Philosophy: Learning To Be Truly Kind.

On Reading Chekhov

Frank Rubenfeld

I have been reading the excellent translation of Chekhov's stories by Pevear and Volokhonsky (Anton Chekhov, Stories, trans. by Peavear and Volokhonsky (New York: Bantam Books, 2000) for the past few days. So forgive me if my prose gives off the odor of pickled herring, dewy lilacs, or stinky cigars - they all have a place in his stories. He gets you by the senses. What vivid pictures he paints of luminescent rivers, magnificent sunsets, fantastic gardens. Or of decrepit hospital wards, gloomy ship-holds, rancid peasants' quarters. These are the evocative stage sets for his stories. They ground the action in a reality that reaches across time and space. We are in the hotel room with the dying madman; lie on the cold ground with the Tartar; dive into the ocean with Gusev; sit in squalor with Anutka.

So much suffering, injustice, pain, and sadness. So much callousness, cruelty, and stupidity. Life is hard enough - we are all flesh and blood fated to grow ill, suffer and die without pouring the salt of our inhumaneness into our own wounds. In "Ward 6", the mad Ivan Dimitrich speaks for the part of Chekhov that refuses to try and escape the presence of pain by adopting the "frozen" philosophy of Stoicism. Pain and suffering is real and present and comes to us all and only those who have not truly suffered can try to scorn and minimize it - can dare to say that " it's all in your head".

Chekhov is a true physician of the soul. In terms of breadth of vision he has more to offer psychotherapists than Freud, Jung, or Perls. He doesn't get lost in the twists and turns of the labyrinthine unconscious - but he does explore the dreams and fantasies of his protagonists and lets us see how they reflect their fears and wishes. Nor does he postulate starry fantasies about a "collective unconscious," yet the weight of past and present cultural and religious icons have their place in the minds of his characters. Nor is he stuck in the Alzheimeran treadmill of the here and now, yet the immediacy and power of the here and now are an integral part of his stories. Chekhov has no theory to sell. He faces all of reality head-on. He pulls no punches. Nikita the orderly rains blows on his hapless wards; the Tartar is forced to sleep outside in the freezing cold because he is a Tartar; the Jew has dogs set upon him who tear his flesh. And those are just the physical abuses. Chekhov shows us the harshness and ridicule, neglect and obtuseness and prejudice, stupidity and vengefulness that comprise all too many human interactions.

The beauty of nature provides scant cover, it in fact can serve as an ironic backdrop to human misfortune. As Gusev's corpse meets the shark on its long trip down to the ocean floor, an amazing sunset brilliantly and tenderly lights up the sea above him. Neither does Chekhov soften the blows of life through a belief in a happy afterlife, or a utopian future. The rantings of a maniac in "Ward 6" provide the text for an exposition of the wonderful fate in store for humanity due to human progress.

Another madman, in "The Black Monk", has at the heart of his madness the conviction that he is one of the select few, who through their goodness and wisdom, will lead humanity to its liberation on a faster track. This madman is a professor of liberal arts, who succeeds in destroying the only two people in the world who love him. The gap between his ideas and his actuality are the ground from which his madness thrives.

We cannot look to these characters for hope, for guidance, for a way to psychologically, ethically, and intellectually survive. The best of them are crushed by the envy, cruelty, and indifference of others. And yet, reading Chekhov I am not left with a sense of hopelessness and despair. True, my sadness has been evoked; my indignation, my pity and my compassion. But those are the very feelings that moved Chekhov to write what he did. The author has channeled his sadness, pity, compassion, and empathic indignation through his artistry in such a manner, that we his readers experience those feelings rising up in us.

Being a psychotherapist, with a front row seat in the theater of human suffering, and the opportunity to respond to it, I soon realized how his writings have impacted my interactions with my clients, myself, and my perspective on life's daily tragedies.

When I think of the goddess Kuan-Yin, an Asian symbol of compassion, I also think of Chekhov. They both compassionately hold human suffering, and in that holding itself there is some relief and comfort. After reading Chekhov, I noticed a shift on my part towards spending more time compassionately accepting my clients' pain and disappointment, rather than prematurely focusing on means of reducing their suffering. I found myself encouraging my clients to accept their disappointments, and in that way to accept their wants, their aliveness. At times the point may not be to reduce pain, it may be to be able to hold it tenderly.

I will be sixty-five this year, and am aware of the limitations that my age places on me. Rather than denying my resultant disappointment and sadness, I am now more inclined to accept my feelings as part of a natural process, rather than insisting on focusing on the half-fullness of the glass. I can appreciate both my sense of loss, and the pleasures remaining. Somehow, Chekhov has helped me to move in that direction.

Each day I read the New York Times, and am reminded of the suffering of people from every corner of the planet. Sometimes a story is written from the heart, and I resonate with it rather than shutting myself off from the images and feelings it elicits. I become the compassionate witness, like Chekhov. The suffering and the people who bear it, somehow become a part of me.

Thus, I have allowed myself to be guided and inspired by Chekhov. In his life and in his writing he was a tender, courageous, wise man who combined an unflinching acknowledgment of moral ugliness, with a profound appreciation of the natural and human beauty that is also part of this world. His writing echoes with an abiding compassion for those who need it most. In his personal life he was a devoted son and brother, an attentive physician, and a good friend.

Decades after his physical death he has the power to move myself and others to look more deeply into ourselves and the world around us. Although Chekhov did not believe in individual immortality, the fragrance of his goodness and artistry will surely waft through the corridors of time for generations to come.

Frank Rubenfeld continues to delight us with his insights and felicitous writing (note that last sentence). He is the author of "A JourneyToward Truth" Vol. 26. 678 Santa Rosa Ave., Berkeley, CA 94707.(Frubenfeld@aol.com)
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