Anton Chekhov Research Articles

Class, Power, and Social Change: A New Historicist Approach to August Strindberg’s Miss Julie and Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard

Class, Power, and Social Change: A New Historicist Approach to August Strindberg’s Miss Julie and Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard

Biochemical characteristics of some varieties of peach and nectarine grown in Sochi

Biochemical characteristics and features of the most promising varieties of stone fruit crops (peach, nectarine) submitted for research have been shown. Biochemical analyzes of peach and nectarine fruits grown in the humid subtropics of Russia were carried out in 2019-2020 at the Subtropical Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences in the Laboratory of Plant physiology and Biochemistry. The following varieties were used for biochemical analyzes: Rannyaya zarya, Larisa (control one), Osenniy rymyanets, Anton Chekhov, Big Top, Nectarine Sklor. The content of biologically valuable substances in stone fruits, which determine not only their taste characteristics, but also their nutritional and therapeutic and prophylactic effects, is a criterion for high commercial quality of products. That is why we are faced with the task of assessing the chemical composition of peaches and nectarines, which directly depends on weather and climate conditions, varietal characteristics, place of growth, etc. It is known that the pulp of peaches and nectarines contains a large amount of sugars, organic acids (mainly malic), vitamins, enzymes, macro- and microelements. In assessing the taste qualities of peaches and nectarines, the content of sugars, acids and vitamin C (or ascorbic acid), which acts as an antioxidant, is of great importance. Biochemical analysis of peach and nectarine fruits revealed the maximum sugar content - 10.16% in the Larisa variety (control one) of mid-late ripening period, the minimum in the Rannyaya Zarya variety of early ripening period, which is significantly lower by 1.3 times compared to the control one. High vitamin C content in the Larisa variety fruits was noted - up to 16.56 mg%, which is significantly higher than other studied varieties by 2.60-5.19 mg%. Promising varieties Larisa and Anton Chekhov were distinguished by a balanced taste of fruits and resistance to abiotic factors of the environment of the Black Sea coast of Russia.

Identity Crisis in Strindberg’s Miss Julie and Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard: A Psychoanalytical Study

August Strindberg’s Miss Julie and Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard have always been recurrently analyzed within disputable studies concerning the characters’ psychoanalytic makeup, the characters’ breakdown at the break of a new social class, and a naturalistic, existential approach. Such a foundational approach for analysis is overpoweringly highlighted in the two plays within an unshakable regularity to the assumption that female identities in the two plays have undergone intense turmoil, toppled heavily in the middle of socioeconomic changes with the decline of aristocracy. However, this paper aims to juxtapose and compare the concept of identity crisis in association with the traumatic experiences of the two characters Miss Julie and Mrs. Ranyevskaia through a comparative psychoanalytic approach. It is inexplicable how the two addressed characters grapple with their different circumstances with fractured identities, where they fail to stand up for their social and gender roles and elevate their sense of individuation and selfhood in the middle of the surrounding deteriorations. Through a comparative analysis, this study lays the groundwork needed for exploring, interpreting, and investigating more nuanced reciprocal relationships associated with identity crisis.

Anton Chekhov in school and university teaching in the 2000s−2010s: discussion in the "Chekhov Herald"

The subject of the study is the features and main content of the discussion on the problems of teaching Chekhov's creativity in post-Soviet secondary and higher educational institutions presented on the pages of the information and bibliographic publication "Chekhov Herald" in the 2000s and 2010s. The problem of the need to create new educational and methodological manuals adequate to the post-Soviet socio-cultural situation, as well as the problem of spreading scientific knowledge about the life and work of A.P. Chekhov attracted the attention of leading modern Chekhov scholars, prompted them to create new educational materials, organize special conferences and, in general, to discuss this problem. The discussion allows us to judge both the latest problems and challenges of both academic Chekhov studies (and literary studies in general) and the school practice of teaching Chekhov's work and literature in general. The analysis of the materials presented on the pages of the information and bibliographic edition of the Chekhov Bulletin allows us to see the peculiarities of the dynamics of this discussion and modern Chekhov studies in general. The main conclusion of this analysis is that with the change in the socio-cultural situation from the turn of the 1990s‒2000s to the end of the 2010s, the challenges that the community of Chekhov scholars tried to answer, also changed. At the beginning of the 2000s, the appearance of new textbooks at the same time was accompanied by the problem of their inaccessibility, especially in the provinces; the widespread use of the Internet by the end of the 2000s – early 2010s partially solved this problem, but created a new one: the inaccessibility of high-quality information as the main problem was replaced by a decrease in the level of culture of reading and critical thinking among schoolchildren/students and, often, teachers, a decrease in the general cultural level leads to a widening gap between academic literary studies and school practice and an intensification of the intergenerational cultural gap, attempts by Czech scholars to influence the school study of Chekhov and Russian literature in general face the problem of unpopularity, lack of demand for scientific humanitarian knowledge in society.

Examining Theories at Work: Speech Acts, Implicatures and Politeness in a Pragmastylistic Analysis of Anton Chekhov’s The Bear

Through a descriptive qualitative method, Anton Chekhov’s The Bear is examined for its use of speech acts, implicatures, and politeness. To surface the said theories, a stylistic analysis is conducted, following the principles of pragma-stylistics. Pragmastylistics is used in analyzing a literary piece towards arriving at particular themes, and in which the focus of analysis is how a speaker or writer chooses to realize their speech act in consideration of the intended meaning and effect of which towards an audience. The subject of the following analysis is a one-act play considered to be a farcical comedy depicting the story of a woman mourning her husband’s recent death, amidst which she encounters and eventually falls in love with her deceased husband’s creditor. The analyses focused on the employment of the pragmatic theories of speech acts, cooperative principles and implicatures, and politeness. The paper attempted ultimately to show through an analysis of dramatic text how words could mean differently or even have meanings at all when put into context.

Challenging Misogyny: A Critical Examination of Gender Bias in Anton Chekhov's 'The Bear

"The Bear" by Anton Chekhov is a one-act play that explores the theme of misogyny through the interactions between the characters Smirnov and Mrs. Popova. Smirnov's misogynistic beliefs are revealed as he objectifies and belittles Mrs. Popova based on her gender. The play critiques the societal prejudices and stereotypes imposed on women during Chekhov's time, emphasizing the importance of gender equality and respect. Readers can see that Smirnov treats Popov rudely. The writer aims to analyze Smirnov's negative attitude towards Popov using feminist critical theory. Data is collected qualitatively. Analysis shows that Smirnov verbally intimidates Popov with lots of rude remarks about women. He accuses women of laziness, deception, and unfaithfulness.

Opening the boundaries of a literary text: Anton Chekhov’s novel “Kashtanka” and its film adaptation in teaching Russian as a foreign language

The article describes the work with a literary text and its adaptation in the classroom of Russian as a foreign language. In particular, we focus on the ways of understanding a literary text by including a film adaptation into classroom activities. Special attention is paid to the characteristics of the intersemiotic translation and its basic concepts: adaptation, film adaptation and interpretation. For the methodology of teaching Russian as a foreign language, this distinction is conditional and is of great interest from the point of view of understanding the idea and content of the literary text and the peculiarities of its interpretation. When working with international students, the use of screen versions of Russian literature texts helps, on the one hand, to simplify the process of understanding their meaning and key points by visualizing verbal and nonverbal components of the text, on the other hand, to complicate this work - to increase the amount of information provided. The present paper presents the algorithm of working on the text of the short story “Kashtanka” by Anton Chekhov and its film adaptations and formulates sample tasks for classroom and independent work.

Reception of Anton Chekhov's play "Uncle Vanya" in China

This paper examines several important translations of the play from the play's first appearance in China in 1930 to the present day, as well as research and analyses of the play by Chinese scholars. The author uses comparative-typological, comparative-historical, and interpretive methods as the leading research methods. Through the comparative-historical method the dependence between the socio-cultural conditions of the state and the peculiarities of the work's reception is established. The difference in the viewpoints of literary scholars and critics on the poetics and imagery of the play is explicated by the author of the work through the use of comparative-typological method. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the fact that some articles and books by Chinese critics and literary critics considering the peculiarities of the figurative structure and ideological content of A. P. Chekhov's play "Uncle Vanya" are the first to be included in the research turnover, allowing to establish the dependence of the perception of the work by Chinese readers on the socio-cultural conditions of the country. As a result, the author has shown that the perception of "Uncle Vanya" in China is closely connected with the social and political factors of the country, changing over time. The study showed that in the 21st century, more and more attention is paid to the artistic and literary aspects of the work.

TRANSLATIONS OF ANTON CHEKHOV’S PLAY “THE CHERRY ORCHARD” INTO GERMAN: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS

In spite of the fact that Anton Chekhov was skeptical about translations of his own works since he believed that his works would not be understood in the West, the first translations of his plays into German appeared already during his lifetime and were successfully staged in German theatres. The following article reviews translations of Anton Chekhov ‘s play “The Cherry Orchard” into German by Peter Urban, Johannes von Gunther, Gudrun Duvel and Hilde Angarova. It may be worth noting that there are two approaches to literary translation. One involves adapting text for the recipient, which inevitably leads to a significant difference between the original and translated texts. The other involves translating closely to the original. Considering the fact that all the abovementioned translators kept to the second concept, they had to accomplish the following tasks: preserving stylistic peculiarities of the original text, translating Russian realia into German, managing phraseological locutions, conveying speech portraits of the characters, as well as adapting the text to a theatrical performance since the text should be understandable for the audience and easily pronounced by the actors. In the article we paid special attention to how all the four translators managed the difficulties and presented a detailed contrastive analysis of their works. As a result of the study, we came to the conclusion that the translations by Peter Urban and Hilde Angarova were closest to the original text due to precisely chosen equivalents. The translation by Gudrun Duvel is not inferior to the translations of Peter Urban and Hilde Angarova in the selection of lexical means, but it often sounds insufficiently concise, which distances it in some cases from the original text. Although Johannes von Gunther offered some interesting translation solutions, his translations have a number of shortcomings, the main ones are incorrect translation of realia and unnecessary additions.

TRANSLATION OF GENDER PRONOUNS FROM RUSSIAN INTO PERSIAN: A CASE STUDY OF THE PLAY “THE CHERRY ORCHARD” BY ANTON CHEKHOV INTO PERSIAN BY SIMIN DANESHVAR

Russian is a synthetic language, whereas Persian is an analytical language. The structures of these two languages are different from each other. The difference between the structures of these two languages makes it difficult to translate from one language to the other. One of these differences is the presence of gender pronouns in Russian and its absence in Persian. This difference will lead to the fact that if there are two gender pronouns in a Russian sentence, the translator will have to apply some tricks to clarify the gender content of the above pronouns. The purpose of the article is to identify techniques and methods for clarifying the gender content of Russian gender pronouns when translating from Russian into Persian. The novelty of the article lies in the fact that this article for the first time considers this problem when translating from Russian into Persian and identifies methods for solving it. This study uses a descriptive and systematic approach. The static population of this study included Russian sentences containing gender pronouns from the text of the play “The Cherry Orchard” by Anton Chekhov. At the end of the article, the methods of translating Russian gender pronouns from Russian into Persian are listed and illustrated by the Persian translation of “The Cherry Orchard” made by Simin Daneshvar.

Under the Influence: Adaptation, Adultery, and Acceptance in Anton Chekhov's Uncle Vanya and Ryusuke Hamaguchi's Drive My Car

Under the Influence: Adaptation, Adultery, and Acceptance in Anton Chekhov's Uncle Vanya and Ryusuke Hamaguchi's Drive My Car

This Is What Evil Looks Like: Toward a Phenomenology of Evil in Postmodern Form

ABSTRACT: This essay draws on phenomenological and psychoanalytical insights to explore, comparatively, manifestations of evil during the twentieth-century totalitarianism and the post-truth present. The regimes of Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump, and Alexander Lukashenko provide contemporary examples. Special attention is paid to the genre of performative confession in Stalinist times and in the present. Authors mentioned include: Anne Applebaum, Hannah Arendt, Anton Chekhov, Nathan Englander, Sigmund Freud, René Girard, Jan Tomasz Gross, Irena Grudzińska Gross, Robert Hamerton-Kelly, Edmund Husserl, Leszek Kołakowski, Ivan Krastev, Marcin Król, Stanisław Jerzy Lec, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Czesław Miłosz, Jan Patočka, Tadeusz Słobodzianek, and Tomas Venclova.

The genre diversity of A.P. Chekhov's work and his vision of reality

The author examines the genre diversity of A.P. Chekhov's literary work. It is noted that Chekhov's works have an acute social orientation, pronounced psychologism, and a subtle artistic description of the literary characters. It is said that an interested reader can observe a deep insight into everyday reality, while experiencing a sense of inevitability of fundamental changes in society. Attention is paid to the speech features of Chekhov's characters, which allow us to accurately characterize their natural essence in a sufficiently capacious form. At the same time, the importance of using the innovative subtext in the works of Anton Chekhov, the linguistic means of character behavior, is fixed, taking into account the fact that the text and the subtext are separated and often contradict each other. It is stated that the bright artistic talent of A.P. Chekhov demonstrated the power of typicality, which allowed the images of his many literary creations to become household names. In addition, the features of Anton Chekhov's dramaturgy, his depiction of real life on the stage, and a detailed description of everyday life are outlined. It is said about the reception of Chekhov's dramatic works by modern domestic and foreign masters of culture. It is concluded that the demand for individual author's receptions of Chekhov's intertext in modern drama certainly confirms the relevance of his works to date. It is emphasized that this is due to the socio-philosophical nature of theatrical productions that touch on moral issues of human existence, since Chekhov's desire for the truth of life and the truth of everyday life creates prerequisites for increased interest in them at all times. A common thread is the idea that the prose and drama of the creator formed the conditions for the further development of realistic traditions in world literature.

BIOGRAPHICAL TRUTH THROUGH THE PRISM OF METAFICTIONAL REPRESENTATION IN IAN WATSON’S CHEKHOV’S JOURNEY

This study aims to spotlight the postmodern tendency of metafiction in Ian Watson’s novel “Chekhov's Journey”. Metafiction is self-conscious in relation to language, literary form, and storytelling in fiction. This form of fiction accentuates its construct and reminds the readers to be aware of a fictional work. Ian Watson is a noteworthy science-fiction writer, and his famous novelsare ‘The Embedding’ (1973) and ‘The Jonah Kit’ (1975), which brought him prestigious awards, while in this study we will focus on his metafictional work ‘Chekhov’s Journey’. This novel exhibits the subject of postmodern metafiction. In this novel, a modern-day actor uses hypnosis to simulate Anton Chekhov's 1890 journey through Siberia. The method of study adopted the metafiction theories proposed by Patricia Waugh and Linda Hutcheon. It highlights Ian Watson’s texts that represent the elements of metafiction through the protagonists. Using various theories related to postmodern metafiction, the view of metafiction in the work is substantiated and explored. The postmodern perspective of metafiction is explored in Ian Watson’s text and analyzed with metafiction theories. The study results are compared and discussed with other studies and contemporary texts concerning metafiction. The findings show that metafiction is applicable in the given work of Ian Watson. He projects the aspects of metafiction in his work through his writing, especially narration, both fiction and reality.

A Study of Human Relationships in Anton Chekhov's Narrative World: Isolation and Connection

A Study of Human Relationships in Anton Chekhov's Narrative World: Isolation and Connection

Лермонтовские тексты в творчестве П. И. Чайковского

Tchaikovsky’s musical legacy includes only two works related to Lermontov’s poetry. These are the song The Love of a Dead Man (1878), which is a part of Opus 38, and the a cappella chorus A Golden Cloud Spent the Night (1887). But there is information available about the composer’s other plans to compose music associated with Lermontov, manifested, in particular, in his intention to write the opera Bela to a libretto by Anton Chekhov. In both completed works, Tchaikovsky was not independent in his choice of texts, but the compositions were set to poems offered to him by other people. The song and the chorus are not equal to each other in their artistic significance: the song, unusual in its artistic solution, figuratively and intonationally connected with the characters of a few separate operas, becomes an special culmination in Opus 38; the chorus, on the contrary, is devoid of any expressive theme or interesting textural and harmonic features that distinguish the composer’s works, remaining merely a small example of the composer’s choral writing.

«Вы новые, я старый»: черновые автографы писем А.С. Суворина к Д.С. Мережковскому (1901–1911)

This work is the first to introduce handwritten drafts of the letters of A.S. Suvorin (1834–1912), owner and publisher of the “Novoye vremya” newspaper, to D.S. Merezhkovsky. The letters, which remained in the newspaper’s archive, cover the period from 1901 to 1911 and can explain the reasons for Suvorin’s interest in the young writer. Merezhkovsky was one of the objects of his passion for talented people, which was recalled by contemporaries and which explains his relationship, in particular, with Anton Chekhov. Suvorin’s letters to Merezhkovsky express his views as a critic, publisher, and theater owner, exhibiting an awareness of circumstances, business sense, and broad knowledge. Appearing as a representative of the “old” literature, he showed a keen perception of the aspirations of the “new” one. Suvorin attempted to hold Merezhkovsky back from an ill-timed publication of his letter to “Novoye vremya” about L. Tolstoy (1901). He also made detailed comments about the drama “Paul I” and reacted sharply to Merezhkovsky’s quoting of his words in the article “Nationalism and Religion” (1911). Attempts to patronize Merezhkovsky and support his endeavors concluded in a conflict with him towards the end of Suvorin’s life. The publication of handwritten drafts of Suvorin’s letters fills certain gaps in the notions about his contacts with the Merezhkovskys. Suvorin’s correspondence also illuminates his personal features and helps to restore the details of the literary life in the first decade of the 20th century.

Повесть А. Чехова «Чёрный монах» как объект композиторской рефлексии (на примере одноимённой оперы А. Курбатова)

The article examines Anton Chekhov’s literary heritage in the musical interpretation by Russian composers. The main material for study was formed by Chekhov’s novelette written in his late period and its opera version created by the young Russian composer Alexei Kurbatov. The enigmatic circumstances of the creation and the musical qualities of the short story served as the occasion for research by numerous literature and music scholars. A special place in this category is taken up by Nikolai Fortunatov’s scholarly work Muzykal'nost' chekhovskoi prozy [The Musical Qualities of Chekhov’s Prose], in which the researcher interprets the structure of the novelette as that of a sonata form. The authors of the present article examine Kurbatov’s operatic text making use of the method of a comparative literary-musical analysis and show how the structure of the opera, its musical themes and characterization of the images correlate with the hidden musical form of Chekhov’s prose. This is also aided by the genre chosen by the composer — a literary opera that preserves the original text and the outline of the plot.

Anton Chekhov’s “The Philistines” in terms of literature studies

The goal of the study is to clarify the chronological framework of the so called Sakhalin period of Chekhov’s biography. The analysis of the creation of “The Teacher of Literature” is conducted to achieve it. The fate of the story “The Teacher of Literature” appears to be somewhat confused: the writer adds together “The Philistines” (“Novoe Vremja”, November 28, 1889) and “The Teacher of Literature” (“Russkie Vedomosti”, July 10, 1894). Chekhov used to avoid reiteration in his publications; thus, he dismissed the first title, and the story first appeared in the collection “Novellas and Stories” (the beginning of December, 1894) under the title “The Teacher of Literature”. As if following the writer’s will “The Philistines” was not included into volume 7 of the Completed Works of Chekhov (1974-1982) thus creating the gap effect. Having rejected the dramatic ending of “The Philistines”, Chekhov seemed to have restored it later when writing “The Teacher of Literature”, which originally constituted the second chapter of the modern story. Taking into consideration the ending of “The Philistines” postponed for five years, the story itself can be regarded as a fact of the writer’s biography against the background of the epistolary evidence and can reveal the writer’s mood before his trip to Sakhalin Island. Thus, the speculations over the story’s ideas can be related to the issue concerning the genre of the book “Sakhalin Island”.

100th anniversary of Anton Chekhov’s death in Barcelona

The interest towards Anton Chekhov’s theatre entered a new phase in the end of the seventies of the 20th century in Barcelona. A quarter of century after Franco’s death the translations of Chekhov’s plays into Catalan and representations thereof recorded a new growth: translators and artists were trying to fill the gap resulting from the cultural crisis suffered under the dictatorship by introducing into the national cultural system some of the most recognized authors of the world, already considered classics in the western neighbour countries (France, Great Britain, Germany). The 100th anniversary of Chekhov’s death offered a perfect occasion to pay tribute to the Russian author’s memory. The present research sums up the principal events dedicated to the centenary of Chekhov’s death in 2004 in Barcelona and focuses on the staging of “Uncle Vanya” by Joan Ollé, one of the most memorable interpretations of this play in Catalonia, in order to evaluate the reception thereof through the analysis of periodical issues. Based on Hans-Robert Jauss’s approach to the literature as a constant interaction between the work of art, the public and the author, the study sheds light on the reception of Chekhov’s theatre in Catalonia and its evolution from the first direct translation of the play until a key staging which, in turn, became a reference for the following generations. The analysis concludes that the centenary of Chekhov’s death may be considered an inflection point in the history of his reception in Catalonia. Thanks to the production of the first canonical staging of “Uncle Vanya” in Catalan, Chekhov’s name stopped being associated exclusively with popular performances produced by foreign companies.