Tumbleweed (story)

The story of A.P. Chekhov "Rolling Field" was written in 1887, first published in 1887 in the newspaper " New Time " No. 4084 dated July 14, signed by An. Chekhov, in 1888, was included in the collection of "Stories", is also included in the publication of A. F. Marx.

For the collection of short stories, the author shortened the story.

The story is based on impressions from Chekhov's visit to the Holy Mountains on the North Donets River in 1887. Upon his return, Chekhov wrote to the publisher N. A. Leikin: “Recently I returned from the Holy Mountains, where I had about 15,000 pilgrims with me. In general, there are a lot of impressions and material ... ” The real person is the Jew Alexander Ivanovich described in the story. According to the memoirs of B. A. Lazarevsky, Chekhov believed that the roommate described in the story was “a detective assigned to him” ^[1] .

During Chekhov's life, the story was translated into Slovak and French.

Controversial criticism of the story. The critic K. Arseniev attributed the story "Tumbleweed" to stories that are "too poor in content and individual beauties, sometimes making up the main force of Chekhov’s essays" ^[2] .

KP Medvedsky reproached Chekhov for not describing in detail what wandering is and what caused it ^[3] .

V. Albov believed that “Chekhov-humorist became a pessimist over time,” and that he has too many stories about the purposelessness, meaninglessness of life. One of these stories was "Tumbleweed" ^[4] .

F. Ye. Paktovsky wrote about the story: “Chekhov, a little seeker of life truth, brought out by Chekhov in the story“ Tumbleweed “” will give even less life to this life ” ^[5] .

G. Kacherets reproached Chekhov for devaluing the Jewish desire for enlightenment in a story and relegating him to the level of mediocrity " ^[6] .

The story is described in the first person. The story takes place on the banks of the North Donets River near the Holy Mountain. Here is the Orthodox Svyatogorsky monastery . By the days of St. John the Evangelist and St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, thousands of believers flocked to the Holy Mountains. Each person who came and came had to find a place in the monastery for an overnight stay, give food to eat and drink. The author describes his impressions of being in the monastery. A roommate settled in his room, who turned out to be a Jew who converted to Orthodoxy. The Jew was called Alexander Ivanovich, and earlier - Isaac. Alexander Ivanovich told the author about his hard life - how poorly his parents lived, who wanted his son to engage in trade and did not know anything except the Talmud . One day, his parents beat him, suspecting that his son was reading a Russian newspaper .

The former Isaac was pleased to talk about his desire for enlightenment, wandering around the country. He visited the cities: Gomel , Kiev , Bila Tserkva, Uman, Balta, Bender, Odessa. In Poltava, the narrator nailed to students who prepared him at a technical school, made him think, and indicated the purpose of life.

Colorfully told Alexander Ivanovich and how he once fell into the mine and was nearly beaten with a bucket there. Now he was going to go to the village teachers. Regarding the change of religion, he said this: "The New Testament is a natural continuation of the Old." This phrase did not fully clarify the issue.

The next day the roommate left. In the monastery there were many people, among them there were many Ukrainians, Taurideans and other people. Among them was Alexander Ivanovich. With him, the author hung around the monastery all day, after which he left.

• Chekhov A.P. Rolling Field // Chekhov A.P. Complete Works and Letters: In 30 Volumes. Works: In 18 Volumes / Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Institute of World Lite. them. A. M. Gorky. - M .: Nauka, 1974-1982.

• Chekhov A.P. Rolling field . Original Russian text