Chekhov: 475 books

Instead of memorizing vocabulary words, work your way through an actual well-written novel. Even novices can follow along as each individual English paragraph is paired with the corresponding Russian paragraph. It won't be an easy project, but you'll learn a lot.

Instead of memorizing vocabulary words, work your way through an actual well-written novel. Even novices can follow along as each individual English paragraph is paired with the corresponding Russian paragraph. It won't be an easy project, but you'll learn a lot.

Olenka, the daughter of the retired collegiate assessor, Plemyanniakov, was sitting in her back porch, lost in thought. It was hot, the flies were persistent and teasing, and it was pleasant to reflect that it would soon be evening. Dark rainclouds were gathering from the east, and bringing from time...

In Ariadne, we meet Ivan Shamokhin on a steamer bound for Sebastopol. Ivan tells the story of his helpless love for Ariadne, a beautiful but cold young woman. Ariadne is selfish, her whole life is style and surface. Ivan becomes her lover, and with his money almost gone and his life destroyed he is still...

The cabman Iona's son recently died. He desperately and unsuccessfully tries to have a talk with the people he meets and tell them of how shattered he is. He ends up talking to his horse.

Nellie, a young and pretty girl, dreaming day and night of being married, gazes into a looking-glass. In the mirror her future husband emerges and they live together through days and months in fast forward, yet she sees her future distinctly in all its details.

Obviously he was born a mouse catcher, a worthy son of his bloodthirsty ancestors. Fate had destined him to be the terror of cellars, store-rooms and cornbins, and had it not been for education . . .

The death of a government clerk is a short humoristic story which was published in 1883. In this story the author raises the problem of a "little" man. In the article there are only three persons: a government clerk, a wife of the clerk and a general Brizzhalov. The main hero is a government...

This story was written in 1886. Vanka Zhukov was a Nine-year-old boy who was an orphan and he was a pupil of the shoemaker - Alyakhin. His grandfather was watchman in the mansion of some gentlefolk called Zhivarev. On the eve of Christmas Vanka decided to write a letter to his grandfather. In the...

The charming Vanda, or, as she was described in her passport, the “Honourable Citizen Nastasya Kanavkin,” found herself, on leaving the hospital, in a position she had never been in before: without a home to go to or a farthing in her pocket. What was she to do?

"Joy" is a funny story by content and sad in itself. It was a great short story that focused on the very different responses to the indiscretion of the main hero. The main hero of the story Mitya with excited face bursted into a room of his parents, woke them up and cried that all Russia...

Checkhov says truth and falsehood both play an important role in personal happiness of men. Could this also be the cause of both passionate romance and failed relationship between an impoverished Russian prince and a rich landowner? This story examines the very essence of human psychology providing valuable insight into complexities of such concepts as happiness, deception, romance and depression.

The party of sportsmen spent the night in a peasant’s hut on some newly mown hay. The moon peeped in at the window; from the street came the mournful wheezing of a concertina; from the hay came a sickly sweet, faintly troubling scent. The sportsmen talked about dogs, about women, about first love, and about snipe.

“A Happy Man” is a very funny and satiric story that tells us that happiness is easy and everything is in our hands. The action happens in the passenger train. One man tries to find his carriage, opening doors and saying “No, wrong again!” every time he misses. But suddenly he hears his name...