Chekhov's works show an astounding resourcefulness and versatility.
There is no monotony, no repetition. Neither in incident nor in
character are any two stories alike. The range of Chekhov's knowledge
of men and things seems to be unlimited, and he is extravagant in the
use of it. Some great idea which many a writer would consider
sufficient to expand into a whole novel he disposes of in a story of a
few pages. Take, for example, _Vanka_, apparently but a mere episode
in the childhood of a nine-year-old boy; while it is really the
tragedy of a whole life in its tempting glimpses into a past
environment and ominous forebodings of the future--all contracted into
the space of four or five pages. Chekhov is lavish with his
inventiveness. Apparently, it cost him no effort to invent.

I have used the word inventiveness for lack of a better name. It
expresses but lamely the peculiar faculty that distinguishes Chekhov.
Chekhov does not really invent. He reveals. He reveals things that no
author before him has revealed. It is as though he possessed a special
organ which enabled him to see, hear and feel things of which we other
mortals did not even dream the existence. Yet when he lays them bare
we know that they are not fictitious, not invented, but as real as the
ordinary familiar facts of life. This faculty of his playing on all
conceivable objects, all conceivable emotions, no matter how
microscopic, endows them with life and a soul. By virtue of this power
_The Steppe_, an uneventful record of peasants travelling day after
day through flat, monotonous fields, becomes instinct with dramatic
interest, and its 125 pages seem all too short. And by virtue of the
same attribute we follow with breathless suspense the minute
description of the declining days of a great scientist, who feels his
physical and mental faculties gradually ebbing away. _A Tiresome
Story_, Chekhov calls it; and so it would be without the vitality