Anton Chekhov Analysis

By Ryan Funes

If you were to have gone out on the street and asked anyone about Mark Twain, William Shakespear, or even F. Scott Fitzgerald, you may get a positive response from the person, in that they know of the person. But, if you were to have asked about Anton Chekhov, you would probably get a dumbfounded, confused response. I would not be surprised though by those results, since Chekhov did not really have anything iconic about him or any gimmick, but when I was introduced to his short stories, I was immediatley hooked in by his themes and writing style. I really did not know what to say about the guy, but after reading and looking into his life, he was definitely a skilled dramatist, satirist, and writer. For those who are not too familiar with his life, Anton Chekhov was born in 1860, Taganrog, Russia to the son of a serf and a merchants wife. He lived a fairly well childhood and also did well in school, as he did continue on to become a medical student, and at the same time, an author who started out as a columnist for a Moscow newspaper. While his first short stories were not well recieved at first, along with a bloody play of his being under heavy censorship at the time, he continued on with his writing career, even while under the pressure of supporting his family, whose health was deterring. But, as a result of his writings, Chekhov became well known for his wit and subtle satire in his early writings. He also wrote a play managing to show his disdain for all the criticism he got. Already being praised, including winning a Pushkin prize in 1887 for great literary excellence, he went on to create some more works, including Boys, Kashtanka, and Peasants. Although, in 1897, his praise could not amount to the pain he suffered when he was diagnosed with tuberculosis. Ironic, in that he caught it from a patient he was helping, and that his brother also died from the disease. By 1998, Chekhov then moved to Yalta, where he got the inspiration to write The Lady with the Lapdog, and also got married to Olga Knipper, a stage actress. But, sadly, Anton did not last long after writing the short story, as in 1904 he lost his life to the battle he had with his tuberculosis. The writings of Anton Chekhov have been heavily praised by many, and are able to capture some laughs and gasps from the readers. While I cannot explore his more famous plays, I have, however, found some of his lesser known ones to include some of his style and themes. One aspect of his writing was that he did use, at times, either a third person narrative or a first person, as we do see some mismatching of this in Lady, where Gurov does go off on a sort of philisophical statement that almost seems to reflect Chekhov's own mind, and also breaks the narrative, and again near the end of Peasants, where a statement on the being of the peasants and their futilities of achieving a morally correct society is stated at the end, and again seems to be as though Chekhov is saying it. Another good element of Chekhov is that he can make some very likeable, sad, and hateful characters. Examples for these are the children we see in his story The Boys, as their visions of grandeur and romantic dreams of adventure are innocent in reality, nostalgic, and is relatable to people who have had these same moments as a child. Another good example is in the story, The Objet d'Art, where a man tries to rid himself of an amative candelabrum, but only to have it fall back into his hands after the candelabrum gets traded through various people, and this, in my opinion, is something that some people could relate to, as I'm sure that we have all tried to get rid of something we hated and tried to be kind to others. A sad, sympathetic character that Chekhov has made would be a woman in The Peasants, who gets sexually harassed by some men in the night, which is tragic in that was shown to be a very upbeat, cheery person, which is a direct juxtaposition of her surroundings, which are poor and unwelcoming. His despicable characters are also made very prominent, such as in The Peasants, as the peoples actions represent their poor and bad environment, and the judge in The Malefactor, who's corruptness is present in his rationale for sentencing the defendent "to gaol". All of this is, of course though, just a small portion of some of the great character design that Chekhov can put into his characters, even in the lesser known stories of his. Along with his style of writing, Chekhov also uses the environments of his characters to great usage, in that he often includes great admiration of nature, such as the beautifully described rivers and trees in The Peasants, and Gurov, the main character of Lady with the Lapdog, describing Yalta in great detail. The descriptions also fit well with the story, such as in the case of The Peasants, where nature is juxtaposed with the opposing environment: human made society. Communitaction among others is also a concept that Chekhov has tossed around in his works, as in The Boys, where the young children are hard to communicate with, due to their immature behavior, and also in Lady, where Gurov has trouble communicating with any other person but Anna Sergeyevna, his love interest, and this actually helps to further the plot using Gurov's longing intentions for Anna. Chekhov's works have also seemed to cover a dark comedy genre to boot. For example, in Grief, where the narrator of the story, Grigory, drives off with his dead wife, and one darkly comedic part is where he pays next to no attention to his wifes head banging on the wheel of the cart he is driving. Another good example is in Lady, where Gurov nonchalantly ignores Anna's complaints. These elements add much to Chekhov's style of writing, but his themes seemed, to me, to be the thing that captured me the most. Chekov's themes were not really what you might say "fairy tale themes". His themes were, for most stories, very somber, melancholic, and darkly satirical. One theme of his that is highly prominent in his short stories that reflects his life is death. We often see the characters of his stories suffer untimely and unceremonious deaths, like in Grief, where the death of Grigory's wife is not taken seriously in any way, or in The Peasants, where the character Nikolay dies abrubtly at the end of one chapter, then the narrator laments on the winter in the very next chapter, showing no acknowledgement to the death that took place right before the chapter started. Anton's seemingly total disregard for the sacredness of human life, though, has been traced by some back to his days as a doctor. As a doctor, Anton Chekhov had to deal with many sick and dying patients, and since seeing all of that plague and famine is not the most amiable sight, it has been suggested that Chekhov grew somewhat of a pessimistic view on human life, and may have shaped a lot of his views. An I also have to somewhat agree with Chekhov's views in terms of how he could think like the way he did, since I too would probably get a little angry with the world after seeing many deaths. Looking back, Chekhov had a very tough life: being under heavy examination by critics, being a doctor, and witnessing ailing and doleful people come in and out of his life as one. But, even after all of that, I must say that I am impressed by Chekhov to still managing to create some of the best short stories of his time. To be able to take your own tragedies and hardships and turn them into amazing tales that would have people question as to how you could think like that, is something that only some are capable of, and Chekhov, tragically, was one of those. But, out of it all, people saw his world, his way of thinking, and felt his feelings, and as I have, I'm sure many could relate to his works, and maybe learn some lessons from them on life, whether it be from Kashtanka, The Peasants, or from any of his other works. To Anton Chekhov, I say, kudos, you sad, magnificent writer. You will not be forgotten.

Sources: http://www.wikipedia.org/ http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/chekhov/themes.html http://www.theatrehistory.com/russian/chekhov001.html