The Importance of the Mare in Misery
Iona Potapov, the main character in Anton Chekhov’s short story, "Misery," is yearning for someone to listen to his woes. Every human he comes in contact with blatantly ignores his badly-needed-to-tell-story by either shunning him or falling asleep. There is, however, one character in this story that would willingly listen to Iona, a character who is with Iona through almost the entire story. This character is his mare.
Renato Poggioli describes the story as being built "around two motionless figures, an animal and a man" (316). Iona and the mare are very much alike. They appear to be each other’s only companion, and they also act a lot alike. When Iona sits quietly, covered in snow that has recently fallen on him, his little mare is described as "white and motionless too" (17). Neither man nor mare cares move; both are still, frozen in time, waiting. Another example of the similar behavior between the two occurs when "the sledge driver clicks to the horse, cranes his neck like a swan. The mare cranes her neck, too" (18).
As the story opens Iona sits in his sleigh desperately waiting for his first fare, and when that fare arrives he immediately starts to talk of his son’s death (18). Although his best possible friend – the mare – is already present to listen to his story, Iona does not come to this realization until much later in the story. At the beginning, he still believes that what he needs, and will be able to find, is another human being with whom to share his woes.
The fare’s response to Iona’s story is, "have you gone cracked, you old dog? Look where you are going" (18). Iona, upset at this, continues to look around at the fare, in hopes of starting his story o...
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... no longer keep silence about the death of his son. He speaks to the air, and the mare is listening. She doesn’t shun him, abuse him, or ignore him. She just listens, as any good animal would do.
Works Cited
Beck, Alan, M., and Aaron Honoria Katcher. "Animal Companions: More Companion Than Animal." Man and Beast Revisited. Ed. Michael H. Robinson and Lionel Tiger. Washington: Smithsonian P, 1991. 265-66.
Chekhov, Anton. "Misery." The Harper Anthology of Fiction. Ed. Sylvan Barnet. New York: HarperCollins, 1991. 17-21.
Hildebrandt, Sherri. "Another Kind of Grief." St. Paul Pioneer Press 13 Sept. 1998: 1-4.
Poggioli, Renato. "Storytelling in a Double Key." Anton Chekhov’s Short Stories. Ed. Ralph E. Matlaw. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1979. 316-317.
Royal Bank of Canada. "Pets and Human Beings." Montreal: Royal Bank Letter, July/Aug. 1989.
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The narrator is a very lonely person that misses a woman by the name of Lenore (Poe, “Raven”). The narrator stood in the dark thinking about things he had never thought about (Poe, “Raven”). Nevertheless, all he could think about was the woman named Lenore (Poe, “Raven”).
There are also two stories or sides to his marriage or mate or spouse that Prometheus chose. Some say it was Pronoia, and some say it was Clymene (Parada 5). The Clymene mentioned is ironically the same Greek figure as mentioned in the myth about Prometheus' mother (Parada 4-5). However, the only version of his offspring or child of his own was Deucalion (Parada 5). Deucalion shared a common interest in the love of man during the Great Flood like his father had (Hunt 1; Parada 2). During the Great Flood of the lands of Greece, Deucalion would learn to recreate men by throwing rocks over his head as commanded by his wish granted from Zeus because of his accomplishment of surviving. This was a similar trait that would be shared by father-and-son.
The first two stanzas of The Raven introduce you to the narrator, and his beloved maiden Lenore. You find him sitting on a “dreary” and dark evening with a book opened in front of him, though he is dozing more than reading. Suddenly, he hears knocking on his door, but only believes it to be a visitor nothing more. He remembers another night, like this one, where he had sought the solace of his library to forget his sorrows of his long lost beloved, and to wait for dawn. Meanwhile the tapping on his door continues.
“To whom shall I tell my grief?” Grief must receive closure. Grief has the power to make the strongest person helpless. For an individual to share their grief they receive a sense of compassion instead of endlessly searching for answers. In the short story “Misery”, Anton Chekhov effectively shows the desperation of communication through the character Iona Potapov and his mare. Chekhov illustrates the difficulty Iona faces to communicate his sufferings to the various people he speaks to as a sleigh driver. He accomplishes this through his style of writing, imagery, and the events that take place in the story.