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That summer Melihovo was especially crowded with visitors. Chekhov was visited not only by his friends, but also by people whose acquaintance he neither sought nor desired. People were sleeping on sofas and several in a room; some even spent the night in the passage.
You will not like Melihovo, at least at first. Here everything is in miniature; a little avenue of lime-trees, a pond the size of an aquarium, a little garden and park, little trees; but when you have walked about it once or twice the impression of littleness goes off. There is great feeling of space in spite of the village being so near. There is a great deal of forest around.
I shall never forget yesterday evening, but still I slept well, and am setting off in a very tolerable good humour. Write to me.... I have received your letter. I am not going to produce the play in Moscow. I shall never either write plays or have them acted. PETERSBURG, October 18, 1896. I am setting off to Melihovo. I shall be there tomorrow between one or two o'clock in the afternoon.
The possible future began to take a different shape to him now, and he was already dreaming of moving from Melihovo, farming and gardening and living there as in the country. He wanted to have hens, cows, a horse and donkeys, and, of course, all of this would have been quite possible and might have been realized if he had not been slowly dying.
Chekhov exerted himself on behalf of everyone, printed appeals in the papers, collected money, and did his utmost to alleviate their condition. After the unfavourable winter came an exquisite warm spring, and on the 12th of April Chekhov was in Moscow and by May in Melihovo. His father had died the previous October, and with his death a great link with the place was broken.
MELIHOVO, November 21, 1895. Well, I have finished with the play. I began it forte and ended it pianissimo contrary to all the rules of dramatic art. It has turned into a novel. I am rather dissatisfied than satisfied with it, and reading over my new-born play, I am more convinced than ever that I am not a dramatist. The acts are very short. There are four of them.
But don't listen to me, I am a bad critic. I have not the faculty of forming my critical ideas clearly. Sometimes I make a regular hash of it.... MELIHOVO, March, 1892. The cost of labour is almost nil, and so I am very well off. I begin to see the charms of capitalism.
This aching feeling, together with a sense of justice, makes my writing a contemptible pursuit in my eyes: I don't respect what I write, I am apathetic and bored with myself, and glad that I have medicine which, anyway, I practise not for the sake of money. I ought to have a bath in sulphuric acid and flay off my skin, and then grow a new hide.... MELIHOVO, August 1.
They have decided, after general consultation, that I am not to go away anywhere but to go on living at Melihovo. I must only arrange the house somewhat more comfortably.... MOSCOW, April 7, 1897. ... You write that my ideal is laziness. No, it is not laziness. I despise laziness as I despise weakness and lack of mental and moral energy.
There are numbers of starlings, and the starling has the right to say of itself: "I sing to my God all the days of my life." It sings all day long without stopping.... MELIHOVO, April 8, 1892. If Shapiro were to present me with the gigantic photograph of which you write, I should not know what to do with it. A cumbersome present. You say that I used to be younger. Yes, imagine!
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