A brief portrait of a rather repulsive intellectual manque and his severe, heartbroken sister. It’s one of the coldest of Chekhov’s portraits: He pokes fun at the man’s writing style and general ignorance. The sister, meanwhile, tried to commit suicide after the death of her husband. Now she seems listless and forlorn, if not really sympathetic.
Chekhov dispatches these two like a sniper: the sister unaccountably announces that she is off to some distant place to “do vaccination work.” One page later, the intellectual falls ill and within half a page after that has not only died but been “utterly forgotten.”
The sudden disappearance/demise of these two characters may be a meaningful portrait, or maybe this just happened to be a piece that Chekhov lost interest in, sewing it up efficiently but inelegantly, to be done with it.
Not one of the best pieces.
READ THIS? READ THAT!
Chekhov disliked bad writers. In “Hush!”, he skewers a pretentious writer with a few quick strokes. But at least he doesn’t kill the character off!
A Chekhov Circus 