Chekhov. A Biography

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Chekhov is an incomparable artist. An artist of life. And the worth of his creation consists of this — he is understood and accepted not only by every Russian, but by all humanity.

— Leo Tolstoy

Preface

There are various ways of writing a biography, but one way not to write it is to leave the reader in doubt, at the end, about how the hero would act in any given situation. The image must be a complete one, for to possess the whole man is to know his whole life, his total person­ality as it develops and takes final shape. In a special sense the enigma of Chekhov's complex personality yields to resolution, if ever, only through an awareness of the myriad of small actions that determined and gave meaning to the significant periods of ebb and flow in his forty- four years. A high degree of selectivity is necessarily involved in what has been set down, but all the accessible data connected with Che­khov's life, including his creative writings, that would contribute to an understanding of the man has been drawn upon, in the effort to achieve a faithful and living portrayal.

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