Chekov’s “The Proposal” is a good example of how a master writer promoted the liberal values of his time while being careful not to advocate the entirely anachronistic values of the distant future and thereby deny himself a readership. In this ironic tale about class power, a woman of the upper class attempts to teach a lesson to the poor, meek governess of her children. She wants to root out her meekness and teach her to be assert herself and defend her right to be paid fairly. This plot, or plan, is very topical. In Chekov’s time the Russian lower classes were already growing bold and whispering about a revolution. To present us with a representative of the upper class who actually encourages the poor to assert themselves—well, that is rich, that is delicious, if only because it is deliciously ironic and rather preposterous.
Does the governess learn to be “strong”? Of course, Chekov used the word ironically, to imply that the strength of the upper class was is not strength in the highest sense of the word. Therefore, the governess had no reason to learn her lesson—even if she could have, for it was a lesson that was poorly and cruelly taught. Had it been taught better, the lesson would have spoiled the literature, and the story would never have been published.
If true strength is not the strength to demand one’s due wages and possibly risk unemployment, poverty and death, than what is it? The question of true strength could not be addressed by Chekov; to the masses it was and remains unthinkable, and though it is both the secret spirit of every revolution it is also the spirit that will never have its own revolution (in the narrow sense of the word).
