In Anton Chekhov's The Darling, the author celebrates the image of the modern-day woman by condemning the epitome of the stereotypical woman, Olga, to an unfulfilling life of short-lived pleasures. By damning Olga, the short story's protagnist, Chekhov promotes the crumbling image of the traditional woman. Through her constant misfortunes and shortcomings, Anton demonstrates this opinion in several ways. The first method he employs consists of her relationships with the male characters of the short story. Chekhov presents Olga's first major flaw through his emphasis of overdependance. Olga, who cannot bear the idea of living alone, transforms into a bitter, unwelcoming character when her fears repeatedly come true. Similarly, he demonstrates another second flaw through Olga's unoriginality and inability to formulate her own opinions. In the end, she sacrifices contact with all of her previous friends due to her ever-changing interests. She does this all out of her fear of solitude. While at a glance the short story appears to promote sexism and machosim, Chekhov reveals his true intentions through little yet unignorable elements within the story.
As stated before, Chekhov presents the first major flaw of the stereotypical women through his emphasis on overdependance. Olga demonstrates this trait repeatedly when she decides that she'd rather be alongside just about anybody than alone. By consequence, she jumps from one relationship to the next, showing that she hardly mourns over her deceased husbands. By "God's will", or rather by Chekhov himself, history repeats itself and Olga finds herself abandonned numerous times throughout the short story. Vassily, her neighbor and future husband, best explains this case; "Everything happens as it is ordained, Olga Semyonovna, and if any of our dear ones die, it must be because it is the will of God." Chekhov, playing the role of God in the story as the author, punishes Olga as a means to show his dissapprovement with...