'The Darling' by Chekhov: Love’s spiritual ideal, or doormat?
- Christopher Smith
- Mar 24
- 3 min read
Updated: Mar 31
A discussion on an intriguing short story by world renowned Russian author and playwright Anton Pavlovich Chekhov...
“This story is curious, “ said one group member as we explored Chekhov’s The Darling. “I mean, what is the nature of Olenka’s love?”
It was a good question..
Chekhov’s inconclusive fable seems to offer the promise of a moral, but right when you feel you have a handle on it, it whips away from you. Perhaps this is just the consequence of reading with people from diverse backgrounds in the room. One person’s selfless sacrificer is another person’s doormat.
Olenka is divisive and she provokes a whole suite of reactions from participants in reading groups. She is held up as love’s spiritual ideal; someone who is completely giving of themselves in service of another. Also, she is despised because she is walked all over, has no self-identity and is easily exploited by those around her.
Is she pure, Ego-less, Divine? Or is she damaged, needy and callow?
When she has someone to love we are told that she is fulfilled, completely happy. However when she has no love object, she is desperate, with no ideas or compulsion to move, she is a void.
Do we not trust her because she refuses to, or is not able to live for herself? Have we been conditioned into the belief that everybody is self-serving to the extent that we cannot tolerate someone who appears not to be?
Or do we recognise from our own lives the deep well of resentment that runs underneath someone who is constantly negating their own needs and opinions?
We all know, perhaps we are, people who need martyrdom. We need to appear like we are the most giving, that we have made sacrifices for the sake of others – Even better if the others that we sacrifice for do not acknowledge or recognise our efforts. There is an inverted pleasure in feeling unjustly overlooked. We take it right down into ourselves, dwell on it, and let the sense of injustice ferment within us.
We know well the trajectory of these feelings. How gradually we feel embittered towards the people who we purport to care for. How an explosion will soon come, because we are human and living for another, or others, without sufficient care for oneself is emotionally unsustainable.
We don’t trust Olenka perhaps because she seems to lack the part of self (which we have) that would resent the love object. She seems not to ask for anything for herself, other than the privilege to love another. She seems to have no reciprocal need of the other person. She asks only for something for the light of her love to shine on. She takes her pleasure from warming others. And in doing so, is happy and fulfilled.
Characters like Olenka sometimes come up in literature. Gimpel the fool is another from Isaac Bashevis Singer’s short story. He takes a lot from his wife: lies, infidelity, and mockery. He is tricked into raising children that are not his. He not only tolerates these circumstances, but he manages to find his way to love, despite them.
Watching on, we are horrified. We put ourselves in his place, we feel betrayed, angry. We bitterly ask why he would put up with this. ‘If it were me…’
But what makes us right and the Olenka’s and Gimpel’s wrong?
Have they not found a way to reconcile with the terms of life? Does their radical acceptance not offer us a model for a happy life? Would we want a happy life on such terms?
After reading ‘The Darling’ to a group, one member said: “It makes you aware that there is another possibility that you weren’t thinking.” Another possibility. That is a good thing to have sometimes isn’t it?
You can read Anton Chekhov's 'The Darling' as a pdf here...
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Interesting reflection. I can’t wait to read the story. It seems to me that the issue is who or what is the love object. Perhaps it is noble to have this desire to love selflessly, but it depends on what you attach your attention and devotion to that matters.