Certainly all sorts of other details that partly inspired the story were originally scribbled in Chekhov's notebook in Nice: first, a governor's daughter sitting in the front row of the provincial theatre in a boa, then an older woman falling for an interesting young man in Yalta, and, finally, a young man falling for a much younger woman in a resort town. Some of the features of a sick young Russian girl called Olga Vasilieva, who became very attached to Chekhov after meeting him in Nice, were probably also incorporated into the character of Anna.48
Chekhov was repelled by the self-indulgent indolence of most of the Russians he was obliged to make conversation with at lunch and dinner every day, and chafed at the enforced idleness imposed by his tubercular condition. He managed to achieve a good deal for his home town while he was in France, however. When he was in Paris, before arriving in Nice, he had met expatriates from Taganrog to discuss building a library and a museum there; and he continued to write regularly to Pavel Iordanov, a doctor colleague in Taganrog who was supervising efforts locally. Thinking of exhibits for the museum, he wrote to tell Iordanov at the end of October 1897 that his aunt had an oil painting of the unveiling of the statue of Alexander I and a picture depicting the British attack on Taganrog during the Crimean War. In March 1898, shortly before he left Nice, he wrote to say that he had bought all the French classics to donate to the library (some 319 books by seventy authors) and was having them shipped to Taganrog. The works of Moliere, Prevost and Pascal he had sent earlier by post; Voltaire he had kept back for the time being to read himself.49
During the long months in Nice, Chekhov whiled away his hours reading, writing a little, taking short walks, playing cards with his friend Maxim Kovalevsky, going on day trips by train and eating. Cultural life also provided some distraction. Nice during the belle epoque was a mecca for artistic celebrities and Chekhov was keen to see and hear the
great coloratura soprano Adelina Patti, the highest paid singer of her day. Her performances in Nice and Monte Carlo in 1897 were her last (she was by then fifty-four) and Chekhov wrote to ask for a press pass from the editor of the Russian Gazette with a view to getting a seat in the front row. He was also interested in seeing the celebrated French actress Sarah Bernhardt, despite having been scathing about her performances in Moscow in 1881. And he was extremely keen to see the superb Italian actress Eleonora Duse, who came to Nice to perform the lead in La Dame aux camelias, Alexandre Dumas's perennially popular play about a selfless courtesan who dies tragically of consumption. If Chekhov had described his bed at the Pension Russe to Suvorin as being like that of Cleopatra, it was because they had both gone to see Duse perform in Antony and Cleopatra during an Italian theatre tour to St Petersburg in March 1891, and he was clearly reminded of the set. Duse had been so compelling that Chekhov thought he understood every word of the Italian translation of Shakespeare's play, even though he had no knowledge of Italian, and now he tried to lure Suvorin again to Nice by telling him Duse would be appearing there.50
There was a magnificent opera house in Nice, and if Chekhov had come back to Nice the following winter, he would have been able to attend the French premiere of Glinka's A Life for the Tsar in February 1899. Russian society was at its most brilliant during this period, and by all accounts it was quite an event, attended by both the Russian and French beau monde. The critic of La Vie mondaine was deeply moved, not only by the sight of the quivering breasts of bare-shouldered French and Russian princesses in their glamorous decolletee gowns, dripping with diamonds, but by the intensity of the emotional outburst, and the unanimity of feeling experienced by the Nigois, Parisians and Russians alike – it was something quite unprecedented in the history of Nice's theatrical life. At the end of the patriotic peasant chorus which closes the third act, the whole audience had spontaneously cried out 'Vive la Russie!' and called for the national anthem amidst a fluttering of fans and waving of hats. With the entire audience and orchestra on their feet shouting 'Vive la Russie! Vive la France!' there was soon nothing to do but perform the 'Marseillaise' and 'God Save the Tsar', which were greeted with 'indescribable enthusiasm' and half an hour of wild applause.51
Many of Nice's theatrical and musical performances took place at
the Casino Municipale. Casinos still only exercised a mild fascination for Chekhov, but everyone went to Monte Carlo, and he went along with his friends more out of idle curiosity than any desire to play the roulette table. He limited his gambling to placing a few bets on le rouge et le noir, as he put it, and sometimes brought home handfuls of francs. But he found it tiring having to stand for any length of time, and the casinos were invariably unpleasantly hot. As someone who preferred the outdoors, it is not surprising that Chekhov yearned to go off on adventures while he was in Nice. Even before he arrived, he was planning a trip to Algiers and Egypt, and he tried to persuade various friends to undertake the journey with him. Corsica was another destination he was interested in. He was thrilled when Maxim Kovalevsky agreed to accompany him to Africa after completing a lecture series in Paris, and he wrote jokingly to his sister that he would probably see Russian starlings there who might recognize him, but would not let on if they did. Chekhov started telling numerous correspondents of his impending trip, and told Kovalevsky he was dreaming of Africa 'day and night'. But first the departure date was pushed back and then Chekhov was crestfallen to receive a letter from Kovalevsky in Paris telling him he had fallen ill with rheumatism and could therefore not go. Chekhov did not want to go alone, and told Suvorin he would probably have to restrict himself to a short visit to Corsica, which was anyway very close to Nice. That journey did not take place either.52
All winter Chekhov bombarded Masha with requests that she run domestic and secretarial errands for him as she filled him in on what was going on at home. She received over fifty letters from him while he was away – far more than any other of his correspondents – and had to carry out her brother's commissions in between teaching at a school in Moscow and coming back to Melikhovo at weekends to keep an eye on their parents. There were no end of problems with the poplar saplings that had been ordered, for example, which first did not arrive and then were sent to the wrong address. 'If they send the poplars in October it might be difficult to plant them,' she wrote in September just as Chekhov was arriving in Nice. 'I've planted the narcissi,' she continued, 'and will plant the tulips today. I've got a huge amount of things to do, and it's difficult managing to do it all, but I will try to carry out all your orders accurately.'51 The poplars were
finally planted in November. In October Masha reported that a stove had now been installed in the little two- room hut in the garden where Chekhov had written The Seagull and where he escaped when there were too many guests. Seeking to supplement his meagre income, the village school teacher was going to do the wallpapering and paint the windows and the door.54
Masha kept her brother posted about who of his friends she had seen in Moscow and how much people had liked the stories he had written in Nice, now published, as well as filling him in on day-to-day life at Melikhayo. While he was still enjoying sunny weather at the end of October, she wrote to tell him that they had had to cut down trees in the forest to use as firewoood, and was worried there would not be enough wood to fuel the stoves all winter. Another day she wrote that Anna Petrovna, the old horse they had bought together with the estate, had died; meanwhile, their two remaining horses were no longer capable of working but were eating their valuable hay all the same. Masha also kept her brother informed about the money she was raising to build a village school in Melikhovo: she had put by money raised from selling that year's harvest of apples from their orchard, and Levitan had donated a couple of canvases to be auctioned. Chekhov himself donated a thousand roubles when he returned, and the school opened finally in 1899. In December Chekhov asked his sister to buy Christmas presents for the local schoolchildren, and she wrote back to tell him that she had bought calico to make shirts for the sixty boys and nice red scarves for the twenty girls.55
Chekhov did not only issue orders. He also spent time hunting out presents to send back to Russia for his family – French soap and perfume, gloves, umbrellas, Japanese teacups, pencils, scissors, ties, purses, and photographs of himself that he had taken in Nice. In his typically brief diary entry for 21 November, Chekhov's father
