In 1879, after graduating from gymnasium, Anton Chekhov entered the medical faculty of Moscow University. Chekhov fell in love with the city. The particularly cozy Moscow streets, Moscow people and even the Moscow climate gave the writer a deep and immediate feeling of his homeland. While studying at Moscow University, Chekhov had the opportunity to listen lectures by such talented doctors of the 19th century as Zakharyin and Sklifosovsky. In 1889 Chekhov wrote: ‘I compare Zakharyin to Tolstoy – for his talent.’ For hours Grigory Antonovich Zakharyin, a university professor, head of a university clinic, could talk with a patient, and then briefly and succinctly give a comprehensive diagnosis. And he was never wrong. The name of Nikolai Vasilyevich Sklifosovsky, dean of the department of the faculty’s surgical clinic, was placed next to the name of Pirogov. He was a doctor who, out of a sense of professional duty, can stay at the operating table for several days without interruption. Sklifosovsky wrote more than 110 scientific works devoted to the most diverse sections of surgery.

Chekhov’s medical practice began in his university years. In 1879, his brother Ivan received a teacher’s job in the town of Voskresensk near Moscow (the modern city of Istra). The Chekhov family came to him for the summer. There Anton met Dr. Peter Alexandrovich Arkhangelsky, the head of the Voskresensk Hospital. Since 1882, he already helped the doctors of the hospital when receiving patients, and in the middle of the summer of 1884, during Dr. Uspensky’s vacation, he worked as the head of the Zvenigorod hospital.

1884 is the year of Chekhov’s graduation from Moscow University. The photo shows a class the Medical Faculty of Moscow University. Among the graduates is Anton Chekhov. Nearby is a photo of A.P. Chekhov as a student in 1883. A significant event for Chekhov in 1884 was also the release of his first book of stories “The Tales of Melpomene.” So, symbolically, medicine and literature went parallel courses in Chekhov’s life. He never left either one or the other.