32 Quotes About Chekhov

He keeps going, going, going on; his people groan and fall one after the other, but he keeps on going, going and in the end, perishes himself, but still remains the despot and tsar of the desert because the cross over his grave is visible to caravans thirty-forty miles away and reigns over the wasteland.

Amalia could hardly keep from crying as she threw out the butts from the ashtray: 'Nora, even drinking is better than smoking. It goes without saying that it's bad for you, but the smell is also disgusting! Chekhov said that kissing a woman who smokes is like licking an ashtray!' Nora dismissed her with a wave of the hand and said, laughing, 'Mama, Chekhov and I will never have to kiss anyway.

There should be more sincerity and heart in human relations, more silence and simplicity in our interactions. Be rude when you’re angry, laugh when something is funny, and answer when you’re asked.

I was oppressed with a sense of vague discontent and dissatisfaction with my own life, which was passing so quickly and uninterestingly, and I kept thinking it would be a good thing if I could tear my heart out of my breast, that heart which had grown so weary of life.

If you want to work on your art, work on your life.

Ach, Tchekov! Why are you dead? Why can’t I talk to you in a big darkish room at late evening—where the light is green from the waving trees outside? I’d like to write a series of Heavens: that would be one.

Reading Chekhov, I felt not happy, exactly, but as close to happiness as I knew I was likely to come. And it occurred to me that this was the pleasure and mystery of reading, as well as the answer to those who say that books will disappear. For now, books are still the best way of taking great art and its consolations along with us on a bus.

He did not want to be original; he made superhuman efforts to be like everybody else: but there is no escaping one's destiny.

El rey David tenía un anillo con la inscripción: «Todo pasa.» Cuando se está triste, estas palabras consuelan; cuando se está alegre, producen melancolía. Yo también me he mandado hacer una sortija parecida, con una inscripción judaica, y ella no me permite extralimitarme ni en las alegrías ni en las tristezas. Sí, todo pasará; la vida misma acabará, ¿por qué entonces atribuir tanta importancia a nuestras pequeñas alegrías y dolores?