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Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy the following conditions”

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Re: Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy the following conditions”

#41

Post by samat »

siberianbear wrote: post #20
danielhooper wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity, how long did you have to study Russian before you could enjoy Chekhov's stories?

I read a bunch of them (in English) when I was a university student: that's where my first exposure came from. When I started to study Russian, I read one or two of his stories in this book [1], which was great because it has English and Russian versions on opposite pages. I got to enjoy reading in Russian because I didn't constantly have to look up every tenth word in a dictionary. Russian is a hard language but the…

Thanks for sharing, never realised that Dostoyevskiy is so hard, being kind-of-native-speaker.

Re: Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy the following conditions”

#42

Post by dang »

ghostly_s wrote: post #33

Oh, how I laughed, to finish this ode to humility and there at the bottom, this little blurb which seems to be working overtime in demonstrating as many of the just-disparaged traits as possible. >Want more? Join over 15,000 readers getting The Open Circle, a weekly dose of my best ideas. I’ll also send you 200+ pages from my private notebooks and 24 of my favorite books. Get it here.

Yes, but please don't post snarky dismissals anyhow. How often do we get to discuss Chekhov?

Re: Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy the following conditions”

#44

Post by stevecalifornia »

kleiba wrote: post #34

They do not use their smart phones in the presence of others.

On the timeline of humanity, our pocket computers are brand-new. It will likely be a couple of decades before we sort out the social norms of using them. However, I think that we will fall towards using these devices constantly in all social settings because the young people growing up won't have the nostalgia of time before smartphones-- there was never a time where you and your friends sat at a table and talked completely free of digital interruption. Go to a coffee shop or restaurant near a high school around the lunch hour...

Re: Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy the following conditions”

#45

Post by spdionis »

gmarx wrote: post #30

This letter appears to be a drawn out detailed set of insults to his older brother. Maybe cultured isn't the best translation. Is this what we in the US would have called "classy" back then?

"well bred" is indeed a more correct translation

Re: Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy the following conditions”

#46

Post by acabal »

sevensor wrote: post #6

One needn't click on affiliate links to buy Chekhov's works. Project Gutenberg has them: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/search/?query=chekhov

Shameless plug, Chekhov's complete short fiction for free, at Standard Ebooks: https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/anton-chekhov/short-fictio...

We took the Gutenberg transcriptions, compiled them into one ebook, ordered by publication date, lightly modernized, edited, corrected, and completely proofread them. Check out the Github repo to see the changes (which are a lot, since it's a huge amount of writing): https://github.com/standardebooks/anton-chekhov_short-fictio...

While I don't speak Russian, I've found Garnett's translations to be extremely readable. A lot of her contemporaries seem to have agreed.

Re: Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy the following conditions”

#48

Post by stephancoral »

makmanalp wrote: post #40
dang wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What's the thing about russians and noses? Well. https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/g/gogol/nikolai/g61n/

I'd always had an impression of classical Russian writing as being impenetrable, but this was delightful. Thank you!

Check out Daniil Kharms too - http://www.sevaj.dk/kharms/stories/noteb10.htm

Re: Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy the following conditions”

#49

Post by avenoir »

siberianbear wrote: post #20
danielhooper wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity, how long did you have to study Russian before you could enjoy Chekhov's stories?

I read a bunch of them (in English) when I was a university student: that's where my first exposure came from. When I started to study Russian, I read one or two of his stories in this book [1], which was great because it has English and Russian versions on opposite pages. I got to enjoy reading in Russian because I didn't constantly have to look up every tenth word in a dictionary. Russian is a hard language but the…

Chekhov was very popular in Russian schools up until early 90s because of his writing style. You're absolutely spot on that he writes in very plain Russian. Dostoevsky has some mindfuck-inducing way or getting across to the reader. His writing is difficult even for a lot of native Russian speakers. L.N. Tolstoy also has some easy reading ( Детство. Отрочество. Юность / Childhood, Boyhood, and Youth is my favorite)

Re: Chekhov: “Cultured people must, in my opinion, satisfy the following conditions”

#50

Post by pjc50 »

sandworm101 wrote: post #14
siberianbear wrote: post #2

I am an American living in Russia. When I was studying Russian I read a number of Chekhov's short stories and got a feel for who he was. I later came across one of his quotes: "В человеке должно быть все прекрасно: и лицо, и одежда, и душа, и мысли" (Everything in a person should be excellent: his face, his clothes, his soul and his ideas). I sometimes discussed this phrase with Russians, eventually coming to be beli…

What's the thing about russians and noses? The naval academy also has a statute with a lucky nose. In other cultures people want to touch the hands or feet of statues, but in russia it seems to be the nose.

Edinburgh's Greyfriars Bobby (a dog) has a nose people touch for luck. Nearby John Hume has an enlightened toe: http://www.scotsman.com/news/hume-giant-of-the-enligh-toe-nm...
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