“Mire” has a problem. It’s not that it’s a terrible story; the problem is the anti-semitism.
“Mire” is a tale about two men smitten with a “jewess” – a scheming, money-grubbing one at that. It’s worth reading if and only if you are making a project of reading all the Chekhov stories.
The question of Chekhov’s view of Jews is vexing. His stories are marred occasionally with an anti-semitic line or two. It’s relatively infrequent. But it happens regularly enough to be discomfiting. Most of the time, the lines are almost throwaways.
For instance, in two separate stories, a character is described as “shaking like a jew in a frying pan.” (I have no idea what that is supposed to mean. I mean, WTF?) I assume that expression was a common colloquialism of the day, and Chekhov was just being lazy when he used the phrase.
Other times (rarely, but not never) Chekhov paints an overtly ugly picture of a jewish character. And I mean “ugly” literally: In “Uprooted,” a Jewish man is described as having fat lips and eyes with an “oily brilliance” that is “only found in Jews.”
Times were different then, I know. Occasionally Chekhov will describe someone as having Chinese features (only he doesn’t put it as circumspectly as that.) Greeks and other Mediterranean folks come in for their own stereotyping. But those are really rare. The Jewish comments happen with just enough frequency to be troubling.
Meanwhile, in life, Chekhov seemed to be anything but an anti-semite. His school in Taganrog enrolled Jews, and a number of them were clearly friendly with him, to the point of continuing their friendship after he moved to Moscow to attend medical college. As a young man, Chekhov had a two-year relationship with a Jewish woman, Natalia Golden, and later was engaged to another Jewish woman. On the other hand, he used the equivalent of the word “Yid” in his letters (“Zhid”). Some readers have argued that “Zhid” was simply the word for Jews in that part of the world. But you could similarly say, for instance, that “PR” was just what people called Puerto Ricans back in the 1960s in New York… it’s not a look that ages well.
(And, speaking of the term “PR,” I’m reminded of the casual racism of a Lou Reed song, “I’m Waiting for the Man.” The “man” is always late (um) and he’s dressed in “PR shoes.” It’s a memorable song, but, you know, maybe better to blur the lyrics a bit. I’ve seen them changed to “beat-up shoes” on some lyric servers. Whatever.)
In that spirit, it’s worth asking, is “Mire” possibly a good story if you strip away the anti-semitism? And the answer is… kinda, yeah, maybe? It might even be actually pretty great?
The story: A military man, Kokolsky, enters the lair (there is no other way to describe it) of a local woman who owes his family a debt. The woman, Susanna Moiseyevna, is cagey and flirtatious, and the surroundings are exotic – softly carpeted stairs, rooms filled with plants and flowers, the air heavy with the scent of jasmine. Susanna, too, has a magical quality: At first she is lounging amidst the jasmine, like a rare bird. A moment later, she appears in a sleek black dress, looking like she has been spun on a lathe. Amidst their flirtatious negotiations, she pockets the bill Kokolsky has presented her. Then they begin to wrestle. Let me repeat that to let it sink in: They begin to wrestle.
It’s a pretty hot scene. So hot, in fact, that Kokolsky ends up staying the night – and leaves the next morning without the IOU or the money.
At that point, his cousin, to whom the bill was owed, becomes involved in the negotiations, and lo! he too is seduced by the mystical Susanna, and finds himself unable to collect on the debt.
Well, if you were to excise the dumb Jewish canards (which would be difficult, because they are ribboned through the entire narrative, including some stupid conversations about the character of Jews, etc.) … but let’s say you did that requisite editing job, would it be a good story? Yes, probably a really good one!
READ THIS? READ THAT!
You could use this story as a starting point for a tour of Chekhov’s worst anti-semitic works, but that’s no fun. Instead, why not read “Champagne,” another tale of a man laid low by lust. It’s narrated by a genuine low-life, an unusual sort of narrator for Chekhov, and the final two pages are pretty amazingly surprising, even given the narrator’s amorality.
A Chekhov Circus 