Huntsman (story)

The story was first published on August 1 (July 18, old style) in 1885 in the Petersburg newspaper (issue No. 194), under the pseudonym A. Chekhonte. The work also featured in the collection “Colorful Stories”, published in St. Petersburg in 1886. Later, the author was also included in the third volume of the original edition of the collected works of A.P. Chekhov, published by Adolf Marx in 1899-1901 ^[1] .

The Huntsman impressed the writer Dmitry Grigorovich , who in a letter dated March 25, 1886 expressed his admiration and urged Chekhov to leave the humorous genre behind and concentrate on more serious issues ^[2] . In his reply dated March 28, Chekhov admitted that so far he had never taken his literary exercises seriously. “I do not recall a single story that I would write more than in a day, and the Huntsman that you liked so much was actually written in the bathroom!” ^[1]

Alexander Lazarev-Gruzinsky in his memoirs quotes Chekhov, who once told him the following: “apparently, right after my“ Huntsman ”, which appeared in the Petersburg newspaper, Grigorovich visited Suvorin and said to him: - Alexey Sergeyevich, please invite Chekhov to New Time . Just read his Huntsman. It would be a crime for you not to get this writer. Suvorin turned to Kurepin, from whom I received an invitation in a letter of accession to the New Time newspaper ” ^[3] .

A huntsman named Egor walks along a country road and accidentally meets his wife Pelageya, whom he has been married for twelve years, but whom he visited only a few times, and even then he was drunk and violently behaving. Pelagia cries and, crouching in front of him, begs him to visit her more often. He is trying to explain why he, the best shooter in the area, a “spoiled person”, enjoying delicious tea and “delicate conversations”, could not live in peace in the village.

• 1959 - Huntsman , director Heinrich Livanov , starring Vasily Leonov , Olga Khorkova