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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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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
Life
Aim
Meaning
Personal
Greater
Purpose
Happiness
Nothing
Something
Wiser

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It's not a matter of old or new forms a person writes without thinking about any forms, he writes because it flows freely from his soul.
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One usually dislikes a play while writing it, but afterward it grows on one. Let others judge and make decisions.
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He who desires nothing, hopes for nothing, and is afraid of nothing, cannot be an artist.
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Wisdom.... comes not from age, but from education and learning.
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And what does it mean -- dying? Perhaps man has a hundred senses, and only the five we know are lost at death, while the other ninety-five remain alive.
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God's world is a good place. The one thing not good in it is we. How little justice and humility there is in us. How little we understand true patriotism!
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In descriptions of nature one must seize on small details, grouping them so that when the reader closes his eyes he gets a picture.
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The illusion which exalts us is dearer to us than ten thousand truths.
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In two or three hundred years life on earth will be unimaginably beautiful, astounding. Man needs such a life and if it hasn't yetappeared, he should begin to anticipate it, wait for it, dream about it, prepare for it. To achieve this, he has to see and know more than did his grandfather and father.
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In my opinion it is harmful to place important things in the hands of philanthropy, which in Russia is marked by a chance character. Nor should important matters depend on leftovers, which are never there. I would prefer that the government treasury take care of it.
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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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A sweet lie is more gracious for us than a virulent but real truth.
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There are in life conjunctions of circumstances when the reproach that we are not Voltaires is least of all appropriate.
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In short stories it is better to say not enough than to say too much, because, because--I don't know why.
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Narrative prose is a legal wife, while drama is a posturing, boisterous, cheeky and wearisome mistress.
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Better to perish from fools than to accept praises from them.
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The sea has neither meaning nor pity.
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Every coming year is as bad as the previous one, the only difference being that in most cases it is even worse.
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You are right in demanding that an artist should take an intelligent attitude to his work, but you confuse two things: solving a problem and stating a problem correctly.
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