The Plays of Anton Chekhov Read online

  A brief Glossary covers currency and units of measurement common to the plays.

  For transliteration I have strictly applied the so-called ‘British system’ now in widespread general use throughout the English-speaking world.

  Last — though first — I thank Richard Gilman for some stimulating discussion, and Antony Wood for the knowledge, sensitivity and vigilance exercised in preparing the text for publication.

  Peter Carson

  GLOSSARY

  Desyatina: A unit of land measurement equivalent to 2.7 acres (1.09 hectares).

  Pud: A measure of weight, approximately 36 lb (16.33 kg).

  Rouble (rubl’): Then as now the central Russian unit of currency, divided into 100 kopecks (kopeyka). The rouble was stable throughout the period Chekhov was writing, and was worth £ 0.16 or US$ 0.76.

  Verst (versta): The standard pre-revolutionary measure of distance, c. 0.67 miles (1.07 km).

  Zolotnik: A measure of weight, c. 2.40 drams (4.26 gm).

  Ivanov

  A Drama in Four Acts

  CHARACTERS

  NIKOLAY ALEKSEYEVICH IVANOV [also KOLYA, NICOLAS, NIKOLASHA], a permanent member of the Office for Peasant Affairs

  ANNA PETROVNA [also ANYA, ANYUTA, SARA], his wife, née Sara Abramson1

  COUNT MATVEY SEMYONOVICH SHABELSKY [also MATYUSHA], his maternal uncle

  PAVEL KIRILLYCH LEBEDEV [also PASHA, PASHENKA], chairman of the District Council2

  ZINAIDA SAVISHNA [also ZYUZYUSHKA], his wife

  SASHA [also ALEKSANDRA PAVLOVNA, SANICHKA, SASHENKA, SHURA, SHURKA, SHUROCHKA], the Lebedevs’ daughter, aged twenty

  YEVGENY KONSTANTINOVICH LVOV, a young district doctor

  MARFA YEGOROVNA BABAKINA [also MARFUSHA, MARFUTKA], a young widow, a landowner and the daughter of a rich merchant3

  DMITRY NIKITICH KOSYKH, an excise officer

  MIKHAIL MIKHAYLOVICH BORKIN [also MISHA], a distant relative of Ivanov and manager of his estate

  AVDOTYA NAZAROVNA, an old woman of indeterminate profession

  YEGORUSHKA, a hanger-on4of the Lebedevs

  FIRST GUEST

  SECOND GUEST

  THIRD GUEST

  FOURTH GUEST

  PYOTR, a manservant of Ivanov’s

  GAVRILA [also GAVRYUSHA], a manservant of the Lebedevs Guests of both sexes, servants

  The action takes place in one of the Districts5of central Russia.

  Act One

  The garden of Ivanov’s country estate. Left, the house façade and terrace. One window is open. In front of the terrace a broad semicircular lawn, from which avenues lead into the garden straight ahead and right. On the right-hand side are garden benches and small tables. On one of the tables a lamp is burning. Evening is coming on. As the curtain rises a piano-cello duet is being practised indoors.

  I

  [IVANOV and BORKIN.]

  [IVANOV is sitting at a table, reading a book. BORKIN appears at the end of the garden wearing big boots and carrying a shotgun; he is rather drunk; seeing Ivanov he goes up to him on tiptoe and as he comes level with him takes aim at his face.]

  IVANOV [seeing Borkin, starts and jumps up]: Misha, God knows what ... you frightened me ... As it is I’m in a state and your silly jokes ... [Sits down.] He gives me a fright and that makes him happy ...

  BORKIN [laughing loudly]: There, there ... I’m sorry, I’m sorry. [Sits down next to him.] I won’t any more, I won’t ... [Takes off his cap.] It’s hot. Would you believe it, dear boy, I’ve done seventeen versts in something like three hours ... I’m worn out ... Feel my heart beating ...

  IVANOV [reading]: All right, later ...

  BORKIN: No, feel it now. [Takes Ivanov’s hand and puts it to his chest.] Do you feel it? Boom-boom-boom-boom. There must be something wrong with my heart. I could die any minute. Tell me, will you be sorry if I die?

  IVANOV: I’m reading ... later ...

  BORKIN: No, seriously, will you be sorry if I die suddenly? Nikolay Alekseyevich, will you be sorry if I die?

  IVANOV: Stop bothering me!

  BORKIN: Just tell me, old man: will you be sorry?

  IVANOV: I’m sorry you smell of vodka. That, Misha, is disgusting.

  BORKIN [laughing]: Do I smell? Surprising ... Though it’s not really surprising. I met the magistrate at Plesniki, and I must confess he and I each put away eight glasses. Tell me, is it bad for one? Is it? Is it?

  IVANOV: This is going too far ... just get it into your head, Misha, that this teasing ...

  BORKIN: There, there ... sorry, sorry! ... Good luck to you, sit by yourself ... [Gets up and goes off.] Astonishing people, one can’t even talk. [Coming back.] Ah, yes! I almost forgot ... Give me the eighty-two roubles! ...

  IVANOV: What eighty-two roubles?

  BORKIN: To pay the workmen tomorrow.

  IVANOV: I haven’t got it.

  BORKIN: I am deeply grateful! [Imitating him.] I haven’t got it ... But don’t we need to pay the workmen? Don’t we?

  IVANOV: I don’t know. I don’t have any money today. Wait till the first of the month when I get my salary.

  BORKIN: To have to talk to such people! ... The workmen will be coming for their money tomorrow morning, not on the first! ...

  IVANOV: So what am I to do now? Just kill me and cut me up in little pieces ... And why do you have this nasty habit of pestering me just when I’m reading or writing or ...

  BORKIN: I’m asking you this: do we have to pay the workmen or not? Oh why am I talking to you! [Gesturing with his hand.] Country gentlemen, devil take them, landowners . . . What a rational enterprise ... A thousand desyatinas of land — and not a kopeck in his pocket ... A wine-cellar without a corkscrew ... I’ll just take the troika1 and sell it tomorrow! I really will! ... I’ve sold the oats still standing in the fields, and tomorrow I’ll go and sell the rye. [Strides about the stage.] Do you think I am going to stand on ceremony? Do you? No, I’m not that kind of man ...

  II

  [The same, SHABELSKY (offstage) and ANNA PETROVNA. SHABELSKY‘s voice through the window: ‘Noone can possibly play with you . . . You have less ear than a stuffed pike and your fingering is disgraceful.’]

  ANNA PETROVNA [appearing in the open window]: Who was talking here just now? Was it you, Misha? Why are you striding about like that?

  BORKIN: Even that won’t have got through to your Nicolas-voilà.2

  ANNA PETROVNA: Listen, Misha, tell them to bring some hay to the croquet lawn.

  BORKIN [gesturing with his hand]: Let me be, please.

  ANNA PETROVNA: Really, what a tone of voice ... That tone doesn’t suit you at all. If you want women to love you, then don’t be cross in front of them and don’t go all pompous ... [To her husband] Nikolay, let’s go and turn somersaults on the hay ...

  IVANOV: Anyuta, it’s bad for you to stand by an open window. Please move away ... [Shouting] Uncle, shut the window!

  [The window is shut.]

  BORKIN: Also, don’t forget that two days from now you have to pay Lebedev his interest.

  IVANOV: I’ve remembered. Today I’ll be at Lebedev’s and I’ll ask him to wait ... [Looks at his watch.]

  BORKIN: When are you going there?

  IVANOV: Now.

  BORKIN [animatedly]: Wait, wait! . . . Isn’t today Shurochka’s birthday ... Tut-tut-tut ... And I forgot ... What a memory ... [Jumps.] I’ll go too, I’ll go ... [Sings.] I will go ... I’ll have a bath, chew some papers,3 take three drops of ammonia and I’ll be ready to begin all over again ... Sweet Nikolay Alekseyevich, my sunbeam, light of my life, you’re a mass of nerves, you’re a real whiner, you’re in a constant melanchondria,4 but the Lord above knows what we could do together! For you I’m ready for anything ... Do you want me to marry Marfusha Babakina — for you? Half the dowry is yours ... That is, not half, but take the lot! ...

  IVANOV: Will you stop talking nonsense ...

  BORKIN: No, seriously, really, would you like me to marry Marfusha? We’ll go halves on t
he dowry ... But why am I telling you this? Can you understand? [Imitating him.] ‘Will you stop talking nonsense.’ You’re a good man, an intelligent man, but you lack that little vein of ambition, do you see, that sweep. To reach out so as to make the imps of hell feel sick ... You’re a mental case, a moaner, but if you were a normal person, you’d make a million in a year. For example, if I now had two thousand three hundred roubles, in two weeks I’d have twenty thousand. Don’t you believe me? And you think that’s nonsense? No, it’s not nonsense ... Just give me two thousand three hundred roubles and in a week I’ll give you twenty thousand. Ovsyanov is selling a strip of land on the other bank of the river, right opposite us, for two thousand three hundred roubles. If we buy that strip, both banks will be ours. And if both banks are ours, then you see we’ll have the right to dam the river. Isn’t that so? We’ll build a mill and as soon as we announce our intention of building a dam, then everyone living down river will kick up a fuss, and we will tell them Kommen Sie hier5 — if you don’t want a dam, pay up. Do you see? Zarev’s factory will give five thousand, Korolkov three thousand, the monastery will give five thousand ...

  IVANOV: That’s sharp practice, Misha ... If you don’t want to quarrel with me, keep it to yourself.

  BORKIN [sitting down at a table]: Of course! ... I thought so! ... You yourself do nothing and you tie my hands.

  III

  [The same, SHABELSKY and LVOV.]

  SHABELSKY [coming out of the house with Lvov]: Doctors are the same as lawyers, the sole difference being that lawyers only rob you, but doctors rob you and kill you too ... Present company excepted. [Sits down on a bench.] Charlatans, exploiters ... Perhaps in some Arcadia there are exceptions to the general rule but ... in my lifetime I’ve got through twenty thousand roubles on treatments and I haven’t come across a single doctor who didn’t seem to me an outright rogue.

  BORKIN [to Ivanov]: Yes, you yourself do nothing and you tie my hands. That’s why we have no money ...

  SHABELSKY: I repeat, I am not talking of present company ... Perhaps there are exceptions although I must say ... [Yawns.]

  IVANOV [shutting his book]: What do you say, doctor?

  LVOV [looking back at the window]: The same as I was saying this morning: she must go to the sunshine of the Crimea immediately. [Walks about the stage.]

  SHABELSKY [bursts out]: To the Crimea! ... Misha, why don’t you and I become medical men? It’s so simple ... Some little Madame Angot or Ophelia6 has a tickle in her throat and starts coughing out of boredom, so take a sheet of paper and write a prescription following the rules of the profession: first a young doctor, then a trip to the Crimea, in the Crimea a dashing Tartar ...

  IVANOV [to the Count]: Oh stop being a pest! [To Lvov] To go to the Crimea one needs money. Even suppose I find it, she still categorically refuses to go ...

  LVOV: Yes, she refuses ...

  [A pause.]

  BORKIN: Tell me, doctor, is Anna Petrovna really so seriously ill that she has to go to the Crimea? ...

  LVOV [looking back at the window]: Yes, it’s consumption ...

  BORKIN: Pss! ... that’s bad ... I long ago saw in her face that she wouldn’t last long.

  LVOV: But ... speak more softly ... you can be heard in the house ...

  [A pause.]

  BORKIN [sighing]: Our life ... Man’s life is like a flower that blooms in its beauty in the field: a goat comes and eats it up and — there’s no more flower! ...

  SHABELSKY: All nonsense, nonsense and more nonsense. [Yawns.] Nonsense and a swindle.

  [A pause.]

  BORKIN: And, gentlemen, here I am teaching Nikolay Alekseyevich to make money. I gave him a marvellous idea but as usual my powder fell on damp ground. He’s unteachable ... Look at him: melancholy, bitterness, boredom, gloom, depression ...

  SHABELSKY [getting up and stretching]: O mind of genius, you think up things for everyone and teach everyone, but why not for once teach me ... Teach me, great brain, show me the way out ...

  BORKIN [getting up]: I’ll go and have a swim now ... Goodbye, gentlemen ... [To the Count] You have twenty ways out ... In your place I’d have twenty thousand roubles in a week. [Goes off.]

  SHABELSKY [going after him]: How? Come, teach me.

  BORKIN: There’s nothing to teach. It’s very simple ... [Coming back.] Nikolay Alekseyevich, give me a rouble.

  [IVANOV silently gives him the money.]

  Merci. [To the Count] You’ve still got a lot of trumps in your hand.

  SHABELSKY [going after him]: Which ones?

  BORKIN: In your place I’d have thirty thousand in a week, if not more. [Exit with the Count.]

  IVANOV [after a pause]: Superfluous people, superfluous words, having to answer stupid questions — doctor, all this has exhausted me to the point of making me ill. I’ve become irritable, bad-tempered, unpleasant and petty to the extent that I don’t recognize myself. I have a headache for days on end, I can’t sleep, there’s a noise in my ears ... And there’s absolutely nowhere I can go ... Nowhere ...

  LVOV: Nikolay Alekseyevich, I must have a serious word with you.

  IVANOV: Speak.

  LVOV: I must talk to you about Anna Petrovna. [Sits down.] She has refused to go to the Crimea but she would go with you.

  IVANOV [thinking]: For two to go takes money. Also I won’t be given any extended leave. I’ve already taken leave once this year ...

  LVOV: Very well. Now let’s go on. The best medicine for consumption is complete rest, and your wife doesn’t have a moment’s rest. She’s constantly upset by your relationship with her. Forgive me, I’m worked up and I must talk frankly. Your behaviour is killing her.

  [A pause.]

  Nikolay Alekseyevich, make me think better of you! ...

  IVANOV: All that is true, true ... I am probably dreadfully to blame, but my thoughts are confused, my soul is paralysed by some kind of sloth, and I haven’t the power to understand myself. I don’t understand other people or myself ... [Glances at the window.] We could be overheard here, come, let’s go for a walk.

  [They get up.]

  I would tell you the story from the beginning, my friend, but it’s a long story and so complicated you wouldn’t have got to the end of it by morning.

  [They walk.]

  Anyuta is a remarkable, unusual woman ... For me she changed her faith, she abandoned her father and mother, gave up wealth, and if I demanded another hundred sacrifices she would make them without blinking. Well, I am wholly unremarkable and have sacrificed nothing. But it’s a long story ... The whole point is, my dear doctor [hesitates], that ... to put it briefly, I married for passionate love and swore to love her for ever, but ... five years have passed, she still loves me, but I ... [Throws up his hands.] Now you’re telling me that she will die soon, but I feel neither love nor pity, just a kind of emptiness, exhaustion. To an outside observer this is probably appalling; I myself don’t understand what is happening inside me ...

  [They walk out down the avenue.]

  IV

  [SHABELSKY, then ANNA PETROVNA.]

  SHABELSKY [coming in and laughing]: My word, he’s not a crook but a thinker, a virtuoso! We should put up a monument to him. He brings together in his own single person the corruption of today in all its guises: lawyer, doctor, profiteer, accountant. [Sits down on the bottom step oftheterrace.] And I don’t think he has any qualifications, that’s what is surprising ... So what a genius of villainy he would be if he were also a master of culture and the humanities! He says, ‘In a week you could have twenty thousand.’ He says, ‘You also hold the ace of trumps in your hand — your title of count. [Laughs.] Any girl would marry you and bring a dowry.’

  [ANNA PETROVNA opens the window and looks down below.]

  He says, ‘Do you want me to try and arrange for you to marry Marfusha?’ Qui est-ce que c’est7Marfusha? Oh yes, it’s that Balabalkina ... Babakalkina ... the one like a washerwoman.

  ANNA PETROVNA: Is that you, Count?

>   SHABELSKY: What is it?

  [ANNA PETROVNA laughs.]

  [In a Jewish accent] Vy are you loffing?

  ANNA PETROVNA: I remembered a remark of yours. Do you remember, you were saying at dinner? A thief pardoned, a horse ... How did it go?

  SHABELSKY: A Jew baptized, a thief pardoned, a horse mended — all for the same price.

  ANNA PETROVNA [laughing]: You can’t make a simple joke without an injection of venom. You are a poisonous man. [In a serious voice] Joking apart, Count, you’re very poisonous. It’s hideously boring to live with you. You’re always grumpy, complaining, you find everyone bad, good for nothing. Tell me frankly, Count: did you ever speak well of anyone?

  SHABELSKY: What kind of a test is this?

  ANNA PETROVNA: We’ve now lived under the same roof for five years, and I’ve never heard you talk of other people calmly, without bile and without your making fun of them. What harm have people done you? And do you really think that you are better than everyone else?