The quarrel as a "living word" in Chekhov's early short stories

Abstract

This thesis focuses on Chekhov's early stories written in the period from 1879 to 1886. It argues that Chekhov's quarrel is a particular literary type through analysis of its functions, uses and role in the development of Chekhov's texts. Quarrels are frequent and crucial motifs in early Chekhov stories. This paper defines two main types of quarrel based on their setting (familial and social), then defines the main characteristics of the quarrel in each. Chekhov himself emphasized the role of the quarrel as means of fighting boredom. The analysis of the quarrel in the selected texts also suggests the importance of the quarrel as means of building communication between and among Chekhov's characters. Although Chekhov's quarrel has not been examined previously as a separate problem, this research is a necessary contribution to the problem of communication in Chekhov's texts, which remains among the major ones in academic discourse about the author. The use of quarrel demonstrates that Chekhov's characters in the early stories, despite their common inability to hear and understand each other, paradoxically gain that understanding through quarreling. This thesis discusses the major functions of the quarrel in Chekhov stories and reveals how the use of quarrel contributes to the development of Chekhov's writing style, the genre of the short story and the literary current of Realism in the Russian literature.