The Shooting Party

Notes

1. Spencer: Herbert Spencer (1820–1903), English sociologist and biologist. In his Education: Intellectual, Moral, Physical (1861), he championed the many-sided development of man, giving special emphasis to physical education. Chekhov mentions him often and in a letter to Aleksandr Chekhov (17/18 April 1883) praises the chapter dealing with moral education.

2. ‘sweet sounds’ in words: Periphrasis of last words of Pushkin’s famous Poet and the Crowd (1829):

We are born for inspiration

For sweet sounds and prayers.

3. Gaboriau: Emile Gaboriau (1832–73), originator of crime novel (roman policier) in France, whose detective Monsieur Lecoq was a forerunner of Sherlock Holmes. His thrillers – they first appeared as feuilletons – include Monsieur Lecoq (1869): extremely popular in Russia, it appeared in Russian translation in the year of its publication. His other main detective novels are L’Affaire Lerouge (1865–6); Le Crime d’Orcival (1867); and Le Dossier no. 113 (1867). The young Maxim Gorky was acquainted with the French writer, whom he avidly read – along with others such as Dumas père (My Apprenticeship, Harmondsworth, 1974).

4. Shklyarevsky: A. A. Shklyarevsky (1837–83), Russian author of detective novels and known as the ‘Russian Gaboriau’. His main novels are: Tales of an Investigating Magistrate (1872) and The Unsolved Crime (1878). For details of the current vogue for detective novels see A Note on the Text, p. xx.

5. sui generis: Unique.

6. Lecoq: See note 3.

7. The Count of Monte Christo: By Alexandre Dumas (Dumas père, 1802–70), highly popular novel (1844–5) of betrayal and vengeance. In a letter of 28 May 1892, to Suvorin, Chekhov writes: ‘What shall I do with Monte Christo? I’ve abridged it until it resembles someone suffering from typhus. The first part – until the Count becomes rich – is very interesting and well written, but the second (with few exceptions) is unbearable, since Monte-Christo performs and speaks inflated nonsense. But on the whole the novel is quite effective.’ In 1892 Suvorin intended publishing an abridged version of the novel, on which Chekhov worked May/June that year.

8. Auguste Comte: French mathematician and philosopher (1798–1857), founder of Positivism. His Cours de philosophie positive (1830–42) expounds a religion of humanity.

9. you: Actually the familiar form in Russian = ‘thou’.

10. Riga balsam: A kind of brandy, usually black, distilled with herbs.

11. Eynem’s: famous Moscow shop selling biscuits and preserves.

12. Leporello: Faithful servant and confidant of Don Juan, hero of Pushkin’s Stone Guest (1830).

13. stukolka: A popular card game of the time.

14. The Cornfield (Niva): A popular illustrated family magazine published in St Petersburg (1870–1918).

15. ‘I lo-ove the storms of early Ma-ay’: The first line of the poem Spring Storm (1829) by Fyodor Tyutchev (1803–73). It was set to music by many composers.

16. one of Born’s books: Pseudonym of Georg Fülleborn (1837–1902), highly prolific German novelist, author of cheap ‘boulevard’ novels. His Eugene, or Secrets of the French Court was published in Russian translation in 1882.

17. Yevtushevsky’s Mathematics Problem Book: A collection of arithmetical problems by A. A. Yevtushevsky (1836–88).

18. The Task: Literary-political journal, published in St Petersburg (1866–88).

19. Miscellany: A literary miscellany published in St Petersburg in 1874 for the benefit of famine sufferers in Samara district. It comprised minor works by Turgenev, Dostoyevsky, Ostrovsky, Goncharov and others.

20. ‘pitcher-snouts’: Reference to Gogol’s clerk Ivan Antonovich in Dead Souls (1848), whose face appeared to have turned into one enormous nose: ‘…the whole of the middle of his face stuck out and looked like a nose – briefly, it was the kind of face commonly called pitcher-snout’ (chap. 7).

21. Mount Athos: Athos – a Greek peninsula in Chalcidice (Macedonia), with numerous monasteries and churches, the object of pilgrimages since the eleventh century.

22. English bitters: Liquor with bitter flavour used for mixing with cocktails.

23. Depré’s: Well-known wine shop in Moscow.

24. ‘Ah, Moscow, Moscow… stone walls’: From the well-known folk song.

25. ‘Down Mo-other Volga… Vo-olga’: Famous folk song.

26. ‘Oh burn, oh speak… speak!’: Refrain from folk dance song, ‘See the young dandy strutting down the street.’

27. ‘Nights of madness, nights of gladness’: Inaccurate quotation from the poem Nights of madness, sleepless nights (1886) by A. N. Apukhtin (1841–93). It was set to music by Tchaikovsky and others. In the 1880s it became a very popular gipsy romance, with various musical settings. The second line runs: ‘Wild words, tired glances…’

28. Shandor candle: A heavy candlestick.

29. ad patres: (Lat.) to his forefathers – i.e. he died.

30. terra incognita: (Lat.) unknown territory. Latin and French tags occur frequently in Chekhov’s earlier stories.

31. Themis: Greek goddess of justice and law.

32. casus belli: (Lat.) an act or situation provoking war.

33. beau monde: Fashionable society.

34. sinister old crones: Words spoken by Chatsky, hero of A. S. Griboyedov’s comedy Woe from Wit (1822–4).

35. A kind of Onegin: Reference to the disenchanted hero of Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin (1831). One of the first exemplars of the Superfluous Man in Russian literature, disillusioned and at odds with society.

36. Homo sum: (Lat.) possible reference to the Roman playwright Terence: Homo sum; humani nil a me alienum puto (I am a man, I count nothing human indifferent to me).

37. Pukirev’s picture: The painting referred to is Misalliance (1862), by V. V. Pukirev (1832–90), a savage denunciation of women’s lack of rights and of the treatment of marriage as a commercial transaction. The painting had far-reaching social repercussions.

38. bon vivant: Person indulging in good living.

39. He was as impressive as forty thousand best men put together: A humorous periphrasis of Hamlet’s words after Ophelia’s death:

I lov’d Ophelia. Forty thousand brothers

Could not with all their quantity of love

Make up my sum.

Hamlet, Act V, Scene I

In his early stories Chekhov liked to refer to this ‘forty thousand’ in a humorous context, for example in ‘Night in a Cemetery’ (1886) where he writes: ‘… I got as drunk as forty thousand brothers.’

40. Like Risler Senior in Alphonse Daudet’s novel: The novel is Fromont jeune et Risler Aîné (1874), which tells of a senile, wealthy proprietor of a Paris wallpaper factory marrying a young girl.

41. Krylov’s fable: Reference to Hermit and Bear (1804) by I. A. Krylov (1769–1844). In this fable a bear befriends a hermit, who when sleeping is pestered by a fly. When all other efforts to drive it away have failed, the despairing bear hurls a rock at it, thus smashing his friend’s skull. Chekhov frequently refers to Krylov’s fables.

42. infusoria: A class of Protozoa, so called because they are found in infusions of decaying animal or vegetable matter.

43. jeune premier: Leading man/character.

44. like Pushkin’s Tatyana: The heroine of Eugene Onegin who thrusts her love upon the uninterested, blasé hero.

45. ‘your hand in mine’: Line from aria in Act 4 of Borodin’s opera, Prince Igor.

46. nolens volens: (Lat.) willy-nilly, perforce.

47. barely time to wear out her wedding shoes: Periphrasis of words spoken by Hamlet, in A. Kroneberg’s Russian translation. The actual lines are:

… or ere those shoes were old

With which she follow’d my poor father’s body

Like Niobe, all tears.

Hamlet, Act I, Scene 2

48. She’s in a hurry to live!: Possibly a reference to First Snow (1819), by Pushkin’s close friend Prince P. A. Vyazemsky (1792–1878). The epigraph to Chapter 1 of Eugene Onegin runs: ‘He hurries to live and hastens to feel.’

49. tussore: A strong, coarse silk made in India.

50. Nevsky Prospekt: Famous thoroughfare in St Petersburg, running for about two and a half miles from the Admiralty to the Aleksandr Nevsky Monastery.

51. ‘As Hamlet… the sin of suicide’: The actual lines are:

Or that the Everlasting had not fix’d

His canon ’gainst self-slaughter!

Hamlet, Act I, Scene 2

Chekhov often quotes from Hamlet in his stories.

52. Hofman drops: In a letter of 20 June 1891 to Lidiya Mizinova (who was not well) Chekhov writes (after giving dietary advice): ‘Take something bitter before food: Hofman’s elixir (Elixir vis-ceralis Hofmani) or tincture of quinine.’ And in a letter to his sister Masha of 23/24 July 1897 he writes: ‘Tell Mother if she has dizzy spells to take 15 Hofman drops at a time.’

53. à la Le Coq: See note 3.

54. of Gaboriau and our own Shklyarevsky: See notes 3 and 4.

55. three leaves: Like stukolka (see note 13), a popular card game.

56. Sapienti sat: (Lat.) enough for a wise man.

57. habitus: (Lat.) general aspect.

58. humanum est errare: (Lat.) to err is human.