Anton Chekhov quotes - page 9

He is no longer a city dweller who has even once in his life caught a ruff or seen how, on clear and cool autumn days, flocks of migrating thrushes drift over a village. Until his death he will be drawn to freedom. (Anton Chekhov)
One must not put a loaded rifle on the stage if no one is thinking of firing it. View quote
Anton Chekhov
When you're thirsty and it seems that you could drink the entire ocean that's faith; when you start to drink and finish only a glass or two that's science. View quote
Anton Chekhov
Prudence and justice tell me that in electricity and steam there is more love for man than in chastity and abstinence from meat. View quote
Anton Chekhov
It is a poor thing for the writer to take on that which he doesn't understand. View quote
Anton Chekhov
We fret ourselves to reform life, in order that posterity may be happy, and posterity will say as usual: "In the past it used to be better, the present is worse than the past." View quote
Anton Chekhov
Tell mother that however dogs and samovars might behave themselves, winter comes after summer, old age after youth, and misfortune follows happiness (or the other way around). A person can not be healthy and cheerful throughout life. Losses lie waiting and man can not safeguard against death, even if he be Alexander of Macedonia. One must be prepared for anything and consider everything to be inevitably essential, as sad as that may be. View quote
Anton Chekhov
Crutch is coming! Crutch! The old horseradish. View quote
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. View quote
Anton Chekhov
You are right to demand that an artist engage his work consciously, but you confuse two different things: solving the problem and correctly posing the question. View quote
Anton Chekhov
Pesotsky had an immense house with columns and lions, off which the stucco was peeling, and with a footman in swallow-tails at the entrance. The old park, laid out in the English style, gloomy and severe, stretched for almost three-quarters of a mile to the river, and there ended in a steep, precipitous clay bank, where pines grew with bare roots that looked like shaggy paws; the water shone below with an unfriendly gleam, and the peewits flew up with a plaintive cry, and there one always felt that one must sit down and write a ballad. (Anton Chekhov)
They say: "In the long run truth will triumph;" but it is untrue. View quote
Anton Chekhov
People love talking of their diseases, although they are the most uninteresting things in their lives. View quote
Anton Chekhov
Not everyone knows when to be silent and when to go. It not infrequently happens that even diplomatic persons of good worldly breeding fail to observe that their presence is arousing a feeling akin to hatred in their exhausted or busy host, and that this feeling is being concealed with an effort and disguised with a lie. View quote
Anton Chekhov
You ask "What is life?” That is the same as asking "What is a carrot?” A carrot is a carrot and we know nothing more. View quote
Anton Chekhov
I don't know why one can't chase two rabbits at the same time, even in the literal sense of those words. If you have the hounds, go ahead and pursue. View quote
Anton Chekhov
Our self-esteem and conceit are European, but our culture and actions are Asiatic. View quote
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. View quote
Anton Chekhov
Although you may tell lies, people will believe you, if only you speak with authority. View quote
Anton Chekhov
When we retreat to the country, we are hiding not from people, but from our pride, which, in the city and among people, operates unfairly and immoderately. View quote
Anton Chekhov
There is not a single criterion which can serve as the measure of the non-existent, of the non-human. (Anton Chekhov)
Who but a stupid barbarian could burn so much beauty in his stove and destroy that which he cannot make? View quote
Anton Chekhov
A nice man would feel ashamed even before a dog. View quote
Anton Chekhov
In general, Russia suffers from a frightening poverty in the sphere of facts and a frightening wealth of all types of arguments. View quote
Anton Chekhov
Why did you marry me into this family, mother?" said Lipa. "One has to be married, daughter. It was not us who ordained it. View quote
Anton Chekhov