“In short, the man displayed a constant and insurmountable impulse to wrap himself in a covering, to make himself, so to speak, a case which would isolate him and protect him from external influences. Reality irritated him, frightened him, kept him in continual agitation, and, perhaps to justify his timidity, his aversion for the actual, he always praised the past and what had never existed; and even the classical languages which he taught were in reality for him goloshes and umbrellas in which he sheltered himself from real life.”

Russian playwright, short story writer, and physician

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was a Russian playwright, short story writer, and physician. He worked in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and is known for the lasting influence of his plays and stories. Chekhov’s stage work produced four classics, and his finest short fiction has long been admired by writers and critics. He is also often named, alongside Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg, as one of the key figures in the rise of early modernist theatre. He practiced medicine professionally while writing literature.