What to make of Chekov?

Speaking of Chek(h)ov, there has been a cyber legend that Pravda questioned the lack of a "Russian" member on the international crew of Star Trek, and so Gene Roddenberry felt compelled to create the character Ensign Chekov. Snopes questions the story on several counts. Nothing has apparently been found in the Pravda archives to verify this claim, and young Pavel looks suspiciously like Davy Jones (mop heads were quite popular at the time). But, if you look at young Anton Chekhov and young Pavel Chekov there is some resemblance ; ) It seems Roddenberry was already cultivating myths back in the 60s that would keep Trekkies going for decades afterward.

It struck me that Roddenberry was more drawn to the voyages of Captain Cook than he was the space race in creating the original series. For whatever reason, he felt compelled to introduce a Russian character, probably in an effort to show that the Cold War really would come to an end some day and the space race would evolve into a joint effort. Turned out to be quite prescient in this regard, as the famous Apollo-Soyuz joint mission proved in 1975. A number of collaborative efforts have been carried out in the years since.

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Ward No. 6

Ward No. 6 is a short story written by Chekhov in 1892. It has appeared in various collections of Chekhov short stories, including The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories translated by Constance Garnett in 1921. In this story, Chekhov explores the inner working of a run-down lunatic asylum in a provincial town. He introduces the readers to a coarse porter who speaks mostly with his fists, various patients, a doctor who presides over this ward, and expresses his thoughts with a local postmaster. It was recently made into a movie , featuring Vladimir Ilyin. Here's a clip . There's also this very recent short film (30 min.) by Suzana Purkovic, with English subtitles.

Myshkin's dilemna

Wrapped up Part II the other night and have to say that Dostoevsky certainly has a comic's eye, although one senses the potentially tragic undertones. For Dostoevsky the aristocracy seems to be one largely made up of capricious souls more obsessed with good manners than any profound sense of their being. This is particularly true for the Epanchins, who comically wrestle with their emotions in one scene after another as he places them in very odd and unnerving situations that test the limits of poor Lizaveta Prokofyevna's endurance. Of her daughters, Aglaya, is the most interesting. A real beauty much along the same lines as Nastasya Filippovna Barashkov, who likewise seems to have a hold on Prince Myshkin's emotional strings. Part II ended with Lizaveta demanding to know the extent of the Prince's interests in her youngest daughter. The Prince insisted his feelings were Platonic, but one senses there is more to be said on the matter in later chapters. ...

Roadside Picnic: Life inside the Zone

If you're like me and wondered what the hell Stalker was all about, I would suggest reading Roadside Picnic , the book on which it was nominally based. Tarkovsky took his idea from the character, Redrick Schuhart, a laboratory assistant and Harmont Branch of the International Institute of Extraterrestrial Cultures, leaving the rest up to the imagination. The names were changed to protect the innocent. While Tarkovsky chose to shroud the story in mystery, the Strugatsky Brothers lay it out pretty clearly in their science fiction classic. Redrick, the Stalker, has gone into the zone countless times but each time represents a new set of challenges, especially with the Harmont Branch cracking down on the plundering of alien objects left behind by a visitation to a small rural town in Canada. I suppose setting the story in a place outside Russia, allowed the Strugatsky brothers more room to explore new ideas and avoid heavy censhorship, but according to Boris in t...

Chekhov's Gun

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