The little white attic

Having read (some of) Shakespeare’s comedies, tragedies, histories, and problem plays, I naturally turned to romances and picked up The Temp...

These days I’ve been very busy. I got accepted to The Network (a TV scheme), and got access to Edinburgh International Film Festival and als...

I’ve been unwell and busy this week, so I’ve been enjoying Chekhov’s company without blogging. Here however are some wonderful passages in “...

After reading Rosamund Bartlett’s biography of Tolstoy (which is brilliant and fair-minded), I returned to Chekhov with the Penguin Lady wit...

I’ve been reading Rosamund Bartlett’s biography of Tolstoy and something caught my attention: Tolstoy’s sister Masha left her husband in sum...

 1/ Recently I’ve reread Tolstoy’s short story “Polikushka”. Still love it. There are many people who keep repeating some stock opinions abo...

As I read “The Bishop” and “Betrothed”, the last 2 stories of the collection Peasants and Other Stories (translated by Constance Garnett), ...

Most of the Chekhov stories I’ve been reading lately, like “A Woman’s Kingdom”, “Three Years”, “My Life”, “Peasants”… are melancholic and gl...

First Love is about a 40-year-old Vladimir Petrovitch looking back at his first love—for a 21-year-old woman—when he was 16. My copy is tra...

Look at this passage from “My Life”:  “… I was growing used to the peasants, and I felt more and more drawn to them. For the most part they ...