Only those who deserve freedom deserve freedom. “Only he is worthy of life and freedom who goes to battle for them every day” German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, “Faust”, 19th century Unified State Exam social studies

A. P. Chekhov “Vanka”

Vanka Zhukov, a nine-year-old boy who was apprenticed to the shoemaker Alyakhin three months ago, did not go to bed on the night before Christmas. Having waited until the masters and apprentices had left for matins, he took out a bottle of ink and a pen with a rusty feather from the master's closet and, laying out a crumpled sheet of paper in front of him, began to write. Before writing out the first letter, he looked timidly at the doors and windows several times, glanced sideways at dark image, on both sides of which were shelves with stocks, and sighed shakily. The paper lay on the bench, and he himself was kneeling in front of the bench.

“Dear grandfather, Konstantin Makarych! - he wrote. - And I’m writing you a letter. I wish you a Merry Christmas and wish you everything from God. I have neither father nor mother, you are the only one left for me.”

Vanka turned his eyes to the dark window, in which the reflection of his candle flickered, and vividly imagined his grandfather Konstantin Makarych, serving as a night watchman for the Zhivarevs. This is a small, skinny, but unusually nimble and active old man of about 65 years old, with an ever-laughing face and drunken eyes. During the day he sleeps in the people's kitchen or jokes with the cooks, but at night, wrapped in a spacious sheepskin coat, he walks around the estate and knocks on his mallet. Behind him, with their heads down, walk the old Kashtanka and the male Vyun, so nicknamed for his black color and a body as long as a weasel. This Loach is unusually respectful and affectionate, looks equally tenderly at both his own and strangers, but does not use credit. Beneath his reverence and humility lies the most Jesuitical malice. No one knows better than him how to sneak up on time and grab someone’s leg, climb into a glacier, or steal a man’s chicken. He had his hind legs beaten off more than once, he was hanged twice, every week he was flogged until he was half to death, but he always came back to life.

Now, probably, the grandfather is standing at the gate, squinting his eyes at the bright red windows of the village church and, stamping his felt boots, joking with the servants. His beater is tied to his belt. He clasps his hands, shrugs from the cold and, giggling like an old man, pinches first the maid and then the cook.

- Is there some tobacco for us to smell? - he says, presenting his snuffbox to the women.

Women sniff and sneeze. The grandfather comes into indescribable delight, bursts into cheerful laughter and shouts:

- Rip it off, it's frozen!

They also let dogs sniff tobacco. Kashtanka sneezes, twists her muzzle and, offended, steps aside. The loach, out of respect, does not sneeze and twirls its tail. And the weather is great. The air is quiet, transparent and fresh. The night is dark, but you can see the whole village with its white roofs and wisps of smoke coming from the chimneys, trees covered with frost, snowdrifts. The entire sky is strewn with cheerfully blinking stars, and the Milky Way appears as clearly as if it had been washed and covered with snow before the holiday...

Vanka sighed, put down his pen and continued to write:

“And yesterday I had a beating. The owner dragged me by my hair into the yard and combed me with a spandher because I was rocking their baby in the cradle and accidentally fell asleep. And this week the hostess told me to clean the herring, and I started with the tail, and she took the herring and started poking me in the mug with her muzzle. The apprentices make fun of me, send me to the tavern for vodka and order me to steal cucumbers from the owners, and the owner hits me with whatever he can find. And there is no food. In the morning they give you bread, at lunchtime porridge and in the evening also bread, and for tea or cabbage soup, the owners themselves crack it. And they tell me to sleep in the hallway, and when their baby cries, I don’t sleep at all, but rock the cradle. Dear grandfather, do God’s mercy, take me home from here, to the village, there is no way for me... I bow at your feet and I will forever pray to God, take me away from here, otherwise I will die...”

Vanka twisted his mouth, rubbed his eyes with his black fist and sobbed.

“I’ll grind your tobacco for you,” he continued, “and pray to God, and if anything happens, whip me like Sidorov’s goat. And if you think I don’t have a position, then for Christ’s sake I’ll ask the clerk to clean his boots, or instead of Fedka I’ll go as a shepherd. Dear grandfather, there is no possibility, just death. I wanted to run to the village on foot, but I didn’t have boots, I was afraid of the frost. And when you grow up big, I will feed you for this very reason and will not give offense to anyone, but when you die, I will begin to pray for the repose of your soul, just like for your mother Pelageya.

And Moscow is a big city. The houses are all master's houses and there are a lot of horses, but there are no sheep and the dogs are not evil. The guys here don’t go with the star and they don’t let anyone into the choir to sing, and I saw in one shop on the window hooks they sell straight with fishing line and for all kinds of fish, they’re very expensive, there’s even one hook that can hold a pound of catfish. And I saw some shops where there were all sorts of guns in the master’s style, so that probably a hundred rubles each... And in the butcher shops there are black grouse, and hazel grouse, and hares, and in which place they are shot, the inmates don’t say anything about it.

Dear grandfather, when the gentlemen have a Christmas tree with gifts, take me a gilded nut and hide it in a green chest. Ask the young lady Olga Ignatievna, say, for Vanka.”

Vanka sighed convulsively and again stared at the window. He remembered that his grandfather always went into the forest to get a Christmas tree for the masters and took his grandson with him. It was a fun time! And the grandfather quacked, and the frost quacked, and looking at them, Vanka quacked. It used to be that before cutting down the tree, the grandfather smokes a pipe, sniffs tobacco for a long time, laughs at the chilled Vanyushka... Young trees, shrouded in frost, stand motionless and wait, which one should die? Out of nowhere, a hare flies through the snowdrifts like an arrow... Grandfather can’t help but shout:

- Hold it, hold it... hold it! Oh, the short devil!

The grandfather dragged the cut down Christmas tree to manor house, and then they began to clean it up... Young lady Olga Ignatievna, Vanka’s favorite, was the one who bothered the most. When Vanka’s mother Pelageya was still alive and served as a maid for the gentlemen, Olga Ignatievna fed Vanka with candy and, having nothing else to do, taught him to read, write, count to one hundred and even dance a square dance. When Pelageya died, the orphan Vanka was sent to the people’s kitchen to his grandfather, and from the kitchen to Moscow to the shoemaker Alyakhin...

“Come, dear grandfather,” Vanka continued, “I pray to you by Christ God, take me away from here. Have pity on me, an unfortunate orphan, otherwise everyone beats me and I want to eat my passion, but I’m so bored that it’s impossible to say, I keep crying. And the other day the owner hit him on the head with a block, so that he fell and barely came to his senses. Wasting my life is worse than any dog... And I also bow to Alena, crooked Yegorka and the coachman, but don’t give my harmony to anyone. I’m staying with your grandson Ivan Zhukov, dear grandfather, come.”

Vanka folded the scribbled sheet of paper into four and put it in an envelope he had bought the day before for a penny... After thinking a little, he dipped his pen and wrote the address:

To grandfather's village.

Then he scratched himself, thought and added: “To Konstantin Makarych.” Satisfied that he was not prevented from writing, he put on his hat and, without throwing on his fur coat, ran out into the street in his shirt—

Sideliners from butcher shop, whom he questioned the day before, told him that letters were dropped into mailboxes, and from the boxes they were transported throughout the land on postal troikas with drunken drivers and ringing bells. Vanka ran to the first mailbox and put the precious letter into the slot...

Lulled by sweet hopes, an hour later he was fast asleep... He dreamed of the stove. The grandfather sits on the stove, hanging bare feet, and reads a letter to the cooks... Loach walks near the stove and twirls his tail...

A. P. Chekhov “Boys”

- Volodechka, we’ve arrived! - Natalya screamed, running into the dining room. - Oh, my God!

The entire Korolev family, who had been waiting for their Volodya from hour to hour, rushed to the windows. There were wide sledges at the entrance, and a thick fog was coming from the three white horses. The sleigh was empty, because Volodya was already standing in the entryway and untying his cap with red, chilled fingers. His school coat, cap, galoshes and hair at the temples were covered with frost, and his entire body from head to toe emitted such a delicious frosty smell that, looking at him, you wanted to freeze and say: “brrr!” His mother and aunt rushed to hug and kiss him, Natalya fell at his feet and began to pull off his felt boots, the sisters started screaming, the doors creaked and slammed, and Volodya’s father, wearing only a vest and holding scissors in his hands, ran into the hallway and shouted in fear:

And we were waiting for you yesterday! Did you get there well? Safely? Lord my God, let him say hello to his father! What, I'm not a father, or what?

- Woof! Woof! - Milord, a huge black dog, roared in a bass voice, banging his tail on the walls and furniture.

Everything mixed into one continuous joyful sound that lasted about two minutes. When the first rush of joy passed, the Korolevs noticed that besides Volodya, there was another small man in the hallway, wrapped in scarves, shawls and caps and covered with frost; he stood motionless in the corner in the shadow cast by one large fox fur coat.

- Volodechka, who is this? - asked the mother in a whisper.

- Ah! - Volodya caught himself. - This, I have the honor to introduce, is my comrade Chechevitsyn, a second-grade student... I brought him with me to stay with us.

- Very nice, you are welcome! - the father said joyfully. - Sorry, I'm at home, without a frock coat... You're welcome! Natalya, help Mr. Cherepitsyn undress! My God, send this dog away! This is punishment!

A little later, Volodya and his friend Chechevitsyn, stunned by the noisy meeting and still pink from the cold, sat at the table and drank tea. The winter sun, penetrating through the snow and patterns on the windows, trembled on the samovar and bathed its pure rays in the rinsing cup. The room was warm, and the boys felt warmth and frost tickling their chilled bodies, not wanting to give in to each other.

- Well, Christmas is coming soon! - the father said in a singsong voice, rolling a cigarette from a dark red tobacco. - How long ago was it summer and your mother cried as she saw you off? And you have arrived... Time, brother, goes quickly! Before you know it, old age will come. Mr. Chibisov, eat, please, don’t be shy! Ours is simple.

Volodya's three sisters, Katya, Sonya and Masha - the eldest of them was eleven years old - sat at the table and did not take their eyes off their new acquaintance. Chechevitsyn was the same age and height as Volodya, but not as plump and white, but thin, dark, and covered with freckles. His hair was bristly, his eyes were narrow, his lips were thick, in general he was very ugly, and if he had not been wearing a school jacket, then in appearance he could have been mistaken for the cook’s son. He was gloomy, silent all the time and never smiled. The girls, looking at him, immediately realized that he must be a very smart and learned person. He was thinking about something all the time and was so busy with his thoughts that when he was asked about something, he shuddered, shook his head and asked to repeat the question.

The girls noticed that Volodya, always cheerful and talkative, this time spoke little, did not smile at all, and did not even seem glad that he had come home. While they were sitting over tea, he addressed the sisters only once, and only with some strange words. He pointed his finger at the samovar and said:

— And in California they drink gin instead of tea. He, too, was busy with some thoughts, and, judging by the looks that he occasionally exchanged with his friend Chechevitsyn, the boys had common thoughts.

After tea everyone went to the nursery. The father and girls sat down at the table and began work, which was interrupted by the arrival of the boys. They made flowers and fringe for the Christmas tree from multi-colored paper. It was exciting and noisy work. The girls greeted each newly made flower with cries of delight, even cries of horror, as if this flower was falling from the sky; Dad also admired it and occasionally threw the scissors on the floor, angry at them for being stupid. Mother ran into the nursery with a very worried face and asked:

- Who took my scissors? Again, Ivan Nikolaich, did you take my scissors?

“Oh my God, they don’t even give you scissors!” - Ivan Nikolaich answered in a tearful voice and, leaning back in his chair, assumed the pose of an insulted man, but a minute later he admired him again.

On his previous visits, Volodya was also busy with preparations for the Christmas tree or ran into the yard to see how the coachman and shepherd were making a snow mountain, but now he and Chechevitsyn did not pay any attention to colorful paper and they never even visited the stables, but sat by the window and began to whisper about something; Then they both opened the geographic atlas together and began to look at some kind of map.

- First to Perm... - Chechevitsyn said quietly... - from there to Tyumen... then Tomsk... then... then... to Kamchatka... From here the Samoyeds will be transported by boat across the Bering Strait... So much for America... There are a lot of fur-bearing animals here.

- And California? - Volodya asked.

- California is lower... Just to get to America, and California is just around the corner. You can get food for yourself by hunting and robbery.

Chechevitsyn avoided the girls all day and looked at them from under his brows. After evening tea it happened that he was left alone with the girls for about five minutes. It was awkward to remain silent. He coughed sternly and rubbed right palm left hand, looked gloomily at Katya and asked:

Samoyed - name northern peoples(obsolete).

—Have you read Mine Read?

No, I haven’t read it... Listen, do you know how to skate?

Lost in his thoughts, Chechevitsyn did not answer this question, but only puffed out his cheeks and sighed as if he were very hot. He once again raised his eyes to Katya and said:

— When a herd of bison runs through the pampas, the earth trembles, and at this time the mustangs, frightened, kick and neigh.

“And Indians also attack trains.” But the worst thing is mosquitoes and termites.

- And what is it?

- These are like ants, only with wings. They bite very hard. Do you know who I am?

- Mr. Chechevitsyn.

- No. I am Montigomo Hawkclaw, Chief of the Invincible.

Masha, the smallest girl, looked at him, then at the window, outside which evening was already setting in, and said thoughtfully:

— We cooked lentils yesterday.

Absolutely unclear words Chechevitsyn, and the fact that he was constantly whispering with Volodya, and the fact that Volodya did not play, but was still thinking about something - all this was mysterious and strange. And both older girls, Katya and Sonya, began to keep a watchful eye on the boys. In the evening, when the boys were going to bed, the girls crept up to the door and overheard their conversation. Oh, what they learned! The boys were planning to run somewhere to America to mine gold; They already had everything ready for the road: a pistol, two knives, crackers, a magnifying glass for making fire, a compass and four rubles of money. They learned that the boys would have to walk several thousand miles, and along the way fight tigers and savages, then mine gold and ivory, kill enemies, enter the sea ​​robbers, drink gin and eventually marry beauties and cultivate plantations. Volodya and Chechevitsyn talked and interrupted each other in enthusiasm. At the same time, Chechevitsyn called himself: “Montigomo Hawk Claw,” and Volodya was “my pale-faced brother.”

“Make sure you don’t tell mom,” Katya said to Sonya, going to bed with her. “Volodya will bring us gold and ivory from America, and if you tell mom, they won’t let him in.”

On the eve of Christmas Eve, Chechevitsyn spent the whole day looking at a map of Asia and writing something down, and Volodya, languid, plump, as if stung by a bee, walked gloomily around the rooms and did not eat anything. And once, even in the nursery, he stopped in front of the icon, crossed himself and said:

- Lord, forgive me, a sinner! Lord save my poor, unfortunate mother!

By evening he burst into tears. Going to bed, he hugged his father, mother and sisters for a long time. Katya and Sonya understood what was going on here, but the youngest, Masha, understood nothing, absolutely nothing, and only when she looked at Chechevitsyn did she think and say with a sigh:

— When fasting, the nanny says, you need to eat peas and lentils.

Early on Christmas Eve morning, Katya and Sonya quietly got out of bed and went to see how the boys would flee to America. We crept up to the door.

- So you won’t go? - Chechevitsyn asked angrily. - Say: won’t you go?

- God! - Volodya cried quietly. “How can I go?” I feel sorry for my mother.

My pale-faced brother, I beg you, let's go!

You assured me that you would go, you lured me in, but when you decided to go, you chickened out.

I... I didn’t chicken out, but I... I feel sorry for my mother.

Tell me: are you going or not?

I'll go, just... just wait. I want to live at home.

“In that case, I’ll go myself!” - Chechevitsyn decided - I can do without you. And I also wanted to hunt tigers and fight! When that happens, give me my caps!

Volodya cried so bitterly that the sisters could not stand it and also began to cry quietly. There was silence.

- So you won’t go? - Chechevitsyn asked again.

- I'll... go.

- Dress like that!

And Chechevitsyn, in order to persuade Volodya, praised America, growled like a tiger, imitated a steamship, cursed, promised to give Volodya all the ivory and all the lion and tiger skins.

And this thin, dark boy with bristly hair and freckles seemed extraordinary and wonderful to the girls. He was a hero, a decisive, undaunted man, and he roared so loudly that, standing outside the doors, one could actually think that he was a tiger or a lion.

When the girls returned to their place and got dressed, Katya, with eyes full of tears, said:

- Oh, I'm so scared!

Until two o'clock, when they sat down to dinner, everything was quiet, but at dinner it suddenly turned out that the boys were not at home. They were sent to the servants' quarters, to the stables, to the clerk's outbuilding - they were not there. They sent him to the village and didn’t find him there. And then they also drank tea without the boys, and when they sat down to dinner, mother was very worried, even cried. And at night we went to the village again, searched, and went to the river with lanterns. God, what a commotion there was!

The next day a policeman came and they wrote some paper in the dining room. Mom was crying.

But then the sledge stopped at the porch, and steam was pouring out from the three white horses.

- Volodya has arrived! - someone shouted in the yard.

- Volodechka, we’ve arrived! - Natalya screamed, running into the dining room.

And Milord barked in a deep voice: “Woof! woof! It turned out that the boys were detained in the city, in Gostiny Dvor(They walked there and kept asking where gunpowder was sold). Volodya, as he entered the hallway, began to sob and threw himself on his mother’s neck. The girls, trembling, thought with horror about what would happen now, heard how dad took Volodya and Chechevitsyn to his office and talked to them for a long time; and mother also spoke and cried.

- Is this possible? - Dad urged. - God forbid, they find out at the gymnasium, you will be expelled, And you are ashamed, Mr. Chechevitsyn! Not good, sir! You are the instigator, and I hope you will be punished by your parents. Is this possible? Where did you spend the night?

- At the station! - Chechevitsyn answered proudly.

Volodya then lay down and a towel soaked in vinegar was applied to his head. They sent a telegram somewhere, and the next day a lady, Chechevitsyn’s mother, arrived and took her son away.

When Chechevitsyn left, his face was stern, arrogant, and, saying goodbye to the girls, he did not say a single word; I just took Katya’s notebook and wrote as a sign of memory:

"Montigomo Hawkclaw."

Young red dog- a cross between a dachshund and a mongrel - with a muzzle very similar to a fox, ran back and forth along the sidewalk and restlessly looked around. From time to time she stopped and, crying, raising first one chilled paw, then the other, tried to understand: how could it happen that she got lost? Read...

The hungry wolf got up to go hunting. Her cubs, all three of them, were fast asleep, huddled together, warming each other. She licked them and walked away. Read...

Olenka, the daughter of the retired collegiate assessor Plemyannikov, was sitting on her porch in her yard, lost in thought. It was hot, the flies were annoying, and it was so pleasant to think that it would soon be evening. Dark rain clouds were approaching from the east, and from there there was an occasional sip of moisture. Read...

Volodya has arrived! - someone shouted in the yard. Read...

Police warden Ochumelov walks through the market square in a new overcoat and with a bundle in his hand. A red-haired policeman walks behind him with a sieve filled to the brim with confiscated gooseberries. There is silence all around... Not a soul in the square... The open doors of shops and taverns look sadly into the light of God, like hungry mouths; There are not even beggars around them. Read...

They came from the Grigorievs for some book, but I said that you were not at home. The postman brought newspapers and two letters. By the way, Evgeny Petrovich, I would ask you to draw your attention to Seryozha. Today and the third day I noticed that he smokes. When I began to admonish him, he, as usual, covered his ears and sang loudly to drown out my voice. Read...

Retired Major General Buldeev had a toothache. He rinsed his mouth with vodka, cognac, applied tobacco soot, opium, turpentine, kerosene to the sore tooth, smeared his cheek with iodine, and had cotton wool soaked in alcohol in his ears, but all this either did not help or caused nausea. The doctor arrived. He picked the tooth and prescribed quinine, but that didn’t help either. Read...

Summer morning. There is silence in the air; only a grasshopper creaks on the shore and somewhere a little eagle purrs timidly. Cirrus clouds stand motionless in the sky, looking like scattered snow... Near the bathhouse under construction, under the green branches of a willow tree, the carpenter Gerasim, a tall, skinny man with a red curly head and a face overgrown with hair, is floundering in the water. Read...

Police officer Semyon Ilyich Prachkin walked around his room from corner to corner and tried to drown out the unpleasant feeling within himself. Yesterday he visited the military commander on business, accidentally sat down to play cards and lost eight rubles. The amount is insignificant, trifling, but the demon of greed and selfishness sat in the ear of the chief and reproached him for wastefulness. Read...

VII grade school student Yegor Ziberov graciously gives Petya Udodov his hand. Petya, a twelve-year-old boy in a gray suit, plump and red-cheeked, with a small forehead and bristly hair, shuffles and reaches into the closet for notebooks. The lesson begins. Read...

It was a long procedure. At first, Pashka walked with his mother in the rain, first along a mown field, then along forest paths, where yellow leaves stuck to his boots, until it dawned. Then he stood in the dark hallway for two hours and waited for the door to be unlocked. Read...

Vanka Zhukov, a nine-year-old boy who was apprenticed to the shoemaker Alyakhin three months ago, did not go to bed on the night before Christmas. Read...

Grisha, a small, plump boy born two years and eight months ago, is walking with his nanny along the boulevard. He is wearing a long cotton wool jacket, a scarf, a large hat with a furry button and warm galoshes. He is stuffy and hot, and here the April sun is still shining, hitting him straight into his eyes and stinging his eyelids. Read...

Dad, mom and Aunt Nadya are not at home. They went to the christening of that old officer who rides a small gray horse. While waiting for their return, Grisha, Anya, Alyosha, Sonya and the cook's son Andrei sit in the dining room at the dining table and play lotto. Read...

Story : Experienced
(Psychological study)

Was New Year. I went out into the hall.

Besides the doorman, there were several more of us standing there: Ivan Ivanovich, Pyotr Kuzmich, Yegor Sidorich... Everyone came to sign on the sheet, which lay majestically on the table. (The paper, however, was cheap, No. 8.)

I looked at the sheet. There are too many signatures and... oh the hypocrisy! O duplicity! Where are you, strokes, underlining, squiggles, tails? All the letters are round, even, smooth, like pink cheeks. I see familiar names, but I don’t recognize them. Have these gentlemen changed their handwriting?

I carefully dipped the pen into the inkwell, for some unknown reason I was embarrassed, held my breath and carefully wrote out my last name. Usually I never used the final “era” in my signature, but now I did: I started it and finished it.

Do you want me to destroy you? - I heard the voice and breathing of Pyotr Kuzmich near my ear.

How?

I'll take it and destroy it. Yes. Want? Hehehehe...

You can't laugh here, Pyotr Kuzmich. Don't forget where you are. Smiles are less than appropriate. Sorry, but I believe... This is profanation, disrespect, so to speak...

Do you want me to destroy you?

How? - I asked.

And like this... Like von Clausen ruined me five years ago... He-he-he. It’s very simple... I’ll take your last name and put a squiggle. I'll do a flourish. Hehehehe. I will make your signature disrespectful. Want?

I turned pale. Indeed, my life was in the hands of this man with a blue nose. I looked with fear and some respect at his ominous eyes...

How little it takes to knock a person down!

Or I’ll drop some ink near your signature. I'll make a blot... Do you want it?

There was silence. He, conscious of his strength, majestic, proud, with a destructive poison in his hand, I, conscious of my powerlessness, pathetic, ready to perish - both were silent. He glared at my pale face with his curls, I avoided his gaze...

“I was joking,” he said finally. - Don't be afraid.

Oh thank you! - I said and, full of gratitude, shook his hand.

I was joking... But still I can... Remember... Go... Pokedova was joking... And then God willing...

Philosophical definitions of life

Our life can be likened to lying in a bathhouse on the top shelf. Hot, stuffy and foggy. The broom does its job, the bath leaf sticks, and the soap hurts your eyes. Exclamations are heard from everywhere: give me some steam! They wash your hair and go through all your bones. Fine! (Sarah Bernhardt)

* * *
Our life can be likened to a torn boot: he always asks for porridge, but no one gives it to him. (J. Sand)

* * *
Our life can be likened to Prince Meshchersky, who is always hustling, always scurrying about, exclaiming, groaning and waving his arms, forever being born and dying, but never seeing the fruits of his deeds. She will always give birth, but everything that is born is stillborn. (Buckle)

* * *
Our life can be likened to a madman leading himself to the block and writing a slander against himself. (Coquelin)

* * *
Our life is like a newspaper that has already received a second warning. (Kant)

* * *
Our life cannot be likened to a letter that is not dangerous to read out loud, but it can be likened to a letter that is afraid of not reaching its address. (Draper)

* * *
Our life is like a drawer in a typesetting room, filled with punctuation marks. (Confucius)

* * *
Our life is like an old maid who does not lose hope of getting married, and a face covered with pimples and wrinkles: an ugly face, but it is offended when they beat it. (Arabi Pasha)

* * *
Our life, finally, can be likened to a frostbitten ear, which is not cut off only because they hope for its recovery. (Charcot)

From different philosophical works learned from Antosha Chekhonte.

Fraudsters willy-nilly
(New Year's babble)

Zakhar Kuzmich Dyadechkin is having an evening. They celebrate the New Year and congratulate the owner Melanya Tikhonovna on Angel's Day.

There are many guests. The people are all respectable, respectable, sober and positive. Not a single scoundrel. There is tenderness, pleasantness and self-esteem on their faces. In the hall, on a large oilcloth sofa, sit the landlord Gusev and the shopkeeper Razmakhalov, from whom the Dyadechkins take each book. They talk about suitors and daughters.

“It’s difficult to find a person,” says Gusev. - Who is a non-drinker and thorough… a person who works… It’s difficult!

The main thing in the house is order, Alexey Vasilich! This won’t happen when the house doesn’t have that... which... the house is in order...

If there is no order in the house, then... everything is like that... Stupid things have happened in this world... Where can there be order here? Hm...

Three old women sit on chairs near them and look at their mouths with emotion. Surprise is written in their eyes. Godfather Guriy Markovich stands in the corner and examines the icons. There is noise in the master bedroom. There, young ladies and gentlemen play lotto. The bet is a penny. First-grade high school student Kolya is standing near the table and crying. He wants to play lotto, but he is not allowed at the table. Is it his fault that he is small and doesn’t have a penny?

Don't cry, fool! - they admonish him. - Well, why are you crying? Do you want mommy to whip you?

Who is this roaring? Kolka? - Mom’s voice is heard from the kitchen. - I spanked him a little, shot him... Varvara Guryevna, pull his ear!

On the master's bed, covered with a faded chintz blanket, sit two young ladies in pink dresses. In front of them stands a young man of about twenty-three, an employee of an insurance company, Kopaisky, who looks very much like a cat. He is courting.

“I don’t intend to get married,” he says, showing off and pulling the high, cutting collars away from his neck with his fingers. - A woman is a radiant point in the human mind, but she can destroy a person. Evil creature!

What about men? A man cannot love. He does all sorts of rude things.

How naive you are! I am not a cynic or a skeptic, but I still understand that a man will always stand on highest point regarding feelings.

Dyadechkin himself and his first-born Grisha scurry from corner to corner, like wolves in a cage. Their souls are on fire. At dinner they drank heavily and now passionately want to get over their hangover... Dyadechkin goes into the kitchen. There the hostess sprinkles the pie with crushed sugar.

Malasha,” says Dyadechkin. - I'd like to serve some appetizer. Guests would like to have a snack...

They'll wait... Now you'll drink and eat everything, but what will I serve at twelve o'clock? You won't die. Go away... Don't hang around in front of your nose!

Just a glass, Malasha... You won’t get any shortage from this... Is it possible?

Punishment! Go away, they tell you! Go and sit with the guests! Why are you hanging around in the kitchen?

Dyadechkin takes a deep breath and leaves the kitchen. He goes to look at his watch. The hands show eight minutes past twelve. There are still fifty-two minutes left until the desired moment. It's horrible! Waiting for a drink is the hardest of waits. It’s better to wait five hours in the cold for a train than wait five minutes for a drink... Dyadechkin looks at his watch with hatred and, after walking around a bit, moves the big hand further five minutes... And Grisha? If Grisha is not given a drink now, he will go to the tavern and drink there. He does not agree to die of melancholy...

Mama,” he says, “the guests are angry that you don’t serve snacks!” It’s just disgusting... To starve!.. They should give me a glass!

Wait... Not much left... Soon... Don't crowd around the kitchen.

Grisha slams the door and goes to look at his watch for the hundredth time. The big arrow is merciless! She's almost in the same place.

Behind! - Grisha consoles himself and index finger moves the hand forward seven minutes.

Kolya runs past the clock. He stops in front of them and begins to count the time... He desperately wants to quickly live until the moment when they shout “Hurray!” The arrow, with its immobility, stabs him in the very heart. He climbs onto a chair, timidly looks around and steals five minutes from eternity.

Come and look, keler ethyl? - sends one of Kopaysky’s young ladies. - I'm dying of impatience. It's New Year! New happiness!

Kopaysky shuffles with both feet and rushes to the clock.

Damn it,” he mutters, looking at the arrows. - How long! And I want to eat passion as much as I want... I will certainly kiss Katya when they shout hurray.

Kopaisky moves away from the clock, stops... After thinking a little, he tosses and turns and shortens the old year by six minutes. Dyadechkin drinks two glasses of water, but... his soul is on fire! He walks, walks, walks... His wife keeps chasing him out of the kitchen. The bottles standing on the window tear at his soul. What to do! I can't stand it! He again grabs the last resort. The watch is at his service. He goes to the nursery, where the clock hangs, and comes across a picture that is unpleasant to his parental heart: Grisha is standing in front of the clock and moving the hand.

Are you... are you... what are you doing? A? Why did you move the arrow? You are such a fool! A? Why is this? A?

Dyadechkin coughs, hesitates, frowns terribly and waves his hand.

For what? Ah-ah-ah... Move her, so that she dies, you vile one! - he says and, pushing his son away from the clock, moves the hand.

There are eleven minutes left until the New Year. Dad and Grisha go into the hall and begin to prepare the table.

Malasha! - Dyadechkin shouts. - It's New Year now!

Melanya Tikhonovna runs out of the kitchen and goes to check on her husband... She looks at her watch for a long time: her husband is not lying.

Well, what should we do? - she whispers. - But I still haven’t cooked the peas for the ham! Hm. Punishment. How will I serve it to them?

And, after thinking a little, Melanya Tikhonovna with a trembling hand moves the big arrow back. The old year gets twenty minutes back.

They'll wait! - says the hostess and runs into the kitchen.

Fortune tellers and fortune tellers
(New Year's pictures)

The old nanny tells fortunes to the papa quartermaster.

The road, she says.

Nanny waves her hand to the north. Dad's face turns pale.

“You are driving,” the old woman adds, “and you have a bag of money on your lap...

A glow runs across daddy's face.

* * *
Chinosha sits at the table and looks into the mirror by the light of two candles. He wonders what height, color and temperament his new, not yet appointed boss will be. He looks in the mirror for an hour, two, three... Goosebumps are running in his eyes, sticks are jumping, feathers are flying, but the boss is gone! Nothing is visible, neither superiors nor subordinates. The fourth hour passes, the fifth... Finally he gets tired of waiting for the new boss. He stands up, waves his hand and sighs.

The place remains vacant, he says. - And this is not good. There is no greater evil than anarchy!

* * *
The young lady stands in the courtyard outside the gate and waits for a passerby. She needs to find out what her betrothed's name will be. Someone is coming. She quickly opens the gate and asks:

What is your name?

In response to her question, she hears a moo and through the half-open gate sees a large dark head... There are horns on the head...

“Perhaps that’s right,” the young lady thinks. “The only difference is in the face.”

* * *
The editor of a daily newspaper sits down to tell fortunes about the fate of his brainchild.

Leave it! - they tell him. - You want to upset yourself! Give it up!

The editor does not listen and looks into the coffee grounds.

There are a lot of drawings,” he says. - The devil can tell them... These are mittens... They look like a hedgehog... But the nose... Just like my Makar's... That's a calf... I can't make out anything!

* * *
The doctor's wife tells fortunes in front of the mirror and sees... coffins.

“One of two,” she thinks. “Either someone will die, or my husband will have a lot of practice this year...”

........................................

on a note (stories about Chekhov) (Chekhov and Ermolova)

Chekhov began writing in his high school years. And one of his early works was the play "Fatherlessness". “The manuscript of this play was found in 1920 while sorting out documents and papers in the Moscow branch of the Russian-Azov Society Bank. It was kept in the personal safe of the writer’s sister.

Anton Chekhov, then a second-year medical student, submitted the drama “Fatherlessness” to Maria Nikolaevna Ermolova for trial. According to one version, he himself personally went to see the prima donna of the Russian theater; according to another, he simply sent her a package with a play.

But the play returned to Chekhov. The writer’s brother Mikhail recalled that “Ermolova was dissatisfied with the play.” In fact, Ermolova most likely never even saw the play. Hardly the creation of a young man, no one has yet famous author was able, contrary to customs and procedures, bypassing the retinue of fans, to fall into the hands of the actress.

His brother Mikhail Pavlovich Chekhov also recalled that Chekhov wrote dramas in his youth. In 1877-1878, while still studying at the gymnasium, Anton Chekhov wrote the drama “Fatherlessness.” Mikhail Chekhov also claimed that Anton Pavlovich destroyed his youthful play: “torn into small pieces.”

The drama "Fatherlessness" was released only in 1923, after the death of the writer. In 1960, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Chekhov’s birth, it was staged at the Theatre. Vakhtangov called "Platonov". Based on this play it was filmed famous movie"Unfinished piece for mechanical piano."

.............................................
Copyright: Anton Chekhov

A story written with extraordinary touching about how a 9-year-old boy, sent from the village to study with a Moscow shoemaker, wrote a letter home to his grandfather. Vanka tearfully complained that in his new place he was being offended by his masters and apprentices, and asked to be taken home from Moscow. Having sealed the envelope and written the address: “To the village of grandfather, Konstantin Makarych,” Vanka took it to Mailbox and went to bed, seeing in his dreams his native village, his grandfather and his dog Vyuna.

Chekhov “Vanka” - summary of the full text of this story.

Chekhov, story “The Lady with the Dog” - briefly

Muscovite Dmitry Dmitrich Gurov had a lot love affairs. He was accustomed to looking somewhat down on women, as unstable and pliable creatures. Starting another one on vacation in Yalta short novel, he did not expect that a sincere and defenseless lady with a dog, Anna Sergeevna, would seriously captivate him.

The stay in Yalta quickly ended in separation. Returning to Moscow, Gurov hoped that he would quickly forget Anna Sergeevna, as he had forgotten many others before. But thoughts about her haunted him relentlessly. Dmitry Dmitrievich went to the city of S., where a lady lived with a dog, and found her there. Anna Sergeevna admitted: she also thought about him all the time.

She began to come to Gurov in Moscow, staying at a hotel. He was married and she was married, so they had to meet secretly. The tragic split between secret and open life weighed heavily on both. The two of them were looking for a way out of the sad impasse...

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “The Lady with the Dog” - a summary of the chapters. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “House with a Mezzanine” - briefly

The artist, who came to the village on vacation, met the inhabitants of the neighboring estate, where there was a house with a mezzanine. These were the elderly noblewoman Ekaterina Pavlovna and her two unmarried daughters, the eldest Lydia and the youngest Zhenya. Imperious, strict and dry Lydia held “advanced” views and with such persistence gave herself to “ social activities”, that she neglected her own happiness, at the same time paying little attention to the personal concerns of her relatives. Young Zhenya, nicknamed Misyus, was not at all like her sister. Very kind, sincere and sincere, she treated her surroundings with trusting openness and heartfelt participation.

Unbeknownst to himself, the artist fell in love with Misya. But hostility constantly grew between him and Lydia, who ruled the house with a mezzanine like a family tyrant. Noticing that the artist treated her ironically, Lida opposed the rapprochement between him and Misyus and did not think about dooming them both to loneliness.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “House with a Mezzanine” - a summary of the chapters. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “Darling” - briefly

The plump and kind daughter of a minor official, Olenka, has been imbued with the desire to love someone from her youth - and so passionately that she belongs to her loved one without a trace. For the bright, happy smile that never leaves Olenka’s face when she is in love, her friends call her Darling.

Darling's personal life is not going very well. She turns her love to the nervous, hapless theater owner Kukin, but he soon dies. Darling marries the sedate, respectable clerk Pustovalov, but after six years he, too, leaves for another world. Communication with the military veterinarian Smirnin ceases when his regiment goes somewhere far away. Darling is left alone and almost dies without love. But Smirnin returns to the city with his wife and young son Sasha, and Olenka transfers all her unfulfilled passion to this 9-year-old boy, who is not cared for by his own mother.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Darling” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “The Intruder” - briefly

The peasants of one village near the railway unscrewed the nuts that fastened the sleepers to the rails, and then made weights for fishing rods out of them. Due to their lack of education, they did not understand that such unscrewing could cause a train crash. One such “attacker,” Denis Grigoriev, was caught by a track guard. During the interrogation, the forensic investigator could not explain to Denis that the absence of nuts on the rails could lead to the death of people. Dark Denis only insisted that he had never thought about killing himself, and the nut fits well with the sinker - it’s heavy, and there’s a hole. And only fools catch fish without weights...

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “The Intruder” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Film based on the story by A.P. Chekhov “The Intruder”

Chekhov, story “Ionych” - briefly

IN provincial town S. ordinary people led a worthless existence. The Turkin family was considered the most educated and gifted here, where the father poured out the same set of artificial, boring witticisms and florid phrases year after year, the mother wrote bad novels, and the daughter Ekaterina (Kotik) played the piano, paying no more attention. on the soul of the music, but on the complexity of the passages.

The doctor Dmitry Ionych Startsev, an intelligent man with good inclinations, found himself in such an environment. The environment immediately began to strongly influence him in a bad way, lowering him to a general flat level. At first, it was as if a ghost had caught fire in Dmitry Ionych strong feeling. He fell in love with a young, attractive Kitty. But his emotional impulse was quickly cooled by the coldness of the narrow-minded girl: she declared that she dreams of great fame as an artist and does not want to commit herself to family life.

Kitty went to study in Moscow, and Startseva was completely sucked into the city routine. Not finding highest goal, he began to think only about money, over the years he became more and more fat in his body, became coarser in his soul, and became callous towards people.

Kotik's career in the capital was not successful. Returning from there, she tried to charm Dmitry Ionych again, but he had completely lost the ability to be passionate. The lives of both of them degenerated into a painful emptiness, which nothing significant could now fill.

Chekhov "Ionych" - summary and Chekhov "Ionych" - summary by chapter. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “Kashtanka” - briefly

A young dog, Kashtanka, who lived in the family of a drunken carpenter, Luka, and his son, who abused her, once got lost on the street. She was picked up by a kind clown who performed in a circus with animals. New owner treated Kashtanka well, fed her deliciously and began teaching her artistic tricks. At his house, Kashtanka met a trained cat, a goose and a pig - Fyodor Timofeich, Ivan Ivanovich and Khavronya Ivanovna.

When the goose unexpectedly died after being stepped on by a horse, the clown decided to take Kashtanka to the show instead. The dog saw the bright circus arena for the first time. Kashtanka’s performance on it started very successfully, but suddenly the screams of her old owners were heard from the audience. Luka and the boy Fedyushka were here and called Kashtanka. Out of dog loyalty, she rushed from the arena through all the rows to these rude, cruel people, forgetting the kindness of the clown, his care and delicious dinners.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Kashtanka” - a summary of the chapters. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “Gooseberry” - briefly

The official Nikolai Ivanovich, who spent his entire life in the city office, dreamed of buying himself a village estate, with beautiful nature, green grass, a river - and always with gooseberry bushes in the garden. For the sake of this dream, he saved on everything, ate and dressed poorly, and put his salary in the bank. For the same purpose, Nikolai Ivanovich married an old, ugly, but rich widow and then kept her in such poverty that she quickly died. After retiring, the official bought himself an estate. There his brother soon visited him.

The brother saw a rather poor estate, standing in an inconvenient place, where two neighboring factories clogged the river so much that the water in it was the color of coffee. When the estate was purchased, there were no gooseberries, but Nikolai Ivanovich ordered 120 bushes for himself and planted them himself. During my brother’s visit, they had just produced their first harvest. When the cook brought a plate of gooseberries to the table, Nikolai Ivanovich began to eat it almost with tears in his eyes, saying: “How delicious!” The brother, having tasted the berries, felt that they were sour and hard. But in front of him sat happy man, who thought that his cherished dream, and he was now glad to deceive himself.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Gooseberry” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “The Horse's Name” - briefly

Retired Major General Buldeev had a toothache. No means helped relieve the pain, and the general did not want to remove the tooth. Buldeev’s clerk, Ivan Evseich, said that his friend Yakov Vasilich, who lives in Saratov, treats teeth well with a spell. You can give him a telegram there, and he will read his plot “from a distance.”

But to send a telegram it was necessary to know the name of Yakov Vasilich. Ivan Evseich forgot it - he only remembered that it was “horse”: it comes from a word associated with horses. The general promised to give five rubles to the one who guessed the horse's name, and all his servants ran after the clerk all day, asking: “Stallions? Kopytin? Troykin? Merinov? Trotter?

The clerk himself wrinkled his forehead in vain thoughts for many hours. Only the next day did he remember the horse’s name: Ovsov. But the general, unable to bear the pain, had already pulled out the doctor’s tooth and did not give him five rubles.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Horse Surname” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “The Bride” - briefly

A young girl, Nadya Shumina, lives richly in the provinces and is preparing to get married. However, in the last days before the wedding, the soul of this bride is overcome by emptiness. Under the influence of conversations with the “eternal student” Sasha, Nadya’s desire to “turn her life around” and to rush into the distance towards a beautiful dream grows.

The bride leaves her fiancé Andrei and, with Sasha’s help, runs away from home, from her grandmother and mother - to go to study in St. Petersburg. Nadya and Sasha believe: a miraculous transformation of all earthly existence will soon take place and driving force of this great revolution will become enlightened, educated people.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “The Bride” - a summary of the chapters. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “About Love” - briefly

The landowner Alekhin strikes up a close friendship with the family of Judge Luganovich and falls in love with his young wife, Anna Alekseevna. She is also interested in Alekhine, but both of them do not dare to directly admit their passion to each other. Alyokhin does not want to ruin the happiness of the Luganovich family, where the husband and children treat him well. Anna also does not dare to change her life. Several years pass between the two of them in mutual silent and sad sympathy, until, due to Luganovich’s new official assignment, the family has to leave for a remote province. Sobbing as they parted forever, Anna Alekseevna and Alekhin finally realize how stupid and petty everything was that had hitherto prevented them from uniting.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “On Love” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov “Ward number 6” - briefly

Doctor Andrei Efimych Ragin, the head of a hospital in a small town, is an intelligent and cultured person, but without a bright, persistent will. Considering himself powerless to overcome the surrounding vices, Ragin washes his hands and satisfies his spiritual interests only by reading books on humanitarian topics. To justify himself, Andrei Efimych develops a special philosophy, like the stoic ideas of indifference to the vicissitudes of fate.

But the aimlessness of existence gradually weighs on Ragin. There are no people among urban society who can understand him. One day, the doctor accidentally enters ward No. 6 - a hospital outbuilding for the insane - and talks with Ivan Dmitrich Gromov, who suffers from persecution mania. Once a very educated man, Ivan Dmitrich ridicules Ragin’s philosophy, arguing that living feeling and empathy must be developed in oneself, and not suppressed.

The doctor initially tries to argue, but the instinct of justice forces him to admit that the madman is right. The collapse of the previous comfortable worldview leads Andrei Efimich to a mental crisis. The doctor’s behavior so amazes the vulgar, indifferent city society that he himself is locked in ward No. 6.

For more details, see separate articles: Chekhov “Ward No. 6” – summary and Chekhov “Ward No. 6” – summary by chapter. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “Letter to a learned neighbor” - briefly

Retired sergeant of the Don Army Vasily Semi-Bulatov from the village of Bliny-Sedeny writes an illiterate letter to his neighbor, a famous scientist who recently arrived from St. Petersburg. In the lines of the letter, Semi-Bulatov expresses admiration for science, but rebels against “implausible” theories about the origin of man from apes and the possibility of life on the Moon. The constable sets out and important discovery which he himself did: the day in winter is short because it shrinks from the cold, and the night lengthens from the warmth of burning lamps and lanterns.

For more details, see Chekhov’s separate article “Letter to a Learned Neighbor” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “The Jumper” - briefly

A frivolous young lady, Olga Ivanovna, loves to surround herself with artists, performers, musicians, and she herself is a little active in various types of arts. By chance, she marries Doctor Dymov, whom she considers not a wonderful person. Dreaming of someday turning the head of an outstanding genius, Olga Ivanovna leads a large life with weekly receptions, picnics, and field trips. She only allows Dymov to work and earn money.

Out of love for his wife, the doctor behaves in family life unpretentious. He fulfills all the whims of Olga Ivanovna and even puts up with her obvious betrayal. Only after Dymov dies from contracting diphtheria does Olga suddenly realize: most of her friends from art are small, wretched nonentities, and her modest, shy husband was the truly major figure she had been looking for for so long.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “The Jumper” - a summary of the chapters. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “Rothschild’s Violin” - briefly

The undertaker Jacob, nicknamed “Bronze,” was a rude, grumpy man. He constantly beat his wife, quarreled with his acquaintances, and due to poverty, all his life he thought only about money. Knowing how to play the violin, Bronze often played music at weddings with a local Jewish orchestra for the sake of extra money and felt a strong dislike for a flutist named Rothschild, a Jew of a plaintive disposition with a haggard face.

But when Jacob's wife, Martha, suddenly died, he felt great sadness. Before, he had never thought about his life, but now he realized how ugly and stupidly he had wasted it on trifles. Soon Bronze himself fell mortally ill. In his dying repentance, he bequeathed to give his violin to Rothschild, whom he had often offended before.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Rothschild’s Violin” - summary e. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “The Death of an Official” - briefly

A minor official, Ivan Dmitrich Chervyakov, sneezed in the theater and accidentally splashed General Brizzhalov, who was sitting in front of him. Although Brizzhalov was not his boss, Chervyakov obsequiously approached him with an apology. The next day he went to apologize to the office, which was in charge of the general, and was so annoying that he finally told him to get out. From shock, the official barely made it home, and there he lay down on the sofa and died.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “The Death of an Official” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “Thick and Thin” - briefly

Two former high school classmates - fat Mikhail and thin Porfiry - met by chance many years later at the railway station and began to tell each other about their lives. Their conversation began in a completely friendly manner, but the thin sycophant, having learned that his fat comrade had risen to a high official rank, began to address him as “Your Excellency” and fell in line.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Thick and Thin” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “Tosca” - briefly

St. Petersburg cab driver Iona Potapov, whose son died this week, involuntarily went out to carry riders due to lack of money. The whole day he drove in melancholy and grief in the middle of falling thick snow, suffering from the reproaches of demanding passengers. Wanting to ease his soul, Jonah tried to tell almost all of them his sadness, but found no sympathy in anyone. Arriving at the carriage house, out of despair he began to talk about the death of the son of his own horse, chewing hay.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Tosca” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “Unter Prishibeev” - briefly

Prishibeev, a former army non-commissioned officer (a rank like sergeant or sergeant major), suffered from a mania for establishing order everywhere and, on his own initiative, even intervened in matters that did not concern him at all. After retiring from military service, he began to oppress his own fellow villagers: he forbade them to gather in crowds, sing songs, and burn fires. One day Prishibeev attacked a local police officer with his fists, deciding that he was performing his duties without proper zeal. The court sentenced the non-commissioned officer to a month of arrest for this, and Prishibeev greeted this sentence with great amazement.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Unter Prishibeev” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “Chameleon” - briefly

The quarterly overseer Ochumelov, walking through the city, saw how goldsmith Khryukin caught a greyhound puppy that had bitten his finger. Ochumelov immediately came to investigate, threatened to “exterminate” the dog and fine its owner, but someone from the gathered crowd said that the puppy belonged to General Zhigalov. Not wanting to quarrel with the general, Ochumelov immediately changed his mind and began to say that Khryukin himself teased the dog, and picked his finger with a nail. Meanwhile, some in the crowd insisted: the dog was a general’s, and others: no. Each time the warden adapted to one version or another, just as a chameleon lizard changes color to match the color of the surrounding vegetation.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Chameleon” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

A.P. Chekhov. "Chameleon". Read by I. Ilyinsky

Chekhov, story “Surgery” - briefly

The church sexton Vonmiglasov came to the hospital to pull a tooth to paramedic Kuryatin. But dental surgery was not easy. At first, Kuryatin, under the cries of the sexton, pulled the aching tooth out of his mouth for a long time, and then broke it off. During this procedure, the initially polite paramedic and the patient completely quarreled and began cursing each other with the last words.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “Surgery” - summary. You can read the full text of this story on our website.

Chekhov, story “The Man in a Case” - briefly

The gymnasium teacher of the ancient Greek language Belikov was strange man, who was afraid of the outside world and tried to separate himself from it with an artificial shell, a case. All his things: an umbrella, a watch, a knife for sharpening pencils were in their cases, and even in good weather he himself left the house in galoshes, with an umbrella and in a warm coat. At teacher councils, the suspicious Belikov demanded that other teachers strictly follow the prohibitory circulars and oppressed everyone with his tedious whining.

To everyone's surprise, the man in the case almost got married. He was charmed by Varenka, the sister of teacher Mikhail Kovalenko. However, Belikov experienced a terrible shock when he once saw Varenka riding a bicycle. The next day he went to her brother to explain that such riding was indecent for a woman. Kovalenko called Belikov a fiscal and threw him down the stairs. Belikov’s fall from the steps was accidentally seen by Varenka, who entered the house, and couldn’t help but burst out laughing.

The man in the case silently went home, went to bed and soon died. At his funeral, all his fellow teachers felt great relief.

For more details, see the separate article Chekhov “The Man in a Case” - summary. On our website you can read and

Basic distinctive feature stories of Anton Pavlovich Chekhov is an emphasis on the main character traits of the hero when detailed description their personality and everyday life. Thanks to such a set of sometimes imperceptible features, the author was unusually able to focus attention on inner world actors.

The humorous stories of A.P. Chekhov are fragments of a gigantic and often sad panorama, personifying the atmosphere of life in Russia at that time. The writer was attracted not by exotic phenomena in society or strange incidents, but by cases from Everyday life Russian people, a kind of swamp, drowning in which the inhabitants do not at all notice that they have become quarrelsome, how mundane their aspirations and stupid goals are. The author discovered an endless source of humor in the monotonous and everyday worries of people, that is, in the routine that deafens his consciousness.

Many great writers, starting to read Chekhov's stories, found themselves under his powerful influence, which was then transmitted to all world literature. A distinctive feature of his literary method is the use of the “stream of consciousness” technique, which influenced such modernists as James Joyce. Among other things, his fairy tales, stories and plays almost always lack a final moral. Anton Pavlovich was convinced that he was not obliged to provide the reader with ready-made answers, but on the contrary, he should ask full of meaning questions.

At night, around 12 o'clock Tverskoy Boulevard two friends were walking. One is a tall, handsome brunette in a worn bearskin coat and top hat, the other is a small, red-haired man in a red coat with white bone buttons. Both walked and were silent. The brunette lightly whistled a mazurka, the red-haired man looked sullenly at his feet and kept spitting to the side.

Shouldn't we sit? - the brunette finally suggested when both friends saw dark silhouette Pushkin and the light above the gates of the Strastnoy Monastery.

The redhead silently agreed, and the friends sat down.

Chapter 1

After the wedding there was not even a light snack; The young couple drank a glass, changed clothes and went to the station. Instead of a cheerful wedding ball and dinner, instead of music and dancing, a trip to a pilgrimage two hundred miles away. Many approved of this, saying that Modest Alekseich was already in rank and not young, and a noisy wedding might perhaps seem not entirely decent; and it’s boring to listen to music when an official of 52 years old marries a girl who is barely 18. They also said that Modest Alekseich, as a man with rules, started this trip to the monastery, in fact, in order to make it clear to his young wife that and in marriage he gives first place to religion and morality.

The young people were seen off. A crowd of colleagues and relatives stood with glasses and waited for the train to leave to shout hurray, and Pyotr Leontyich, the father, in a top hat, in a teacher's tailcoat, already drunk and already very pale, kept reaching for the window with his glass and saying pleadingly:

Dawn is coming soon.

Everything has long since fallen asleep. Only the young wife of the pharmacist Chernomordik, the owner of the b-skaya pharmacy, is awake. She has already gone to bed three times, but sleep stubbornly does not come to her - and no one knows why. She's sitting by open window, in one shirt, and looking at the street. She's stuffy, bored, annoyed... so annoyed that she even wants to cry, but why is again unknown. Some kind of lump lies in the chest and every now and then it rolls up to the throat... Behind, a few steps from the pharmacist, crouched against the wall, Chernomordik himself sweetly snores. A greedy flea bites into the bridge of his nose, but he doesn’t feel it and even smiles, because he dreams that everyone in the city is coughing and constantly buying drops of the Danish king from him. Now you can’t wake him up either with injections, or with a gun, or with caresses.

I

On Palm Sunday, an all-night vigil was held in the Staro-Petrovsky Monastery. When they began to distribute the willows, it was already ten o'clock, the lights had dimmed, the wicks had burned out, everything was as if in a fog. In the church twilight the crowd swayed like the sea, and to His Grace Peter, who had been unwell for three days already, it seemed that all the faces - both old and young, both male and female - resembled one another, those of everyone who came up for the willow , the same expression in the eyes. The doors were not visible in the fog, the crowd kept moving, and it seemed that there was no end to it and there would be no end. A women's choir sang, a nun read the canon.

How stuffy it was, how hot! How long the all-night vigil went on! His Eminence Peter was tired. His breathing was heavy, rapid, dry, his shoulders ached from fatigue, his legs were trembling. And it was unpleasantly disturbing that the holy fool would occasionally cry out in the choir. And then suddenly, as if in a dream or in delirium, it seemed to the bishop that his own mother Maria Timofeevna, whom he had not seen for nine years, or an old woman who looked like his mother, came up to him in the crowd, and, having accepted the willow from him, walked away and all the time she looked at him cheerfully, with a kind, joyful smile, until she mixed with the crowd.

(Episode from the life of "Gracious Sirs")

The most deadly boredom was written on the well-fed, shiny face of the gracious sovereign. He had just come out of Morpheus's afternoon embrace and didn't know what to do. I didn’t want to think or yawn... I’ve been tired of reading since time immemorial, it’s too early to go to the theater, I’m too lazy to go for a ride... What to do? What to do for fun?

Some young lady has come! - Yegor reported. - He’s asking you!

Young lady? Hm... Who is this? All the same, however, ask...

While taking his evening walk, collegiate assessor Miguev stopped near a telegraph pole and took a deep breath. A week ago, at this very place, when he was returning from a walk to his home in the evening, his former maid Agnia caught up with him and said angrily:

Already, wait! I’ll bake you such a cancer that you’ll know how to destroy innocent girls! And I’ll give you the baby, and I’ll go to court, and I’ll explain it to your wife...

The hungry wolf got up to go hunting. Her cubs, all three of them, were fast asleep, huddled together, warming each other. She licked them and walked away.

Was already spring month March, but at night the trees crackled with cold, like in December, and as soon as you stuck out your tongue, it began to sting strongly. The wolf was in poor health and suspicious; She shuddered at the slightest noise and kept thinking about how no one would offend the wolf cubs at home without her. The smell of human and horse tracks, tree stumps, stacked firewood and the dark, manure-covered road frightened her; It seemed to her as if people were standing behind the trees in the darkness and dogs were howling somewhere beyond the forest.

Part one.

There is a wedding dinner at the house of the widow Mymrina, on Pyatisobachy Lane. 23 people are having dinner, eight of whom do not eat anything, nod off and complain that they are “sick.” Candles, lamps and a lame chandelier, rented from a tavern, burn so brightly that one of the guests sitting at the table, a telegraph operator, coquettishly narrows his eyes and every now and then starts talking about electric lighting - neither to the village nor to the city. He prophesies a brilliant future for this lighting and electricity in general, but, nevertheless, those dining listen to him with some disdain.

Electricity... - the seated father mutters, looking blankly at his plate. - And in my opinion, electric lighting is just a scam. They stick a coal in there and think to look away! No, brother, if you give me light, then give me not a coal, but something substantial, something incendiary, so that I have something to take on! Give me some fire, do you understand? - fire, which is natural, not mental.

(From the chronicle of one city)

The earth pretended to be inferno. The afternoon sun burned with such zeal that even Reaumur, hanging in the excise office, was lost: he reached 35.8° and stopped indecisively... Sweat poured from the townsfolk, like from worn-out horses, and it dried up on them; I was too lazy to wipe it.

Along the large market square, in sight of houses with tightly closed shutters, two ordinary people were walking: the treasurer Pocheshikhin and the intercessor for affairs (he is also the old correspondent of “Son of the Fatherland”) Optimov. Both walked and, due to the heat, were silent. Optimov wanted to condemn the council for the dust and uncleanliness of the market square, but, knowing the peaceful disposition and moderate direction of his companion, he remained silent.

- Hey, you figure! - shouted a fat, white-bodied gentleman, seeing in the fog a tall and skinny man with a thin beard and a large copper cross on his chest. - Give me a couple!

I, Your Highness, am not a bath attendant, I am a barber, sir. It's not my place to give in to couples. Would you like to order some blood-sucking jars to be installed?

The fat gentleman stroked his crimson thighs, thought and said:

The daughters of Actual State Councilor Bryndin, Kitty and Zina, rode along Nevsky in a landau. Riding with them was also their cousin Marfusha, a little sixteen-year-old provincial landowner who recently came to St. Petersburg to stay with noble relatives and look at the “sights.” Next to her sat Baron Dronkel, a freshly washed and too noticeably cleaned little man in blue coat and a blue hat. The sisters rolled around and glanced sideways at their cousin. The cousin both made them laugh and compromised them. The naive girl, who had never been in a landau and had not heard the noise of the capital, looked with curiosity at the upholstery in the carriage, the footman's hat with braid, and screamed at every encounter with a horse-drawn carriage... And her questions were even more naive and funnier...

A small square near the Nativity Monastery, which is called Trubnaya, or simply Truba; On Sundays there is a market there. Hundreds of sheepskin coats, capes, fur caps, and top hats are swarming like crayfish in a sieve. You can hear the multi-voiced singing of birds, reminiscent of spring. If the sun is shining and there are no clouds in the sky, then the singing and smell of hay are felt more strongly, and this memory of spring excites the thought and carries it far, far away. A row of carts stretches along one edge of the site. On the carts there is not hay, not cabbage, not beans, but goldfinches, siskins, belladonnas, larks, blackbirds and graybirds, tits, bullfinches. All this is jumping in bad, homemade cages, looking with envy at the free sparrows and chirping Goldfinches for a penny, siskins are more expensive, the rest of the birds have the most uncertain value.

The village of Ukleevo lay in a ravine, so from the highway and from the station railway Only the bell tower and the chimneys of the calico-printing factories were visible. When passers-by asked what village this was, they were told:

This is the same place where the sexton ate all the caviar at the funeral.

Once, at the funeral of the manufacturer Kostyukov, the old sexton saw grainy caviar among the appetizers and began to eat it greedily; They pushed him, tugged at his sleeve, but he seemed numb with pleasure: he felt nothing and only ate. I ate all the caviar, and there were four pounds in the jar. And a lot of time has passed since then, the sexton died long ago, but everyone remembered about caviar. Was life so poor here or were people unable to notice anything other than this unimportant event that happened ten years ago, and they just didn’t tell anything else about the village of Ukleevo.

In the private boarding house m-me Zhevuzem strikes twelve. The boarders, lethargic and skinny, arm in arm, walk sedately along the corridor. Cool ladies, yellow and freckled, with an expression of extreme concern on their faces, do not take their eyes off them and, despite the perfect silence, every now and then shout out: “Medam! Silence!”*.

In the teacher’s room, in this mysterious holy of holies, Zhevuzem herself and the mathematics teacher Dyryavin are sitting. The teacher had given the lesson a long time ago, and it was time for him to leave, but he stayed to ask the boss for an increase. Knowing the stinginess of the “old scoundrel,” he raises the issue of an increase not directly, but diplomatically.

I look at your face, Bianka Ivanovna, and remember the past... - he says, sighing. - What beauties there used to be in our time! Lord, what beauties! You'll suck your fingers! And now? The beauties are gone! There are no real women these days, but all are, God forgive me, wagtails and sprat... One is worse than the other...