Ward No. 6 Page #10

"Ward No. 6" by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov is a poignant and thought-provoking short story that explores the themes of madness, isolation, and the nature of sanity. Set in a mental institution, it follows Dr. Andrei Yefimitch Ivanov, the director of the ward, who becomes emotionally and intellectually entangled with a patient named Gromov. Through their conversations, the story delves into the existential crises faced by both the doctor and the patients, challenging the boundaries between sanity and insanity. Chekhov's exploration of human suffering, societal norms, and the fragility of the human mind invites readers to reflect on the complexities of life and the often arbitrary distinctions we draw regarding mental health.

								


"Yes, a likely idea!" said Ivan Dmitritch, sitting up and looking at the
doctor with irony and uneasiness. His eyes were red. "You can go and spy
and probe somewhere else, it's no use your doing it here. I knew
yesterday what you had come for."

"A strange fancy," laughed the doctor. "So you suppose me to be a spy?"

"Yes, I do. . . . A spy or a doctor who has been charged to test me--it's
all the same ----"

"Oh excuse me, what a queer fellow you are really!"

The doctor sat down on the stool near the bed and shook his head
reproachfully.

"But let us suppose you are right," he said, "let us suppose that I am
treacherously trying to trap you into saying something so as to betray
you to the police. You would be arrested and then tried. But would you
be any worse off being tried and in prison than you are here? If you are
banished to a settlement, or even sent to penal servitude, would it be
worse than being shut up in this ward? I imagine it would be no worse. .
. . What, then, are you afraid of?"

These words evidently had an effect on Ivan Dmitritch. He sat down
quietly.

It was between four and five in the afternoon--the time when Andrey
Yefimitch usually walked up and down his rooms, and Daryushka asked
whether it was not time for his beer. It was a still, bright day.

"I came out for a walk after dinner, and here I have come, as you see,"
said the doctor. "It is quite spring."

"What month is it? March?" asked Ivan Dmitritch.

"Yes, the end of March."

"Is it very muddy?"

"No, not very. There are already paths in the garden."

"It would be nice now to drive in an open carriage somewhere into the
country," said Ivan Dmitritch, rubbing his red eyes as though he were
just awake, "then to come home to a warm, snug study, and . . . and to
have a decent doctor to cure one's headache. . . . It's so long since I
have lived like a human being. It's disgusting here! Insufferably
disgusting!"

After his excitement of the previous day he was exhausted and listless,
and spoke unwillingly. His fingers twitched, and from his face it could
be seen that he had a splitting headache.

"There is no real difference between a warm, snug study and this ward,"
said Andrey Yefimitch. "A man's peace and contentment do not lie outside
a man, but in himself."

"What do you mean?"

"The ordinary man looks for good and evil in external things--that is, in
carriages, in studies--but a thinking man looks for it in himself."

"You should go and preach that philosophy in Greece, where it's warm and
fragrant with the scent of pomegranates, but here it is not suited to
the climate. With whom was it I was talking of Diogenes? Was it with
you?"

"Yes, with me yesterday."

"Diogenes did not need a study or a warm habitation; it's hot there
without. You can lie in your tub and eat oranges and olives. But bring
him to Russia to live: he'd be begging to be let indoors in May, let
alone December. He'd be doubled up with the cold."

"No. One can be insensible to cold as to every other pain. Marcus
Aurelius says: 'A pain is a vivid idea of pain; make an effort of will
to change that idea, dismiss it, cease to complain, and the pain will
disappear.' That is true. The wise man, or simply the reflecting,
thoughtful man, is distinguished precisely by his contempt for
suffering; he is always contented and surprised at nothing."

"Then I am an idiot, since I suffer and am discontented and surprised at
the baseness of mankind."

"You are wrong in that; if you will reflect more on the subject you will
understand how insignificant is all that external world that agitates
us. One must strive for the comprehension of life, and in that is true
happiness."

"Comprehension . . ." repeated Ivan Dmitritch frowning. "External,
internal. . . . Excuse me, but I don't understand it. I only know," he
said, getting up and looking angrily at the doctor--"I only know that God
has created me of warm blood and nerves, yes, indeed! If organic tissue
is capable of life it must react to every stimulus. And I do! To pain I
respond with tears and outcries, to baseness with indignation, to filth
with loathing. To my mind, that is just what is called life. The lower
the organism, the less sensitive it is, and the more feebly it reacts to
stimulus; and the higher it is, the more responsively and vigorously it
reacts to reality. How is it you don't know that? A doctor, and not know
such trifles! To despise suffering, to be always contented, and to be
surprised at nothing, one must reach this condition"--and Ivan Dmitritch
pointed to the peasant who was a mass of fat--"or to harden oneself by
suffering to such a point that one loses all sensibility to it--that is,
in other words, to cease to live. You must excuse me, I am not a sage or
a philosopher," Ivan Dmitritch continued with irritation, "and I don't
understand anything about it. I am not capable of reasoning."

"On the contrary, your reasoning is excellent."

"The Stoics, whom you are parodying, were remarkable people, but their
doctrine crystallized two thousand years ago and has not advanced, and
will not advance, an inch forward, since it is not practical or living.
It had a success only with the minority which spends its life in
savouring all sorts of theories and ruminating over them; the majority
did not understand it. A doctrine which advocates indifference to wealth
and to the comforts of life, and a contempt for suffering and death, is
quite unintelligible to the vast majority of men, since that majority
has never known wealth or the comforts of life; and to despise suffering
would mean to it despising life itself, since the whole existence of man
is made up of the sensations of hunger, cold, injury, and a Hamlet-like
dread of death. The whole of life lies in these sensations; one may be
oppressed by it, one may hate it, but one cannot despise it. Yes, so, I
repeat, the doctrine of the Stoics can never have a future; from the
beginning of time up to to-day you see continually increasing the
struggle, the sensibility to pain, the capacity of responding to
stimulus."

Ivan Dmitritch suddenly lost the thread of his thoughts, stopped, and
rubbed his forehead with vexation.

"I meant to say something important, but I have lost it," he said. "What
was I saying? Oh, yes! This is what I mean: one of the Stoics sold
himself into slavery to redeem his neighbour, so, you see, even a Stoic
did react to stimulus, since, for such a generous act as the destruction
of oneself for the sake of one's neighbour, he must have had a soul
capable of pity and indignation. Here in prison I have forgotten
everything I have learned, or else I could have recalled something else.
								Rate this book:0.0 / 0 votes