CHEKHOV – TOLSTOY – LESKOV: STORY "BY THE ROAD"

Abstract

The article suggests that the hero of the story "By the Road" doctor Starchenko, on the one hand, is internally related to von Koren from Chekhov's story "Duel", and on the other hand, is no less unceremonious and callous than the hero of "Ionych" Dmitry Startsev in the last chapter of Chekhov's story. at the same time, the main character of the story "By the Road", the young judicial investigator Lyzhin, resembles Tolstoy's Levin (and the constable Loshadin resembles the policeman "Ryzhov" from Leskov's " Singlemind", 1879). So, on the one hand, this story is a vivid manifestation of autointertextuality in Chekhov’s late work, and on the other hand, it can be seen as a kind of “pre-conceptualist” variation of the recurring motifs of Leo Tolstoy’s work.