Introduction & Overview of The Lady with the Pet Dog

This Study Guide consists of approximately 45 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more - everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of The Lady with the Pet Dog.

Introduction & Overview of The Lady with the Pet Dog

This Study Guide consists of approximately 45 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more - everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of The Lady with the Pet Dog.
This section contains 264 words
(approx. 1 page at 400 words per page)
Buy The Lady with the Pet Dog Study Guide

The Lady with the Pet Dog Summary & Study Guide Description

The Lady with the Pet Dog Summary & Study Guide includes comprehensive information and analysis to help you understand the book. This study guide contains the following sections:

This detailed literature summary also contains Further Study and a Free Quiz on The Lady with the Pet Dog by Anton Chekhov.

"The Lady with the Pet Dog" was published in 1899, during Chekhov's two-year stay at the seaside health resort at Yalta, where he had been sent because of his tuberculosis. Though he found Yalta painfully boring, he produced many of his finest stories during that time, including "Gooseberries," "The Darling," "On Official Business," and "The Lady with the Pet Dog," his most famous story. Well received by audiences when it was published, the reputation of this tale of adultery and discovery of true love has only grown over time. Many critics believe that Chekhov drew upon Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, an epic novel with an adulterous heroine, by painting a similarly complex moral and emotional portrait in only a few pages. Chekhov was able to speak volumes in a few words by his selection of gestures or details. Unlike Chekhov's contemporaries—most notably Tolstoy and Dostoevsky—who were preoccupied with sweeping historical, philosophical, and religious themes, Chekhov was interested in the smallest moments of human interest. While Tolstoy and Dostoevsky were driven by profound moral convictions, Chekhov was noted for his cool objectivity. He was reluctant to moralize, adhering to his own conviction that it is less important to moralize over a horse thief or an adulterer than it is to understand them. In "The Lady with the Pet Dog," Chekhov neither romanticizes nor condemns the illicit love affair between Gurov and Anna. He simply presents it, but with such clarity and perception that the reader recognizes the profundity of what the characters experience and is entirely persuaded by their reality.

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This section contains 264 words
(approx. 1 page at 400 words per page)
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The Lady with the Pet Dog from Gale. ©2005-2006 Thomson Gale, a part of the Thomson Corporation. All rights reserved.