Premium
The Child in Chekhov
Author(s) -
PETERSON NADYA L.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
the russian review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.136
H-Index - 24
eISSN - 1467-9434
pISSN - 0036-0341
DOI - 10.1111/russ.10744
Subject(s) - dialogical self , sketch , salient , narrative , reading (process) , representation (politics) , focus (optics) , literature , close reading , history , linguistics , art , epistemology , philosophy , computer science , physics , political science , politics , archaeology , algorithm , optics , law
The focus of my research is on representation of childhood in Chekhov's stories. In this article I look at two stories (“Grisha” and “At Home”) published at the height of Chekhov's interest in children in the mid‐1880s. I have chosen this material because one of the stories appears on Leo Tolstoy's list of known favorites, both stories are written in the form of a dramatic sketch, and both narratives address two crucial stages in the development of the child protagonist. My aim is to sketch the literary and extraliterary background on the topic, and to identify the salient features of Chekhov's model through a careful reading of the stories. A close reading of Chekhov's texts provides an opportunity to see the outlines of Chekhov's model in its dialogical relationship with the prevalent discourses of the time.