Summary: Chekhov's Horse Family. A good example of an anecdote

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Anton Pavlovich in his works always described some moral or social situations concerning ordinary people. The writer firmly believed that if you show a person who he really is, then he will definitely change for the better. The early work of Anton Pavlovich is characterized by short humorous stories that use satirical and comic techniques. A striking example of such works is A. P. Chekhov.

Find workarounds

The summary tells the reader that retired Major General Buldeev had a bad toothache. Chekhov wrote "Horse Family" in order to laugh at the current situation, to understand the comical position of the former military man. All those around him advised Buldeev to use folk methods. What the general did not do: he applied opium, tobacco soot, kerosene, turpentine to the tooth, put cotton wool soaked in alcohol in his ears, smeared his cheek with iodine, but these methods did not work, onlycaused nausea.

Buldeev called the doctor, but the chin attributed to him did not bring any result, and the general flatly refused to pull the tooth. And here his clerk Ivan Evseich recalls a man who knows how to treat dental diseases with conspiracies - this is what the summary tells about. Chekhov wrote "Horse Family" to ridicule the ways in which adults and quite reasonable people were going to relieve pain. The general is dismissive of conspiracies, calls the healer a charlatan, but at the same time is going to entrust his he alth to him.

Trouble in the house

The clerk persuaded Buldeev to use the services of an excise official, but the problem is that he left for Saratov, but it doesn’t matter either, because you can write a dispatch and the healer will heal the tooth at a distance, and send him the money for treatment by mail. Everything would be fine, but only Ivan Evseich forgot the name of the healer, remembered only that it was somehow connected with horses. This is where the commotion began, about which the summary tells. Chekhov wrote "The Horse Name" to once again show the discrepancy between the inner essence and external manifestations.

Everyone in the house began to come up with different versions of the name of the so-called "doctor": Kobylkin, Zherebtsov, Uzdechkin, Loshadkin. Wife, children, servants, acquaintances - all abandoned their business and followed on the heels of the clerk, offering their options. To show the exaggeration of the commotion in the house, Chekhov used hyperbole. "Horse Name", a summary shows how busy everyone waswriting a surname, contains a lot of colloquial speech, which characterizes the characters very well.

Unexpected denouement

With the onset of night, Buldeev became even worse, he had such a toothache that he could not even sleep, but could not even find a place for himself. Having suffered until the morning, the general sent for the doctor so that he would eventually pull out his tooth - this is what the summary tells about. Chekhov's "Horse Name", like any other anecdote story, ends unexpectedly and comically. When the doctor asks the clerk to sell him some oats, Ivan Evseich recalls the name of the healer - Ovsov. He runs with the good news to the general, but he only angrily shows him two figs, the tooth has already been pulled out.