Top 500 Anton Chekhov Quotes (2025 Update)
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251. “All of life and human relations have become so incomprehensibly complex that, when you think about it, it becomes terrifying and your heart stands still.”

— Anton Chekhov

252. “One must not put a loaded rifle on the stage if no one is thinking of firing it.”

— Anton Chekhov

253. “I have no will of my own. Never did. Limp and lily-livered, I always obey – is it possible that’s attractive to women?”

— Anton Chekhov

254. “There are people whom even children’s literature would corrupt. They read with particular enjoyment the piquant passages in the Psalter and in the Wisdom of Solomon.”

— Anton Chekhov

255. “If I were asked to chose between execution and life in prison I would, of course, chose the latter. It’s better to live somehow than not at all.”

— Anton Chekhov

256. “It’s better to live down a scandal than to ruin one’s life.”

— Anton Chekhov

257. “Eyes – the head’s chief of police. They watch and make mental notes.”

— Anton Chekhov

258. “I don’t care for success. The ideas sitting in my head are annoyed by, and envious of, that which I’ve already written.”

— Anton Chekhov

259. “Every coming year is as bad as the previous one, the only difference being that in most cases it is even worse.”

— Anton Chekhov

260. “We go to great pains to alter life for the happiness of our descendants and our descendants will say as usual: things used to be so much better, life today is worse than it used to be.”

— Anton Chekhov

261. “Dear, sweet, unforgettable childhood! Why does this irrevocable time, forever departed, seem brighter, more festive and richer than it actually was?”

— Anton Chekhov

262. “If one wants to lead a good life, A HUMAN LIFE, one must work.”

— Anton Chekhov

263. “I’ve noticed that people who get married cease to be curious.”

— Anton Chekhov

264. “I was oppressed with a sense of vague discontent and dissatisfaction with my own life, which was passing so quickly and uninterestingly, and I kept thinking it would be a good thing if I could tear my heart out of my breast, that heart which had grown so weary of life.”

— Anton Chekhov

265. “I was so drunk the whole time that I took bottles for girls and girls for bottles.”

— Anton Chekhov

266. “If you look at anything long enough, say just that wall in front of you – it will come out of that wall.”

— Anton Chekhov

267. “Even while lying, you’ll be believed if you speak with authority.”

— Anton Chekhov

268. “Happiness does not await us all. One needn’t be a prophet to say that there will be more grief and pain than serenity and money. That is why we must hang on to one another.”

— Anton Chekhov

269. “In countries where there is a mild climate, less effort is expended on the struggle with nature and man is kinder and more gentle.”

— Anton Chekhov

270. “People are far more sincere and good-humored at speeding their parting guests than on meeting them.”

— Anton Chekhov

271. “I divide all literary works into two categories: Those I like and those I don’t like. No other criterion exists for me.”

— Anton Chekhov

272. “It is as acceptable now to love the wives of others as it is to smoke their cigars and read their books.”

— Anton Chekhov

273. “You only have to start a job of work to realize how few decent, honest folk there are about.”

— Anton Chekhov

274. “Humankind has understood history as a series of battles because, to this day, it regards conflict as the central facet of life.”

— Anton Chekhov

275. “Others made me a slave, but I must squeeze the slave out of myself, drop by drop.”

— Anton Chekhov

276. “It’s immoral to steal, but you can take things.”

— Anton Chekhov

277. “Nothing can be accomplished by logic and ethics.”

— Anton Chekhov

278. “It’s worth living abroad to study up on genteel and delicate manners. The maid smiles continuously; she smiles like a duchess on a stage, while at the same time it is clear from her face that she is exhausted from overwork.”

— Anton Chekhov

279. “To make a face from marble means to remove from the slab everything that is not the face.”

— Anton Chekhov

280. “It is easier to ask of the poor than of the rich.”

— Anton Chekhov

281. “An artist observes, selects, guesses, and synthesizes.”

— Anton Chekhov

282. “When an actor has money he doesn’t send letters, he sends telegrams.”

— Anton Chekhov

283. “I have in my head a whole army of people pleading to be let out and awaiting my commands.”

— Anton Chekhov

284. “There is a proverb that if a peasant woman has no troubles she will buy a pig.”

— Anton Chekhov

285. “Anna Petrovna: Never talk to women about your own good qualities. Let them find out for themselves.”

— Anton Chekhov

286. “Life is difficult for those who have the daring to first set out on an unknown road. The avant-garde always has a bad time of it.”

— Anton Chekhov

287. “The wealthy are always surrounded by hangers-on; science and art are as well.”

— Anton Chekhov

288. “We old bachelors smell like dogs, do we? So be it. But I must take issue with your claim that doctors who treat female illnesses are womanizers and cynics at heart. Gynecologists deal with savage prose the likes of which you have never dreamed of.”

— Anton Chekhov

289. “Write, write, write-till your fingers break.”

— Anton Chekhov

290. “Flies purify the air, and plays – the morals.”

— Anton Chekhov

291. “By poeticizing love, we imagine in those we love virtues that they often do not possess; this then becomes the source of constant mistakes and constant distress.”

— Anton Chekhov

292. “When performing an autopsy, even the most inveterate spiritualist would have to question where the soul is.”

— Anton Chekhov

293. “Probably nature itself gave man the ability to lie so that in difficult and tense moments he could protect his nest, just as do the vixen and wild duck.”

— Anton Chekhov

294. “When a person hasn’t in him that which is higher and stronger than all external influences, it is enough for him to catch a good cold in order to lose his equilibrium and begin to see an owl in every bird, to hear a dog’s bark in every sound.”

— Anton Chekhov

295. “You are right to demand that an artist engage his work consciously, but you confuse two different things: solving the problem and correctly posing the question.”

— Anton Chekhov

296. “The world is a fine place. The only thing wrong with it is us. How little justice and humility there is in us, how poorly we understand patriotism!”

— Anton Chekhov

297. “What’s the use of talking? You can see for yourself that this is a barbarous country; the people have no morals; and the boredom!”

— Anton Chekhov

298. “It always seems to the brothers and the father that their brother or son didn’t marry the right person.”

— Anton Chekhov

299. “Despite your best efforts, you could not invent a better police force for literature than criticism and the author’s own conscience.”

— Anton Chekhov

300. “To live simply to die is by no means amusing, but to live with the knowledge that you will die before your time, that’s really is idiotic.”

— Anton Chekhov