Anton Chekhov

“ TRIGORIN. What success have I had? I have never pleased myself; as a writer, I do not like myself at all. The trouble is that I am made giddy, as it were, by the fumes of my brain, and often hardly know what I am writing. I love this lake, these trees, the blue heaven; nature's voice speaks to me and wakes a feeling of passion in my heart, and I am overcome by an uncontrollable desire to write. But I am not only a painter of landscapes, I am a man of the city besides. I love my country, too, and her people ”

“ Anna Sergeyevna was touching; there was about her the purity of a good, simple woman who had seen little of life. The solitary candle burning on the table threw a faint light on her face, yet it was clear that she was very unhappy.
"How could I despise you?" asked Gurov. "You don't know what you are saying."
"God forgive me," she said, and her eyes filled with tears. "It's awful."
"You seem to feel you need to be forgiven."
"Forgiven? No. I am a bad, low woman; I despise myself and don't attempt to justify myself. It's not my husband but myself I have deceived. ”

“ The time is precious, Doctor! Let us go, I beg of you."
"I can't come," Kirilov said after a pause, and stepped into his drawing-room.
Aboguin followed him and seized him by the sleeve.
"You're in sorrow. I understand. But I'm not asking you to cure a toothache, or to give expert evidence,—but to save a human life." He went on imploring like a beggar. "This life is more than any personal grief. I ask you for courage, for a brave deed—in the name of humanity."
"Humanity cuts both ways," Kirilov said irritably. "In the name of the same humanity I ask you not to take me away. ”

“ Between the distance and the horizon on the right there was a flash of lightning so vivid that it lighted up part of the steppe and the spot where the clear sky met the blackness. A terrible cloud was swooping down, without haste, a compact mass; big black shreds hung from its edge; similar shreds pressing one upon another were piling up on the right and left horizon. The tattered, ragged look of the storm-cloud gave it a drunken disorderly air. There was a distinct, not smothered, growl of thunder. Yegorushka crossed himself and began quickly putting on his great-coat. ”

“ Styopka, a waggoner whom Yegorushka noticed now for the first time, a Little Russian lad of eighteen, in a long shirt without a belt, and full trousers that flapped like flags as he walked, undressed quickly, ran along the steep bank and plunged into the water. He dived three times, then swam on his back and shut his eyes in his delight. His face was smiling and wrinkled up as though he were being tickled, hurt and amused.
On a hot day when there is nowhere to escape from the sultry, stifling heat, the splash of water and the loud breathing of a man bathing sounds like good music to the ear. ”

“ Motka followed her; she, too, was crying on a deeper note, without wiping her tears, and her face was as wet as though it had been dipped in water.
"Holy Saints!" cried Olga, aghast, as the two came into the hut. "Queen of Heaven!"
Sasha began telling her story, while at the same time Granny walked in with a storm of shrill cries and abuse; then Fyokla flew into a rage, and there was an uproar in the hut.
"Never mind, never mind!" Olga, pale and upset, tried to comfort them, stroking Sasha's head. "She is your grandmother; it's a sin to be angry with her. Never mind, my child." ”

“ That does not fit in with the legend.
“That does not matter,” the monk answered in a low voice, not immediately turning his face towards him. “The legend, the mirage, and I are all the products of your excited imagination. I am a phantom.”
“Then you don’t exist?” said Kovrin
“You can think as you like,” said the monk, with a faint smile. “I exist in your imagination, and your imagination is part of nature, so I exist in nature.
“You have a very old, wise, and extremely expressive face, as though you really had lived more than a thousand years,” said Kovrin. ”

“ IVANOFF. I don't see anything splendid about it. How can I lead a new life? I am lost forever. It is time we both understood that. A new life indeed!
SASHA. Nicholas, come to your senses. How can you say you are lost? What do you mean by such cynicism? No, I won't listen to you or talk with you. Go to the church!
IVANOFF. I am lost!
SASHA. Don't talk so loud; our guests will hear you!
IVANOFF. If an intelligent, educated, and healthy man begins to complain of his lot and go down-hill, there is nothing for him to do but to go on down until he reaches the bottom--there is no hope for him. ”

“ Her head ached every day when school was over. She was obliged to collect money from her scholars to buy wood and pay the watchman, and then to give it to that fat, insolent peasant, the warden, and beg him for mercy's sake to send her a load of wood. And at night she would dream of examinations and peasants and snow drifts. This life had aged and hardened her, and she had grown plain and angular and awkward, as if lead had been emptied into her veins. She was afraid of everything, and never dared to sit down in the presence of the warden or a member of the school board. ”

“ I always knew and was convinced that nothing good would come of your Pyotr! I told you so, and I tell you so now. What you have sown, that now you must reap! Reap it!"
"But what have I sown, Father Fyodor?" the deacon asked softly, looking up at his Reverence.
"Why, who is to blame if not you? You're his father, he is your offspring! You ought to have admonished him, have instilled the fear of God into him. A child must be taught! You have brought him into the world, but you haven't trained him up in the right way. It's a sin! It's wrong! It's a shame!" ”

“ Why do you want to frighten us? [Tenderly] Give it up, Uncle Vanya! My misfortune is perhaps even greater than yours, but I am not plunged in despair. I endure my sorrow, and shall endure it until my life comes to a natural end. You must endure yours, too. [A pause] Give it up! Dear, darling Uncle Vanya. Give it up! [She weeps] You are so good, I am sure you will have pity on us and give it up. You must endure your sorrow, Uncle Vanya; you must endure it.
VOITSKI takes a bottle from the drawer of the table and hands it to ASTROFF.
VOITSKI. There it is! ”

“ A
doctor in the train told me that if parents are immoral, their
children are drunkards or criminals. Think of that!"
Once he came into the yard, staggering; his eyes gazed about blankly,
his breathing was laboured; he laughed and cried and babbled as
though in a high fever, and the only words I could catch in his
muddled talk were, "My mother! Where's my mother?" which he uttered
with a wail like a child who has lost his mother in a crowd. I led
him into our garden and laid him down under a tree, and Masha and
I took turns to sit by him all that day and all night. ”

“ IVANOFF. All that is nothing to me; my head is aching.
LEBEDIEFF. Because you think so much.
IVANOFF. I never think.
LEBEDIEFF. Come, Nicholas, snap your fingers at the whole thing, and drive over to visit us. Sasha loves and understands you. She is a sweet, honest, lovely girl; too good to be the child of her mother and me! Sometimes, when I look at her, I cannot believe that such a treasure could belong to a fat old drunkard like me. Go to her, talk to her, and let her cheer you. She is a good, true-hearted girl.
IVANOFF. Paul, my dear friend, please go, and leave me alone. ”

“ Hearing his soft, friendly voice, Laevsky felt that something unheard of, monstrous, had just happened to him, as though he had been nearly run over by a train; he almost burst into tears, waved his hand, and ran out of the room.
"To feel that one is hated, to expose oneself before the man who hates one, in the most pitiful, contemptible, helpless state. My God, how hard it is!" he thought a little while afterwards as he sat in the pavilion, feeling as though his body were scarred by the hatred of which he had just been the object. ”

“ What is more, under the influence of Kisotchka's voice, the evening air, and the stillness, I gradually myself fell into a quiet sentimental mood. I remember I sat in an easy chair by the wide-open window and glanced at the trees and darkened sky. The outlines of the acacias and the lime trees were just the same as they had been eight years before; just as then, in the days of my childhood, somewhere far away there was the tinkling of a wretched piano, and the public had just the same habit of sauntering to and fro along the avenues, but the people were not the same. ”

“ She is like a rock that cannot be shattered; there is no moving her. But was there no other solution for her, Volodya? Is burying oneself alive the only solution of the problem of life? Why, it's death, not life!"
At the thought of Olga, Volodya's face softened.
"Here, you are a clever man, Volodya," said Sofya Lvovna. "Show me how to do what Olga has done. Of course, I am not a believer and should not go into a nunnery, but one can do something equivalent. Life isn't easy for me," she added after a brief pause. ”

“ Sometimes I peered through the keyhole; and always saw the same scene: my uncle sat at his desk and worked; and his work seemed always the same: with one hand he wrote, with the other he turned over the pages of a book; and — what seemed strangest to me — his body moved without cease; he swung his leg as a pendulum, whistled and nodded his head in time. His face expressed levity and abstraction, as if he were playing noughts and crosses. He always wore the same short, smart jacket and the same well-tied necktie, and even through the keyhole I could smell his delicate, feminine perfumes. ”

“ IRINA. When I woke up today and got up and dressed myself, I suddenly began to feel as if everything in this life was open to me, and that I knew how I must live. Dear Ivan Romanovitch, I know everything. A man must work, toil in the sweat of his brow, whoever he may be, for that is the meaning and object of his life, his happiness, his enthusiasm. How fine it is to be a workman who gets up at daybreak and breaks stones in the street, or a shepherd, or a schoolmaster, who teaches children, or an engine-driver on the railway. ”

“ My strength and health have been joyfully spent with my money. I was never mean, and so was always merry and sorrowless. I am Harlequin, and shall die Harlequin. Don’t cry, Columbine! Rather be glad that I’m dying, not like others, but full of delight, content with fate and my conduct. Or would you rather see me grappling to life with greedy eyes and a prayer on my lips? No, Harlequin is not like that. He has fulfilled his mission in life and dies calmly. And, really, didn’t I give my kisses to who wanted them? Didn’t I lavish my soul for the good of others? ”

“ You must have a cup of tea and a snack of something, anyway."
"We have no time for tea," said Kuzmitchov.
Moisey Moisevitch bent his head on one side, crooked his knees, and put his open hands before him as though warding off a blow, while with a smile of agonized sweetness he began imploring:
"Ivan Ivanitch! Father Christopher! Do be so good as to take a cup of tea with me. Surely I am not such a bad man that you can't even drink tea in my house? Ivan Ivanitch!"
"Well, we may just as well have a cup of tea," said Father Christopher, with a sympathetic smile; "that won't keep us long." ”

“ The leaves did not stir on the trees, grasshoppers chirruped, and the monotonous hollow sound of the sea rising up from below, spoke of the peace, of the eternal sleep awaiting us. So it must have sounded when there was no Yalta, no Oreanda here; so it sounds now, and it will sound as indifferently and monotonously when we are all no more. And in this constancy, in this complete indifference to the life and death of each of us, there lies hid, perhaps, a pledge of our eternal salvation, of the unceasing movement of life upon earth, of unceasing progress towards perfection. ”

“ Masha and I walked a couple of miles to see her on her way; we walked back slowly and in silence, as though we were resting. Masha held my hand, my heart felt light, and I had no inclination to talk about love; we had become closer and more akin now that we were married, and we felt that nothing now could separate us.
"Your sister is a nice creature," said Masha, "but it seems as though she had been tormented for years. Your father must be a terrible man."
I began telling her how my sister and I had been brought up, and what a senseless torture our childhood had really been. ”

“ How strange to see a famous actress weeping, and for such a trifle! Is it not strange, too, that a famous author should sit fishing all day? He is the idol of the public, the papers are full of him, his photograph is for sale everywhere, his works have been translated into many foreign languages, and yet he is overjoyed if he catches a couple of minnows. I always thought famous people were distant and proud; I thought they despised the common crowd which exalts riches and birth, and avenged themselves on it by dazzling it with the inextinguishable honour and glory of their fame. ”

“ One pale crimson streak was all that was left, and even that began to be covered by little clouds as a fire with ash.
A copse with alder-trees, softly whispering, and from time to time shuddering in the fitful breeze, lay, a dark blur, on the right of the kitchen gardens; on the left stretched the immense plain. In the distance, where the eye could not distinguish between the sky and the plain, there was a bright gleam of light. A little way off from me sat Savka. With his legs tucked under him like a Turk and his head hanging, he looked pensively at Kutka. ”