'In this triumph of beauty, in this exuberance of happiness, you feel a tenseness and agonized regret, as if the steppe knew how lonely she is, how her wealth and inspiration are lost to the world'
The Steppe marks Chekhov's achievement of maturity as a writer of short stories. Presenting the world as seen through the eyes of its young hero, Yegorushka, it is a masterly account of a journey across the Russian prairies, interrupted by one of literature's most spectacular thunderstorms.
If in Chekhov's work as a whole the focus is chiefly on the privileged class which he himself had joined, the stories in this selection show that he never forgot his origins as the son of a failed provincial grocer. The innocent, if somewhat brutal, peasant soldier in Gusev, the elderly local constable in On Official Business, and the bemused peasants in New Villa, provide eloquent testimony to the power and flexibility of his art.
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