THE PRIVY COUNCILLOR

The Privy Councillor

A boy eagerly awaits his uncle who is coming to spend the summer with the family.

The uncle is from Petersburg and is a general. The boy expects to find someone dressed and looking like a soldier and instead finds a short man who doesn't act like or resemble a general.

And nothing seems to happen. Life goes on as usual.

Except the uncle who has never married falls for the bailiff's wife and she rejects him and after that nothing is the same.

The uncle begins to complain and starts behaving like someone of his rank and his sister, the boy's mother, finally gives him three thousand roubles to make him leave. (Be careful what you wish for.)

There's a few things I enjoyed in this story. The best is the point of view -- we see everything from the boy's eyes. At times the boy sounds like -- well -- a boy and at other times he sounds much older. But why quibble.

This perspective helps us look at the world with curious and observant eyes. And also the boy's point of view is not harsh -- but forgiving -- not judgmental --  the boy expects certain things and we learn through him that things are not always what they seem or are they? It's a great way to tell the story and probably the only way this story works. 

Another is the uncle -- at first he seems like a regular Joe -- not one to be stuck up or worry about formalities -- easy going -- and then he shows his true stripes -- and in life we find people who might pass themselves off as one thing or another until some crisis strikes and then we see their true colors.

And then there is the description of Tatyana -- the uncle's love interest. "Not everyone would have called Tatyana a beauty. She was a plump little woman of twenty, with black eyebrows and a graceful figure, always rosy and attractive-looking, but in her face and in her whole person there was not one striking feature, not one bold line to catch the eye, as though nature had lacked inspiration and confidence when creating her."  Pure Chekhov.