In assessing Chekhov’s influence on East Asian literatures, Heekyoung Cho focuses on the first few decades of the twentieth century, when East Asian intellectuals were discovering Russian literature as a resource and guide to their own confrontation with European modernity. In this context, Cho uncovers the strikingly optimistic, life-affirming, and hopeful-though-cautious vision of Chekhov that was filtered into Japan and Korea through the influential exegesis of the anarchocommunist Pyotr Kropotkin.