If any writer can be said to have invented the modern short story it is Anton Chekhov. It is not just that Chekhov democratized this art form; more than that he changed the thrust of short fiction from relating to revealing. And what marvelous and unbearable things are revealed in these Forty Stories. The abashed happiness of a woman in the presence of the husband who abandoned her years before. The obsequious terror of the official who accidentally sneezes on a general. The poignant astonishment of an aging Don Juan overtaken by love. Spanning the entirety of Chekhov s career and including such masterpieces as Surgery The Huntsman Anyuta Sleepyhead The Lady With the Pet Dog and The Bishop this collection manages to be amusing dazzling and supremely moving--often within a single page.