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Anton Chekhov

Anton Chekhov Quotes

Physician

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Famous Anton Chekhov Quotes

“Critics are like horse-flies which hinder the horses in their plowing of the soil. The horse works, all its muscles drawn tight like the strings on a double-bass, and a fly settles on his flanks and tickles and buzzes. And what does the fly buzz about? It scarcely knows itself; simply because it is restless and wants to proclaim: 'Look, I too am living on the earth. See, I can buzz, too, buzz about anything.'”

KnowsWantLooksDoeI CanEarthHorseCriticsSettlingSoilMusclesStringsRestlessBassLiving OnHinderBuzzPlowingDouble Bass
Author:Anton Chekhov
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“You have lost your reason and taken the wrong path. You have taken lies for truth, and hideousness for beauty. You would marvel if, owing to strange events of some sorts, frogs and lizards suddenly grew on apple and orange trees instead of fruit, or if roses began to smell like a sweating horse; so I marvel at you who exchange heaven for earth. I don't want to understand you.”

IfsWantReasonEarthLyingLostHeavenPathTakenTreeEventsStrangeGrewHorseRoseFruitSmellApplesOrangeFrogsOwingSweatingLizardsWrong PathApples And OrangesOrange Trees
Book:Delphi Complete Works of Anton Chekhov (Illustrated)
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“After us they'll fly in hot air balloons, coat styles will change, perhaps they'll discover a sixth sense and cultivate it, but life will remain the same, a hard life full of secrets, but happy. And a thousand years from now man will still be sighing, "Oh! Life is so hard!" and will still, like now, be afraid of death and not want to die.”

MenWantYearsStillsHardLife IsDiesSecretAirStyleThousandHotThousand YearsCoatsWanting To DieBalloonsHard LifeSixth SenseAfraid Of DeathHot AirAir BalloonsHot Air Balloons
Author:Anton Chekhov
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“This man, who for twenty-five years has been reading and writing about art, and in all that time has never understood anything about art, has for twenty-five years been hashing over other people's ideas about realism, naturalism and all that nonsense; for twenty-five years he has been reading and writing about what intelligent people already know and about what stupid people don't want to know--which means that for twenty-five years he's been taking nothing and making nothing out of it. And with it all, what conceit! What pretension!”

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Author:Anton Chekhov
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“When you describe the miserable and unfortunate, and want to make the reader feel pity, try to be somewhat colder - that seems to give a kind of background to another's grief, against which it stands out more clearly. Whereas in your story the characters cry and you sigh. Yes, be more cold. ... The more objective you are, the stronger will be the impression you make.”

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Author:Anton Chekhov
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“I long to embrace, to include in my own short life, all that is accessible to man. I long to speak, to read, to wield a hammer in a great factory, to keep watch at sea, to plow. I want to be walking along the Nevsky Prospect, or in the open fields, or on the ocean - wherever my imagination ranges.”

MenWantLifeLongSpeakImaginationMy OwnWatchesSeaFieldsWalkingOceanEmbraceRangeFactoriesMy ImaginationHammersShort LifeOpen Fields
Book:Forty Stories
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