The concept of "Russianness" in A.P. Chekhov's artistic world picture

the aim of the study is to reconstruct and provide a multifaceted analysis of the artistic representation of the concept of "Russianness" in A.P. Chekhov's prose works, as well as to identify the specifics of its semantics within the author's individual worldview. The scientific novelty of the work lies in its systematic approach to studying Chekhov's concept sphere of "Russianness" as a dynamic, multifaceted, and internally contradictory phenomenon. The research identifies and classifies a complex of interconnected representations of this concept (spatio-geographical, socio-cultural, related to private life, and anthropological), and provides a detailed analysis of its interpretation through the "own/alien" opposition. Using methods of conceptual, motivic, and structural-semantic analysis applied to the writer's stories and novellas, the study demonstrates that Chekhov does not merely record stereotypes of the national character but subjects them to complex artistic problematization and deconstruction. He shifts the reader's focus from external, ideologically charged definitions to the internal, existential experience of the individual. It is concluded that true "Russianness" in Chekhov's works is associated not with a set of fixed traits, but with the individual's capacity for moral effort, critical reflection, and the independent search for life's meaning, irrespective of national and social frameworks.

A.P. Chekhov, prose, poetics, Russianness, artistic worldview, concept, national identity