Approaches to Teaching the Works of Anton Chekhov

by Michael C. Finke (Editor), Michael Holquist (Editor)

Overview

Chekhov's works are unflinching in the face of human frailty. With their emphasis on the dignity and value of individuals during unique moments, they help us better understand how to exist with others when we are fundamentally alone. Written in Russia at the end of the nineteenth century, when the country began to move fitfully toward industrialization and grappled with the influence of Western liberalism even as it remained an autocracy, Chekhov's plays and stories continue to influence contemporary writers.

The essays in this volume provide classroom strategies for teaching Chekhov's stories and plays, discuss how his medical training and practice related to his literary work, and compare Chekhov with writers both Russian and American. The volume also aims to help instructors with the daunting array of new editions in English, as well as with the ever-growing list of titles in visual media: filmed theater productions of his plays, adaptations of the plays and stories scripted for film, and amateur performances freely available online.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781603292696
Publisher:	Modern Language Association
Publication date:	02/01/2016
Series:	Approaches to Teaching World Literature , #141
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	248
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

Michael C. Finke is professor and department head of Slavic Languages and Literatures at the University of Illinois, Urbana. He is the coeditor, with Julie de Sherbinin, of Chekhov the Immigrant: Translating a Cultural Icon (2007) and the author of Seeing Chekhov: Life and Art (2005) and Metapoesis: The Russian Tradition from Pushkin to Chekhov (1995). Michael Holquist is professor emeritus of comparative literature at Yale University and a senior fellow at the Heyman Center for the Humanities at Columbia University. He is a past president of the MLA and author of Dostoevsky and the Novel (1977); Mikhail Bakhtin, with Katerina Clark; and Dialogism: Bakhtin and His World (1990). He has also edited or translated several volumes of the works of Mikhail Bakhtin.

Table of Contents

A Note on Transliteration, Citations, and Dates vii

Part 1 Materials Michael C. Finke

Chekhov's Biography: Outline, Useful Resources, and Notes on Biography as an Object of Study 4

Chekhov in Translation 12

Editions of Chekhov's Works 16

The Instructor's Library Michael C. Finke Dmitry Tartakovsky 16

Part 2 Approaches

Introduction: Teaching Chekhov, Chekhov Teaching: "A Boring Story" and Critical Thinking Michael Holquist 23

Approaches to Chekhov's Prose

Chekhov and the Anglophone Short Story Julie W. de Sherbinin 34

Reading Chekhov's Short Fiction: The Invisible Language of Culture Brian James Baer Maia Solovieva 41

Teaching Chekhov in Translations Carol Apollonio 48

A Tolstoyan Narratological Lesson: Teaching What Chekhov Learned Michael C. Finke 56

Classroom Strategies: Writing and Performance

Chekhov in the Undergraduate Creative Writing Classroom John Griswold 64

Adapting Chekhov: A Primer for Dramaturgs Valleri J. Robinson 74

A Performance-Based Approach to Play Analysis Using Anton Chekhov's The Three Sisters Annamaria Pileggi 82

Introducing Chekhov's The Chemj Orchard with Method-Style Acting and Facehook-Style Reacting Lisa Siefker Bailey 91

Teaching Chekhov in Film and Theater

Chekhov's Seagull: Teaching Poetics through Stage History Olga Levitan 98

Chekhov's Seagull in Postmodern Times; Boris Akunin and Tennessee Williams Lyudmila Parts 106

Stagescapes, Sceneseapes: Uncle Vanya on Film Stanton B. Garner, Jr. 114

Chekhov on the Screen: Lady with a Little Dog (1960) and Vanya on Forty-Second Street (1994) John MacKay Rita Safariants 123

Cross-Curricular Approaches

History, Voice, Money, and Trees: "Rothschild's Fiddle" and the Jews Benjamin Knelman Gabriella Safran 141

"A Talent for Humanity": Teaching Chekhov and the Medical Humanities Cathy Popkin 151

Reading the Environmental Chekhov Jane Costlow 163

Teaching Chekhov as Environmental History: Sakhalin Island and Cold Climates Conevery Bolton Valencius 171

Beauty in "The Beauties": Teaching Aesthetic Theory through a Chekhov Short Story Thomas Adajian 179

Chekhov's Art of the Prosaic: Great Ideas and Dramatic Events Gary Saul Morson 187

Appendix: Concordance of Translation Variants of Titles Mentioned in This Volume 197

Notes on Contributors 203

Survey Participants 207

Works Cited 209

Index of Works by Chekhov 227

Index of Names 229

Editorial Reviews

"This volume brings together masterful teachers of literature who share expertise in how to read Chekhov's work, gained over decades of working with undergraduates. A fascinating and instructive project which is both thought-provoking and pragmatic." —Angela Brintlinger, Ohio State University

From the Publisher