Narrative techniques in Chekhov's story “Rothschild's violin”

The article discusses the peculiarities of using the singulative and iterative in Chekhov’s “Rothschild’s Violin”. It is argued that eventfulness weakening in Chekhov’s later short stories should have led to the iterative proportion increase in his prose texts. While in classical novels, according to Gerard Genette, the iterative is less than 10%, in Chekhov’s short stories it turns out to be unprecedentedly high. In “The Two Volodyas” the narrative rhythm is determined by the alternation of singulative and iterative scenes, whereas in “Rothschild’s Violin” a clear localization is visible: the iterative is concentrated in the prologue and epilogue, the singulative is concentrated in the story. Their interaction in this story (the singulative is “infected” with the iterative and vice versa) is carried out in different ways. Two singulative inserts in the prologue, correlating with two episodes of the story, contribute to the creation of a reductionist picture of the world, while using the pseudo-iterative gives the replication effect and, thereby, the symbolization of the “motto phrase”. The inclusion of iterative segments into the story expands its temporal boundaries (“external, or generalizing, iterations”). The quasi-epilogue is closely connected with the story, it continues, but does not complete it, since the iterative scene in the epilogue reproduces the climax of the story with a partial replacement of the participants (“merchants and officials” instead of Yakov). The effect of repetition is reinforced by the use in the strong position of the counting complex “ten times”, which has the meaning “an indefinitely large number of situations”. Thus, the “unheard-ness” of history itself is called into question, and Russian life in the late nineteenth century appears as having taken a step on the path of endless repetition.