Anton Chekhov: Plays, Short Stories, Diary & Letters (Collected Edition). Anton Chekhov
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I don’t think there can really be a town so dull and stupid as to have no place for a clever, cultured person. Let us suppose even that among the hundred thousand inhabitants of this backward and uneducated town, there are only three persons like yourself. It stands to reason that you won’t be able to conquer that dark mob around you; little by little as you grow older you will be bound to give way and lose yourselves in this crowd of a hundred thousand human beings; their life will suck you up in itself, but still, you won’t disappear having influenced nobody; later on, others like you will come, perhaps six of them, then twelve, and so on, until at last your sort will be in the majority. In two or three hundred years’ time life on this earth will be unimaginably beautiful and wonderful. Mankind needs such a life, and if it is not ours to-day then we must look ahead for it, wait, think, prepare for it. We must see and know more than our fathers and grandfathers saw and knew. [Laughs] And you complain that you know too much.
MASHA. [Takes off her hat] I’ll stay to lunch.
IRINA. [Sighs] Yes, all that ought to be written down.
[ANDREY has gone out quietly.]
TUZENBACH. You say that many years later on, life on this earth will be beautiful and wonderful. That’s true. But to share in it now, even though at a distance, we must prepare by work….
VERSHININ. [Gets up] Yes. What a lot of flowers you have. [Looks round] It’s a beautiful flat. I envy you! I’ve spent my whole life in rooms with two chairs, one sofa, and fires which always smoke. I’ve never had flowers like these in my life…. [Rubs his hands] Well, well!
TUZENBACH. Yes, we must work. You are probably thinking to yourself: the German lets himself go. But I assure you I’m a Russian, I can’t even speak German. My father belonged to the Orthodox Church…. [Pause.]
VERSHININ. [Walks about the stage] I often wonder: suppose we could begin life over again, knowing what we were doing? Suppose we could use one life, already ended, as a sort of rough draft for another? I think that every one of us would try, more than anything else, not to repeat himself, at the very least he would rearrange his manner of life, he would make sure of rooms like these, with flowers and light… I have a wife and two daughters, my wife’s health is delicate and so on and so on, and if I had to begin life all over again I would not marry…. No, no!
[Enter KULIGIN in a regulation jacket.]
KULIGIN. [Going up to IRINA] Dear sister, allow me to congratulate you on the day sacred to your good angel and to wish you, sincerely and from the bottom of my heart, good health and all that one can wish for a girl of your years. And then let me offer you this book as a present. [Gives it to her] It is the history of our High School during the last fifty years, written by myself. The book is worthless, and written because I had nothing to do, but read it all the same. Good day, gentlemen! [To VERSHININ] My name is Kuligin, I am a master of the local High School. [Note: He adds that he is a Nadvorny Sovetnik (almost the same as a German Hofrat), an undistinguished civilian title with no English equivalent.] [To IRINA] In this book you will find a list of all those who have taken the full course at our High School during these fifty years. Feci quod potui, faciant meliora potentes. [Kisses MASHA.]
IRINA. But you gave me one of these at Easter.
KULIGIN. [Laughs] I couldn’t have, surely! You’d better give it back to me in that case, or else give it to the Colonel. Take it, Colonel. You’ll read it some day when you’re bored.
VERSHININ. Thank you. [Prepares to go] I am extremely happy to have made the acquaintance of…
OLGA. Must you go? No, not yet?
IRINA. You’ll stop and have lunch with us. Please do.
OLGA. Yes, please!
VERSHININ. [Bows] I seem to have dropped in on your nameday. Forgive me, I didn’t know, and I didn’t offer you my congratulations. [Goes with OLGA into the dining-room.]
KULIGIN. To-day is Sunday, the day of rest, so let us rest and rejoice, each in a manner compatible with his age and disposition. The carpets will have to be taken up for the summer and put away till the winter… Persian powder or naphthaline…. The Romans were healthy because they knew both how to work and how to rest, they had mens sana in corpore sano. Their life ran along certain recognized patterns. Our director says: “The chief thing about each life is its pattern. Whoever loses his pattern is lost himself” — and it’s just the same in our daily life. [Takes MASHA by the waist, laughing] Masha loves me. My wife loves me. And you ought to put the window curtains away with the carpets…. I’m feeling awfully pleased with life to-day. Masha, we’ve got to be at the director’s at four. They’re getting up a walk for the pedagogues and their families.
MASHA. I shan’t go.
KULIGIN. [Hurt] My dear Masha, why not?
MASHA. I’ll tell you later…. [Angrily] All right, I’ll go, only please stand back…. [Steps away.]
KULIGIN. And then we’re to spend the evening at the director’s. In spite of his ill-health that man tries, above everything else, to be sociable. A splendid, illuminating personality. A wonderful man. After yesterday’s committee he said to me: “I’m tired, Feodor Ilitch, I’m tired!” [Looks at the clock, then at his watch] Your clock is seven minutes fast. “Yes,” he said, “I’m tired.” [Violin played off.]
OLGA. Let’s go and have lunch! There’s to be a masterpiece of baking!
KULIGIN. Oh my dear Olga, my dear. Yesterday I was working till eleven o’clock at night, and got awfully tired. To-day I’m quite happy. [Goes into dining-room] My dear…
CHEBUTIKIN. [Puts his paper into his pocket, and combs his beard] A pie? Splendid!
MASHA. [Severely to CHEBUTIKIN] Only mind; you’re not to drink anything to-day. Do you hear? It’s bad for you.
CHEBUTIKIN. Oh, that’s all right. I haven’t been drunk for two years. And it’s all the same, anyway!
MASHA. You’re not to dare to drink, all the same. [Angrily, but so that her husband should not hear] Another dull evening at the Director’s, confound it!
TUZENBACH. I shouldn’t go if I were you…. It’s quite simple.
CHEBUTIKIN. Don’t go.
MASHA. Yes, “don’t go….” It’s a cursed, unbearable life…. [Goes into dining-room.]
CHEBUTIKIN. [Follows her] It’s not so bad.
SOLENI. [Going into the dining-room] There, there, there….
TUZENBACH. Vassili Vassilevitch, that’s enough. Be quiet!
SOLENI. There, there, there….
KULIGIN. [Gaily] Your health, Colonel! I’m a pedagogue and not quite at home here. I’m Masha’s husband…. She’s a good sort, a very good sort.
VERSHININ. I’ll have some of this black vodka…. [Drinks] Your health! [To OLGA] I’m very comfortable here!
[Only IRINA and TUZENBACH are now left in the sitting-room.]
IRINA. Masha’s out of sorts to-day. She married when she was eighteen, when he seemed to her the wisest of men. And now it’s different. He’s the kindest man, but not the wisest.
OLGA. [Impatiently] Andrey, when are you coming?
ANDREY. [Off] One minute. [Enters and goes to the table.]
TUZENBACH. What are you thinking about?
IRINA. I don’t like this Soleni of yours and I’m afraid of him. He only says silly things.
TUZENBACH. He’s a queer man. I’m sorry for him, though he vexes me. I think he’s shy. When there are just the two of us he’s quite all right and very good company; when other people are about he’s rough and hectoring. Don’t let’s go in, let them have their meal without us. Let me stay with you. What are you thinking of? [Pause] You’re twenty. I’m not yet thirty. How many years are there left to us, with their long,