Read complete books and articles on: Anton Chekhov

Chekhov, Anton Pavlovich - chĕkˈôf, Rus. əntônˈ pävˈləvĭch chĕˈkhəv, 1860–1904, Russian short-story writer, dramatist, and physician, b. Taganrog. The son of a grocer and grandson of a serf, Chekhov earned enduring international acclaim for his stories and plays. His early works, broad humorous sketches and tales published under a pseudonym, were written to support himself and his family while he studied for his medical degree in Moscow. Under this strain he contracted tuberculosis, which ravaged him all his life.

Chekhov's first large collection, Motley Stories (1886), brought him critical respect; it was followed by the collections At Twilight (1887) and Stories (1888), from which "The Steppe" earned him the Pushkin Prize. Chekhov's many hundreds of stories concern human folly, the tragedy of trivialities, and the oppression of banality. His characters are drawn with compassion and humor in a clear, simple style noted for realistic detail. In his plays, too, Chekhov emphasizes character and mood; his plots describe the desolation of lonely people and the misunderstandings that accrue from self-absorption and desperation. His focus on internal drama was an innovation that had enormous influence on both Russian and foreign writing.

An active humanitarian, Chekhov wrote The Island of Sakhalin (1890), a study of convicts' lives that helped to effect social reform; as a physician he fought two cholera epidemics. He wrote several farces related to his early stories, but his first major staged drama was Ivanov (1887). His success as a dramatist was assured when the Moscow Art Theater took his works and built superb productions, beginning with The Seagull in 1898. They followed this with his masterpieces Uncle Vanya (1899), The Three Sisters (1901), and The Cherry Orchard (1904), his last great work.

Among the finest works of Chekhov's later years are his hundreds of letters to notable contemporaries. For the final three years of his life Chekhov was happily married to Olga Knipper, an actress with the Moscow Art company. Although they were often separated, they were together at a German health resort when he died, at 44. Most of Chekhov's works are available in English. Several lesser-known works appear in Avrahm Yarmolinsky's The Unknown Chekhov (1954) and 38 previously untranslated stories were published in The Undiscovered Chekhov (1999).

Bibliography

See his letters, ed. by S. Karlinsky (1973) and A. Yarmolinsky (1973), Chekhov-Knipper letters, ed. by J. Benedetti (1998); biographies by D. Magarshack (1952, repr. 1960), E. J. Simmons (1962), D. Gillès (tr. 1968), and D. Rayfield (1998); studies of his prose by T. G. Winner (1966) and V. L. Smith (1973); studies of his plays by M. Valency (1966), J. L. Styan (1971), D. Magarshack (1973), R. Gilman (1995), and V. Kataev (2002); critical essays, ed. by R. L. Jackson (1967).

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16 of the Best Books and Articles on: Anton Chekhov

as selected by Questia librarians

1.

Anton Chekhov, the Iconoclast » Read Now
by Lee J. Williames. 174 pgs.

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2.

Plays (includes "Ivanov," "Uncle Vania," "Three Sisters,""The Cherry Orchard," "The Seagull," "The Bear," "The Proposal," and "A Jubilee") » Read Now
by Anton Chekhov, Elisaveta Fen. 464 pgs.

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3.

The Schoolmistress: And Other Stories » Read Now
by Anton Chekhov, Constance Garnett. 309 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library
4.

The Witch: And Other Stories » Read Now
by Anton Chekhov, Constance Garnett. 328 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library
5.

A Systems Approach to Literature: Mythopoetics of Chekhov's Four Major Plays » Read Now
by Vera Zubarev. 194 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

This systematic approach to the study of literary works involves the search for mythological archetypes, parallels, paradigms, and motives in a literary text. In a new attempt at an integrated vision of literary works, Zubarev presents a comprehensive approach on the basis of mythopoetics. Her...
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This systematic approach to the study of literary works involves the search for mythological archetypes, parallels, paradigms, and motives in a literary text. In a new attempt at an integrated vision of literary works, Zubarev presents a comprehensive approach on the basis of mythopoetics. Her theory is verified through a close examination of four of Chekhov's major plays: The Seagull, Uncle Vanya, Three Sisters, and The Cherry Orchard. Zubarev presents a compelling approach to literary analysis, and explores the enigmatic roots of Chekhov's universal significance. Her mythopoetic study sheds light on why Chekhov's plays are moving in any language and in any time.
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6.

Chekhov in My Life » Read Now
by Lydia Avilov, David Magarshack. 162 pgs.

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7.

The Drama of Chekhov, Synge, Yeats, and Pirandello » Read Now
by F. L. Lucas. 454 pgs.

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8.

Russia Discovered: Nineteenth-Century Fiction From Pushkin to Chekhov » Read Now
by Angus Calder. 308 pgs.

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9.

Metapoesis: The Russian Tradition From Pushkin to Chekhov » Read Now
by Michael C. Finke. 226 pgs.

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10.

Anton Cechov, 1860-1960: Some Essays » Read Now
by T. Eekman. 335 pgs.

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11.

Russian Writers: Their Lives and Literature (Chap. 14 "The Dramatic Works of Chekhov") » Read Now
by Janko Lavrin. 370 pgs.

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12.

Rewriting the Jew: Assimilation Narratives in the Russian Empire (Chap. 4 "Mutable, Permutable, Approximate, and Relative: Anton Chekhov") » Read Now
by Gabriella Safran. 269 pgs.

Collections: Religious Studies, History, Entire Library

In the Russian Empire of the 1870s and 1880s, while intellectuals and politicians furiously debated the "Jewish Question", more and more acculturating Jews, who dressed, spoke, and behaved like non-Jews, appeared in real life and in literature. This book examines stories about Jewish assimilation by...
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In the Russian Empire of the 1870s and 1880s, while intellectuals and politicians furiously debated the "Jewish Question", more and more acculturating Jews, who dressed, spoke, and behaved like non-Jews, appeared in real life and in literature. This book examines stories about Jewish assimilation by four authors: Grigory Bogrov, a Russian Jew; Eliza Orzeszkowa, a Polish Catholic; and Nikolai Leskov and Anton Chekhov, both Eastern Orthodox Russians. Safran introduces the English-language reader to works that were much discussed in their own time, and she situates Jewish and non-Jewish writers together in the context they shared.
For nineteenth-century writers and readers, successful fictional characters were "types", literary creations that both mirrored and influenced the trajectories of real lives. Stories about Jewish assimilators and converts often juxtaposed two contrasting types: the sincere reformer or true convert who has experienced a complete transformation, and the secret recidivist or false convert whose real loyalties will never change. As Safran shows, writers borrowed these types from many sources, including the novel of education produced by the Jewish enlightenment movement (the Haskalah), the political rhetoric of "Positivist" Polish nationalism, the Bible, Shakespeare, and Slavic folk beliefs.
Rewriting the Jew casts new light on the concept of type itself and on the question of whether literature can transfigure readers. The classic story of Jewish assimilation describes readers who redesign themselves after the model of fictional characters in secular texts. The writers studied here, though, examine attempts at Jewish self-transformation while wondering about thereformability of personality. In looking at their works, Safran relates the modern Eastern European Jewish experience to a fundamental question of aesthetics: Can art change us?
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13.

From Chekhov to the Revolution: Russian Literature, 1900-1917 » Read Now
by Marc Slonim. 252 pgs.

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14.

The Director and the Stage: From Naturalism to Grotowski (Chap. 5 "Stanislavsky and Chekhov") » Read Now
by Edward Braun. 218 pgs.

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15.

Opposition or Identification: Chekhov's Plays on Screen, in West Virginia University Philological Papers » Read Now
by Natalia L. Olshankskay. 4 pgs.

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16.

Chekhov's Doctors: A Collection of Chekhov's Medical Tales » Read Now
by Anton Chekhov, Jack Coulehan. 199 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library