READING CHEKHOV IN TIMES OF ANGER

 

ANTON CHEKHOV “STORY OF MY LIFE” READING ANTON CALMS ME DOWN. MANY OF US ARE ON NERVES BECAUSE OF THE BEAST

This Russian author 1860-1904 in his short novel Historia de mi vida narrates a little of his life and partly of mine and that of anyone who calls themselves a good writer. His books are like a touch of rods, a sacrament that imprints character. Anointed by the sacred oil of his simple and unstrident way of narrating, we will never be able to extirpate that chrism that is charisma, even if we try to erase it, to extirpate it. I go to Chekhov's books in times of crew or I am nervous as in the current circumstances of the Ukrainian fratricidal war, times of the great apostasy. Then I calm down, stillness and peace return to me. This great genius of Russian and universal literature taught us to see the world from his particular perspective. His prose makes us be better, lament the triumph of indolence, alcoholism, stupidity, heartbreak. Here two main questions or rather three are raised: nobility and lineage against commoners, the countryside-city dilemma and the manual labor dilemma, intellectual labor. On these areas he plans the Russian soul with its hopes and contradictions. All this seasoned with certain doses of humor and a certain piety. There is another contrast: Masha Victorian carnal love with whom the protagonist marries to go with another and Ana Blagovo the dulcinea of his thoughts ideal love representative of beauty, selflessness and tenderness. Ana Blagovo. Ah, I looked for her in all the countries of the world and I wanted her with all my might to land in a more prosaic and lethal reality. Ana Blagovo escaped from my existence and I came face to face with that femme fatale who is the destiny of the great idealists Masha Victoriana, the flesh against the spirit represented by that ethereal woman, the Dulcinea of our thoughts, who perhaps does not exist. Anton Chekhov taught us to look at life with his magnifying glasses with which he makes us laugh, makes us cry and one day he made us dream. It is beautiful to live but not so easy

 

Friday, April 5, 2024