The Seagull (Further Reading)

Further Reading

• Hahn, Beverly, Chekhov: A Study of the Major Stories and Plays, Cambridge University Press, 1977.

  Although in drama Hahn’s principal focus is on The Cherry Orchard, her refutation of the dramatist’s alleged deficiencies — for example his formlessness, insipidity, and negativism — is very helpful for understanding Chekhov’s achievement in his late plays.

• Kirk, Irina, Anton Chekhov, Twayne Publishers, 1981.

  This overview of Chekhov and his work offers a good starting point for further study. It offers brief but insightful interpretations of Chekhov’s plays and the artistic principles underlying them.

• Lantz, K. A., Anton Chekhov: A Reference Guide to Literature, G. K. Hall, 1985.

  For those needing to conduct further research on Chekhov, this is an indispensable aid. It includes a biography and checklist of the author’s works with both English and Russian titles, with a helpful annotated bibliography of critical studies published before 1984.

• Magarshack, David, Chekhov the Dramatist, Hill and Wang, 1960.

  In this introduction to Chekhov’s plays, Magarshack divides the dramatist’s canon into “plays of direct action” and “plays of indirect action,” with The Wood Demon serving as a transitional work between the two types. He relates The Seagull to Chekhov’s life and his estate in Melikhovo.

• — — — , The Real Chekhov: An Introduction to Chekhov’s Last Plays, Allen & Unwin, 1972.

  This study offers a scene by scene analysis of each of Chekhov’s four major plays and the dramatist’s attitude towards matters addressed in them-which, in the case of The Seagull, Magarshack argues, is the nature of art.

• Styan, J. L., Chekhov in Performance: A Commentary on the Major Plays, Cambridge University Press, 1971.

  Styan also provides a close analysis of Chekhov’s four major plays. A principal focus is the “submerged life” of the playwright’s text and Chekhov’s stage technique. Styan also discusses the preparation and initial staging of each play.

• Valency, Maurice, The Breaking String: The Plays of Anton Chekhov, Oxford University Press, 1966.

  This work relates Chekhov’s major plays both to his own fiction and to the Russian theater of his day. Valency argues that Chekhov is essentially an ironist and comedist, although each play involves the breaking of a “golden string” that binds man both to his heavenly father and his own past.

• Williams, Lee J., Anton Chekhov, the Iconoclast, University of Scranton Press, 1989.

  This study takes the view that Chekhov was a self-conscious agent of change in Russia, that he employed a scientific method to dispel old, class-biased myths about Russian peasants, and that in both method and philosophy he was, as the title indicates, a dedicated iconoclast.