Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya attacks the historic idolization of the Russian country peasant life. The character’s realization of their country lives’ lack of opportunity and monotony causes a suicidal catharsis and the detrition of their already frail familial relationships. Chekhov is attempting to destroy the aggrandized peasant life shown in a novel such as Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina where members of the aristocracy vacation into manual labor and instead show the consequences and horrors of peasant country life.

Famously, Levin in Anna K temporarily inhabits peasant labor in the drawn-out mowing scene. Levin seeks out the life of his peasants for, “so he loved the peasantry in contrast to the class of people he did not love, and so he knew the peasantry as something in contrast to people in general. In his methodical mind, certain forms of peasant life acquired clear shape.” Levin exalts and vacations to peasantry for its simplicity in comparison to the highly political life of Moscow and St. Petersburg. In the simple life of labor, Levin can find purpose and clear meaning to his action.

Tolstoy’s Levin is problematic, however, in that it idolizes peasant life but does not show the harsh realities that accompany country life. Levin is able to vacation into manual labor and embedded (to use Giddens terminology) society but does not immigrate. Tolstoy fails to show the harsh realities accompanying the lifestyle Levin visits.

Chekhov does display the harsh consequences of assimilation into country life. Unlike the aggrandized praise for the natural environment presented in Anna K, Chekhov’s characters display the real hardships that accompany an embedded and labor-filled life. Astrov, the country doctor who has experienced modernized society before, remarks, “it’s our life—our provincial, parochial Russian life—I can’t stand. I despise it with my whole heart… I work harder than anyone in the district. You know that. Fate lashes out at me from all sides.” Instead of romanticizing peasant country life, Chekov accurately show is harsh reality and the poor quality of life manual labor begets. More so, Chekhov continually emphasizes the lack of opportunity and mobility in country residences—they have no opportunity like Levin. As Tolstoy’s Levin romanticizes his two days of labor, Chekov notes the consequences of such a life.