The earliest literary depiction of Maslach’s triad of physician burnout in Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya

Abstract Physician burnout is often regarded as an affliction of modern medicine, yet Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya reveals that its human contours were recognizable more than a century ago. In Dr Mikhail Astrov, a rural physician worn down by relentless work and repeated encounters with suffering, Chekhov portrays emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and diminished professional accomplishment, the three dimensions later formalized in the Maslach burnout framework. This portrayal carries particular resonance because Chekhov himself combined medicine and writing, provided rural care, responded to epidemics, and continued working while tuberculosis progressively curtailed his life. Through a close reading of selected passages, this commentary interprets Astrov as a possible autobiographical refraction of Chekhov’s medical experience and examines how his disillusionment anticipates physician burnout. First published in 1897, Uncle Vanya may constitute the earliest literary portrayal of burnout’s three dimensions, nearly eight decades before the syndrome entered modern medical discourse.