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A grimy fly can soil the entire wall and a small, dirty little act can ruin the entire proceedings.
Anton Chekhov -
I was so drunk the whole time that I took bottles for girls and girls for bottles.
Anton Chekhov
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The bourgeoisie loves so-called 'positive' types and novels with happy endings since they lull one into thinking that it is fine to simultaneously acquire capital and maintain one’s innocence, to be a beast and still be happy.
Anton Chekhov -
Happiness does not await us all. One needn’t be a prophet to say that there will be more grief and pain than serenity and money. That is why we must hang on to one another.
Anton Chekhov -
There is not a single criterion which can serve as the measure of the non-existent, of the non-human.
Anton Chekhov -
When an actor has money, he doesn't send letters but telegrams.
Anton Chekhov -
To describe drunkenness for the colorful vocabulary is rather cynical. There is nothing easier than to capitalize on drunkards.
Anton Chekhov -
'Grigory Petrovitch, let us weep, let us weep with joy!' he said in a thin voice, and then at once burst out laughing in a loud bass guffaw. 'Ho-ho-ho! This is a fine daughter-in-law for you too! Everything is in its place in her; all runs smoothly, no creaking, the mechanism works well, lots of screws in it.'
Anton Chekhov
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Everyone judges plays as if they were very easy to write. They don’t know that it is hard to write a good play, and twice as hard and tortuous to write a bad one.
Anton Chekhov -
I try to catch every sentence, every word you and I say, and quickly lock all these sentences and words away in my literary storehouse because they might come in handy.
Anton Chekhov -
An artist must pass judgment only on what he understands; his range is limited as that of any other specialist—that's what I keep repeating and insisting upon. Anyone who says that the artist's field is all answers and no questions has never done any writing or had any dealings with imagery. An artist observes, selects, guesses and synthesizes.
Anton Chekhov -
Better a debauched canary than a pious wolf.
Anton Chekhov -
She read a lot, wrote letters without the letter.
Anton Chekhov -
By all means I will be married if you wish it. But on these conditions: everything must be as it has been hitherto-that is, she must live in Moscow while I live in the country, and I will come and see her. ... I promise to be an excellent husband, but give me a wife who, like the moon, will not appear every day in my sky.
Anton Chekhov
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It is easier to ask of the poor than of the rich.
Anton Chekhov -
If you wish women to love you, be original; I know a man who used to wear felt boots summer and winter, and women fell in love with him.
Anton Chekhov -
Who but a stupid barbarian could burn so much beauty in his stove and destroy that which he cannot make?
Anton Chekhov -
Ah, but ignorance is better. At least then there's hope.
Anton Chekhov -
All great sages are as despotic as generals, and as ungracious and indelicate as generals, because they are confident of their impunity.
Anton Chekhov -
The wealthy are always surrounded by hangers-on; science and art are as well.
Anton Chekhov
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One can only call that youth healthful which refuses to be reconciled to old ways and which, foolishly or shrewdly, combats the old. This is nature’s charge and all progress hinges upon it.
Anton Chekhov -
Wherever there is degeneration and apathy, there also is sexual perversion, cold depravity, miscarriage, premature old age, grumbling youth, there is a decline in the arts, indifference to science, and injustice in all its forms.
Anton Chekhov -
In my opinion it is harmful to place important things in the hands of philanthropy, which in Russia is marked by a chance character. Nor should important matters depend on leftovers, which are never there. I would prefer that the government treasury take care of it.
Anton Chekhov -
I don’t care for success. The ideas sitting in my head are annoyed by, and envious of, that which I’ve already written.
Anton Chekhov