Biography
Born as Alexander Shamkovich on November 2, 1893 in the city of Taganrog in the family of doctor Isaak Shamkovich. His father studied at Taganrog Boys' Gymnasium in the same class with Anton Chekhov and shared the same school desk. Alexander Shamkovich also studied at the Taganrog Boys' Gymnasium and entered the law faculty of Kharkiv University, which he graduated from in 1916. Alexander Shamkovich published his first feuilleton in the newspaper Priazovksy Kray in 1912. The first book published under the name of Sergey Zvantsev was the feature story Taganrog's Delegate on the famous steelworker Nikolai Dygai. Zvantsev's feuilletons were published in satirical magazine Krokodil, in Literaturnaya Gazeta and many more. His miniatures were included in the satirical TV series Fitil. Sergey Zvantsev published many stories dedicated to Taganrog before October Revolution.
Taganrog is a port city in Rostov Oblast, Russia, on the north shore of the Taganrog Bay in the Sea of Azov, several kilometers west of the mouth of the Don River. As of the 2010 Census, its population was 257,681.
The Chekhov Gymnasium in Taganrog on Ulitsa Oktyabrskaya 9 is the oldest gymnasium in the South of Russia. Playwright and short-story writer Anton Chekhov spent 11 years in the school, which was later named after him and transformed into a literary museum. Visitors can see Anton's desk and his classroom, the assembly hall and even the punishment cell which he sometimes visited.
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was a Russian playwright and short-story writer, who is considered to be among the greatest writers of short fiction in history. His career as a playwright produced four classics, and his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics. Along with Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg, Chekhov is often referred to as one of the three seminal figures in the birth of early modernism in the theatre. Chekhov practiced as a medical doctor throughout most of his literary career: "Medicine is my lawful wife", he once said, "and literature is my mistress."
