#194 The Darling

Find today’s 4,956 word story here: http://www.chekhovshorts.com/stories/194.html Travis review: Olenka is a woman of empathetic obsession. She is a blank slate with neither desire or even logical thoughts until she meets a man (two husbands, one companion, and a child) from whom she can live vicariously. Chekhov writes Olenka almost a caricature. At first, the empathetic …

#193 A Doctor’s Visit

Find today’s 4529 word short story here: http://www.chekhovshorts.com/stories/193.html Travis review: It today’s story Korolyov, a doctor from Moscow, comes out to a small factory town to look at an ailing heiress. He rides into town with extreme prejudice and irritation. He sees the peasant class workers leading drunken, pointless lives. Korolyov hates the factory’s owner’s …

#192 Ionitch

You can find today’s 7117 word story here http://www.chekhovshorts.com/stories/192.html Travis review: This story starts out comical with an introduction to the Turkins, the smartest family in a small, unnamed town. The father plays puns on words, the wife writes and reads aloud unrealistic novels “of what never happens in real life,” and the daughter pounds the keyboards …

#191 About Love

Find today’s 3886 word story here: http://www.chekhovshorts.com/stories/191.html Travis review: So this is the third story featuring Ivan Iavnovitch and Burkin and the second with Alehin. The story picks up the following day from Gooseberries. When Alehin tells his story it helps answer the curious details in Gooseberries, like why Alehin was so filthy and in desperate …

#190 Gooseberries

Find today’s 4373 word short story here: http://www.chekhovshorts.com/stories/190.html Travis review: I believe “Gooeseberries” is the first time that Chekhov has used characters from a previous story. And this is his 190th story. This story follows yesterday’s Man in a Case, where the teacher, Burkin, told the veterinarian surgeon, Ivan Ivanovitch, about a tyrannical Greek instructor who …

#189 The Man in a Case

Please find today’s 5400 word short story here: http://www.chekhovshorts.com/stories/189.html Travis review: The Man in the Case certainly lives up to it’s name both figuratively and literally. Two accomplished men spend the night in a barn after what I imagine was a vigorous day of hunting. Discussion about the how the wife of the man whose land …

#188 The Schoolmistress

Please today’s story 3491 word short story here: http://www.chekhovshorts.com/stories/188.html Travis review:  Chekhov follows a schoolmistress riding in a cart to pick up her pay from the zemstvo. She is introverted and had taken the job thirteen years ago out of necessity after her parents died. Her psychological disposition is to not reflect too deeply about anything. To that …

#187 At Home

Please find today’s 4973 word short story here: http://www.chekhovshorts.com/stories/187.html Travis review Today’s story is very different than The Peasants although both stories feature people returning to their childhood homes. Vera comes back to the steppe after inheriting her father’s estate. Having spent several years abroad she sees potential for her old home, but she is …