In Chap­ter 6 of “The Witch and Oth­er Sto­ries,” the town of Uklee­vo grap­ples with the impris­on­ment of Anisim for coun­ter­feit­ing. Time moves on, with the com­mu­ni­ty and his fam­i­ly adjust­ing to his absence. Anisim’s father, old Tsy­bukin, vis­i­bly declines, no longer the for­mi­da­ble fig­ure he once was, bur­dened by his son’s legal trou­bles and his own declin­ing busi­ness. Despite his attempts to nav­i­gate through these chal­lenges by seek­ing influ­en­tial help and engag­ing in acts of des­per­a­tion such as bribery and peti­tion­ing, the shad­ow of his son’s sit­u­a­tion hangs heav­i­ly over him.

Var­vara, Anisim’s step­moth­er, feels the weight of the sit­u­a­tion but main­tains her role in the house­hold and the busi­ness with sto­icism. The fam­i­ly busi­ness ven­tures into new ter­ri­to­ries with the devel­op­ment of a brick­yard, man­aged in part by Aksinya, show­cas­ing the resilience and adapt­abil­i­ty of the fam­i­ly in the face of adver­si­ty.

Lipa, Anisim’s wife, nav­i­gates her new life as a moth­er to their child, Niki­for, find­ing joy and solace in her son amid the tur­moil. Her inno­cence and hope con­trast sharply with the dark­er real­i­ties the fam­i­ly faces, high­light­ing the per­va­sive impact of Anisim’s actions on each fam­i­ly mem­ber dif­fer­ent­ly.

As the tri­al con­cludes and Anisim is sen­tenced to penal servi­tude, the full weight of the ver­dict sends rip­ples through the house­hold. Old Tsy­buk­in’s absence is not­ed with anx­i­ety by Var­vara, who awaits any news with a mix of fear and curios­i­ty. The fam­i­ly’s reac­tion to the sentencing—ranging from the cook’s mourn­ing to Aksinya’s prac­ti­cal inquiry about her father—paints a pic­ture of a fam­i­ly frac­tured by cri­sis but bound by resilience and a com­plex web of emo­tions.

Through­out the chap­ter, the fam­i­ly’s fluc­tu­at­ing dynam­ics bed under the pres­sure of soci­etal judg­ment, legal entan­gle­ments, and the per­son­al toll of Anisim’s crimes, encap­su­lat­ing the strug­gle for sur­vival and sem­blance of nor­mal­cy in the face of relent­less adver­si­ty.