“Anna Sergeevna and he loved each other like very close, dear people, like husband and wife, like tender friends,” the writer claimed. What is really hidden behind the relationship of the characters?
Chekhov does not tell us about Gurov’s past, nor about Anna Sergeevna’s childhood, thereby making this story universal. And we can fantasize about this couple or project something of our own onto them.
It is difficult for Gurov with men, but with women, on the contrary, it is simple. Devaluing them, at the same time he cannot live two days without seducing. In essence, he behaves like a child who has always been loved by nannies, mother and other female environment, giving him everything he wants. Therefore, a quick victory over the young Anna Sergeevna is not appreciated at first. He just takes what he wants and forgets about her at the end of the holiday romance.
Anna Sergeevna, as befits a young woman, lives in fantasies about the future, but instead of searching for her destiny, as was customary in those days, she gets married. And, of course, she is quickly disappointed, realizing that marriage does not add anything to her empty existence. Her life is not yet filled with meaning.
And now the forbidden passion in the autumn Yalta instantly fills her, revives, awakens in her desires, strength and courage, which she did not even suspect. Love causes her suffering both with what exists and with what will inevitably end.
Perhaps it is her deep despair at the inability to keep the one who is so dear to her that touches Gurov, although at first her experiences seem to him something superfluous. He returns to them with his thoughts in winter Moscow, when the meaninglessness of his life falls upon him along with the phrase “And yesterday the sturgeon was with a smell.”
And there is an understandable desire to relive their own need next to a woman who is ready to take risks in order to love him. What is behind the attempt to revive their romance: a desire to take again what you suddenly wanted, or a conscious desire to grow up? Chekhov leaves this question open, prompting us to reflect on it ourselves.