Here we have a mean little portrait of a miserable little man – Krasnyhin, identified in the very first sentence as “a fourth-rate journalist.”
Krasnyhin arrives home (it’s not clear whether he has been at work as a journalist all day, or just, I don’t know, out) and immediately he makes life difficult for his family: ordering them to be quiet so that he can write, calling out for tea, complaining when the stove smokes excessively. He may be a “humble, meek, dull-witted little man” when he is in the editor’s offices, but he’s an unpleasant martinet at home.
Not only is Krasnyhin unsuccessful, whiny, and overly sensitive (he even complains when the lodger in the next room prays too loudly–and she’s whispering!), he is also self-aggrandizing: “How is it,” he wonders, “nobody has described the agonizing discord in the soul of a writer who has to amuse the crowd when his heart is heavy?”
Presumably this is all supposed to be amusing and I guess it is, very mildly so, but mainly it seems like punching down – look at the pathetic little writer typing up stories “to order!” Even as early as 1886 Chekhov was gaining widespread renown as a writer of brief stories; in January of 1886 he was approached about writing for Russia’s largest newspaper. So, with success at hand, why be so mean-spirited about a character less successful? Who knows, maybe he was sending up his own self?
Or maybe this is a portrait of someone he knew, some low level writer that he felt was deserving of a filleting.
If so, then the deed was done. But I don’t know why I would want to read about him.
READ THIS? READ THAT!
You could probably curate a multi-volume set of Chekhov stories devoted only to characters who are bullies, snobs, hypocrites, and narcissists. I’m not sure anyone would want to read such a set, though! These tend to be my least favorite Chekhov stories, because humor almost never ages particularly well.
For a portrait of a different sort of ass, but one no less irritating, you could try “The Lion and the Sun.”
A Chekhov Circus 