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VERSHININ: Take Copernicus or Columbus, for instance — didn't their discoveries seem useless or ridiculous at first, and some fool's empty nonsense seem the truth?
Anton Chekhov
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Everything is quiet, peaceful and against it all is only the silent protest of statistics...
Anton Chekhov
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In a century or two, or in a millennium, people will live in a new way, a happier way. We won"t be there to see it - but it"s why we live, why we work. It"s why we suffer. We"re creating it. That"s the purpose of our existence. The only happiness we can know is to work toward that goal.
Anton Chekhov
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It is the writer's business not to accuse and not to prosecute, but to champion the guilty, once they are condemned and suffer punishment.
Anton Chekhov
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The time's come: there's a terrific thunder-cloud advancing upon us, a mighty storm is coming to freshen us up....It's going to blow away all this idleness and indifference, and prejudice against work....I'm going to work, and in twenty-five or thirty years' time every man and woman will be working.
Anton Chekhov
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You look boldly ahead; isn't it only that you don't see or divine anything terrible in the future; because life is still hidden from your young eyes.
Anton Chekhov
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If I wanted to order a ring for myself, the inscription I should choose would be: "Nothing passes away." I believe that nothing passes away without leaving a trace, and that every step we take, however small, has significance for our present and our future existence.
Anton Chekhov
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Faith is a capacity of the spirit. It is like talent: you have to be born with it
Anton Chekhov
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Oh, I don't object, of course, to cutting wood from necessity, but why destroy the forests? The woods of Russia are trembling under the blows of the axe. Millions of trees have perished. The homes of the wild animals and birds have been desolated; the rivers are shrinking, and many beautiful landscapes are gone forever. And why? Because men are too lazy and stupid to stoop down and pick up their fuel from the ground.
Anton Chekhov
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You only have to start a job of work to realize how few decent, honest folk there are about.
Anton Chekhov
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In short stories it is better to say not enough than to say too much, because, because--I don't know why.
Anton Chekhov
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And it is the way with us that you may express disapproval of the sun or the moon, or anything you like, but God preserve you from touching the Liberals! Heaven forbid!
Anton Chekhov
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When one sees one of the romantic creatures before him he imagines he is looking at some holy being, so wonderful that its one breath could dissolve him in a sea of a thousand charms and delights; but if one looks into the soul -- it's nothing but a common crocodile.
Anton Chekhov
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A doctor is called in, but a nurse sent for.
Anton Chekhov
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Perhaps man has a hundred senses, and when he dies the five senses that we know perish with him, and the other ninety-five remain alive... Everything that is unattainable for us now will one day be near and clear... But we must work.
Anton Chekhov
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A woman is fascinated not by art but by the noise made by those in the field.
Anton Chekhov
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What did your uncle die of? Instead of fifteen Butkin drops, as the doctor prescribed, he took sixteen.
Anton Chekhov
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Ah, Caviar! I keep on eating it, but can never get my fill. Like olives. It's a lucky thing it's not salty.
Anton Chekhov
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Sometimes we go to a play and after the curtain has been up five minutes we have a sense of being able to settle back in the arms of the playwright. Instinctively we know that the playwright knows his business.
Anton Chekhov
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My mistress has come home; at last I've seen her. Now I'm ready to die.
Anton Chekhov
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I let myself go at the beginning and write with an easy mind, but by the time I get to the middle I begin to grow timid and to fear my story will be too long...That is why the beginning of my stories is always very promising and looks as though I were starting on a novel, and the middle is huddled and timid, and the end is...like fireworks.
Anton Chekhov
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I can only regard with bewilderment an educated man who is also religious
Anton Chekhov
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Science is the most important, the most magnificent, and the most necessary element of life.
Anton Chekhov
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What's the use of talking? You can see for yourself that this is a barbarous country; the people have no morals; and the boredom!
Anton Chekhov
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You confuse two things: solving a problem and stating a problem correctly. It is only the second that is obligatory for an artist.
Anton Chekhov
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Quote of the day
Marriages are made in heaven and consummated on earth.
John Lyly
Anton Chekhov
Creative Commons
Born:
January 29, 1860
Died:
July 15, 1904
(aged 44)
Bio:
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was a Russian playwright and short story writer who is considered to be among the greatest writers of short fiction in history.
Known for:
The Seagull (1896)
The Cherry Orchard (1904)
Three Sisters
Uncle Vanya (1897)
Ivanov (1887)
Most used words:
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life
man
live
love
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understand
time
happiness
write
work
happy
artist
god
women
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