Anton Chekhov

A masterfully rendered volume of Chekhov's stories from famed translators Pevear and Volokhonsky. Chekhov's genius left an indelible impact on every literary form in which he wrote, but none more so than short fiction. Now renowned translators Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky give us their superb renderings of fifty-two Chekhov stories. These stories, which span the full arc of his...

46 new books in the bestselling Little Black Classics series, to celebrate the first ever Penguin Classic in 1946 \"I did have hallucinations, but did they harm anyone? Who did they harm, that's what I'd like to know!'

Introducing Little Clothbound Classics — irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas, and essays from the world's greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith. Widely considered to be one of the greatest ever writers of the form, Anton Chekhov's short stories offer unforgettable character, crystalline expression, and a beautiful, quiet uncertainty. Collected here are five of his very best...

The Lady with the Dog and Other Stories (1917) is a collection of nine stories by Russian writer Anton Chekhov. Recognised today as foundational for the development of the modern short story, Anton Chekhov has transcended Russian literature to become one of the most popular and acclaimed authors in history, in any language. This collection includes "The Lady with the...

The Schoolmistress and Other Stories (1920) is a collection of short stories by Russian writer Anton Chekhov. "The Schoolmistress" was written in 1897 and published in an issue of Moscow's daily newspaper Russkiye Vedomosti. Even for Chekhov, whose work is characteristically bleak and noted for its unsparing realism, the title story of this collection is particularly hopeless. And yet, reading...

A man and woman fall in love in a seaside town. The only trouble is, they're both married to other people. A schoolmaster is scandalized by his sweetheart riding a bicycle. A woman falls in love with a series of men, each of whom leaves her in different ways. Chekhov's stories capture Russian provincial life in the late nineteenth century...

Old Arkhip sits every day by the roots of a wizened, hunchbacked willow, fishing and exchanging whispered stories with the ancient tree. One of these takes Arkhip three decades back in time, to a quiet day in early spring when a strange encounter shook him momentarily from the rural bliss in which he lived, catapulting him into a world of...

A married woman restlessly seeks a deeper love. An insomniac ponders the meagreness of his life. A man loses the respect of his family because of a counterfeit coin. A duel of wits escalates into a clash of cultures - and more. The Duel and Other Stories is the second in an exclusive three-volume edition of Chekhov's stories. Encompassing the...

The Bishop and Other Stories (1919) is a collection of short stories by Russian writer Anton Chekhov. The title story of the collection, originally published in 1902, finds the author at his most introspective. Written while Chekhov was dealing with the long-term effects of tuberculosis, a period in which he began to accept the inevitability of his own death, "The...

When a young woman dies during a shooting party at the country estate of a dissolute count, a magistrate is called upon to investigate. The mystery deepens and suspicion falls more widely as it emerges that the dead woman was at the centre of a tangled web of relationships: with her elderly husband, with the lecherous count, and with the...

This collection of Chekhov's finest early writing reveals a young writer mastering the art of the short story. The Steppe, which established his reputation, is the unforgettable tale of a boy's journey to a new school in Kiev, travelling through majestic landscapes towards an unknown destiny. Gusev depicts an ocean voyage, where the sea takes on a terrifying, primeval power;...

At a time when the Russian theatre was dominated by formulaic melodramas and farces, Chekhov created a new sort of drama that laid bare the everyday lives, loves and yearnings of ordinary people. Ivanov depicts a man stifled by inactivity and lost idealism, and The Seagull contrasts a young man's selfish romanticism with the stoicism of a woman cruelly abandoned...

These stories from the middle period of Chekhov's career show him exploring complex, ambiguous, and often extreme emotions. Influenced by his own experiences as a doctor, Ward No. 6, set in a mental hospital, is a savage indictment of the medical profession. The Black Monk, portraying an academic who has strange hallucinations, explores ideas of genius and insanity. In Murder,...

In the final years of his life, Chekhov had reached the height of his powers as a dramatist and also produced some of the stories that rank among his masterpieces. The poignant The Lady with the Little Dog and 'About Love' examine the nature of love outside of marriage — its romantic idealism and the fear of disillusionment. In stories...

Chekhov was without doubt one of the greatest observers of human nature in all its untidy complexity. His short stories, written throughout his life and newly translated for this essential collection, are exquisite masterpieces in miniature. Here are tales offering a glimpse of beauty, the memory of a mistaken kiss, daydreams of adultery, a lifetime of marital neglect, the frailty...

A secret terrorist group infiltrates the household of a government official’s son, with a view to spying on the father and, ultimately, assassinating him. But the young man entrusted with the task – an ailing, world-weary “nobody” – seized with the purposelessness of life and a sense of his own impending death, gradually becomes disillusioned with his mission, and decides...

The Cherry Orchard is a tragi-comedy by Anton Chekhov, and perhaps his most popular play. The Gayev family is torn by powerful forces deeply rooted in history and the society in which they live. Their estate is hopelessly in debt, and they are urged to cut down their beautiful cherry orchard to sell the land for holiday cottages. They struggle...

A masterpiece of Russian drama, now in a student edition. Along with Three Sisters and The Cherry Orchard, Uncle Vanya is credited as one of Chekhov's masterpieces and a significant precursor of modern drama. Set on a country estate in late nineteenth century Russia, Uncle Vanya is in part a study of the enervation of Russian middle-class provincial life. The...

Winner of Best Revival at the Olivier Awards 2024Winner of Best Play Revival at the WhatsOnStage Awards 2024 Can you imagine if it was possible to completely change the way you live your life? To look at your life and ask yourself what you would do if it died. If your old life died. It ended. And then take what’s...

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860-1904) was a Russian short story writer and a playwright. His playwriting career produced four classics, while his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics. Chekhov practiced as a doctor throughout most of his literary career: "Medicine is my lawful wife, " he once said, "and literature is my mistress". Chekhov renounced...

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860-1904) was a Russian short story writer and a playwright. His playwriting career produced four classics, while his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics. Chekhov practiced as a doctor throughout most of his literary career: "Medicine is my lawful wife, " he once said, "and literature is my mistress". Chekhov renounced...

The orchard’s white, all white. You haven’t forgotten, have you, Lyuba? The avenue lined with trees, unfurling like a slender ribbon. And on moonlit nights, it shimmers. You remember, don’t you? You haven’t forgotten? Can anyone persuade Ranevskaya and her aristocratic household that the world is changing, and they must too? Following internationally acclaimed productions of The Seagull (Belvoir St...

Along with Three Sisters and The Cherry Orchard, Uncle Vanya is credited as one of Chekhov's masterpieces and a significant precursor of modern drama. Set on a country estate in late nineteenth century Russia, Uncle Vanya is in part a study of the enervation of Russian middle-class provincial life. The major dynamics between the characters themselves are centred on two...

We need the theatre, couldn’t, couldn’t do without it. Could we? A successful actress visits her brother’s isolated estate far from the city, throwing the frustrated residents' unfulfilled ambitions into sharp relief. As her son attempts to impress with a self-penned play, putting much more than his pride at stake, others dream of fame, love, and the ability to change...

Love and Other Stories (1922) is a collection of twenty-three stories by Russian writer Anton Chekhov. Recognized today as foundational for the development of the modern short story, Anton Chekhov has transcended Russian literature to become one of the most popular and acclaimed authors in history, in any language. This collection showcases the author's unique talent for illuminating the intricacies...

The Schoolmistress and Other Stories (1920) is a collection of short stories by Russian writer Anton Chekhov. "The Schoolmistress" was written in 1897 and published in an issue of Moscow's daily newspaper Russkiye Vedomosti. Even for Chekhov, whose work is characteristically bleak and noted for its unsparing realism, the title story of this collection is particularly hopeless. And yet, reading...

“We need the theatre, couldn’t, couldn’t do without it. Could we?” A successful actress visits her brother’s isolated estate far from the city, throwing the frustrated residents' unfulfilled ambitions into sharp relief. As her son attempts to impress with a self-penned play, putting much more than his pride at stake, others dream of fame, love and the ability to change...

This volume includes The Seagull, a play about the battle for power between a mother and her son, which ends in tragedy. Uncle Vanya tells of two obsessive love affairs that lead nowhere, and a flirtation that brings disaster. In Three Sisters, three siblings wrestle with their futures, and The Cherry Orchard portrays how the old must inevitably give way...

The most widely staged dramatist after Shakespeare, Chekhov left a deep mark both on the development of Russian literature and world theatre, with plays that were remarkable not just for their dialogue but their atmosphere and the tensions expressed between the lines. Collected in this volume are Chekhov’s four most celebrated plays – The Seagull, Uncle Vanya, Three Sisters, and...

You'd be hard put to find a better script to work with than this translation by Michael Frayn. It sticks rigorously to the inner thrust of the play while giving it a fresh, crisp clarity that makes it not just accessible but compelling to watch. The underlying tragedy is intact. It is made more moving, not less, by the way...

Oh, Misha, it's terrible to be an educated woman. An educated woman with nothing to do. What am I here for? Why am I alive? They should make me a professor somewhere, or a director of something ... If I were a diplomat I'd turn the whole world upside down ... An educated woman ... And nothing to do. Village...

Anton Chekhov's short stories are an extraordinary record of life in nineteenth-century Russia. Encompassing small-town coffin-makers, socially mobile Orthodox bishops, and wealthy Muscovite adulterers, the tales featured in Love and Other Stories are at once bleakly ironic and profoundly humane in their depiction of their subjects. These beautifully translated works demonstrate why Chekhov's short fiction has achieved universal acclaim: when...

A young man tries to figure out the best way to live. A young woman struggles to assert herself within a regrettable marriage. A doctor attempts to befriend his most interesting patient. This riverrun edition presents a selection of Chekhov's longer stories—novellas, effectively—in Constance Garnett's timeless translations. These four stories, The Wife, The Steppe, Ward No. 6, and My Life,...

Little Black Classics - the new series to celebrate Penguin's 80th anniversary \"Oh, good God,\" he kept saying with great relish. \"Good God...\"

Written in France toward the end of his career, these stories are Chekhov's only attempt at the linked collection. The first is a grotesque Gogolian comedy; the second, a narrator's impassioned response; and the third, a poignant story of failed love. Translated by the impeccable David Helwig and fabulously illustrated by Seth, Three Stories is essential for any Chekhov enthusiast....

In 1890, the thirty-year-old Chekhov, already knowing that he was ill with tuberculosis, undertook an arduous eleven-week journey from Moscow across Siberia to the penal colony on the island of Sakhalin. Now collected here in one volume are the fully annotated translations of his impressions of his trip through Siberia and the account of his three-month sojourn on Sakhalin Island,...