Months and months ago, I got to talking books with Lev and he gave a strong (especially for him) recommendation to Chekhov; I wondered how much of that was attributable to the Russian heritage, but filed it away anyway (as is my wont when people talk up music or, especially, books/writers) and after a while someone else lent me the pocket Penguin 70 years volume which includes two of his stories, "The Kiss" and "A Visit to Friends".
A'course I knew of Chekhov's reputation as one of the great short story writers, but I had a feeling I'd read him in fits and bursts in the past without his stuff having made much of an impression - and, having read these two, I still feel much the same. They're finely etched and good on the details - the writing gives a sense of real craft - but the stories don't do a great deal for me...another instancing, maybe, of a telescoping of my tastes in literature.
