The District Doctor is one of the stories in The Sportsman’s Sketches by Ivan Turgenev, which is 873rd on The Greatest Books of All Time site, a few hundred of those works are reviewed on my blog, and if you are interested, this may be my best take: https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/01/maybe-you-have-some-ideas-click-on-link.html - 9 out of 10

 

The District Doctor is one of the stories in The Sportsman’s Sketches by Ivan Turgenev, which is 873rd on The Greatest Books of All Time site, a few hundred of those works are reviewed on my blog, and if you are interested, this may be my best take: https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/01/maybe-you-have-some-ideas-click-on-link.html

 

9 out of 10

 

‘First you want to get hold of something to say, then you fudge up a plot of a story of some kind, and then you put in bits of things you have seen and heard round the place, and then you try and make it all sound sort of interesting or witty or funny or unusual or striking in some way. If you find some bit that isn't that, you work at it until it is, or at least as near it as you can get…’ Ivan Turgenev follows these precepts…

 

Magister Ludi Kingsley Amis has suggested the above https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/01/lucky-jim-by-kingsley-amis-author-of.html and there is some more, which might come up later in this note – the ‘plan’ would be to say a few words about The District Doctor and then most likely I will fall on my own…

 

-          Sauna doctor

 

Trifon Ivanitch is the one in the sketch and this is how we meet him ‘One day in autumn on my way back from a remote part of the country I caught cold and fell ill. Fortunately, the fever attacked me in the district town at the inn; I sent for the doctor. In half-an-hour the district doctor appeared, a thin, dark-haired man of middle height’

Then the District Doctor tells this touching story, how he received a note from a poor lady – ‘a widow, writes to me; she says, "My daughter is dying. Come, for God's sake!" she says; "and the horses have been sent for you."

 

However, these were poor, if well educated people, we would learn that the late husband had been a man who took care of his children, even if they are now destitute and caught in the middle, they do not see the lower classes – surely, they would have little to talk about – and they are too proud to visit the rich…

 

-          This made me think of According to Mark

 

In that excellent book https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/01/according-to-mark-by-penelope-lively.html we get the idea that we are separated form others as much by what we have read or not read, as by birth, class and status

 

Even if he is reluctant, doctor Trifon Ivanitch knows his duty, so he is off to see this widow, who is extremely worried about her daughter, who is very sick, it takes a long time, it is a gruesome journey, but help is coming

The young woman, Alexandra Andreevna, is indeed in a serious condition, and the hero of the narrative is in trouble, he is facing self-doubt, can see that her state is not improving, and what adds pressure are his feelings

 

-          He fell in love with the young woman

 

She says she feels the same, albeit Trifon Ivanitch talks about her health, that is lack thereof, and sees that in her situation, it might be the disease talking, she would not see clearly what is happening and what she feels

Thomas Mann https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2024/12/joseph-and-his-brothers-by-thomas-mann.html has written about love, and how we find the real thing in art, literature and not in real life, and there are arguments

 

When you test this love, you see that it does not match the definition, long lasting, if not forever, and one of Thomas Mann’s characters is appalled that all around him talk about a ‘love for which there are no words to describe it’

Alas, Alexandra Andreevna is not getting out of bed – spoiler alert on two counts, I am telling you about her and the District Doctor and then I will digress with impunity, or maybe I get some angry comments from MAGA fools

 

This is not the ‘they will live together happily, for ever after’ type of story, and now about this District Doctor who comes to the sauna downtown, a chap who is for…Putin, just like Orange Jesus, who talked to the tyrant yesterday

The Local Doctor has made a ton of money – speculating, we would say through corruption, their salaries have always been small, but they were known to take kickbacks, look, my sister is a doctor, so I respect them, nevertheless, my sibling has been a doctor in America for about thirty years – and he has properties

 

He is lamenting the fact that he gets calls form real estate people, and I have tried to explain to him’ look, you love this Putin monster, but he is the kind that will not call, like the realtors, he will just have the tanks come into your home, take it, or just destroy it, together with all else you have, unless of course you agree to some abject tradeoff

 

Now for my standard closing of the note with a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/01/maybe-you-have-some-ideas-click-on-link.html – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se

 

 There is also the small matter of working for AT&T – this huge company asked me to be its Representative for Romania and Bulgaria, on the Calling Card side, which meant sailing into the Black Sea wo meet the US Navy ships, travelling to Sofia, a lot of activity, using my mother’s two bedrooms flat as office and warehouse, all for the grand total of $250, raised after a lot of persuasion to the staggering $400…with retirement ahead, there are no benefits, nothing…it is a longer story, but if you can help get the mastodont to pay some dues, or have an idea how it can happen, let me know

 

As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/realini-in-newsweek-participant-in.html

 

Some favorite quotes from To The Hermitage and other works

 

‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’

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