Hush!

By: Anton Chekhov

Narrated by: Kenneth Branagh

This is a story from the In the Ravine and Other Stories collection.

Anton Chekhov, one of the finest masters of what is acknowledged as a difficult genre. There is the richly comic "Oh! The Public" about a hassled ticket inspector, a wry look at morals and manners in "The Chorus Girl", and the melancholic tale of a cab driver in "Misery".

Perhaps the finest of all is the novella "In The Ravine", a minutely observed look at life in a village through the eyes of one family. All the characters come to life with their foibles, their strengths, and their hopes. Kenneth Branagh uses his natural talent for characterisation to bring this village to life.

The other short stories in this collection are: "The Trousseau", "A Story Without a Title", "Children", "Fat and Thin", "The Beggar", "Hush!", "The Orator", and "An Actor's End".

Public Domain (P)2002 NAXOS AudioBooks Ltd.

Critic reviews

"If you want an outstanding reading, in which the narrator's voice brilliantly conveys the speaker's class and the intricate relationships between characters during conversations, you can do no better than to listen to Kenneth Branagh. This great actor mesmerizes as he gasps, chuckles, stutters, and declaims. A must listen." ( AudioFile)

One of My Favorite Chekhov Stories

Hush! is a favorite! It’s humorous yet sad, and unfortunately rings true for some families of musicians, writers and artists. I appreciate the well-chosen music played as an introduction and conclusion. With narrated anthologies the stories often run too close together, so I was delighted to discover a dozen or so of these Chekhov stories on Audible, narrated by Branagh and sold separately as singles. If more become available I will scoop them up.