SOURCE: Pospelov, G. N. “The Style of Čexov's Tales.¹” In Anton Čexov as a Master of Story-Writing, edited by Leo Hulanicki and David Savignac, pp. 119–30. The Hague, the Netherlands: Mouton & Co. B. V., 1976.

In the following essay, originally published in 1970, Pospelov demonstrates how Chekhov used neoteric and original literary devices and principles to transcend traditional literary constructions.

The stories which he wrote at the end of the 1880s show that Čexov was already surmounting the canons of sujet construction which had become traditional in literature and that he was advancing new principles. This primarily affected the construction of sujets of novel-like stories prevailing in Čexov—works wherein the basic goal consisted in disclosing the development of the principal hero's (or heroes') character in relation to his disaffection with the social milieu.

In the course of Russian literature, even from the time of the first novels and novel—like...