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To a chemist, nothing on earth is unclean. A writer must be as objective as a chemist he must abandon the subjective line he must know that dungheaps play a very respectable part in a landscape, and that evil passions are as inherent in life as good ones.

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
Play
Ones
Subjective
Must
Writer
Objective
Writing
Lines
Inherent
Good
Passion
Passions
Life
Evil
Abandon
Part
Objectives
Unclean
Earth
Landscape
Chemist
Nothing
Line
Respectable

More quotes by Anton Chekhov

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I still lack a political, religious and philosophical world view - I change it every month - and so I'll have to limit myself to descriptions of how my heroes love, marry, give birth, die, and how they speak.
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Fine. Since the tea is not forthcoming, let's have a philosophical conversation.
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In all my life I never met anyone so frivolous as you two, so crazy and unbusinesslike. I tell you in plain Russian your property is going to be sold and you don't seem to understand what I say.
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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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Narrative prose is a legal wife, while drama is a posturing, boisterous, cheeky and wearisome mistress.
Anton Chekhov
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There is nothing new in art except talent.
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Nothing lulls and inebriates like money when you have a lot, the world seems a better place than it actually is.
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When a lot of remedies are suggested for a disease, that means it can't be cured.
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[In] death at least there would be one profit it would no longer be necessary to eat, to drink, to pay taxes, or to [offend] others and as a man lies in his grave not one year, but hundreds and thousands of years, the profit was enormous. The life of man was, in short, a loss, and only his death a profit.
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!
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If our life has a meaning, an aim, it has nothing to do with our personal happiness, but something wiser and greater.
Anton Chekhov
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Revolting means for good ends make the ends of themselves revolting.
Anton Chekhov
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The happy man only feels at ease because the unhappy bear their burden in silence. Without this silence, happiness would be impossible.
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Faith is an aptitude of the spirit. It is, in fact, a talent: you must be born with it.
Anton Chekhov
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Knowledge is of no value unless you put it into practice.
Anton Chekhov
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Children are holy and pure. Even those of bandits and crocodiles belong among the angels.... They must not be turned into a plaything of one's mood, first to be tenderly kissed, then rabidly stomped at.
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In displaying the psychology of your characters, minute particulars are essential. God save us from vague generalizations! Be sure not to discuss your hero's state of mind. Make it clear from his actions. Nor is it necessary to portray many main characters. Let two people be the center of gravity in your story: he and she.
Anton Chekhov
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Each of us is full of too many wheels, screws and valves to permit us to judge one another on a first impression or by two or three external signs.
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Everyone judges plays as if they were very easy to write. They don't know that it is hard to write a good play, and twice as hardand tortuous to write a bad one.
Anton Chekhov
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Flies purify the air, and plays - the morals.
Anton Chekhov