Olga Tabachnikova examines Chekhov as a mirror for the transformation of British culture over the twentieth century, from the Bloomsbury Circle’s natural affinity for Chekhov’s prose, to the uphill, against-the-grain climb of the plays onto the British stage, delineating the gradual emergence of Chekhov in the cultural consciousness as a kind of honorary Englishman, whose understated manner, modesty, reserve, and reticence made him the least un-foreign of the Russian literary titans.