Known far more for his plays such as the Cherry Orchard and Three Sisters, Chekhov is regarded as the father of the short story as well as the first modern fiction writer. His famous Chekhov's gun comment is still regarded as some of the best advice for storyline progression:

"Remove everything that has no relevance to the story. If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. ... One must never place a loaded rifle on the stage if it isn't going to go off."

His short stories are a wonderful example of how he rejected conventional forms to examine the lives of ordinary people in prosaic situations.

His impressionistic depictions of Russian life and the human condition resound with emotional honesty, focusing on character rather than plot and revealing subtle but important truths. Thomas Mann held Chekhov in highest esteem, declaring, "His short stories rank with all that is greatest and best of European literature."

This compilation of seven tales attests to the timeless appeal of the Russian author's short fiction.

Selections include "Misery," an account of a sleigh-driver's attempts to communicate his overwhelming grief; "A Father," a meditation on the conflict between rejecting a monstrous parent and giving him his respectful due; "A Problem," which proposes that criminals cannot reform unless they pay for their misdeeds; and "In Exile," an examination of whether it is better to dream of happiness or to accept a living hell.

Other tales include "Ward No. 6," relating a conflict between an asylum inmate and the institution's director; "My Life: The Story of a Provincial," in which a rebellious young bourgeois joins the working classes; and "Peasants," an exposé of the dehumanizing effects of poverty.

If you haven't read Chekhov since school then I highly recommend picking up this book and diving in. I enjoyed it tremendously.

http://www.hive.co.uk/Product/Anton-Chekhov/Great-Stories-By-Chekhov/20352081

Great Stories by Anton Chekov is a beautiful collection of stories by Chekov. This collection has some of Chekovs well known stories collected in one volume. This is a wonderful book for fans of Chekov as well as those who have never read his works. I highly recommended it.

3.5★
I feel ridiculous pretending to review such a well-known and admired Russian author. I have no idea if the original Russian is old-fashioned and stilted or if the translation doesn’t do it justice. There are so many words and phrases that sound awkward but probably aren’t intended to. Whatever the reason, it prevented me from enjoying quite a lot of these stories, but the parts I liked, I really liked.

The Goodreads biography says that Chekov called his childhood gloomy. That seems like an understatement, if these stories are any reflection of it.

There’s a selection of stories, but I’ll mention only a couple that struck a chord with me. The first is “Misery: To Whom Shall I Tell My Grief?”, which was the first in the book.

“The twilight of evening. Big flakes of wet snow are whirling lazily about the street lamps, which have just been lighted, and lying in a thin soft layer on roofs, horses’ backs, shoulders, caps. Iona Potapov, the sledge driver, is all white like a ghost. He sits on the box without stirring, bent as double as the living body can be bent.”

Chekhov suggests Potapov’s horse is lost in thought, used as she is to pulling a plough and now finding herself in the middle of “monstrous lights, of unceasing uproar and hurrying people.”

They are the local cab service. An officer shouts to him, boards, and tells him to hurry up. As they pull into traffic, he is sworn at and berated by other drivers and people in the street. The officer suggest they’re just “rascals”.

“Iona looks at his fare and moves his lips. . . . Apparently he means to say something, but nothing comes but a sniff.

‘What?’ inquires the officer.

Iona gives a wry smile, and straining his throat, brings out huskily: ‘My son . . . er . . . my son died this week, sir.’

‘H'm! What did he die of ?’

Iona turns his whole body round to his fare, and says: ‘Who can tell! It must have been from fever. . . . He lay three days in the hospital and then he died. . . . God's will.’

‘Turn round, you devil!’ comes out of the darkness. ‘Have you gone cracked, you old dog? Look where you are going!’

‘Drive on! drive on! . . . ’ says the officer. ‘We shan't get there till to-morrow going on like this. Hurry up!’”

When he delivers his fare, he searches for someone, anyone, to talk to, but eventually, he goes out to the stables to confide in his faithful mare, who seems to listen (as we all like to think our pets do).

As I said, gloomy. But Chekhov made me feel the cold-to-the bone of a Russian winter and the misery of the bereft father. And it’s not as if I didn’t have some idea of what I was getting into, with a title like that.

A story I really enjoyed took place in a hospital: “Ward No. 6”. This was the ward with lunatics. As we go in the ward, our narrator describes the various men with whom he shares this ward. After hearing all of their stories, we meet Andrey Yefimitich, the doctor, who is appalled at the conditions. No thermometer in the whole place, only two scalpels, and people said the previous doctor sold the hospital alcohol.

So how does the good doctor deal with this? Philosophically, of course. There are many discussions of philosophy, which I enjoyed, as so much of it is still prevalent today to justify all kinds of questionable activity. I’ll leave you with the doctor’s reasoning:

“What is gained if some shopkeeper or clerk lives an extra five or ten years? If the aim of medicine is by drugs to alleviate suffering, the question forces itself on one: why alleviate it? In the first place, they say that suffering leads man to perfection; and in the second, if mankind really learns to alleviate its sufferings with pills and drops, it will completely abandon religion and philosophy, in which it has hitherto found not merely protection from all sorts of trouble, but even happiness. Pushkin suffered terrible agonies before his death, poor Heine lay paralyzed for several years; why, then, should not some Andrey Yefimitch or Matryona Savishna be ill, since their lives had nothing of importance in them, and would have been entirely empty and like the life of an amoeba except for suffering?

Oppressed by such reflections, Andrey Yefimitch relaxed his efforts and gave up visiting the hospital every day.”

Or in a few words: What's the point? We're all going to die anyway.

Gloomy.

Thanks to NetGalley and Dover Publications for the copy for review from which I’ve quoted.

A nice collection by a wonderful author. If you have not been exposed much to the Russian writer Anton Chekhov than I highly recommend this book. My previous exposure was his highly acclaimed play "The Cherry Orchard", so for me this was a treat.

Thank you NetGalley and Dover Pubblications for giving me the opportunity to read this beautiful collection of short stories by Checkov. It's a collection to be published in January 2017 and translated by Constance Garnett, who actually translated most of the classical literary productions of Russian literature.
Whenever we think of Russian literature, we think of words like "hopelessness", "despair", and "dark"; but I can think of only two words when it comes to it "amazing" and "truthful". Despite his blunt and to the point writing, Checkov will always stand out for his concise messages and beautiful descriptions of characters and places. His style can easily be described as Impressionist. Impressionism as a movement was based on capturing a subjective experience rather than the realistic description of it. Checkov does not give too many details in his stories and leaves us as readers to peace the story together from his hints. As a reading audience we totally depend upon the appearances and actions of the characters. Each story is told through the characters' actions, movements and thoughts. If the action becomes confusing sometimes, it's because the characters are confused too. By the way of telling the story, we as readers become caught up in the plot as if it were happening to us right then and there.
Some critics described his stories "short and sweet". They may be short in length but they make up for the content. Checkov describes the characters in such a way that the audience already knew them. Checkov's writing style is so wonderful because of that. It make us connect with the charactes, bad or good, and he does that in such a beautil way.
I totally recommend this short collection of stories for all of you who love Russian literature and short stories.

Great Stories by Chekhov by Anton Chekhov published by Dover Publications is a collection of seven short stories from the person attributed as the father of the short story. Chekhov lived from 1860 until 1904 and lived in a range of semi-comfort and of poverty. He began writing to pay for his tuition at medical school and to support his family. He was well traveled in Russia and met and interviewed a variety of people including prisoners. His works consist mostly of plays and short stories.
This Dover edition presents seven of the lesser known short stories to give a reader an introduction to the writer. Russian literature, to me has always seemed more human and in touch with the common people than other European literature. Chekhov is a master of portraying people in a very honest and at times touching way. It is not always the simple good man that he writes about. He can take you into the mind of a manipulative character and the reader will hear the rationalizations going justifying his actions and passing the blame along. Other characters, like the carriage driver who lost his son, are alone in the world and are simply seen as automatons. These characters find compassion in forms other than humans. The rich Russian culture, the good and bad, are also displayed in the stories.

The Dover edition gives the reader a very adequate introduction to Chekhov and a simple introduction to the short stories. Words of Russian origin are also defined for the reader. Everything that a novice to Russian literature needs is provided in this edition. The language in the stories is simple. Russian literature tends to be intimidating in the length of the work rather than the story line. Being short stories, the longest story is under one hundred pages. Constance Garnett provides the translation into English. Her work is well known and her experience extensive -- translating over seventy volumes of Russian literature. Well done and, as always, a very affordable Dover publication.