Academic literature on the topic 'Chekhov Anton Pavlovich 1860-1904'

Статья посвящена исследованию творчества Александра Чехова, писателя, публициста и автора мемуаров об А.П. Чехове, старшего брата Антона Павловича Чехова, на примере его редакторской работы в журналах «Слепец», «Пожарный», «Вестник Российского общества покровительства животным». Отражение личного элемента в произведениях — это то, чем зачастую отличался слог беллетристических произведений Александра Чехова. Об этом не раз ему указывал Антон Павлович Чехов. Думается, что и редакторская работа именно в этих изданиях не обошлась без влияния «личного элемента», который проявился у Александра Павловича в следствиие жизненных обстоятельств, которые ему пришлось пережить в своей жизни: внезапная слепота, а также репортерская работа с выездом на городские пожары и другие происшествия, и их последующими описаниями. Для исследования в данной статье используются материалы писем Ал.П. Чехова к его брату Антону Павловичу с 1875-1904 гг., а также воспоминания отца Павла Егоровича Чехова и сына Михаила ПавловичаАлександровича Чехова. Приведенные в тексте статьи отрывки писем, которые имеют явный отсыл к жизни Александра Павловича Чехова, призваны подтвердить точку зрения автора статьи о том, что возможно, выбор именно этих изданий (по крайней мере именно двух: «Слепец» и «Пожарный») редактор Александр Чехов сделал несознательно, невольно, но в этой невольности прослеживается ассоциативная связь с его личным жизненным опытом. The article is devoted to the study of the work of Alexander Chekhov, a writer, publicist and author of memoirs about A.P. Chekhov, the elder brother of Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, on the example of his editorial work in the magazines "Slepets", "Fireman", "Bulletin of the Russian Society for the Protection of Animals". The reflection of the personal element in the works is what often distinguished the style of the fictional works of Alexander Chekhov. Anton Pavlovich Chekhov pointed this out to him more than once.It seems that the work in these publications was not without the influence of the “personal element”, which manifested itself in Alexander Pavlovich as a result of the life circumstances that he had to endure: sudden blindness, as well as reporter work with a trip to city fires and other incidents, and their subsequent descriptions. For research in this article, materials from the letters of Al.P. Chekhov to his brother Anton Pavlovich from 1875-1904, as well as the memoirs of his father Pavel Yegorovich Chekhov and brother Mikhail Pavlovich Chekhov. The excerpts of letters cited in the text of the article, which have a clear reference to the life of Alexander Pavlovich Chekhov, are intended to confirm the point of view of the author of the article that it is possible that the choice of these particular publications (at least two: "Slepets" and "Fireman") editor Alexander Chekhov did it unconsciously, involuntarily, but in this involuntariness there is an associative connection with his personal life experience.

This account of Anton Chekhov's life as a doctor is distinct from the short story writer and playwright on which his fame rests. It describes his school days, the years as a medical student and the period in general practice. In later years he became active in social medicine on a voluntary basis and earned his living purely from his literary work. He died from pulmonary tuberculosis at the age of 44 years.

(Authors' Note: Anton Pavlovich Chekov (1860 – 1904) the Russian playwright and short story writer is considered one of the greatest fiction writers in history. He was a physician and practiced medicine his whole life before his death from tuberculosis at the young age of 44. “The Black Monk”, one of his most famous short stories was written in 1894.) Andrei Vasslyich Kovrin, Master of Arts in Psychology, decides to go to a country house on account of his nerves being ‘weary from over work’. There, he feels rejuvenated at the sight of blossoming natural beauty. It seems to bring on intense joy and hope he hasn’t felt since childhood. ‘The Black Monk’1 opens to the promise of an exhilarating summer. Buoyed by preternatural energy, Kovrin adopts a feverish routine of continuous, vigorous work. His exertions intensify with a soaring of confidence and ambition. To his mind, his efforts begin to take on a cosmic significance. He becomes more cheerful, tal kative, and energetic. A piece of music, distantly played and faintly heard, evokes the idea of a sacred harmony. This suggests the legend of “the black monk.” The origin of the legend is not specified in the story. It appears to be an invention of Kovrin’s steadily slipping mind. It goes like this: A monk, dressed in black, gave rise to a mirage a thousand years ago. This mirage, through regeneration of images, flits throughout the universe. It would appear, a thousand years after the original monk walked the earth, to a specific person and reveal eternal truths. Soon Kovrin becomes obsessed by the idea of the black monk and begins having hallucinations in which he converses with the apparition. He also falls prey to grandiose delusions. He begins treatment once his wife finally realizes, to her ‘amazement and horror’, the extent of his madness. Other writers of the time utilized the artifice of testimonials purported to be written by ‘lunatics’ to portray the subjective experience of mental illness. A typical example would feature a madman protesting his innocence while descending into the absurdity and incoherence of lunacy. (Examples include Jack London’s ‘Told in the Drooling Ward’,2 Edgar Allen Poe’s ‘Tell – tale Heart’,3 Guy de Maupassant’s ‘Le Horla’4 and Charlotte Perkins Gilmans' ’The Yellow Wall – paper’).5 Chekhov eschews this approach. Here, we are not passive listeners, trying to decipher monologues. In The Black Monk, the mood of the story mirrors the mental state of the protagonist. As in the beginning, when Kovrin is feeling elated, the words used to describe the summer landscape are poetic and effusive (luxuriant, cheerful, animated, joyful etc.). These pages gush with scenes of lively joviality. We are lulled into confidence and exult in hope and beauty with Kovrin. But subtle hints accumulate and make us uneasy (e.g. Kovrin’s insomnia, his nervous energy). Madness creeps on gently and insidiously upon Kovrin – and the readers. We see his attempts to explain away the madness, ‘People with ideas are nervous and marked by high sensitivity.’ We are party to Kovrin’s exultation, hopes and fears. Gradually the descriptions grow more sinister and strange. Initial hope burgeons into grandiose delusions and the music of early pages develops into phantoms. The knowledge of intimate clinical details of the illness presented in this story is astonishing. It can only have been written by a doctor. Anton Chekhov (1860 – 1904) continued to practice as a physician until 1897. All the while he conti-nued to compose short stories and plays which would transform the theatre and help bring about the modern form of the short story. He himself described the relationship of his two occupations by saying, “Medicine is my wife while literature is my mistress.”6 Lesser mortals might not even survive their co-existence but Chekhov seemed to thrive on it. Doctors are the primary characters in 25 of his plays. In addition he wrote numerous stories describing mental and physical illnesses. These are popularly known as his ‘clinical studies’ and include ‘The Dreary Story’, ‘About Love’, 'Black Monk’, and ‘Ward no 6’. Chekhov’s best stories show compassion and sympathy for human failings. In ‘The Black Monk’ protagonists deal with their incomprehension, confusion and dread by failing or refusing to recognize the madness. Kovrin’s failure to accept the fact of his madness is presented with remarkable acuity and sensitivity. In dealing with mental illness, the oft-reported and often forgotten mantra that ‘Our primary concern is the patient, not the disease,’ has even more significance than in other disciplines of medicine. Chekhov’s tender treatment of his characters exemplifies this approach. The story continues. Kovrin is treated and given “bromide”, a primitive psychotropic agent. As the elation disappears Kovrin discovers the painful fact of his mediocrity. His relationships fall apart, as does his mental tranquility. Here too readers share the dullness of his life. All the luster of life has disappeared. The dreariness of the landscape, for example, is masterfully contrasted (using descriptors like gnarled, monoto-nous) with its earlier descriptions. The boredom and rancor of Kovrin’s new life is on full display. Physicians, of all people, cannot afford to harbor illusions. We must look life squarely in the eye. ‘The Black Monk’, like life, shows us that agony and ecstasy, exhilaration and ennui, joy and despair exist together. One cannot hope for one and not expect the other. It is our task, as healers, to understand this and help others understand it as well.

In the corpus of Chekhov's prose there is a perceptible evolution in his use of irony. This study involves an examination of the use of irony in the initial, middle and final phases of his artistic career. It will demonstrate that in the initial phase, Chekhov's use of irony was direct and overt; in the middle phase, it was more deliberate and covert; and in the final phase, it was subdued, more transparent and transcendent. Selected stories taken from all three periods will illustrate this evolution.

The purpose of the present study is to analyze the structural techniques and genre of Chekhov's plays.
The many books and articles published on Chekhov's plays far exceeds his own works. Although there have been numerous studies analyzing the structural techniques of his play, considerable controversy still exists among literary and theatre scholars regarding the genre of his plays. Most of the studies simply avoid this complex and intricate problem.
In this study particular emphasis is also placed on the dramatic techniques used by Chekhov: the sequence of events, the nature of the roles and the so-called "unfinished" endings.

Anton Chekhov pursued two careers simultaneously throughout his life—that of a doctor as well as a writer of prose and drama. It is not surprising, therefore, to discover many physicians amongst his characters but it is puzzling that the portrayal of doctors is frequently unflattering despite his admitted indebtedness to the profession. The thesis herein proposed is that the poor image Chekhov presents points to the necessity of self-determination in matters of emotional and spiritual health; if the doctors are incapable of healing themselves and those in their care, the patients might well take the biblical directive, "Arise! Take up thy bed and walk." In his stated desire to show people how bad and dreary their lives are, thereby assisting them in fashioning better lives, Chekhov's prescription is one of self-help. The short stories—Late-Blooming Flowers, Anyuta, Ward No. 6, The Head Gardener's Tale and The Doctor's Visit—and the plays— Platonov, Ivanov, The Seagull, The Wood-Demon, Uncle Vanya and Three Sisters—have been examined; beneath the incompetence and villainy of the doctors an affirming statement is discovered in the otherwise melancholy canon of Chekhov.
Arts, Faculty of
Theatre and Film, Department of
Graduate

The transfer of an artistic work from the literary medium to the filmic medium presents technical, personal, social and political factors for consideration which are capable of revealing important information about the times in which both the literary work and the film work were created. In a Russian context, where both literature and film have played roles of central cultural importance, the study of this interaction can be particularly fruitful. The first chapter of this dissertation considers the theoretical aspects of adaptation, namely fidelity to the original work and questions of metaphor and narrative structure. After examining these issues in a general context, Chapter 1 then views them in the light of specific stages of Russian cinematic history. The remaining chapters of this dissertation consider selected post-revolutionary Soviet and Russian filmic adaptations of the works of Nikolai Gogol', Fedor Dostoevskii and Anton Chekhov in chronological order. Analysis of both text and film is undertaken in order to demonstrate the complexity of literary and extra-literary factors involved in adaptation. The works of Gogol' have provided film makers with the challenge of finding "adequate" filmic equivalents to this writer's narrative devices, particularly his use of skaz [oral folk narration]. Dostoevskii's works have proven to be a stumbling block for film makers, both in terms of their ideological acceptability, and their exploration of complex psychological and religious issues. The adaptations of Chekhov's works have provided cinema with diverse subject matter that reflects the various stages and developments of Russian cinematic history, from pure fabula borrowing to an emphasis on mood and atmosphere. The interdisciplinary approach of this dissertation strives to show both the on-going relevancy of nineteenth-century Russian literature to modern culture, and the cinema's ability to present vastly differing interpretive possibilities of the literary cano

A ideia do trabalho é discutir o realismo no conto e verificar como Machado de Assis e Anton Tchekhov trabalham dentro dessa estética, em que aspectos eles se enquadram nos preceitos teóricos e em que medida afastam-se, originando, assim um realismo diferente do cânone, um realismo periférico àquele desenvolvido na Europa no final do séc. XIX. A fim de ilustrar o que seria um conto realista característico, considerado aqui como exemplar, Bola de Sebo, de Maupassant, é analisado dentro dos pressupostos da estética desenvolvidos por alguns teóricos, tais como Watt, Luckács, Rosenfeld, Auerbach e Moretti. Os atos de fingir de Iser também são abordados na tentativa de entender melhor a questão do realismo. É feita uma análise de Machado de Assis e Tchekhov, a partir dos contos O Empréstimo, Uns Braços de Machado e O Beijo de Tchekhov, avaliando os pontos de contato e de afastamento do realismo europeu.
The idea behind this work is to discuss the realism in the short story and check how Machado de Assis and Anton Chekhov work within this aesthetic, in which ways they fit the theoretical rules and to what extent they deviate from it, producing thus a realism different from the canon, a peripheral realism in relation to that developed in Europe at the end of the century XIX. In order to illustrate what would be a characteristic realistic short story, considered here as an example of the aesthetic, Bola de Sebo, of Maupassant, is analyzed within the assumptions of the aesthetic developed by some theorists, such as Watt, Luckács, Auerbach and Moretti. The acts of pretending from Iser are also mentioned, adding to the effort of trying to understand the aesthetic of realism. An analysis of Machado de Assis and Chekhov is made, based on the short stories O Empréstimo, Uns Braços of Machado and O Beijo of Chekhov by evaluating the points of contact and distance from the European realism.

Ce mémoire-création est né du souci de comprendre le discours sous-jacent que peut contenir la représentation théâtrale d'un sacrifice et du désir de récrire une tragédie grecque. Dans le premier volet, de nature théorique, ce présent travail se base sur l'impact du rite sacrificiel et sur l'importance qu'il occupe dans le maintien de l'ordre social. Nous y développons l'hypothèse qu'une pièce comportant la représentation d'un sacrifice inutile (ou dont l'origine n'est plus tout à fait sacrée) peut receler un certain discours critique sur les conflits sociaux de l'époque dans laquelle évolue son auteur. Les deux textes étudiés (Hécube d'Euripide et La cerisaie de Tchekhov) ont été choisis en fonction de la période de guerre ou de révolution pendant laquelle ils ont été composés ainsi que de la nature du sacrifice qu'ils présentent. La mort de Poluxène dans Hécube et la destruction du domaine de Lioubov dans La cerisaie apparaissent comme deux sacrifices inutiles. Afin de bien prouver les liens qui existent entre les textes analysés et leur époque, nous retraçons d'abord les indices qui les renvoient à l'actualité de leur temps. Ensuite, nous explorons les différentes facettes des sacrifices présentés et les rattachons au contexte social. Notre approche est essentiellement dramaturgique et sociohistorique. La pièce d'Euripide, à travers le sacrifice de Poluxène dont les motifs sont politiques et non sacrés, comporte une critique de la corruption du langage et des politiques intéressées de certains démagogues athéniens -Cléon étant le principal visé, selon nous et selon l'étude qu'en a faite Édouard Delebecque. La pièce de Tchekhov, quant à elle, semble véhiculer une critique des idées bolcheviques et des changements sociaux qui apparaissent dans les campagnes russes de la fin du XIXe siècle. Le sacrifice de la cerisaie, parce qu'il laisse place aux pratiques capitalistes et individualistes de Lopakhine et parce qu'il aurait pu être évité par une solidarité renouvelée de la famille qui l'habite, apparaît comme le symbole du sacrifice de la vie en communauté et des valeurs sociales transmises par le ДBop (dvor, «feu»). Dans le second volet de notre mémoire, nous présentons l'adaptation libre que nous faisons de la pièce Hécube. Cette actualisation de la pièce grecque et sa transposition dans le Québec actuel est influencée à la fois par l'histoire québécoise et par la pièce de Tchekhov. Nous expliquons, dans le dernier chapitre théorique, quelles sont les références à la société québécoises et en quoi La cerisaie constitue une inspiration pour ce texte. Dans cette partie, nous parlons également de ce qu'il advient du sacrifice et de la forme plus contemporaine qu'il revêt. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : Sacrifice, Critique sociale, Euripide, Tchekhov, Adaptation.

This study examines how travelogues by the Russian author Anton Chekhov, an American, George Kennan and a British citizen, Harry de Windt, contributed towards establishing the image of Siberia towards the end of the 19th century, juxtaposing their individual views against the commonly perceived view of the region at the time. In examining the texts, a literary analysis is merged with elements of other approaches, through a strong thematic focus, centring on the cultural and ideological assumptions implied in the texts. The findings reveal that both native inhabitants and foreigners are capable of expressing a justifiable opinion on a locality, resulting in different versions of what is observed, from divergent points of view. Although the three writers in this study appear to support a negative view of Siberia, closer investigation show evidence of optimism about the eventual destiny of a region in a stage of transition.
Linguistics and Modern Languages
M.A. (Russian)