Told in two parts, Anton Chekhov's "At Christmas Time" begins with an illiterate woman hiring a local man to write a letter wishing her daughter-from who she has heard nothing since her wedding and departure four years earlier-a merry Christmas. In the second part, the letter arrives for the daughter, whose life is not what she imagined it would be. While not a traditional story of Christmas cheer, Chekhov's "At Christmas Time" has captivated audiences...

A collection of Chekhov's short stories featuring: Talent, Anyuta, The Helpmate, Ivan Matveyitch, Polinka. These stories are rich in characterisation and represent brilliantly observed slices of life. They don't come to an end, they just peter out inconclusively leaving you to draw your own conclusions.

The charming Vanda, or, as she was described in her passport, the "Honourable Citizen Nastasya Kanavkin," found herself, on leaving the hospital, in a position she had never been in before: without a home to go to or a farthing in her pocket. What was she to do?

Big raindrops were pattering on the dark windows. It was one of those disgusting summer holiday rains which, when they have begun, last a long time-for weeks, till the frozen holiday maker grows used to it, and sinks into complete apathy. It was cold; there was a feeling of raw, unpleasant dampness. The mother-in-law of a lawyer, called Kvashin, and his wife, Nadyezhda Filippovna, dressed in waterproofs and shawls, were sitting over the dinner table...

The party of sportsmen spent the night in a peasant's hut on some newly mown hay. The moon peeped in at the window; from the street came the mournful wheezing of a concertina; from the hay came a sickly sweet, faintly troubling scent. The sportsmen talked about dogs, about women, about first love, and about snipe.

On a hot summer day two carpenters, Gerasim and Lyubim, sit in a pond, floundering about in the water under a willow tree, beside the unfinished bathing shed they were supposed to be working on. Blue from cold and wrangling, they struggle to drag a large eelpout by the gills, from under the root.

Strizhin, who normally leads a sober and regular life, comes home from a christening party where he had permitted himself to drink four glasses of vodka and a glass of wine, the taste of which suggested something midway between vinegar and castor oil. And of course spirituous liquors being like sea-water and glory: the more you imbibe of them the greater your thirst, Strizhin felt an overwhelming craving for another drink. He accidentally downed a...

Madame Nashatyrin is fed up with violent behaviour and foul language emanating from abusive male guest next door. She has two grown up daughters and is concerned about their well being when complaining to the hotel-keeper. 'Either give me other apartments, or I shall leave your confounded hotel altogether! It's a sink of iniquity! Why don't you get rid of the scoundrel?' But as soon as the marital status of the scoundrel revealed she meditates and...

The importance of women and their influence can never be underestimated. This story vividly shows how in 19th century Russia women pull strings behind scenes to influence even the most principled and seemingly unbreakable of decision makers. And only Chekhov knows how to express such delicate matters in the most enjoyable and humorous way.

A piano tuner called Murkin, a close-shaven man with a yellow face, with a nose stained with snuff, and cotton-wool in his ears, came out of his hotel-room into the passage. And looking at his frightened face one might have supposed that the ceiling had fallen in on him or that he had just seen a ghost in his room. 'Upon my word, Semyon!' he cried, seeing the attendant running towards him. 'What is the meaning of it? I am a rheumatic, delicate man...