A short story written in the vein of the Gothic tradition, "The Black Monk" tells of a Kovrin, a Russian scholar, who is suffering from stress and overworking. He goes to the countryside, to an idyllic garden, where he starts seeing a ghostly apparition in the figure of a black monk. Step by step, Kovrin begins to lose his sanity and health, largely due to the influence of the black monk. Touching upon the powers of one's imagination and the hallucinations of a trouble mind, Chekhov creates a haunting story of madness, love, and the supernatural.