Plot summaries of the stories of Anton Chekhov - wdjoyner.org

Plot summaries of the stories of Anton Chekhov 

A. Chekhov ∗ 

July 5, 2012 

Contents 

This is a (growing) collection of plot summaries, since for the most part they 

seem to be missing from Chekhov’s Wikipedia pages [C]. When known, links 

are given to webpages with summaries. 

Short stories 

Plot summaries of the short stories of Anton Chekhov. 

1880 

1882 

• “Because of Little Apples” 

Note: Missing from Wikipedia. Appeared in [Y]. 

Summary: 

Teenage boy and his sweetheart are caught stealing apples by a cruel 

landowner and his sadistic assistant. The tortuous tribulations they put 

the young couple through is interuppted by the landowner’s daughter. The 

story ends with the landowner continuing his sick ways and the traumatized 

couple never seeing each other again. 

• “The Album” 

Note: The date for this story is unknown. Wikipedia gives 1882-1885. 

Text: 

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/13412 

∗ Compiled and latexed by D. Joyner, wdjoyner@gmail.com 

1

• “At the Barber’s” 


Text: 


• “Boots” 


Text: 


• “A Classical Student” 


Text: 


• “A Country Cottage” 

Note: Not to be confused with “At a Country House” The date for this 

story is unknown. Wikipedia gives 1882-1885. 

Text: 


• “An Enigmatic Nature” 


Text: 


• “Gone Astray” 


Text: 


• “An Inquiry” 


Text: 


• “In the Hotel” 

Text: 


• “Joy” 


Text: 


2

• “Late-Blooming Flowers” 

Summary: 

http://litmed.med.nyu.edu/Annotation?action=view&annid=11818 

• “A Living Chattel” 


Text: 


• “Malingers” 


Text: 


• “Nerves” 


Text: 


• “Oh! The Public” 

Note: The date for this “early” story is unknown. Wikipedia gives 1882- 

1885. 

Summary: 

A story told by a self-critical drinking man who is a ticket collector working 

on a train. One of the passengers argues with him, saying he is sick and 

dying and wants to sleep. In truth, he has no ticket. This repeats. Finally, 

the collector goes back his compartment to have another drink. 

Audio: Read by Kenneth Branagh (on youtube, 

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=92A3C135220A7135). 

Text: 


• “A Slander” 


Text: 



• “A Tragic Actor” 

Text: 


3

1883 

• “The Bird Market” 

Text: 


• “The Daughter of Albion” 

Text: 


• “The Death of a Civil Servant” 

Note: Also “The Death of a Government Clerk” 

Text: 


• “An Incident at Law” 

• “Fat and Thin” 

Summary: 

This is about two school friends who meet by chance years later after they 

are grown up. They are happy and friendly towards the other. When one 

discovers the other is a Privy Councillor, he becomes overly formal and 

ruins the happiness of the meeting. 



Text: 


• “Rapture” 

• “The Swedish Match” 

Note: Wikipedia says the day of this story is unknown, giving 1882-1885. 

However, litmed gives 1883. Early detective story, pre-dating Sherlock 

Holmes’ story by Arthur Conan Doyle but not Edgar Allan Poe’s in “The 

Murders of the Rue Morgue” (which Poe published in 1841). 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “The Trousseau” 

Text: 


4

• “Two in One” 

1884 


Summary: 

A rich boss rides a streetcar for a change. He hears a confident conversationalist 

who sounds like his meek clerk, but with more intellience than he 

expected. When the boss laughs suddenly, the clerk recognizes him and 

reverts to the meek personality he takes at work. 

• “A Chameleon” 

Summary: 

Amusing story of an officer who cannot make up his mind what to do to 

the owner of a dog who has bitten a shop-keeper. The dog could be a 

General’s pet. He puts on or takes off his coat each time he changes his 

mind. 

Text: 


• “The Complaints Book” 

• “Choristers” 

Text: 


• “A Dreadful Night” 

• “In the Graveyard” 

Text: 


• “In a Strange Land” 

Text: 


• “Minds in Ferment” 

Text: 


• “Oysters” 

Summary: 

A young boy and his father are starving. He begs rich men for oysters and 

they feed him, mocking him when he bites into the shell. His father still 

hungry, watches over him in the hospital. 


5

1885 

Text: 


• “Perpetuum Mobile” 


Summary: 

We’ve gotten into a vicious circle, one of the protagonists remarks near 

the end of the story. The two men have a duty to perform - after all, there 

is a corpse waiting for them in a village down the road - but somehow 

they keep going around in circles. 


• “The Skit” 


Summary: 

A skit is written and read by its author to some friends. First, they love 

it. Then they suggest changes. Then they say to trash it. 

• “Vint” Note: Missing from Wikipedia. Appeared in [Y]. The game of vint 

is also known as “Russian whist”. 

Summary: 

An administrator passes his office building one night after work on the 

way home from the theater. Seeing lights on, he goes inside expecting his 

workers to be working on a eport. Instead, they are playing vint, but using 

card combinations named after the the administrators (including himself). 

He joins them. The story ends with the janitor overhearing some of their 

funny-sounding arguments over their card game. 

• “Worse and worse” 


Summary: 

A choir master is sued by one of his members for insulting him. The former 

apologizes to the latter, but in the process makes even more insults. Once 

in court, he gets 2 months jail time. He insults the trial judge and the 

appelate judge as well. 

• “The Cook’s Wedding” 

Text: 


• “A Dead Body” 

Text: 


6

• “Drowning” 


Summary: 

A hustler works the docks trying to get money for jumping off the dock 

to impersonate a drowning victim. The first man is not at all interested. 

The second is, but will give him hardly any money for the act. The man 

jumps in, does his thrashing, gets out soaking wet and collects his money. 

• “The Fish” 

Text: 


• “The Head of the Family” 

Text: 


• “The Huntsman” 

Summary: 

While walking along the roadside, a hunter is stopped by his long-separated 

wife rushing out of a crop field. 

• “The Looking Glass” 

Text: 


• “Mari d’Elle” 

Text: 


• “The Malefactor [The Culprit]” 

• “A Man of Ideas” 

• “The Marshal’s Widow” 

Text: 


• “The Misfortune” 

Note: Also, “A Misfortune” or “A Calamity” 

Summary: 

A story of the bored wife of a notary republic who is pusued by a younger 

lawyer. She, “like a bumblebee bumping up against the window-pane,” 

yearns to escape her marriage and run away with him. 

Text: 


7

• “Overdoing It” 

Text: 


• “Old Age” 

Text: 


• “Saintly simplicity” 


Summary: 

A son returns home to visit his father after many years absence. The 

father, a priest, cannot believe his son, now a very successful lawyer, has 

become so wealthy and distant. 

• “Sergeant Prishibeyev” 

Summary: 

Sgt P thinks he must control people, as though they were Army subordinates, 

even when he is out taking a stroll with his wife. On one occasion, 

he assaults a policeman and is taken before a judge. The story takes place 

duirng the trial when the Sgt tries to explain his actions to the court. 

• “Small Fry” 

Text: 


• “Sorrow” 

Text: 


• “Two of a Kind” 


Summary: 

A newly married young couple are visiting relatives. Embarrassment over 

the relatives’ behavior is replaced by releif when they find that the oher 

spouse’s relatives are also crazy. 

• “The Villiage Elder” 


Summary: 

A man tells a story of a village “bumpkin” wh makes good and is elected 

Village Elder. Not wanting this position of responsibility, he does all he 

can to be discharged. 

8

1886 

• “An Actor’s End” 

Summary: 

A story of an actor who becomes ill and thinks he is dying. He wants to 

go home, interuppting the play is is performing in. The other actors in the 

play try to cheer him up and talk him out of it, not believing he is about 

to die. One at a time, day after day, they visit him in his hotel room, 

trying to comfort him with one “remedy” (e.g., castor oil) or another. All 

the sick actor wants to talk about is going to his home town. After a few 

days lying in his hotel-room bed, he dies. 



Text: 


• “Agafya” 

Summary: 

http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/chekhov/section9.rhtml 

• “Anyuta” 

Text: 


• “Art” 

Text: 


• “At the Mill” 

Note: Seems to be missing from WIkipedia. 

Summary: 

This is a story of a mill owner who is well-off thanks to his mill and the 

well-stocked river. His selfish character is made clear when it is revealed 

that the woman he is speaking impersonally to for most of the story is his 

impoverished mother. 

• “At a Summer Villa” 

Text: 


• “A Blunder” 

Text: 


9

• “The Chemist’s Wife” 

Text: 


• “Children” 

Note: Also “Kids” (however, WIkipedia lists “Kids” and “Children” as 

separate stories in 1886) 

Text: 


• “The Chorus Girl” 

Text: 


• “A Day in the Country” 

Text: 


• “The Dependents” 

Text: 


• “Difficult People” 

Text: 


• “Dreams” 

Also “Daydreams”. 

Summary: 

Two police officers escort an escaped prisoner who tells them a story of 

hope. 

• “Excellent People” (“Difficult People”) 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “The First-Class Passenger” 

Text: 


• “A Gentleman Friend” 

Text: 


10

• “Grisha” 

Text: 


• “A Happy Man” 

Text: 


• “The Husband” 

Text: 


• “Hush” 

Summary: 

Story of a journalist who is a writer at night after work. He complains of 

the life of a writer, agonizing his wife and family in the process. 



Text: 


• “Hydrophobia” 

Note: Missing from Wikipedia. Appeared in [Y]. Slightly revised in 1901 

as “The Wolf”. 

Summary: 

A tale of a hunter’s fight with a wolf. He worries about catching hydrophobia 

as a result of being in contact with a possibly rabid wolf. 

• “An Incident” 

Note: Not to be confused with “A Trivial Incident”, from the same year. 

Text: 


• “In the Court” 

Text: 


• “In the Dark” 

Text: 


• “Ivan Matveyitch” 

Text: 


11

• “A Jeune Premiere” 

Text: 


• “A Joke” 

Note: Also, “The Little Joke” 

Text: 


• “Ladies” 

Text: 


• “The Lodger” 


Summary: 

A husband of a wife who owns an apartment complex realizes he is just 

as much of a lodger as the other tenants. 

• “Love” 

Text: 


• “Martyrs” 

Text: 


• “Mire” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “Misery” 

Note: Also “Heartache” 

Summary: 

This is a story of a father who has lost his son. He drives a carriage and 

his customers do not listen as he tells them his son has died. 




Text: 


12

• “Not Wanted” 

Text: 


• “On the Road” 

Text: 


• “The Orator” 

Summary: 

A story of a gifted orator who is asked to speak at a funeral. The orator 

knew the deceased as a rascal” and on his way to the funeral stopped 

by several bars for a drink. The orator called the deceased by the wrong 

name, said he was a bachelor (while is weeping wife sat in front of him), 

and described his features incorrectly. During the speech, he discovers the 

error himself and gets into an argument with the fellow who escorted him 

to the gravesite. In fact, the person the orator spoke of was also at the 

funeral and was insulted by the descriptions of him. Good dry, black-ish 

humr. 



Text: 


• “Other People’s Misfortune” 


Summary: 

A wealthy couple, young and newly married, are on a trip to buy another 

house - a “romantic nook” in the country. They arrive at an estate (with its 

own fishing pond, guest house, and separate building housing the kitchen) 

still occupied by its elderly owners. They cannot afford the property taxes 

and so must sell. The young husband mocks them behind their back, while 

the young wife pities them. 

• “Panic Fears” 

Text: 


• “A Peculiar Man” 

Text: 


• “A Pink Stocking” 

Text: 


13

• “The Princess” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “The Privy Councillor” 

Summary: 

Humorous story of a brother visiting his sister, and getting her to pay for 

his trip abroad so that she can have some peace and quiet. 

Text: 


• “The Requiem” 

Text: 


• “Revenge” 

• “Romance with Double-Bass” 

• “The Schoolmaster” 

Text: 


• “A Story Without an End” 

Text: 


• “Strong Impressions” 

Text: 


• “Talent” 

Text: 


• “A Trifle From Life” 

Text: 


• “A Tripping Tongue” 

Text: 


14

• “A Trivial Incident” 

1887 

Text: 


• “A Troublesome Visitor” 

Text: 


• “An Upheaval” 

Text: 


• “Van’ka” 

Also “Vanka” 

Summary: 

A nine year old boy writes his grandfather asking him to rescue him from 

the home he is forced to live in. He is a servant and poorly treated. 

Text: 


• “Who Was to Blame?” 

Text: 


• “Women Make Trouble” 


Summary: 

A witness is summoned for questioning by a judge. A man is accused 

of beating his wife. According to the witness, he beats everyone, wife 

included. His abuse is tolerated because her has more money than the 

others. 

• “A Work of Art” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “Aborigines” 

Text: 


15

• “An Adventure” 

Text: 


• “An Avenger” 

Summary: 

Humorous story of a man who finds his wife with another man and goes 

to buy a gun. He buys a fishing net instead. 

Text: 


• “Bad Business” 

Text: 


• “Bad Weather” 

Text: 


• “Beggar” 

Text: 


• “Boa Constrictor and the Rabbit” 


Summary: 

Unlikely tale of a man describing how he would seduce a happily married 

woman. 

• “Boys” 

Text: 


• “The Cattle-Dealers” 

Text: 


• “Champagne” 

Text: 


• “The Cossack” 

Text: 


16

• “The Coach-House” 

Text: 


• “Darkness” 

Text: 


• “A Defenseless Creature” 

Also “A Defenceless Creature” 

Text: 


• “The Doctor” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “Drunk” 

Text: 


• “On Easter Eve” 

Note: Some date this story as 1886. 

Also “Easter Eve”, “The Night Before Easter”, “Easter Night” 

Summary: 

The traveler’s conversation with the ferryman, perhaps leavened by his 

later all-night Easter Vigil, leads him to a mystical event as he returns 

across the river. He experiences a sense of oneness in which grief and 

happiness, time and eternity, fuse. 

Summary: 



Text: 

http://classiclit.about.com/library/bl-etexts/achekhov/bl-achek-easteve. 

htm 

• “The Encounter” 

Note: Also “An Encounter” 

Missing from Wikipedia (but in “The Portable Chekhov”) 

See also http://people.brandeis.edu/~teuber/chekhovbio.html 

Summary: 

This is a story about a devoted Denisov who roams the country begging 

17

for funds to rebuild his church. He runs across Kuzma, a thief and a liar 

who takes his money. Out of guilt, he tries to return what is left, but 

Denisov only repeats “It’s God’s money.” 

• “Enemies” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “The Examining Magistrate” 

Text: 


• “Expensive Lessons” 

Text: 


• “A Father” 

Text: 


• “From the Diary of a Violent Tempered Man” 

Text: 


• “Frost” 

Text: 


• “Happiness” 

Summary: 

Living in a world of superstition and fear, the characters in this story 

believe that happiness is just beyond their grasp. They are convinced 

that the countryside is full of buried treasure, but no one knows how to 

find it. They see their lives as a long quest for happiness, without realizing 

that the treasure is within them all along. 


• “A Happy Ending” 

Note: Not to be confused with “Happiness” 

Text: 


18

• “Home” 

Summary: 

This is a story of a father trying to teach a lesson to his son (to stop 

smoking). He eventually succeeds not though logic but through a story. 


Text: 


• “An Inadvertence” 

Text: 


• “In Passion Week” 

Text: 


• “In Trouble” 

Text: 


• “Kashtanka” 

Summary: 

The story about a dog is told by an omniscient narrator who privileges 

Kashtanka’s point of view, so we follow the dog’s subsequent adventures 

largely from her eyes. 


Text: 


• “The Kiss” 

Summary: 

In this story, Ryabovitch, a real loser of an ordinary man, undergoes two 

extraordinary experiences. In the first of these, he stumbles by chance 

into a passionate kiss, a kiss that seems to promise a plenitude of future 

happiness. The second extraordinary experience takes place near the end 

of the tale, when Ryabovitch undergoes a flash of insight or enlightenment. 

He suddenly detaches himself from the world, learns to expect nothing, 

and comes to understand that life is “an unintelligible, aimless jest.” 


Text: 


• “A Lady’s Story” 

Text: 


19

• “The Letter” 

Summary: 

Story of an archdeacon who has two visitors late one night after a long 

day. One is a failed priest, who as “lost his way” by drinking too much 

and not following proper church protocols. The other has “lost his way” 

because he cannot love his brother for who he is. The letter is written by 

the archdeacon for the second priest. Despite his failings, the first priest 

shows more compassion. 

Text: 

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Letter_(Chekhov) 

• “The Lion and the Sun” 

Text: 


Text: 

http://www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/ac/jr/140.htm 

• “The Lottery Ticket” 

Text: 


• “A Mystery” 

Text: 


• “The Old House” 

Text: 


• “A Play” 

Text: 


• “Polinka” 

Text: 


• “A Problem” 

Text: 


• “The Runaway” 

Text: 


20

• “Shrove Tuesday” 

Text: 


• “The Siren” 

Summary: 

An amusing story of a panel of judges who disagree on a case; the judge 

who opposes an opposite opinion must write an opinion; the others tak 

about the dishes serves at their regular restaurant outing, causing the 

opposing judge to be distracted and drop his opposition and join them for 

dinner. 

• “Too Early!” 

Text: 


• “A Transgression” 

Text: 


• “Typhus” 

Summary: 


Text: 


Text: 


• “Verotchka” 

Also “Verochka” 

Text: 


• “Volodya” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “Zinotchka” 

Text: 


21

1888 

• “The Beauties” 

Text: 


• “At a Country House” 


Text: 


• “Attack of Nerves” 

Summary: 

This story concerns the dilemma posed by the recognition that there is 

large scale human suffering in the world which the individual is powerless 

to alter. 


• “An Awkward Business” 

Summary: 

This story illustrates both a conflict of conscience and a conflict between 

social classes. 


• “Lights” 

Text: 


• “A Nervous Breakdown” 

Text: 


• “The Party” 

Note: Also “The Name-Day Party” 

Summary: 

A story about the wife of a lawyer who have a party one night at their 

estate by a lake. While she was busy as a hostess, he flirted with the 

female guests, hurting her feelings. Towards the end of the story it is 

revealed that she is very pregnant. She delivers a still-born baby the next 

day. 

Text: 


• “The Shoemaker and the Devil” 

Text: 


22

• “Sleepy” 

1889 

Text: 


• “A Story WIthout a Title” 

Summary: 

Story of visitor to an isolated monastery. He criticizes the hospitable 

monks, telling them they should try to save the people in the local town 

who were sinning from ignorance. This stirred the Father Superior to go 

out into the town for 3 months. Shocked, he returned to the monastery 

to tell the monks of his experiences. He described drunken debauchry 

and widespead sinning. When he finished, he went to his cell to sleep. 

The next morning, he discovered that all the other monks had left the 

monastery to live in the town. 



Text: 


• “An Unpleasantness” 


Summary: 

A relatively long (23p) story of a hospital physician who strikes his assistant 

with his fist. He must deal with his own anger issues in the process. 

In the end, no one is fired and life goes on as before. 

• “The Wife” 

Text: 


• “A Woman’s Kingdom” 

Text: 


• “The Bet” 

Note: The bass of an episode of “The Twilight Zone” TV series written 

by Rod Serling. 

Summary: 

A banker and a young lawyer who make a bet with each other about 

whether the death penalty is better or worse than life in prison. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bet_(short_story) 

Text: 


23

• “A Dreary Story” 

1890 

1891 

1892 

Text: 


• “Gusev” 

Also “Goussiev” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “The Horse Stealers” 

Note: A quotation: “If one reasons from science, of course, there are no 

devils, for it’s a superstition; but if one looks at it simply, as you and I 

do, there are devils ... ” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “The Duel” 

Note: See the entry in the Novella section . 

• “Peasant Wives” 

Summary: 


• “A Boring Story” 

Summary: 


• “After the Theater” 

Text: 


• “The Grasshopper” 

Summary: 


24

1893 

Another summary: 


Text: 


• “In Exile” 

Summary: 


Text: 


Text: 


• “Neighbors” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “Terror” 

Note: This story is about the strangeness and uncertainty in ordinary life. 

How can we know what is right? How can we tell the good from the evil? 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “Ward No. 6” 

Note: Some sources put this as written in 1890. 

Summary: 

This is a long story (45 pages) in which we encounter the conflict of story 

versus philosophy, individuality versus abstraction. A lazy mental hospital 

administrator befreinds a patient and eventually becomes a patient 

himself. 



Text: 


• “An Anonymous Story” 

See “novella” section for this. 

25

• “The Two Volodyas” 

1894 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “The Black Monk” 

Summary: 

This story follows the character Andrey Kovrin, a Russian scholar who is 

seemingly brilliant. On a vacation, he starts seeing a black monk, goes 

crazy, and dies. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Black_Monk_(short_story) 


Text: 


• “The Head Gardner’s Story” 

Note: Also “The Head-Gardner’s Story” 

Wikipedia merely gives the date of this story as 1888-1895. 

litmed gives 1894. 

However, 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “Rothschild’s Fiddle” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “The Student” 

Note: This simple story captures a profound mystical experience. The 

story tells of betrayal and remorse - a very human sequence but also offers 

the hope of forgiveness. 

Summary: 


• “The Teacher of Literature” 

Summary: 

Recall the first two of the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths: suffering informs 

26

1895 

all of human life, and the cause of suffering is desire. Nikitin wins the 

object of his desire, and ought to be perfectly happy, but he soon realizes 

that something is missing - he is dissatisfied, he wants to escape the confinement 

and ordinariness of his life. But we know that no matter where 

he goes, dissatisfaction will follow him, unless he renounces desire and 

achieves Enlightenment. 


Text: 


• “Anna on the Neck” 

Summary: 

A story of a poor young woman who marries an older rich man for convenience 

and not love. In the begining she reaches out to her family for 

consolation. In the end, she finds a young single man to escort her to 

social events and they become more distance. 

Text: 


• “The Helpmate” 

Note: Also, “His Wife” Not to be confused with “The Wife” 

Text: 


• “Murder” 

Summary: 

Matvey Terekhov lives with his cousin Yakov, who runs an inn. Matvey 

was once extremely religious and ascetic, but now has left asceticism behind. 

Yakov, on the other hand, is obsessively religious. At one point 

Matvey initiates an argument with Yakov about a religious issue. Yakov 

is overcome with anger and Aglaya, Yakov’s wife, hits Matvey over the 

head with a bottle, and kills him. Husband and wife are sent to prison 

in Siberia. While Yakov loses his faith after the murder, he regains it in 

prison. 


• “Whitebrow” 

Text: 


• “Ariadna” 

Summary: 


27

1896 

1897 

Text: 


• “An Artist’s Story [The House with the Mezzanine]” 

Note: Also called “The House with an Attic” 

Summary: 


Text: 


Text: 


• “My Life” 

Note: The story contrasts the hypocrisy of the upper class, who believe 

that manual labor is demeaning, but who are also morally corrupt, with 

Misail’s gradual development of an authentic personal commitment to the 

simple life. 

Summary: 


Text: 



• “At Home” 

Text: 


• “Peasants” 

Summary: 

A detailed story (45 pages) of a man and his family who must return to 

the rural village he grew up in, after losing his job in Moscow. It is a 

study of the lower depths of poverty and rural life. 

Text: 

http://www.online-literature.com/o_henry/1285/ 

• “The Petchenyeg” 

Text: 


28

• “The Schoolmistress [In the Cart]” 

1898 

Summary: 

This is a story of a school teacher who is riding in a cart, as she regularly 

does, to go to town to collect her paycheck. She day dreams of the people 

she knew when she was younger. 

Text: 


• “About Love” 

Note: Also, “A Little Trilogy: Concerning Love” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “A Doctor’s Visit” 

Note: Also, “A Case History” or “A Medical case” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “Gooseberries” 

Note: Also, “The Little Trilogy: Gooseberries” 

Summary: 


Text: 



• “Ionych” 

Note: Also “Ionitch” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “The Man in a Case” 

Note: Also, “The Little Trilogy: The Man in the Case” or “The Little 

Trilogy: The Man in the Shell” or “The Little Trilogy: A Hard Case” 

29

1899 

A fascinating story of character. Chekhov uses the device of a tale within 

a tale. 

Summary: 


Text: 


• “A Visit to Friends” 


Summary: 

A successful Moscow lawyer gets a letter from three sisters he knew as a 

young man. The implore him to visit, with the hope that he will take 

pity and help them save their family estate. Through poor management, 

their estate must be sold and he thinks about the life he might have lead 

had he married one of the sisters. In the end, he returns to Moscow to his 

work, never to think of them again. 

• “The Darling” 

Summary: 



Text: 


• “The Lady with the Dog” 

Summary: 

This tells the story of an adulterous affair between a Russian banker and 

a young lady he meets while vacationing in Yalta. The story comprises 

four parts: (I) describes the initial meeting in Yalta, (II) the consummation 

of the affair and the remaining time in Yalta, (III) Gurov’s return 

to Moscow and his visit to Anna’s town, and (IV) Anna’s visits to Moscow. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lady_with_the_Dog_(short_story) 


Text: 



• “On Official Duty” 

Summary: 


Text: 


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• “The New Villa” 

1900 

1902 

1903 

Summary: 


• “At Christmas Time” 

Summary: 


• “In the Ravine” 

Summary: 


• “The Bishop” 

Summary: 


• “Betrothed [The Fiance]” 

Note: Chekhov’s last completed story. 

Summary: 


Text: 


Novellas 

Plot summaries of the novellas of Anton Chekhov. 

1884 

The Shooting Party 

Note: The first novel (ever) written in the format of a mystery. In its 

innovative structure, the book prefigures Agatha Christie’s most famous novel, 

“The Murder of Roger Ackroyd” written 45 years later. Christie’s novel caused 

a sensation with its narrator-as-murderer plot device. It is interesting that 

The Shooting Party was first translated into English in 1926, only a few years 

before Agatha Christie published “Roger Ackroyd.” Perhaps Chekhov invented 

Agatha Christie’s famous device. 

Summary: 


31

1888 

The Steppe 

Summary: 


1891 

The Duel 

Note: Wikipedia called this a “short story” as opposed to a “novella.” 

Summary: 


Text: 


http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Duel_(Chekhov-Garnett) 

1893 

An Anonymous Story 

Note: Alternate translations: The Story of an Unknown Man/The Story of 

a Nobody 

Summary: 


Text: 


1895 

Three Years 

Summary: 


Text: 


1896 

My Life 

Summary: 


Plays 

Plot summaries of the plays of Anton Chekhov. 

32

1881 

1886 

1887 

1888 

• That Worthless Fellow Platonov 

Note: Also known as “Platonov.’ 

• On the Harmful Effects of Tobacco ( 1886, 1902) 

Note: Revised in 1902. Both versions appeared in [Y]. 

Summary: 


Text: 

http://method.vtheatre.net/doc/tobacco.html 

http://www.wdjoyner.org/writing/public-domain/chekhov/ 

• Swansong - a one-act play 

Text: 


• Ivanov 

Note: A drama in four acts 

Also “Ivanoff” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• The Bear 

Note: A one act comedy 

Also “The Boor” 

Summary: 


Text: 


• A Marriage Proposal 

Note: A one act play. Written 1888-1889. Also “The Proposal” 

Text: 


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1889 

1891 

1896 

1899 

1901 

• A Tragedian in Spite of Himself 

Note: Also, “A Reluctant Tragic Hero” 

Text: 


• The Wedding 

Note: One act. 

Text: 


• The Wood Demon 

Note: A four-act comedy 

• The Festivities 

• The Seagull 

Note: A comedy in four acts 

Summary: 


Text: 


• Uncle Vanya 

Note: Written: 1899-1900 

Based on The Wood Demon 

Summary: 


Text: 


• Three Sisters 

Note: A drama in four acts 

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1904 

Summary: This is a beautiful play of character, relationship, and motivation. 

It explores the gap between hope and fulfillment in the lives of the 

Prozorovs and their friends. 


Text: 


• The Cherry Orchard 

Note: A comedy in four acts 

Summary: 


Text: 


References 

[C] 

A. Chekhov 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Chekhov 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Chekhov_bibliography 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_short_stories_by_Anton_ 

Chekhov 

Stories of Anton Chekhov: 

http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/authors/c#a708 

[Y] Avrahm Yarmolinsky (translator and editor), The Unknown Chekhov Farrar, 

Straus and Giroux, 1999. 

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Plot summaries of the stories of Anton Chekhov - wdjoyner.org

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