Karen Thacker - Part I

The first thing that jumps out to me in “Misery” by Chekhov was the line right under the title. “To whom shall I tell my grief?” While it was the soviet editors that added this line to Chekhov’s story it does a good job hinting at what the main themes of the story will be; despair and loneliness. We get a sense of the despair that the main character, Iona Potapov, is feeling right at the start of the story. Chekhov uses the physical description of Iona’s actions, “bent as double as the living body can be bent,” as a metaphor for how bent and twisted Iona feels inside. It struck me as fascinating that while Iona was full of despair and loneliness, Chekhov decided to humanize his horse as if to create someone for Iona to converse with. He humanizes the mare by giving her the ability to think and show emotion at being pulled away from the country she loved to the busy city she does not love. It is as if Chekhov made sure that he gave Iona some sort of companion who can share his “Misery”.

Iona Popatov perks up a little when he finally acquires some riders. They are not the nicest people, however, this apparently does not phase the sleigh driver. “He hears abuse addressed to him, he sees people, and the feeling of loneliness begins little by little to be less heavy on his heart.” He must have been extremely lonely if something as bad as verbal and eventually physical abuse brings him comfort just because it is from another human being. At last we find out why Iona is so depressed although the way he brings it up is very weird. He stumbles through saying that his son has died and rather than be sorry for him his riders brush it off saying, “we shall all die.” This is not a very compassionate way to address the loss that Iona has suffered. As Iona tries to elaborate on his son’s death one rider completely ignores his tale and thanks God out loud that they are at their destination. To me this is another classic example of the characters in Chekhov’s stories not being on the same page. While they are physically close to one another the characters are most often mentally very far apart and have different things that bore them or excite them. For these characters, Iona is only concerned with his son’s death and the riders are only concerned with getting to their destination quickly. We see this same Chekovian style later in the story when Iona tries to talk to another sleigh driver about his son’s death, but that man only has concerns for sleeping and very quickly does fall asleep as Iona is trying to engage him.

The ending of the story brings us full circle back to the opening companions of the mare and the sleigh driver. After Iona fails to get humans to listen to him he goes out to the stable to talk to his horse. Again Chekhov wanted Iona to be able to vent somehow so he has provided him with the horse. “The little mare munches, listens, and breathes on her master’s hands. Iona is carried away and tells her all about it (son’s death).” Finally, Iona has found his only companion that will never rudely interrupt him or completely ignore him. I find it very heartbreaking that he is reduced to this interaction. Reading this story reaffirmed my feelings that all too often people are caught up in their own lives to care about the lives or heartaches of others. The saying “fend for youself” comes to mind.