Chapter 1 Summary

Dmitri Dmitritch Gurov has been on vacation at Yalta, the seaside vacation town, for a fortnight when he hears of a new arrival. The young, fair-haired woman of medium height wears a béret and has a white Pomeranian dog with her. She is often alone, and the other vacationers refer to her as "the lady with the dog."

Gurov rationalizes that if she is here alone, without her husband, then he should make her acquaintance. Dmitri Gurov is under forty, but he already has three children: a twelve-year-old daughter and two school-age boys. He also has a wife whom he despises, describing her as "unintelligent, narrow, inelegant, was afraid of her, and did not like to be at home." He is often unfaithful to her and almost always speaks ill of women in general, referring to them as "the lower race."

However...