8 h 6 minAudiobook8 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · 199 pagesHardcover · 6 × 9 in · 199 pagesAbout this book
What if a brief meeting by the sea makes your ordinary life impossible to return to?
In Anton Chekhov’s The Lady with the Dog and Other Stories, small encounters carry deep emotional weight. At Yalta, Dmitri Gurov meets Anna Sergeyevna, a young married woman walking a small white dog. Both are tied to other lives. Their growing attachment unsettles what they expect from love and what they can bear to leave unchanged.
Around the title story, Chekhov gathers quiet portraits of longing and loneliness. The Darling follows Olenka, who takes on the opinions of those she loves. The Bishop centres on Pyotr, a tired churchman set apart by his rank. The Bet, Gooseberries, and Misery explore solitude, happiness, and the need for someone to hear our grief.
What you’ll discover
- Love beyond a holiday Walk beside Gurov and Anna as an unexpected attachment challenges their familiar lives.
- A heart shaped by others Meet Olenka, whose devotion raises uneasy questions about love and a self of her own.
- The distance of rank Follow Bishop Pyotr into the loneliness that his high position cannot ease.
- Happiness under question Let The Bet and Gooseberries unsettle easy ideas about solitude, life, and personal contentment.
- Someone to hear grief In Misery, a cab driver’s search for a listener makes loneliness painfully concrete.
Is it for you?
This book suits readers who like quiet, close portraits of people, and anyone who wants a first taste of Russian fiction in short form. If you want fast plots, strong villains or tidy morals, these stories may feel too still.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A stranger with a dog appears in Yalta
- A holiday affair becomes a burden
- Moscow cannot hold a man who remembers
- The Darling gives her whole heart away
- The Bishop feels alone in high office
- What Chekhov sees and how he tells it
Who’s who
- Dmitri GurovA Moscow man, unhappily married, who treats love as a holiday pastime until one meeting at Yalta will not leave his mind.
- Anna SergeyevnaA young married woman on holiday in Yalta, shy and troubled, who walks a small white dog and longs for a more real life.
- OlenkaThe Darling of the title, a kind provincial woman who cannot live without someone to love and takes on that person's opinions.
- KukinA gloomy manager of a pleasure garden who is Olenka's first love and who complains constantly about weather and audiences.
- Bishop PyotrA churchman of high rank, tired and unwell, who remembers his poor childhood and feels apart from the people around him.
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- Large print hardcover
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The Lady with the Dog and Other Stories
Ordinary people face love, grief, and loneliness in short stories.
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“If Chekhov had not been such a remarkable writer, he would have been a great doctor.”
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1 of 6
A stranger with a dog appears in Yalta
The title story opens in the resort town of Yalta, on the Black Sea. Word goes round the promenade that a new face has arrived, a young woman in a beret who walks a small white Pomeranian dog. Dmitri Gurov, a Moscow man, hears of her and takes notice.
Gurov is not a young man. He married early, while still a student, and he has a wife and children at home. He thinks of his wife as narrow and dull, and he fears her a little. Over the years he has had many short affairs with women, and he speaks of women in a careless, rather cold way.
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The author
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
1860–1904 · Russian playwright and story writer
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904) was a Russian writer and physician. He was born in Taganrog and lived in Moscow and later Yalta. He wrote short stories and plays, including The Seagull (1896), Uncle Vanya (1897), and The Cherry Orchard (1904). He died in Badenweiler, Germany.
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What is The Lady with the Dog about?
It follows Dmitri Gurov, a married Moscow man, and Anna Sergeyevna, a married woman he meets on holiday in Yalta. What starts as a casual affair grows into something that disturbs both their lives.
Who wrote The Lady with the Dog and when?
Anton Chekhov wrote it in 1899, near the end of his life. He died in 1904. It is one of his best-known short stories and is often counted among the finest of its kind.
What is The Darling about?
It is a short story about Olenka, a gentle woman who loves each man in her life so completely that she adopts his opinions. Chekhov shows both her warmth and the lack of a self of her own.
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