Studies in the innovative master of modern narrative forms: short story, drama, letter. Extensive exposure to the life and times of Anton Chekhov. Practice in critical approaches to literature and theater. Writing-intensive course.

Anton Chekhov said that the writer’s task is not to answer questions, but to pose questions correctly. In this course, we will consider the many questions that Chekhov—one of the most influential dramatists and short story writers in world literature—poses in his stories and plays. These are questions about: love, death, time, the environment, prisons, mental asylums, medicine, the body, pain, the self and the other, the comic, the tragic. We will examine his thematic and formal innovations; discuss the connections between his narrative and dramatic texts; and consider his understated, elusive vision of human experience. We will explore his texts in the historical context of late 19th-century Russia, as well as several theater productions and film adaptations of Chekhov in a contemporary global context.

Repeat Rules

Course is not repeatable for credit.

Requirements class fulfills