  * * * * *

  A schoolboy with mustaches, in order to show off, limps with one leg.

  * * * * *

  A writer of no talent, who has been writing for a long time, with his air of importance reminds one of a high priest.

  * * * * *

  Mr. N. and Miss Z. in the city of X. Both clever, educated, of radical views, and both working for the good of their fellow men, but both hardly know each other and in conversation always rail at each other in order to please the stupid and coarse crowd.

  * * * * *

  He flourished his hand as if he were going to seize him by the hair and said: "You won't escape by that there trick."

  * * * * *

  N. has never been in the country and thinks that in the winter country people use skis. "How I would enjoy ski-ing now!"

  * * * * *

  Madam N., who sells herself, says to each man who has her: "I love you because you are not like the rest."

  * * * * *

  An intellectual woman, or rather a woman who belongs to an intellectual circle, excels in deceit.

  * * * * *

  N. struggled all his life investigating a disease and studying its bacilli; he devoted his whole life to the struggle, expended on it all his powers, and suddenly just before his death it turned out that the disease is not in the least infectious or dangerous.

  * * * * *

  A theatrical manager, lying in bed, read a new play. He read three or four pages and then in irritation threw the play on to the floor, put out the candle, and drew the bedclothes over him; a little later, after thinking over it, he took the play up again and began to read it; then, getting angry with the uninspired tedious work, he again threw it on the floor and put out the candle. A little later he once more took up the play and read it, then he produced it and it was a failure.

  * * * * *

  N., heavy, morose, gloomy, says: "I love a joke, I am always joking."

  * * * * *

  The wife writes; the husband does not like her writing, but out of delicacy says nothing and suffers all his life.

  * * * * *

  The fate of an actress: the beginning—a well-to-do family in Kertch, life dull and empty; the stage, virtue, passionate love, then lovers; the end: unsuccessful attempt to poison herself, then Kertch, life at her fat uncle's house, the delight of being left alone. Experience shows that an artist must dispense with wine, marriage, pregnancy. The stage will become art only in the future, now it is only struggling for the future.

  * * * * *

  (Angrily and sententiously) "Why don't you give me your wife's letters to read? Aren't we relations?"

  * * * * *

  Lord, don't allow me to condemn or to speak of what I do not know or do not understand.

  * * * * *

  Why do people describe only the weak, surly and frail as sinners? And every one when he advises others to describe only the strong, healthy, and interesting, means himself.

  * * * * *

  For a play: a character always lying without rhyme or reason.

  * * * * *

  Sexton Catacombov.

  * * * * *

  N.N., a littérateur, critic, plausible, self-confident, very liberal minded, talks about poetry; condescendingly agrees with one—and I see that he is a man absolutely without talent (I haven't read him). Some one suggests going to Ai-Petri. I say that it is going to rain, but we set out. The road is muddy, it rains; the critic sits next to me, I feel his lack of talent. He is wooed and made a fuss of as if he were a bishop. And when it cleared up, I went back on foot. How easily people deceive themselves, how they love prophets and soothsayers; what a herd it is! Another person went with us, a Councillor of State, middle-aged, silent, because he thinks he is right and despises the critic, because he too is without talent. A girl afraid to smile because she is among clever people.

  * * * * *

  Alexey Ivanitch Prokhladitelny (refreshing) or Doushespasitelny (soul-saving). A girl: "I would marry him, but am afraid of the name—Madam Refreshing."

  * * * * *

  A dream of a keeper in the zoological gardens. He dreams that there was presented to the Zoo first a marmot, then an emu, then a vulture, then a she-goat, then another emu; the presentations are made without end and the Zoo is crowded out—the keeper wakes up in horror wet with perspiration.

  * * * * *

  "To harness slowly but drive rapidly is in the nature of this people," said Bismarck.

  * * * * *

  When an actor has money, he doesn't send letters but telegrams.

  * * * * *

  With insects, out of the caterpillar comes the butterfly; with mankind it is the other way round, out of the butterfly comes the caterpillar.[1]

  [Footnote 1: There is a play on words here, the Russian word for butterfly also means a woman.]

  * * * * *

  The dogs in the house became attached not to their masters who fed and fondled them, but to the cook, a foreigner, who beat them.

  * * * * *

  Sophie was afraid th
at her dog might catch cold, because of the draught.

  * * * * *

  The soil is so good, that, were you to plant a shaft, in a year's time a cart would grow out of it.

  * * * * *

  X. and Z., very well educated and of radical views, married. In the evening they talked together pleasantly, then quarreled, then came to blows. In the morning both are ashamed and surprised, they think that it must have been the result of some exceptional state of their nerves. Next night again a quarrel and blows. And so every night until at last they realize that they are not at all educated, but savage, just like the majority of people.

  * * * * *

  A play: in order to avoid having visitors, Z. pretends to be a regular tippler, although he drinks nothing.

  * * * * *

  When children appear on the scene, then we justify all our weaknesses, our compromises, and our snobbery, by saying: "It's for the children's sake."

  * * * * *

  Count, I am going away to Mordegundia. (A land of horrible faces.)

  * * * * *

  Barbara Nedotyopin.

  * * * * *

  Z., an engineer or doctor, went on a visit to his uncle, an editor; he became interested, began to go there frequently; then became a contributor to the paper, little by little gave up his profession; one night he came out of the newspaper office, remembered, and seized his head in his hands—"all is lost!" He began to go gray. Then it became a habit, he was quite white now and flabby, an editor, respectable but obscure.

  * * * * *

  A Privy Councillor, an old man, looking at his children, became a radical himself.

  * * * * *

  A newspaper: "Cracknel."

  * * * * *

  The clown in the circus—that is talent, and the waiter in the frock coat speaking to him—that is the crowd; the waiter with an ironical smile on his face.

  * * * * *

  Auntie from Novozybkov.

  * * * * *

  He has a rarefaction of the brain and his brains have leaked into his ears.

  * * * * *

  "What? Writers? If you like, for a shilling I'll make a writer of you."

  * * * * *

  Instead of translator, contractor.

  * * * * *

  An actress, forty years old, ugly, ate a partridge for dinner, and I felt sorry for the partridge, for it occurred to me that in its life it had been more talented, more sensible, and more honest than that actress.

  * * * * *

  The doctor said to me: "If," says he, "your constitution holds out, drink to your heart's content." (Gorbunov.)

  * * * * *

  Carl Kremertartarlau.

  * * * * *

  A field with a distant view, one tiny birch tree. The inscription under the picture: loneliness.

  * * * * *

  The guests had gone: they had played cards and everything was in disorder: tobacco smoke, scraps of paper, and chiefly—the dawn and memories.

  * * * * *

  Better to perish from fools than to accept praises from them.

  * * * * *

  Why do trees grow and so luxuriantly, when the owners are dead?

  * * * * *

  The character keeps a library, but he is always away visiting; there are no readers.

  * * * * *

  Life seems great, enormous, and yet one sits on one's piatachok.[1]

  [Footnote 1: The word means five kopecks and also a pig's snout.]

  * * * * *

  Zolotonosha?[1] There is no such town! No!

  [Footnote 1: The name of a Russian town, meaning literally

  "Gold-carrier."]

  * * * * *

  When he laughs, he shows his teeth and gums.

  * * * * *

  He loved the sort of literature which did not upset him, Schiller,

  Homer, etc.

  * * * * *

  N., a teacher, on her way home in the evening was told by her friend that X. had fallen in love with her, N., and wanted to propose. N., ungainly, who had never before thought of marriage, when she got home, sat for a long time trembling with fear, could not sleep, cried, and towards morning fell in love with X.; next day she heard that the whole thing was a supposition on the part of her friend and that X. was going to marry not her but Y.

  * * * * *

  He had a liaison with a woman of forty-five after which he began to write ghost stories.

  * * * * *

  I dreamt that I was in India and that one of the local princes presented me with an elephant, two elephants even. I was so worried about the elephant that I woke up.

  * * * * *

  An old man of eighty says to another old man of sixty: "You ought to be ashamed, young man."

  * * * * *

  When they sang in church, "Now is the beginning of our salvation," he ate glavizna at home; on the day of St. John the Baptist he ate no food that was circular and flogged his children.[1]

  [Footnote 1: Glavizna in Russian is the name of a fish and also means beginning; the root of the verbs "to behead" and "to flog" are the same.]

  * * * * *

  A journalist wrote lies in the newspaper, but he thought he was writing the truth.

  * * * * *

  If you are afraid of loneliness, do not marry.

  * * * * *

  He himself is rich, but his mother is in the workhouse.

  * * * * *

  He married, furnished a house, bought a writing-table, got everything in order, but found he had nothing to write.

  * * * * *

  Faust: "What you don't know is just what you want; what you know is what you can't use."

  * * * * *

  Although you may tell lies, people will believe you, if only you speak with authority.

  * * * * *

  As I shall lie in the grave alone, so in fact I live alone.

  * * * * *

  A German: "Lord have mercy on us, grieshniki."[1]

  [Footnote 1: Grieshniki means "sinners," but sounds like grietchnieviki which means "buckwheat cakes."]

  * * * * *

  "O my dear little pimple!" said the bride tenderly. The bridegroom thought for a while, then felt hurt—they parted.

  * * * * *

  They were mineral water bottles with preserved cherries in them.

  * * * * *

  An actress who spoilt all her parts by very bad acting—and this continued all her life long until she died. Nobody liked her; she ruined all the best parts; and yet she went on acting until she was seventy.

  * * * * *

  He alone is all right and can repent who feels himself to be wrong.

  * * * * *

  The archdeacon curses the "doubters," and they stand in the choir and sing anathema to themselves (Skitalez).

  * * * * *

  He imagined that his wife lay with her legs cut off and that he nursed her in order to save his soul….

  * * * * *

  Madame Snuffley.

  * * * * *

  The black-beetles have left the house; the house will be burnt down.

  * * * * *

  "Dmitri, the Pretender, and Actors." "Turgenev and the Tigers."

  Articles like that can be and are written.

  * * * * *

  A title: Lemon Peel.

  * * * * *

  I am your legitimate husband.

  * * * * *

  An abortion, because while birthing a wave struck her, a wave of the ocean; because of the eruption of Vesuvius.

  * * * * *

  It seems to me: the sea and myself—and nothing else.

  * * * * *

  Education: his three-year-old son wore a black frock-coat, boots, and waistcoat.

  * * * * *

  With pride: "I'm not of Yuriev, but of Dorpat University."[1]

  [Footnote 1: Yuriev is the Russian name of the town Dorpat.]

  * * * * *

  His beard looked like the tail of a fish.

  * * * * *

/>   A Jew, Ziptchik.

  * * * * *

  A girl, when she giggles, makes noises as if she were putting her head in cold water.

  * * * * *

  "Mamma, what is a thunderbolt made of?"

  * * * * *

  On the estate there is a bad smell, and bad taste; the trees are planted anyhow, stupidly; and away in a remote corner the lodge-keeper's wife all day long washes the guest's linen—and nobody sees her; and the owners are allowed to talk away whole days about their rights and their nobility.

  * * * * *

  She fed her dog on the best caviare.

  * * * * *

  Our self-esteem and conceit are European, but our culture and actions are Asiatic.

  * * * * *

  A black dog—he looks as if he were wearing goloshes.

  * * * * *

  A Russian's only hope—to win two hundred thousand roubles in a lottery.

  * * * * *

  She is wicked, but she taught her children good.

  * * * * *

  Every one has something to hide.

  * * * * *

  The title of N.'s story: The Power of Harmonies.

  * * * * *

  O how nice it would be if bachelors or widowers were appointed

  Governors.

  * * * * *

  A Moscow actress never in her life saw a turkey-hen.

  * * * * *

  On the lips of the old I hear either stupidity or malice.

  * * * * *

  "Mamma, Pete did not say his prayers." Pete is woken up, he says his prayers, cries, then lies down and shakes his fist at the child who made the complaint.

  * * * * *

  He imagined that only doctors could say whether it is male or female.

  * * * * *

  One became a priest, the other a Dukhobor, the third a philosopher, and in each case instinctively because no one wants really to work with bent back from morning to night.

  * * * * *

  A passion for the word uterine: my uterine brother, my uterine wife, my uterine brother-in-law, etc.

  * * * * *

  To Doctor N., an illegitimate child, who has never lived with his father and knew him very little, his bosom friend Z., says with agitation: "You see, the fact of the matter is that your father misses you very much, he is ill and wants to have a look at you." The father keeps "Switzerland," furnished apartments. He takes the fried fish out of the dish with his hands and only afterwards uses a fork. The vodka smells rank. N. went, looked about him, had dinner—his only feeling that that fat peasant, with the grizzled beard, should sell such filth. But once, when passing the house at midnight, he looked in at the window: his father was sitting with bent back reading a book. He recognized himself and his own manners.