Word: chekhovisms
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...delivered in a complete prose deadpan, methodically thorough detail, small paradoxical moments that reveal character--the touches sound contrived and unnatural in Carver's hands. If "Errand" were akin to Harold Bloom's apophrades, a return from the dead of an old literary influence, the styles of Carver and Chekhov would merge without seams. Instead they...
...without warning, blood began gushing from his mouth" in the middle of a lengthy paragraph. Nor would Carver use a phrase like "Suddenly, without warning" in one of his own stories, because, in addition to the dated gentility of the phrase, it is redundant. Furthermore, in his homage to Chekhov, Carver adopts a pace that is not as tight as his own, a pace that surveys each scene with caution and scrutiny before proceeding...
...interaction between life (non-fiction) and art (fiction) fascinated and troubled Chekhov as much as Carver. Chekhov's lover, Lydia Avilov, recorded in her memoirs that Chekhov's story, "About Love," was material stolen from their furtive affair. Ms. Avilov reproached Chekhov for his theft: "The colder the writer, the more sensitive and moving his story. Let the reader weep over it. That's what...
Like the Carver figure in "Intimacy," Chekhov did not try to excuse himself from the theft. His reply to her letter was gentle. He wrote about the weather and his plans for a trip abroad. His response to her accusation was a plea for compassion: "All I can say is: another man's soul is a dark well...
John Cheever, in a lecture he delivered on Chekhov before his death, noted how often Chekhov crossed the border between life and art. "In reading a dozen stories of Chekhov," Cheever said...