Gooseberries, Anton Chekhov - Thomas Winner (essay date 1966)
Thomas Winner (essay date 1966)
SOURCE: "Life in a Shell," in Chekhov and His Prose, Holt, Rhinehart and Winston, 1966, pp. 191-208.
[In the following excerpt, Winner examines "Gooseberries" as a response to Leo Tolstoy's story, "How Much Land Does Man Need?"]
The second part of [Chekhov's] allegoric trilogy, "Gooseberries," is told by Ivan Ivanych, who bears the grotesque surname Chimsha-Gimalayski. It is the story of his brother, Nikolay Ivanych, who, obsessed with the desire for a little estate upon which to retire, scrimps and saves, and, like Akaki in Gogol's "The Overcoat," denies himself all the pleasures of life and even food. He had entered into a mariage de convenance with a rich old widow and had contributed to her death by forcing her also to stint on food. The idyllic life of retirement was symbolized for him by a gooseberry bush from which he could eat his own gooseberries. When Nikolay finally realizes his dream,...
[The entire page is 1468 words long]
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