In the Court - Anton Chekhov

Chapter Notes by Uma Gopal*

About the Author:

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was born in Taganrog1, Russia, on January 29, 1860. He
was a leading Russain playwright and master of modern short stories, who captured
the literary world’s imagination in the late 19 and early 20th centuries. Most of his
early works showed the influence of Leo Tolstoy2 and Fyodor Dostoyevsky3, Russian
realist writers.

He brought out the depths of human nature with his novellas4 such as, The Steppe
(1888); short story, The Lady with the Dog (1899) and plays such as, The Seagull
(1895) and Uncle Vanya (1897). He was a master in bringing out human emotions,
maintaining a fine balance between comedy and tragedy. His other masterpieces
include plays such as: The Three Sisters (1901), The Cherry Orchard (1904); short
story such as: Ward No 6.
His plays are still staged worldwide and his overall body of work still continues to
influence many writers of different genres, including James Joyce (Irish
novelist), Ernest Hemingway (American novelist, short story writer, and journalist),
Tennessee Williams (an American playwright ) and Henry Miller (American writer).

Chekhov's remarkable life was devoted to medicine and consumed by literature.

“Medicine is my lawful wife", he once said, "and literature is my mistress."

The Characters:
Nikolay Harlamov: The Accused
Prohor / Proshka : Harlamov’s son and soldier employed by the Government
The President
The Assistant Prosecutor
The defense Counsel
The Doctor
The Witness: Two peasant women, five men and the village Policeman
The Audience: A few people from the Harlamov’s village that included the local
Croesus5

1
Taganrog is a port city in Rostov, Oblast, Russia. It’s the birthplace of Chekhov and the home in which he spent
his early life. It has A.P. Chekhov theatre.
2
Count Lyov Nikolayevich Tolstoy (1828–1910), was a Russian writer who is regarded as one of the greatest
authors of all time.
3
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (1821 -1881), was a Russian novelist, short story writer, essayist, journalist
and philosopher
4
A text of written, fictional, narrative prose, shorter than a novel but longer than a short story.
5
The last king of Lydia (reigned c. 560–546), who was renowned for his great wealth. In this context, a wealthy
person.

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 1

 Summary

‘In the Court’ was first published in 1886. The story relates to Chekhov’s experiences
from 1884-86, when he worked as a substitute country doctor in Zvenigorod6.
Chekhov saw patients, conducted autopsies, and testified in courts as an expert
witness. A lawyer by the name Serpovsky wrote that Chekhov was keenly interested
in the court proceedings and was very well acquainted with the judicial procedures.
Leo Tolstoy considered this story to be one of the best that Chekhov wrote and called
it “a true pearl.”

The story is a satire on the Russian judiciary. Chekhov, as is true to his style, does not
give a realistic portrayal of the court proceedings. His aim through the story is to
criticize the incompetencies of the Russian judiciary. A system that fails in all aspects
of serving justice. His major tool in doing so is satire.

The case is that of a peasant called Nikolay Harlamov, who has been accused of
murdering his wife, on the evening of the ninth of June. She was found in the porch
with her broken skull lying in a pool of blood and an axe beside her. She had been
spotted by her neighbours and when they went to inform Nikolay about the calamity,
he wasn’t to be spotted anywhere. He in fact had disappeared and two days later,
came on his own accord to the police office, looking pale, in torn clothes, trembling
all over. He was then put in a lock-up.

Chekhov wants to highlight the apathy shown by the officials of the circuit court. He
starts the narrative, setting the background for the reader, wherein, he brings out the
general dull appearance of the court even on a bright spring day. On clear moonlight
nights, Chekhov says that the court stood like an oppressive mass of stone above the
modest landscape and little dwelling houses which seemed plunged in quiet slumber.

The case was heard on a dull autumn day, where the court was described as an
unattractive barn coupled with the looks of a dismal barrack-like appearance with
dingy windows and cinnamon coloured filthy perspiring walls, noisy due to the
whirring of the ventilation wheels, in other words the noise of fan was deafening. All
these accentuated the unattractive state of the circuit court. The disgusting odour of
fumigating candles gives the reader a feeling that it must have been suffocating inside.
Further Chekhov mentions that it had no comforts internally or externally.

What added to the gloom of the court was the proceedings conducted by the most
disinterested officials, where the service is described as a church service without a
choir. The officials could not be bothered about the misfortunes, the truth, the lies
spoken inside the courtroom. It spilled over to Nikolay Harlamov’s case too, which
came up for hearing at two o’clock in the afternoon. The officials could not care less
that a murder case had to be heard and a man’s life was at stake. A man, who had
been accused of murdering his wife, who had denied the charges and was supported
by his neighbours who testified that the man in question, Nikolay Harlamov had been
good to his wife, except perhaps when he was in an inebriated state.

6
An old town in Moscow Oblast, Russia

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 2

Then, material evidences like the full-skirted coat, the sleeve which had dark brown
stain of blood, axe etc., were examined. Harlamov denied that the brown coloured
stain was possibly his wife’s blood. When the question of the possession of an axe
arose, he first denied that he had an axe; then he claimed that he did have a smaller
one but was lost by his son Prohor, two years before Prohor joined the Army.
During the entire prosecution process, all the officials were unmistakably detached
and showed no emotions. The officials included the Secretary, who read the case in a
monotonous, bored voice, rapidly like a sacristan or a church officer, the President
who was more worried about his comforts and took a deep interest in the clothes of
other members, the Assistant Prosecutor who sat motionless as a statue, busy reading
with full attention Byron’s Cain7, lifting his head occasionally. Compounding the
narcotic and still character of the courtroom was the expression of the counsel for
Harlamov, who had boredom written on his face, an expression which is seen on the
faces of school boys and men on duty, who are forced from day to day to sit in the
same place and see the same faces and walls everyday. What added to the woes of the
accused was the doctor’s tawdry investigation, where all the possible witnesses had
not been examined such as the accused’s brother or the elders of the village; neither
was the mental state of the accused examined. All they were interested was to get
done with the prosecution and wind up with the case as soon as possible.

Initially Harlamov looked with dull-witted respectfulness at the judges’ uniforms, at

the weary faces of the jurymen and blinked calmly thinking that he would be given a
proper hearing. Later as the hearing proceeded, he was irritated that he was not
properly heard. When the trail came to a close and the prisoner was escorted back, it
was a painful moment, which was felt by the audience too. Chekhov leaves it to the
audience to draw their own conclusion about the case, as he ends the case without the
judgement being pronounced.

We never get to know what Nikolay Harlamov’s relationship with the members of
his family was. Was Nikolay guilty or was it his son Prohor, who had escorted him
into the courtroom as a guard responsible for the murder? Who was responsible for
the crime, is left for the audience/reader to decide. Chekhov’s objective is to bring out
the boredom and apathy among the court officials that was seen in Russian courts
back then. That a man’s life was at stake did not emotionally move them to their job
diligently and sincerely. He presents this story in the most satirical way to an audience
that includes thinking readers who can very well empathize with the accused and
realise the importance of an efficient and accountable judiciary system.

Comprehension
Question 1: How does Chekhov succeed in creating an appropriately dull and
sombre atmosphere for holding of the trial?

Answer 1: The author, Anton Chekhov, sets the tone of the atmosphere in the Russian
circuit court where the Justices of the Peace, the Rural Board, the Liquor Board, the

7
Cain is a dramatic work by Lord Byron published in 1821. In Cain, Byron dramatizes the story of Cain and Abel
from Cain's point of view. Cain is an example of the literary genre known as closet drama.

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 3

Military Board and many others sat by turns. He describes the appearance of the
Government house as a cinnamon coloured, dismal barrack-like building, sans any
comfort, which was in a decrepit condition. He elaborates that even on a bright spring
day, it seemed wrapped in a dense shade. On moonlight nights, when the trees and
little dwelling houses merged in one blur of shadow, the circuit house stood tall as an
oppressive mass of stone, above modest landscape, spoiling the harmony of the place,
keeping a sleepless vigil, as if symbolically making up for the memories that carried
the burden of past unforgiven sins.

He goes on to describe the insides of the court, remarking that it appeared like an
unattractive barn with dingy windows and walls, which was noisy due to the whirring
of the ventilation wheels, coupled with the disgusting odour of fumigating candles
and the filthy perspiring walls, giving the reader a feeling that it must have been
suffocating inside. The occupants of the court, that is, the learned lawyers, members
of committee and marshals of nobility were a complete misfit inside the court,
especially when one thinks of the comforts the nobility may have been used to within
their homes. When the proceedings of the court took place, the prevailing atmosphere
spills over in the attitude of the professionals present inside the court which was very
unbecoming of them, especially while handling sensitive cases of human interest.

The sitting of the circuit court began between nine and ten. The cases came on one
after the other and ended quickly like a church service without a choir. There was an
overall haste to get done with the cases, the pace seemed like that of a river racing by
in a flood. Before one could understand and comprehend the seriousness of a case, the
next one would be brought forward. The reader cannot but empathize with the
under-trials, whose fate was sealed by these so called professionals and care-takers of
the justice system!

What makes the reader realise the sense of hopelessness in the court is the attitude of
all the officials involved in the trial of the peasant Nikolay Harlamov. The boredom of
the officials, saturated with indifference, produce an atmosphere of frigidity as though
the murderer was simply some official property or as though he was not being judged
by living men but by some unseen machine, set going by an unknown force.

The President was more interested in finding a luxurious place to stay and was more
worried about the length of the doctor’s jacket! When an aberration in the
investigation was brought to the President’s notice by the Assistant Prosecutor, that is,
of the fact that the prisoner’s brother and the village elders had not been examined,
the President just brushed it aside. He didn’t care that the doctor had neither examined
the mental condition of the criminal nor done his investigations properly.

The narrow-chested, pale-faced Secretary, read Harlamov’s case in a low, thick bass
monotonous voice that lacked any emotion giving the impression that he didn’t want
to exert his lungs to compete with the whirring sound of the ventilation, which gave a
drowsy, narcotic character to the stillness of the hall.

The Assistant Prosecutor sat motionless like a statue busy reading with full attention
Byron’s Cain, lifting his head occasionally while the defense Counsel moved the

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 4

blunt end of his pencil about the table and mused with his head on one side, his
expressions showing a boredom which is seen on the faces of school boys and men on
duty who are forced from day to day to sit in the same place and see the same faces
and walls everyday. There was no excitement about the speech he had read to defend
his client. When the counsel for defense got no satisfactory answer from the doctor on
the lapse of the examination done, he couldn’t be bothered about the fact that this may
prove an innocent man guilty. So much so, that monotony and boredom infected the
prisoner too! The charge of murder hung over his head and yet he met no threatening
faces, no indignant looks, no sympathy on their faces, no loud phrases, none of the
officers even sparing him a glance, showing no emotions; in fact showing complete
apathy towards the case or the person involved.

Thus, Chekhov creates an atmosphere inside the court that is sombre and laced with
official indifference, extremely dull and boring. His main attempt is to draw the
reader’s attention to the lack of professionalism among the officers in the court, thus
forcing the reader to think about the Russian justice system.

Question 2: Which techniques and details used by Chekhov give to his writing
the character of a literary piece distinguishing it from a factual report of the
Court proceedings?

Answer 2: A literary piece is a piece of communication that helps us to understand

the complexities of life. The author’s personal motivation behind writing a literary
piece is creativity. Here, in this short story, In the Court, it is a subjective personal
view of Chekhov’s, who is making his reader see the apathy of the Russian courts.
Chekhov manages to evoke and provoke a response form his reader about the
prevalent Russian courts functioning in the later half of the 19th century, since
Chekhov, from 1884 -86 had the opportunity to testify in the courts after conducting
post mortems or examining his patients and thus got an opportunity to study the
proceedings of the Russian court. It is said that he got well acquainted with the
judicial system.

He starts the story after setting the tone in the opening paragraph, using imagery, of
what the reader needs to expect by describing the court using qualifiers such as,
‘cinnamon coloured walls’, ‘perspiring walls’, ‘fumigating candles’, ‘barrack-like
appearance’, to describe the structure of the court.
He adds:
“Even on the brightest spring days, it seems wrapped in a dense shade, and on
clear moonlight nights, when the trees and the little dwelling-houses merged in
one blur of shadow seem plunged in quiet slumber, it alone absurdly and
inappropriately towers, an oppressive mass of stone, above the modest
landscape, spoils the general harmony, and keeps sleepless vigil as though it
could not escape from burdensome memories of past unforgiven sins.”

He uses personification while describing the external structure of the court. The court
seemed to carry the burden of the past unforgiven sins, that is, Chekhov describes that
the court carried the burden of the shoddy trails that would have possibly happened in
the past, thus giving life to the court and make it appear as if the court has some

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 5

feelings. The general apathy of the court officials was brought out, thus focusing on
the irony of the justice system that prevailed then. The past sins of the court
proceedings had a bearing on the life of innocents. He focuses on the unprofessional
attitude that prevailed among the officers of the court through symbolism,i.e.,
burdensome memories of past unforgiven sins.

He uses an analogy to describe the way the cases were handled, “A church service
without a choir, so that no mind could form a complete picture of all this
particoloured mass of faces, movements, words, misfortunes, true sayings and lies, all
racing by like a river in flood.” Here, he is able to provoke a feeling of frustration in
his readers with his armoury of words. The description of the dull, boring court
metaphorically extends to his characters.

He vividly describes the characters using imagery, thus helping the reader to imagine
the way the characters look: Nikolay Harlamov as a completely bald, apathetic face
with a red beard; the defending counsel who is described as a beardless young
graduate in a coat with bright buttons; the President, a short-sighted man, not old but
with an extremely exhausted face; the Assistant Prosecutor; a fat, well- nourished
dark man with gold rimmed spectacles; with a handsome well-groomed beard; the
doctor who wore a glossy black suit.

Throughout the story, the actual court proceedings are not described as a question and
answer session between the accused, the prosecutor and the defense counsel. The
main idea of Chekhov is to trigger the consciousness of the reader poking at the
human interest that gets generated. He mentions, ‘the court proceeded hurriedly to the
examination of the witness’; the witness testifying that Harlamov lived well with his
wife; the doctor not having examined the mental condition of the criminal or unable to
answer the questions raised by the defense counsel,’ all these show loose ends in the
proceedings about which the court officials didn’t seem to care. The idea here was to
raise questions in the mind of the reader. At the end, Chekhov ends it without giving a
conclusive ending, allowing the readers to conclude on their own. One is left
wondering whether it was Harlamov or his son, who was the culprit.

He leaves it with an open ending, his basic aim being to make the reader reflect upon
the prevailing justice system then in Russia and evoke the reader’s response to life,
infusing the emotions of disappointment, frustration in a satirical way, which is the
strongest literary device he has used in this literary piece. His intention is not to make
fun, or entertain and amuse his readers but actually to derive a reaction of contempt
from the reader. He uses precise descriptions, clever dialogues and understatements.
He doesn’t sermonise. He creates the necessary mood and atmosphere inside the court
efficiently. He intellectually engages the readers and forces them to think for
themselves and arrive at a conclusion at the then prevailing justice system in Russia.
A thinking reader would also be forced to arrive at solutions, and if one were to
imagine, his aim is to set the general intelligentsia to deliberate and advocate reforms
in the judicial system perhaps.

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 6

Question 3: Point out the human interest in the story.

Answer 3: What strikes the reader is, ‘what if I was the accused instead of
Harlamov?’. This is where the reader empathises with Nicolay Harlamov in the story,
In the Court. Chekhov manages to kindle this emotion in the reader.

In spite of knowing that an innocent may unnecessarily have to be punished, that too
when the charge was murder, the officials in the Russian court conducted themselves
in the most detached way. From the time Harlamov was brought into the court at two
o’clock till the time when he was led away, the reader is left with many unanswered
question. The soldier escorting the accused was Harlamov’s own son Prohor, who
drops the gun out of his hand. Whether it was just a clumsy act or did it happen
because the son was accompanying his father upon whom the charges of murder lay
or was he himself involved in the murder and therefore filled with emotion, is left to
the reader’s imagination.

When Harlamov was brought in, he was nervous and he had turned pale and coughed
nervously not knowing what his fate held for him. He also looked with dull-witted
respectfulness at the judge’s uniform, at the weary faces of the jurymen and blinked
calmly. While in the prison waiting for trial, the expectations from the procedures of
the court weighed on his soul and now in the court the hope that the trial would
happen and the truth would be established, had a calming effect on him.

However, what he experienced in the court was not what he had expected. The charge
of murder hung over him but in the court he was met neither with threatening faces
nor indignant looks nor loud phrases about retribution nor sympathy for his
extraordinary fate. Not one officer looked at him with interest for long. They were so
indifferent to his fate, the monotonous voice of the secretary reading the charge
rapidly like a sacristan, the attitude of the assistant prosecutor with gold rimmed
glasses, who seemed more interested in reading Byron’s Cain, the young defense
counsel who was so frigid and his conduct so colourless and boring that it looked as if
the routine of defending his clients was a mundane chore and above all the President
who didn’t seem to care that a shoddy investigation had been done. All the members
inside the court seemed to be bothered more about their comforts or other frivolous
things such as the place of stay or the dress of a co-member than the case at hand and
just wanted to get done with the routine for the day. Both the President and the
Assistant Prosecutor discussed trivial matter not connected to the case, like a member
of the audience sitting in the front row who had a fortune of fifty thousand! Adding to
this whole indifference, were the dingy windows and perspiring walls, the court room
filled with the sound of fan, the suffocating feeling due to the fumigating candles.

Harlamov didn’t realise that the men here were accustomed to the dramas and
tragedies of life and were as blunted by the sight of them as hospital attendants are at
the sight of death. As the case progressed, he felt hopeless and horrified at his position.
It seemed that he had to begin appealing with tears for he was at their mercy. He felt
his fate was already sealed by the blunted nerves and callous customs and his appeals
would be like waves against a rock. The officials seemed to the masters of his fate.

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 7

When his neighbours, two peasant women and five men and the village policeman
(who had made the inquiry) were questioned, they gave the same evidence about the
murder. They also testified that Harlamov lived well with his wife and would never
resort to violence except when he had a couple of drinks.

Yet another point of human interest was the loss of a human life that is, the death of
Harlamov’s wife. Who had broken her skull? Who had used the bloody axe that lay
beside her broken skull? Why did Harlamov disappear and come back two days later
on his own accord, pale and trembling all over? How did Harlamov’s coat sleeve have
darkish brown stains of blood? Was he lying or speaking the truth when he said that
the stain was from the horse that was bled to death by Penkov, his neighbour? Was
Harlamov speaking the truth when he said that the axe found near his wife’s body was
not his despite his neighbour, Ivan Timofeyitch, giving evidence that it was indeed
Harlamov’s. Was he speaking the truth when he said that he had an axe but a bit
smaller than the one in question that was lost by his son Prohor when Prohor had gone
to fetch wood; the incident having taken place two years before Prohor joined the
army.

No matter what, whatever Harlamov said in front of the jury didn’t seem to trigger
any interest in the officials present in the court. The desperation in Harlamov’s voice
upon not having been heard was a painful moment not only for the audience present
there but also for the reader. A lady’s life had been taken away brutally. Whether it
was the son or father who had committed the crime, it was a brutal crime. That the
son had to escort his father back into the prison was a poignant moment and thereafter
when there is a change of guard, the fate of the father and son is uncertain.Chekhov
does well playing with the human emotions.

All these unspoken and unanswered questions leave a question mark in the minds of
the reader. If only the officials concerned with the investigation, that is the court
officials and the doctor, had conducted their investigations professionally, the real
culprit may have been convicted and an innocent life may have been spared and at the
same time justice would have prevailed. This is where the human interest in the story
is brought out as the reader can easily empathise with Harlamov, especially since he
was a victim of a shoddy investigation. Some readers may also be filled with anger at
the thought of human life whether it was that of the murdered or the accused that was
taken so casually. After all the denial of justice is absolute NO is any civilized
society.

Question 4: Do you think the trial is fair? Give reasons to support your answer.

Answer 4: No, the trial is not fair. From the time the prisoner walked into the court
nothing seemed to be fair and professional. The attitude of all the people involved in
the trial of the peasant Nikolay Harlamov was the most unbecoming of professionals
whose primary responsibility was to ensure justice in the case so that the case is
solved in the most objective and scientific way, ensuring that justice is not only
delivered to the victim of the crime but also an innocent is not wrongfully punished.
The boredom of the officials saturated with indifference produced an atmosphere of
frigidity as though the murderer was simply an official property or as though he was

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 8

not being judged by living men but by some unseen machine, set going by an
unknown force.

All the officers appeared to be doing a monotonous job that had to get done either
way. The most responsible officer, that is, the President was more interested in the
finding a more comfortable and luxurious place of stay or was more worried about the
length of the doctor’s jacket! When an aberration in the investigation was brought to
the President’s notice by the Assistant Prosecutor, that is, the prisoner’s brother and
the village elders had not been examined, the President just brushed it aside. He didn’t
care that the doctor had neither examined the mental condition of the criminal nor
done his investigations properly. He seemed to be more interested in the fact that the
Assistant Prosecutor had mentioned about a member in the audience with a fortune of
fifty thousand and other trivial matters of little consequence and unrelated to the case!
He just wanted to get done with the examination.

The Assistant Prosecutor, sat motionless as a statue busy reading with full attention
Byron’s Cain, lifting his head occasionally. However, at one point when he did raise a
pertinent flaw in the investigation, the fact that the prisoner’s brother and the village
elders had not been examined, he had to give up pursuing the flaw because the
President just brushed it aside. When eventually asked by the President if he wanted
to cross examine the doctor, he replied in the negative, again going back to reading
Cain.

The Defense Counsel moved the blunt end of his pencil about the table and mused
with his head on one side, his expressions showing frigid boredom which is often seen
on the faces of school boys and men on duty who are forced from day to day to sit in
the same place and see the same faces and walls everyday. There was no excitement
about the speech he had read to defend his client. When he got no satisfactory answer
from the doctor on the mental condition of the criminal, he couldn’t be bothered. It
appeared as though he had just asked the question for the sake of it. He could not be
bothered about the fact that this may prove Harlamov’s innocence.

Harlamov’s neighbours, that is, the two peasant women, five men and the village
policeman did testify that Harlamov lived well with his wife and that he never beat
her except when he was drunk. On the ninth of June, when the neighbours had found
Harlamov’s wife with her skull broken, beside a pool of blood, Harlamov was not to
be found either in his house or in the streets. Yet, Harlamov did appear after two days
and testified that he had disappeared due the fear of having been judged guilty.

Upon examining the material evidence, Harlamov’s cry for justice went unheard.
Harlmaov claimed that the blood found on his sleeve was from his neighbour’s
Penkov’s horse which was bled to death. This admission was brushed aside. When he
claimed that the axe or the murder weapon was not his, it was dismissed. Harlamov
admitted to having an axe but much smaller than the one in question. He had given
the axe to his son two years ago, before his son had joined the army, which his son
claimed to have lost in the woods. His appeal to question his son about this also went
unheard. When he tried to converse with his son, he was forbidden to do so as he was
not supposed to converse with an official guard. As he gets escorted back after a

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 9

half-hearted shoddy investigation, the reader can’t help but conclude that the
investigation was not done in a fair way and justice may have been denied to the
prisoner.

Reference:

1. Bhatnagar. R.P. (2016). . Law and Language. “In the Court”. ISBN:
978-93-5138-012-2. Bangalore. M.P.P House. pp. 59-65.
2. Hingley Ronald Francis.s.d. “Anton Chekhov” Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Retrieved on May 31, 2018 from
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Anton-Chekhov
3. The Editors of Encyclopaedia Brittanica. s.d. “Taganrog, Russia” Encyclopaedia
Britannica. Retrieved on June 1, 2018 from
https://www.britannica.com/place/Taganrog
4. N. ( last updated on November 10, 2014). “Anton Chekhov Biography” The
Biography.com website. A & E Television Networks. Retrieved on May 31, 2018
from https://www.biography.com/people/anton-chekhov-9245947
5. N. s.d . “In the Court, An Annotated Russian Reader” . ilearnrussian.com.
Retrieved on June 1, 2018 from
http://ilearnrussian.com/en/blog.html/coming-soon-new-reader-in-the-court-by-an
ton-chekhov-b20.html
6. N. (February 1, 2010). “ The timeless allure of Chekhov.” Retrieved on June 1,
2018 from
https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/the-timeless-allure-of-chekhov-1.6160
57

*Assistant Professor at Christ Academy Institute for Advanced Studies,Bangalore, India 10