About the work
On the Harmful Effects of Tobacco is a one-act monologue by Anton Chekhov, published under the pen name A. Chekhonte on 17 February 1886 in the Peterburgskaya Gazeta. Chekhov revised the text repeatedly, including in 1898 and 1903, before arriving at the version most commonly performed today; no documented stage premiere has survived, though the text was cleared by theatrical censorship on 11 March 1886.
Plot
Nyukhin, compelled by his domineering wife to give a lecture on the harmful effects of tobacco, loses his thread within a few sentences and instead laments his suppressed married life and constant lack of money. In the end he asks the audience not to tell his wife about his brief moment of rebellion.
Cultural significance
The comic monologue is seen less as a critique of smoking than as a pointed study of marital power dynamics and personal powerlessness, and reached German stages in 1960, on the centenary of Chekhov's birth.