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A sweet lie is more gracious for us than a virulent but real truth.

Anton Chekhov

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Anton Chekhov
Age: 44 †
Born: 1860
Born: January 1
Died: 1904
Died: January 1
Author
Dramaturge
Journalist
Novelist
Physician
Playwright
Prosaist
Satirist
Writer
Tahanroh
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
Antón Pávlovič Čéhov
Antón Pávlovich Chékhov
Chekhov
Real
Virulent
Gracious
Sweet
Lying
Truth

More quotes by Anton Chekhov

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My own experience is that once a story has been written, one has to cross out the beginning and the end. It is there that we authors do most of our lying.
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Even while lying, you'll be believed if you speak with authority.
Anton Chekhov
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This life of ours...human life is like a flower gloriously blooming in a meadow: along comes a goat, eats it up---no more flower.
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Nothing can be accomplished by logic and ethics.
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It seems to me that all of the evil in life comes from idleness, boredom, and psychic emptiness, but all of that is inevitable when you become accustomed to living at others' expense.
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Women can't forgive failure.
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To describe drunkenness for the colorful vocabulary is rather cynical. There is nothing easier than to capitalize on drunkards.
Anton Chekhov
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I can't accept our nervous age, since mankind has been nervous during every age. Whoever fears nervousness should turn into a sturgeon or smelt if a sturgeon makes a stupid mistake, it can only be one: to end up on a hook, and then in a pan in a pastry shell.
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It's worth living abroad to study up on genteel and delicate manners. The maid smiles continuously she smiles like a duchess on a stage, while at the same time it is clear from her face that she is exhausted from overwork.
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People understand God as the expression of the most lofty morality. Maybe He needs only perfect people.
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Silence accompanies the most significant expressions of happiness and unhappiness: those in love understand one another best when silent, while the most heated and impassioned speech at a graveside touches only outsiders, but seems cold and inconsequential to the widow and children of the deceased.
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No psychologist should pretend to understand what he does not understand... Only fools and charlatans know everything and understand nothing.
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The University brings out all abilities, including incapability.
Anton Chekhov
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Not everyone knows how to be silent or to leave in good time. It happens that even people of good breeding fail to notice that their presence provokes in the weary or preoccupied host a feeling akin to hatred, and that this feeling is tensely concealed and covered up with lies.
Anton Chekhov
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What's the use of talking? You can see for yourself that this is a barbarous country the people have no morals and the boredom!
Anton Chekhov
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A woman can become a man's friend only in the following stages - first an acquantaince, next a mistress, and only then a friend.
Anton Chekhov
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Once you've married, be strict but just with your wife, don't allow her to forget herself, and when a misunderstanding arises, say: Don't forget that I made you happy.
Anton Chekhov
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A litterateur is not a confectioner, not a dealer in cosmetics, not an entertainer. . . . He is just like an ordinary reporter. What would you say if a newspaper reporter, because of his fastidiousness or from a wish to give pleasure to his readers, were to describe only honest mayors, high-minded ladies, and virtuous railroad contractors.
Anton Chekhov
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I was oppressed with a sense of vague discontent and dissatisfaction with my own life, which was passing so quickly and uninterestingly, and I kept thinking it would be a good thing if I could tear my heart out of my breast, that heart which had grown so weary of life.
Anton Chekhov
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Flies purify the air, and plays - the morals.
Anton Chekhov