Memory is one of the most pervasive and complex motifs in Anton Chekhov's prose. This book clearly demonstrates that memory is not only a dominant theme, but, more significantly, a structuring principle that shapes the poetic, temporal, and spatial composition of several of Chekhov's stories from 1887 to 1904, including some of his best known works, such as «The Bishop, » «The Lady with a Lapdog, » «The House with a Mezzanine, » and «The Black Monk». Chekhov and the Poetics of Memory examines various modes of memory - nostalgic, regenerative, commemorative - and traces their expression in the language of the journey, prayer, and artistic inspiration, shedding light on the centrality of the themes of spiritual growth and moral action in Chekhov's work. In considering the larger theoretical and cultural context of memory, this study breaks new ground in showing the impact on Chekhov's work of the Eastern Orthodox religious tradition, as well as Henri Bergson and other modernist notions of time and memory.

In this volume, Gronas addresses the full range of psychological, social, and historical issues that bear on the mnemonic existence of modern literary works, particularly Russian literature. He focuses on the mnemonic processes involved in literary creativity, and the question of how our memories of past reading experiences shape the ways in which we react to literary works. The book also examines the concrete mnemonic qualities of poetry, as well as the social uses to which poetry memorization has historically been put to use. This study will appeal to scholars of cognitive poetics, Russian literature, and cultural studies.

Presents a collection of critical essays on the works of Anton Chekhov.

"Chekhov's keen powers of observation have been remarked by both memoirists who knew him well and scholars who approach him only through the written record and across the distance of many decades. To apprehend Chekhov means seeing how Chekhov sees, and the author's remarkable vision is understood as deriving from his occupational or professional training and identity. But we have failed to register, let alone understand, just what a central concern for Chekhov himself, and how deeply problematic, were precisely issues of seeing and being seen."—from the Introduction Michael C. Finke explodes a century of critical truisms concerning Chekhov's objective eye and what being a physician gave him as a writer in a book that foregrounds the deeply subjective and self-reflexive aspects of his fiction and drama. In exploring previously unrecognized seams between the author's life and his verbal art, Finke profoundly alters and deepens our understanding of Chekhov's personality and behaviors, provides startling new interpretations of a broad array of Chekhov's texts, and fleshes out Chekhov's simultaneous pride in his identity as a physician and devastating critique of turn-of-the-century medical practices and ideologies. Seeing Chekhov is essential reading for students of Russian literature, devotees of the short story and modern drama, and anyone interested in the intersection of literature, psychology, and medicine.

"'Dew on the Grass : The Poetics of Inbetweenness in Chekhov' is the first comprehensive and systematic study to focus on the poetic dimensions of Anton Chekhov's prose and drama. Using the concept on "inbetweenness," this book reconceptualizes the central aspects of Chekhov's style, from his use of language to the origins of his artistic worldview. Radislav Lapushin offers a fresh interpretive framework for the analysis of Chekhov's individual works and his oeuvre as a whole." -- Book cover.

Applying systems theory to the comedies of Chekhov, Balzac, Kleist, Moliere, and Shakespeare, A Concept of Dramatic Genre and the Comedy of a New Type: Chess, Literature, and Film approaches dramatic genre from the point of view of the degree of richness and strength of a character’s potential. Its main focus is to establish a methodology for analyzing the potential from multidimensional perspectives, using systems thinking. The whole concept is an alternative to the Aristotelian plot-based approach and is applied to an analysis of western and eastern European authors as well as contemporary American film. This innovative study consists of three parts: The first part is mostly theoretical, proposing a new definition of the dramatic as a category linked to general systems phenomena and offering a new classification of dramatic genre. In the second part, Ulea offers a textual analysis of some works based on this new classification. She analyzes comedies, tragedies, and dramas on the same or similar topics in order to reveal what makes them belong to opposite types of dramatic genre. Additionally, she considers the question of fate and chance, with regard to tragedy and comedy, from the point of view of the predispositioning theory. In the third part, Ulea explores an analysis of the comedy of a new type—CNT. Her emphasis is on the integration of the part and the whole in approaching the protagonist’s potential. She introduces the term quasi-strong potential in order to reveal the illusory strength of protagonists of the CNT and to show the technique of CNT’s analysis and synthesis. Ulea’s research begins with the notion of the comic, traditionally considered synonymous with the laughable, and attempts to approach it as independent from the laughable and laughter. The necessity to do so is dictated by the desire to penetrate the enigmatic nature of Chekhov’s comedy. The result is A Concept of Dramatic Genre and the Comedy of a New Type: Chess, Literature, and Film, a completely new approach to potential and systems thinking—which has never been a focus of dramatic theory before. Such potential is the touchstone of the comic and comedy, their permanent basic characteristic, the heart and axis around which the comedic world spins.

This text attempts to map the unique structure and meaning that comprise Chekhov's immensely rich artistic universe. The prime components of his theatrical technique and fictional world are explored to uncover the basic principles governing the Chekhov's universe.