“You are right to demand that an author be conscious of what he is doing, but you are confusing two concepts: solving… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“Medicine is my lawful wife, and literature is my mistress. When I get fed up with one, I spend the night with… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
And I despise your books, I despise wisdom and the blessings of this world. It is all worthless, fleeting, illusory, and deceptive,… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
I agree that one can't dispense with the reins and the whip altogether, for knaves find their way even into literature, but… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
Here I am with you & yet not for a single moment do I forget that there's an unfinished novel waiting for me. — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
My own experience is that once a story has been written, one has to cross out the beginning and the end. It… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“I am a book-worm and a scholar, and am unfamiliar with practical affairs.” — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“In your books I have flung myself into the bottomless pit, performed miracles, slain, burned towns, preached new religions, conquered whole kingdoms” — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
The bourgeoisie is very fond of so-called practical types and novels with happy endings, since they soothe it with the idea that… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“It is true I have not seen the earth nor men, but in your books I have drunk fragrant wine, I have… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
It is as acceptable now to love the wives of others as it is to smoke their cigars and read their books. — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“Since Samoylenko had left Dorpat, where he had studied medicine, he had rarely seen a German and had not read a single… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
In descriptions of nature one must seize on small details, grouping them so that when the reader closes his eyes he gets… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
My own experience is that once a story has been written, one has to cross out the beginning and the end. It… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
These people have learned not from books, but in the fields, in the wood, on the river bank. Their teachers have been… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
When you describe the miserable and unfortunate, and want to make the reader feel pity, try to be somewhat colder - that… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
I let myself go at the beginning and write with an easy mind, but by the time I get to the middle… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
I am writing a play which I probably will not finish until the end of November. I am writing it with considerable… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“I am a man of cultivation; I have studied various remarkable books, but I cannot fathom the direction of my preferences; do… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
I abide by a rule concerning reviews: I will never ask, neither in writing nor in person, that a word be put… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
When all is said and done, no literature can outdo the cynicism of real life; you won't intoxicate with one glass someone… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
Pharisaism, obtuseness and tyranny reign not only in the homes of merchants and in jails; I see it in science, in literature,… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“The feminine reader, who expected a melodramatic ending, may relax. October” — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
There are people whom even children's literature would corrupt. They read with particular enjoyment the piquant passages in the Psalter and in… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
When you want to touch the reader's heart, try to be colder. It gives their grief as it were, a background, against… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“Using vile means to attain worthy ends makes the ends themselves vile. Let them ride on the backs of doctors and medical assistants, but… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
There are still many more days of failure ahead, whole seasons of failure, things will go terribly wrong, you will have huge disappointments ,… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“But here was all the timorousness and angularity of inexperienced youth, a feeling of awkwardness, and an impression of bewilderment, as if someone had… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“At the water's edge, barrels of pitch blazed like huge bonfires. Their reflection, crimson as the rising moon, crept to meet us in long,… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
Anna Petrovna: Never talk to women about your own good qualities. Let them find out for themselves. — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
While you're playing cards with a regular guy or having a bite to eat with him, he seems a peaceable, good-humoured and not entirely… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“Lebedev: France has a clear and defined policy... The French know what they want. They just want to wipe out the Krauts, finish, but… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“My holy of holies are the human body, health, intelligence, talent, inspiration, love, and the most absolute freedom - freedom from force and falsity,… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
“What we have, we do not treasure,” and what’s more we do not even love it.” — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
No matter how corrupt and unjust a convict may be, he loves fairness more than anything else. If the people placed over him are… — Anton Chekhov Copy Share Image
