Two centuries of the Russian classics Two centuries of the Russian classics 2686-7494 IWL RAS https://doi.org/10.22455/2686-7494-2026-8-1-32-53 Research Article Articles Through the Eyes of an Artist at the Turn of the Centuries. About Anton Chekhov’s Story “The House with a Mezzanine” Shchukin Vasilii G. red@rusklassika.ru 25 03 2026 8 1 32 53 A. Chekhov the story “The House with the Mezzanine ” beauty truth-truth truth-justice positivism modernism non-intellectual mental functions F. Nietzsche C. G. Jung Copyright © 2026, IWL RAS 2026 Unlike most studies devoted to A. Chekhov’s story “The House with a Mezzanine,” the article examines the problem of two enduring values — truth and beauty, which is not always noticeable at first glance. The author emphasizes that this is an artist’s story, which means that the picture of the world depicted in it arose in the mind of not an intellectual seeking truth, but an aesthetically inclined person for whom the “bitter truth” cannot overshadow the beauty of nature, the culture created by people, or the human soul. That is why the artist describes with such love the slightly faded charm of noble estates, changes in the weather, carefree girls’ laughter, or the equally carefree far niente. But the turn from the pressing truth of current problems to elusive but eternal beauty is a characteristic feature of modernism. The artist and the girl he fell in love with are not so far from the “seditious” thought of F. Nietzsche, according to which beauty lies “beyond good and evil.” The study provides a parallel analysis of the broad cultural context and the construction of the text of the work, the author of which intentionally but unobtrusively permeates the writing with a complex system of cultural and psychological signals. Volynskii, A. L. Bor’ba za idealizm: Kriticheskie stat’i [The Struggle for Idealism. Critical Articles]. St. Petersbourg, N. G. Molostvov Publ., 1900. 542 p. (In Russ.) Gazheva, I. D., “ʽIa zakat ne liubliu’: semantika zakatnykh simvolov v romane Dostoevskogo ʽPodrostok’.” [“ʽI Don’t Like Sunsets’: The Semantics of the Symbol of the Sunset in Dostoevsky’s Novel ʽThe Adolescent’.”] Dostoevskii i mirovaia kul’tura. Filologicheskii zhurnal, no. 3 (15), 2021, pp. 53–75. https://doi.org/10.22455/2619-0311-2021-3-53-75 (In Russ.) Gitovich, N. I. Letopis’ zhizni i tvorchestva A. P. Chekhova [Chronicle of Chekhov’s Life and Work]. Moscow, Goslitizdat Publ., 1955. 880 p. (In Russ.) Gukovskii, M. E. Novye veianiia i nastroeniia [New Trends and Moods]. Odessa, N. A. Khmel’nitskii Publ., 1903. 314 p. (In Russ.) Durylin, S. N., “Ob odnom simvole u Dostoevskogo. Opyt tematicheskogo obzora” [“On One Symbol in Dostoevsky. An Experiment in a Thematic Review”]. Dostoevskii: Trudy Gosudarstvennoi akademii khudozhestvennykh nauk. Literaturnaia sektsiia [Dostoevsky: Proceedings of the State Academy of Art Sciences. Literary Section], issue 3. Moscow, State Academia of Artistic Sciences Publ., 1928, pp. 163–199. (In Russ.) Kataev, V. B., Proza Chekhova: problemy interpretatsii [Chekhov’s Prose. Problems of Interpretation]. Moscow, Moscow State University Publ., 1979. 327 p. (In Russ.) Losev, A. F. Problema simvola i realisticheskoe iskusstvo [The Problem of Symbol and Realistic Art]. Moscow, Iskusstvo Publ., 1995. 319 p. (In Russ.) Fedorov-Davydov, A. A. Isaak Il’ich Levitan: Zhizn’ i tvorchestvo, 1860–1900 [Isaac Ilyich Levitan. Life and Work, 1860–1900]. Moscow, Iskusstvo Publ., 1976. 571 p. (In Russ.) Churak, G. “Sud’by skreshchen’e... Chekhov i Levitan” [“Crossing of Destinies... Chekhov and Levitan”]. Tret’iakovskaia galereia. Spetsial’nyi vypusk: Isaak Levitan, 2013, pp. 16–29. (In Russ.) Shchukin, V. G. “K fenomenologii krasoty v tvorchestve A. P. Chekhova. Rasskaz ʽKrasavitsy’.” [“On the Phenomenology of Beauty in Chekhov’s Work. The Story ʽBeautiful Women’.”] Dzieło Antoniego Czechowa dzisiai [The Work of Anton Chekhov Today], red. naukowa A. Wołodźko-Butkiewicz i L. Lutevici. Warszawa, Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 2005, pp. 99–116. (Studia Rossica, XVI) (In Russ.) Shchukin, V. G. “Mif dvorianskogo gnezda: Geokul’turologicheskoe issledovanie po russkoi klassicheskoi literature” [“The Myth of The Nest of Nobles. A Geocultural Study of Classic Russian Literature”]. Shchukin, V. G. Rossiiskii genii prosveshcheniia: Issledovaniia v oblasti mifopoietiki i istorii idei [Russian Genius of Enlightenment. Research in Mythopoetics and History of Ideas]. Moscow, Russian Political Encyclopedia Publ., 2007, pp. 155–458. (In Russ.)