Letters of Anton Chekhov (Tchekhov) - Penn State University

Letters of Anton Chekhov to His Family and Friends with biographical sketchMOSCOW, September 21, 1886.… It is not much fun to be a great writer. To begin with, it’s adreary life. Work from morning till night and not much to show forit. Money is as scarce as cats’ tears. I don’t know how it is with Zolaand Shtchedrin, but in my flat it is cold and smoky …. They giveme cigarettes, as before, on holidays only. Impossible cigarettes! Hard,damp, sausage-like. Before I begin to smoke I light the lamp, drythe cigarette over it, and only then I begin on it; the lamp smokes,the cigarette splutters and turns brown, I burn my fingers … it isenough to make one shoot oneself!… I am more or less ill, and am gradually turning into a drieddragon-fly.… I go about as festive as though it were my birthday, but tojudge from the critical glances of the lady cashier at the Budilnik, Iam not dressed in the height of fashion, and my clothes are notbrand-new. I go in buses, not in cabs.But being a writer has its good points. In the first place, my book,I hear, is going rather well; secondly, in October I shall have money;thirdly, I am beginning to reap laurels: at the refreshment bars peoplepoint at me with their fingers, they pay me little attentions and treatme to sandwiches. Korsh caught me in his theatre and straight awaypresented me with a free pass …. My medical colleagues sigh whenthey meet me, begin to talk of literature and assure me that they aresick of medicine. And so on ….42