The Lady With The Dog Four Levels 
Four Levels of The lady with the dog
- Anton Chekhov (1850-1904)1.LITERAL COMPREHENSION :
Once Dmitri Dmitrich Gurov, a man with a daughter of 12 years old and two son went to Yalta, a sea side town on holiday. There he heard about a fair haired young lady of medium height with a dog running behind her. She was Anna Sergeyevna who had gone there to spend her holidays. She was waiting for her husband to join her but it had been five days of her stay over there alone. So she was feeling bored.
One evening while Gurov was dining in the gardens, the lady came, took the next table. Gurov initiated conversation with her. After week they started roaming together. One day they went to Anne's hotel room and made love. Anna regretted for the event and Gurov consoled her.After that they spend whole day together. They lunched, dined and visited different places together. While Anna was expecting her husband's arrival .She got a letter from him stating that he wouldn't be able to come there due to his eye problem. She was told to go back home as quickly as possible. She left Gurov being sad and telling him that it was her fate to go away from him. Their separation was inevitable. So they parted without any hope of seeing again.
Left alone on the platform Gurov felt lonely and returned his home in Moscow. He was fully occupied with the image of Anna all the time. Her memories glowed more and more vividly. Anna's image followed him everywhere like a shadow. As he was termenant by a strong desire to meet Anna, he prepared for a journey to 'S' on the holidays in december telling his wife that he was going to petersburg with his friend. He searched Anna's house in S and found it without much trouble But he couldn't go inside because he thought if her husband knew about their relation everything might ruined. So he waited for the right moment. The new play was on at the local theater. Gurov went there with the hope of meeting Anna. His hope turned out into reality. Anna came there with her husband and took seat on the third row. During the first inter mission the husband went out to smoke. Taking opportunity, Gurov went to Anna and called her. When Anna Saw him, she turned pale being shocked. And she almost fainted. The play was about resume, Anna went to the door quickly. And Gurov followed her. She complained for coming there. But at the same time she revealed that she was unhappy after she left him and thought only about him even if she was trying to forget him. Gurov without listening to her, drew her to him and kissed her on her face. She shouted at him in terror to go away as she was afraid of others' notice. She promised to see him in Moscow.
To keep her promise, Anna went to meet Gurov in Moscow every two or three months telling her husband that she had to go there to concealed a doctor about an internal complain. They love each more and more as they grew older and had the relationship of a husband and wife. However, they were forced to live separately and meet secretly. Finally, they planed to live in the same town so that they could see each other quite often.But it was quite tough for both of them.
2. INTERPRETATION :
This story might be telling us that true love is a kind of inner feeling or emotion that is not bound by marital relations. Gurov and Anna despite being, married people loved each other and got their love materialized by any means. It also can be interpreted that marriage doesn't guarantee the love relationship between the spouses because love happens automatically without any compromise.
3.CRITICAL THINKING :
The writer has beautifully presented the extramarital relationship of Gurov and Anna who are not hesitant to deceive their spouses. If seen for Nepalese context, it is not justifiable to have such relationship. They should have exposed their love openly if they had loved each other truly instead of meeting secretly which was a betrayal to both of their family. This story defines love as fulfillment of one's sexual desires going beyond the platonic love.
4.ASSIMILATION :
After reading this story I realize that love happens automatically .It may happen before marriage as well as after marriage . Also ,I will never believe on my wife. She also may have extra marital relationship. So I will be aware about it.
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