“The Lady with the Pet Dog”

“The Lady with the Pet Dog” pg 192

1) Consider the following assessment of the story: “No excuses can be made for the lovers’ adulterous affair. They behave selfishly and irresponsibly. They are immoral –and so it’s the story.” Explain what you think Chekhov’s response to this view would be, given his treatment of the lovers. How does this compare with your own views?

I agree with the assessment of the story. I think they did “behave selfishly and irresponsibly.” They didn’t think about their husband or wives. Chekhov response would be that Gurov lured Anna. Anna felt bad for what she had done. This was Gurov first affair. I think Chekhov would say that Anna was just a victim of Gurov.

3) What does Gurov’s view of woman reveal about him? Why does he regard them as an “inferior race”?

Gurov feels that he is superior to woman. This can be related to any person who feels like they are superior to someone else. Gurov has the upper hand over women. In reality, the upper class needs the lower or middle classes. Chekhov states how “he couldn’t live without the ‘inferior race’ for two days together” (192). Gurov can be describes as a player. A player is a type of person who uses the opposite sex for their enjoyment. Chekhov states that Gurov “disposed women in his favor” (192).

5) When and why do Gurov’s feeling about Anna begin to change? Is he really in love with her?

Gurov feelings start to change about Anna in a little more than a month after she had left. Chekhov talked about how Anna “followed him about everywhere and watch him” (197). He thought about her “when in the evening stillness the voices of his children preparing their lessons reached his study, or when the storm howled in the chimney, suddenly everything would rise up in his memory” (197). Yes, Gurov does love Anna. Chekhov states at the end of the story that Gurov “had fallen in love really, truly –for the first time in his life” (202).

6) Who or what is the antagonist in this story? What is the nature of the conflict?

Gurov’s and Anna affair is the antagonist in the story. They both love each other. The conflict is that they have to be in secrecies with their love for each other. Chekhov states that Gurov and Anna felt like “they were a pair of migratory birds, male and female, caught and forced to live in different cages” (202). The antagonist and the conflict go together.  

7) What is the effect of having Gurov as the central consciousness? How would the story be different if were told in Anna’s perspective?

Gurov loved Anna. Chekhov states at the end of the story that Gurov “had fallen in love really, truly –for the first time in his life” (202). Gurov goes to find Anna. I believe that Anna just would have gone on with her life. Chekhov states that Anna says, “We are parting forever –it has to be, for ought never to have met” (196). Anna would not have come looking for Gurov like he did for her. Anna even says that she “pressed him to confess that he did not respect her” (196). She didn’t think Gurov loved her.

Works Cited

Chekhov, Anton.“The Lady with the Pet Dog.” The Compact Bedford Introduction to Literature. Ed. Michael Meyer. 9^th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s 2012. 192-203. Print.

“The Lady with the Pet Dog” pg 206

1) Which version do you like better –Chekhov’s story of Oates’s? What’s the point of retelling the story?

I like Oate’s version better. It is more of Anna version of the story I enjoy. As a woman I can better relate to woman. So, this is why I enjoyed this version more.

10) At the end of paragraph 19, Oates has Anna ask herself the question “What did it mean to enter into a bond with another person?”

To me entering into a bond with another person means starting a relationship with that person. A “bond” can be made with different things. When a child is first born parents have to “bond” with this child. After we grow up, we can bond with friends or our significant other. Having a “bond” with someone means that one know more about that person than the outside world does.

Works Cited

Oates, Joyce.“The Lady with the Pet Dog.” The Compact Bedford Introduction to Literature. Ed. Michael Meyer. 9^th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s 2012. 206-218. Print.