‘About Love: Three Stories by Anton Chekhov’ translated by David Helwig

Reviewed by Charlene Van Buekenhout

David Helwig is a Canadian author, teacher, and singer, and if you go to largeheartedboy.com you can find his playlist of music to listen to while reading this book. While some men who hit middle age suddenly find themselves buying that little red convertible, David Helwig found himself auditing a Russian language course. Lucky for us he did: with About Love, Helwig’s own poetic sense shines a brilliant and smooth light on Chekhov’s text, allowing his readers to skip Russian class and cozy up with these three tales.

The book is designed and decorated by Seth. Its pleasing tactile cover is reminiscent of books which, with tiny four-year-old hands, I used to pick out books from my parents’ library and pretend to read because the objects looked and felt lovely and important. The pages are wide and stiff, and the words are centered so that they don’t bend and disappear into the binding when being read. These details are part of what draws the reader inside under the blanket (with the moon, which appears on the cover within the word “love,” like a beam of light by which to read), imploring us to open the unusually shaped small, squarish hardcover book and wrap ourselves in it.

If you don’t know, Seth is a cartoonist and designer, and on flavorwire.com you can look up A Collection Of Seth’s Book Design Work by Emily Temple, and flip through a few examples of his work. He makes great use of light and shadow, and with such simplicity of line that he is a perfect match for Chekhov’s writing.

Speaking of Chekhov, although he wrote plays and stories, and was also a physician, About Love is, according to Helwig, “his only experiment in linking his stories.” He has long been considered among the greatest short story writers, and this concise collection of linked tales will give you a good idea why.

At the outset of the first story, “A Man In A Shell,” we are introduced to Ivan Ivanych, a veterinarian, and Burkin, a school teacher, who are out hunting in the Russian countryside of their village Mironositskoe. They and their dogs have taken shelter in a shed for the night and are exchanging stories. The rest of the book follows our heroes as they move from the shed to the countryside, to the mill and bath house to finally rest at the residence of their friend Alyokhin.

The linking story is as intriguing, if not more so, as the stories being told. This may be because it is through the reactions of the storytellers and listeners that we get to understand their personalities and the socio-economic situations that ultimately inform the stories themselves. Often, it is a character’s reaction to the story being told that is inspiring, chilling, and heartbreaking.

Part of Chekhov’s talent (and of Helwig’s perceptive translation) lies in his ability to conserve words, and to choose the exactly right turn of phrase to convey to the reader everything they need to know. One example is Alyokhin’s description of his once vibrant love: “When I dropped something she would say coldly, ‘Congratulations’.” We see in this short exchange how she has turned from him.

Similarly, his dialogue is surprisingly modern (and so character specific) that by simple word choice we know exactly who the person is, and what they are like. Varenka, for example, exclaims about cooking in Ukraine  “–and they cooked borsht with tomatoes and eggplant, so delicious, so delicious that it was simply… scary!”

“A Man In a Shell” has Burkin telling the story of a fellow teacher who has some obsessive compulsive behaviour, most likely based on his fear of anything worth living for, and his encounter with love. This chapter offers one of the most delicious character descriptions in the collection: “in a word, not some dainty miss but a real jam tart […] At the drop of a hat she burst into full-throated laughter – ha-ha-ha.” I think it is always a treat when a character attempts to imitate another as though we can hear them.

Halfway through the story, we turn the page and there are the soft, shadowed illustrations by Seth showing gathering clouds, all red and ominous, against the white shining snow. Alas: morality and piety, ever the enemy, leave us with the heartbreaking humiliations of life and love.

Just as we leave this story we are drawn into the linking story of Ivan and Burkin. The storytelling going on outside of the stories within the story is a fascinating blend of the mystery and magical moments that make up life and, from what I can tell, what Chekhov must have loved about it. Credit should go to Helwig for delivering on Chekhov’s simple yet exact images, which are so brief yet so right for the moment that no more is needed. An example can be seen in this reprieve upon arriving at their friend’s residence: “A maid welcomed Burkin and Ivan Ivanych to the house, a young woman so beautiful that they both stopped short and stared at each other.”

On the other hand, we do get a hefty dose of what Chekhov didn’t like about nineteenth-century Russian life. The first story ends with Ivan Ivanych’s reaction “and you know, the way we live in the city, the closeness, crowded together, how we sign unnecessary documents, play cards, isn’t that really a shell? And the way we lead our whole lives among loafers, people pursuing lawsuits, fools, idle women, talking and listening to all manner of nonsense, isn’t that really a shell?” Here we get what might be construed as a Chekhovian mouthpiece in Ivan. In fact, we are treated to Chekhov’s political and social leanings in action through character several times throughout the book, but they are balanced by Burkin, who seems to share Ivan’s views, but from a more casual position. As Ivan dives into another rant on society culminating in an example in the form of a story, Burkin cuts him off with “well, that’s from another opera,” and while Burkin is able to sleep, Ivan is aggravated by his thoughts and stays awake.

The second tale gives Ivan Ivanych a chance to speak his mind with a story about his brother.   “Gooseberries” is not about love (in Belikov’s case, unrequited and to be feared), but about the love one person has for an idea. But like all stories where the goal of the seeker is monetary, things are tainted. As Ivan says about his brother’s desire to leave the city in order to own a country estate: “Leaving the city, the struggle, leaving the worldly clamour in order to hide away at a place in the country, that isn’t life, that’s egotism, idleness, it’s some kind of monasticism, but monasticism without the challenges.”

The final story is the title tale “About Love,” and is the closest to a true love story that Chekhov gets in this trilogy. Its storyteller is intimately involved, and this gives depth to the content, whereas the first story is more removed from the storyteller and has a tragic/comical element (note: many passages throughout this book made me laugh out loud!), and the second involves Ivan and his brother, but Ivan’s opposition to his brother’s way of living figuratively removes him from the personal.

I could go on to write an essay about all of the social context, how perfect the positioning of the illustrations are, and the panoply of themes, giving many more examples of rich turns of phrases, sharp descriptions of an idle class, and impassioned words about social justice, but I would be giving away the entire book. If there is any fault to this collection, it is that it is too short. For its size, it is jam-packed with artistic merit on the parts of the contributors, and is an excellent addition to any Chekhov fan’s library, and a solid introduction to his work.

Biblioasis | 112 pages |  $14.95 | cloth | ISBN # 978-1926845425