A letter by this author rejects labels like “liberal” and “conservative” in favor of the “holy of holies” of the human body, health, and freedom. For 10 points each:
[10e] Name this author whose letters to Aleksey Suvorin claim that the writer’s task is to state problems correctly, not solve them. This author drew on his medical background in stories like “Ward No. 6.”
ANSWER: Anton Chekhov
[10h] A Chekhov letter decries people who’d have him state that this crime is evil, though that’s “been known for ages without my saying so.” This crime titles a 2003 novel in which Trond accidentally shoots his twin brother.
ANSWER: stealing horses [accept horse-stealers or horse thieves; prompt on stealing or thievery] (The novel is Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson.)
[10m] A Chekhov letter written during his return from Sakhalin recounts the sea burial that inspired this story. This story about the death of the title soldier is praised in Virginia Woolf’s essay “Modern Fiction.”
ANSWER: “Gusev”
<JB, European Literature>