{"id":519,"date":"2016-11-10T22:31:13","date_gmt":"2016-11-10T22:31:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/ivytech-engl206-master\/?post_type=chapter&p=519"},"modified":"2020-01-28T22:28:15","modified_gmt":"2020-01-28T22:28:15","slug":"anton-chekhov-the-cherry-orchard-1904","status":"web-only","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-eng-102-college-writing-ii\/chapter\/anton-chekhov-the-cherry-orchard-1904\/","title":{"raw":"Anton Chekhov, \"The Cherry Orchard,\" 1904","rendered":"Anton Chekhov, “The Cherry Orchard,” 1904"},"content":{"raw":"

THE CHERRY ORCHARD<\/h2>\r\n

A COMEDY IN FOUR ACTS<\/h3>\r\nCHARACTERS\r\n
     LUBOV ANDREYEVNA RANEVSKY (Mme. RANEVSKY), a landowner\r\n     ANYA, her daughter, aged seventeen\r\n     VARYA (BARBARA), her adopted daughter, aged twenty-seven\r\n     LEONID ANDREYEVITCH GAEV, Mme. Ranevsky\u2019s brother\r\n     ERMOLAI ALEXEYEVITCH LOPAKHIN, a merchant\r\n     PETER SERGEYEVITCH TROFIMOV, a student\r\n     BORIS BORISOVITCH SIMEONOV-PISCHIN, a landowner\r\n     CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA, a governess\r\n     SIMEON PANTELEYEVITCH EPIKHODOV, a clerk\r\n     DUNYASHA (AVDOTYA FEDOROVNA), a maidservant\r\n     FIERS, an old footman, aged eighty-seven\r\n     YASHA, a young footman\r\n     A TRAMP\r\n     A STATION-MASTER\r\n     POST-OFFICE CLERK\r\n     GUESTS\r\n     A SERVANT\r\n<\/pre>\r\nThe action takes place on Mme. RANEVSKY\u2019S estate\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\n
\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n
ACT ONE<\/h2>\r\n[A room which is still called the nursery. One of the doors leads into ANYA\u2019S room. It is close on sunrise. It is May. The cherry-trees are in flower but it is chilly in the garden. There is an early frost. The windows of the room are shut. DUNYASHA comes in with a candle, and LOPAKHIN with a book in his hand.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. The train\u2019s arrived, thank God. What\u2019s the time?\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. It will soon be two. [Blows out candle] It is light already.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. How much was the train late? Two hours at least. [Yawns and stretches himself] I have made a rotten mess of it! I came here on purpose to meet them at the station, and then overslept myself... in my chair. It\u2019s a pity. I wish you\u2019d wakened me.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. I thought you\u2019d gone away. [Listening] I think I hear them coming.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Listens] No.... They\u2019ve got to collect their luggage and so on.... [Pause] Lubov Andreyevna has been living abroad for five years; I don\u2019t know what she\u2019ll be like now.... She\u2019s a good sort\u2014an easy, simple person. I remember when I was a boy of fifteen, my father, who is dead\u2014he used to keep a shop in the village here\u2014hit me on the face with his fist, and my nose bled.... We had gone into the yard together for something or other, and he was a little drunk. Lubov Andreyevna, as I remember her now, was still young, and very thin, and she took me to the washstand here in this very room, the nursery. She said, \u201cDon\u2019t cry, little man, it\u2019ll be all right in time for your wedding.\u201d [Pause] \u201cLittle man\u201d.... My father was a peasant, it\u2019s true, but here I am in a white waistcoat and yellow shoes... a pearl out of an oyster. I\u2019m rich now, with lots of money, but just think about it and examine me, and you\u2019ll find I\u2019m still a peasant down to the marrow of my bones. [Turns over the pages of his book] Here I\u2019ve been reading this book, but I understood nothing. I read and fell asleep. [Pause.]\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. The dogs didn\u2019t sleep all night; they know that they\u2019re coming.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. What\u2019s up with you, Dunyasha...?\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. My hands are shaking. I shall faint.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. You\u2019re too sensitive, Dunyasha. You dress just like a lady, and you do your hair like one too. You oughtn\u2019t. You should know your place.\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. [Enters with a bouquet. He wears a short jacket and brilliantly polished boots which squeak audibly. He drops the bouquet as he enters, then picks it up] The gardener sent these; says they\u2019re to go into the dining-room. [Gives the bouquet to DUNYASHA.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. And you\u2019ll bring me some kvass.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. Very well. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. There\u2019s a frost this morning\u2014three degrees, and the cherry-trees are all in flower. I can\u2019t approve of our climate. [Sighs] I can\u2019t. Our climate is indisposed to favour us even this once. And, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, allow me to say to you, in addition, that I bought myself some boots two days ago, and I beg to assure you that they squeak in a perfectly unbearable manner. What shall I put on them?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Go away. You bore me.\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. Some misfortune happens to me every day. But I don\u2019t complain; I\u2019m used to it, and I can smile. [DUNYASHA comes in and brings LOPAKHIN some kvass] I shall go. [Knocks over a chair] There.... [Triumphantly] There, you see, if I may use the word, what circumstances I am in, so to speak. It is even simply marvellous. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. I may confess to you, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, that Epikhodov has proposed to me.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Ah!\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. I don\u2019t know what to do about it. He\u2019s a nice young man, but every now and again, when he begins talking, you can\u2019t understand a word he\u2019s saying. I think I like him. He\u2019s madly in love with me. He\u2019s an unlucky man; every day something happens. We tease him about it. They call him \u201cTwo-and-twenty troubles.\u201d\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Listens] There they come, I think.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. They\u2019re coming! What\u2019s the matter with me? I\u2019m cold all over.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. There they are, right enough. Let\u2019s go and meet them. Will she know me? We haven\u2019t seen each other for five years.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. [Excited] I shall faint in a minute.... Oh, I\u2019m fainting!\r\n\r\n[Two carriages are heard driving up to the house. LOPAKHIN and DUNYASHA quickly go out. The stage is empty. A noise begins in the next room. FIERS, leaning on a stick, walks quickly across the stage; he has just been to meet LUBOV ANDREYEVNA. He wears an old-fashioned livery and a tall hat. He is saying something to himself, but not a word of it can be made out. The noise behind the stage gets louder and louder. A voice is heard: \u201cLet\u2019s go in there.\u201d Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, ANYA, and CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA with a little dog on a chain, and all dressed in travelling clothes, VARYA in a long coat and with a kerchief on her head. GAEV, SIMEONOV-PISCHIN, LOPAKHIN, DUNYASHA with a parcel and an umbrella, and a servant with luggage\u2014all cross the room.]\r\n\r\nANYA. Let\u2019s come through here. Do you remember what this room is, mother?\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Joyfully, through her tears] The nursery!\r\n\r\nVARYA. How cold it is! My hands are quite numb. [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] Your rooms, the white one and the violet one, are just as they used to be, mother.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. My dear nursery, oh, you beautiful room.... I used to sleep here when I was a baby. [Weeps] And here I am like a little girl again. [Kisses her brother, VARYA, then her brother again] And Varya is just as she used to be, just like a nun. And I knew Dunyasha. [Kisses her.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. The train was two hours late. There now; how\u2019s that for punctuality?\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. [To PISCHIN] My dog eats nuts too.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Astonished] To think of that, now!\r\n\r\n[All go out except ANYA and DUNYASHA.]\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. We did have to wait for you!\r\n\r\n[Takes off ANYA\u2019S cloak and hat.]\r\n\r\nANYA. I didn\u2019t get any sleep for four nights on the journey.... I\u2019m awfully cold.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. You went away during Lent, when it was snowing and frosty, but now? Darling! [Laughs and kisses her] We did have to wait for you, my joy, my pet.... I must tell you at once, I can\u2019t bear to wait a minute.\r\n\r\nANYA. [Tired] Something else now...?\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. The clerk, Epikhodov, proposed to me after Easter.\r\n\r\nANYA. Always the same.... [Puts her hair straight] I\u2019ve lost all my hairpins.... [She is very tired, and even staggers as she walks.]\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. I don\u2019t know what to think about it. He loves me, he loves me so much!\r\n\r\nANYA. [Looks into her room; in a gentle voice] My room, my windows, as if I\u2019d never gone away. I\u2019m at home! To-morrow morning I\u2019ll get up and have a run in the garden....Oh, if I could only get to sleep! I didn\u2019t sleep the whole journey, I was so bothered.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. Peter Sergeyevitch came two days ago.\r\n\r\nANYA. [Joyfully] Peter!\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. He sleeps in the bath-house, he lives there. He said he was afraid he\u2019d be in the way. [Looks at her pocket-watch] I ought to wake him, but Barbara Mihailovna told me not to. \u201cDon\u2019t wake him,\u201d she said.\r\n\r\n[Enter VARYA, a bunch of keys on her belt.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. Dunyasha, some coffee, quick. Mother wants some.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. This minute. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. Well, you\u2019ve come, glory be to God. Home again. [Caressing her] My darling is back again! My pretty one is back again!\r\n\r\nANYA. I did have an awful time, I tell you.\r\n\r\nVARYA. I can just imagine it!\r\n\r\nANYA. I went away in Holy Week; it was very cold then. Charlotta talked the whole way and would go on performing her tricks. Why did you tie Charlotta on to me?\r\n\r\nVARYA. You couldn\u2019t go alone, darling, at seventeen!\r\n\r\nANYA. We went to Paris; it\u2019s cold there and snowing. I talk French perfectly horribly. My mother lives on the fifth floor. I go to her, and find her there with various Frenchmen, women, an old abb\u00e9 with a book, and everything in tobacco smoke and with no comfort at all. I suddenly became very sorry for mother\u2014so sorry that I took her head in my arms and hugged her and wouldn\u2019t let her go. Then mother started hugging me and crying....\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Weeping] Don\u2019t say any more, don\u2019t say any more....\r\n\r\nANYA. She\u2019s already sold her villa near Mentone; she\u2019s nothing left, nothing. And I haven\u2019t a copeck left either; we only just managed to get here. And mother won\u2019t understand! We had dinner at a station; she asked for all the expensive things, and tipped the waiters one rouble each. And Charlotta too. Yasha wants his share too\u2014it\u2019s too bad. Mother\u2019s got a footman now, Yasha; we\u2019ve brought him here.\r\n\r\nVARYA. I saw the wretch.\r\n\r\nANYA. How\u2019s business? Has the interest been paid?\r\n\r\nVARYA. Not much chance of that.\r\n\r\nANYA. Oh God, oh God...\r\n\r\nVARYA. The place will be sold in August.\r\n\r\nANYA. O God....\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Looks in at the door and moos] Moo!... [Exit.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Through her tears] I\u2019d like to.... [Shakes her fist.]\r\n\r\nANYA. [Embraces VARYA, softly] Varya, has he proposed to you? [VARYA shakes head] But he loves you.... Why don\u2019t you make up your minds? Why do you keep on waiting?\r\n\r\nVARYA. I think that it will all come to nothing. He\u2019s a busy man. I\u2019m not his affair... he pays no attention to me. Bless the man, I don\u2019t want to see him.... But everybody talks about our marriage, everybody congratulates me, and there\u2019s nothing in it at all, it\u2019s all like a dream. [In another tone] You\u2019ve got a brooch like a bee.\r\n\r\nANYA. [Sadly] Mother bought it. [Goes into her room, and talks lightly, like a child] In Paris I went up in a balloon!\r\n\r\nVARYA. My darling\u2019s come back, my pretty one\u2019s come back! [DUNYASHA has already returned with the coffee-pot and is making the coffee, VARYA stands near the door] I go about all day, looking after the house, and I think all the time, if only you could marry a rich man, then I\u2019d be happy and would go away somewhere by myself, then to Kiev... to Moscow, and so on, from one holy place to another. I\u2019d tramp and tramp. That would be splendid!\r\n\r\nANYA. The birds are singing in the garden. What time is it now?\r\n\r\nVARYA. It must be getting on for three. Time you went to sleep, darling. [Goes into ANYA\u2019S room] Splendid!\r\n\r\n[Enter YASHA with a plaid shawl and a travelling bag.]\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Crossing the stage: Politely] May I go this way?\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. I hardly knew you, Yasha. You have changed abroad.\r\n\r\nYASHA. Hm... and who are you?\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. When you went away I was only so high. [Showing with her hand] I\u2019m Dunyasha, the daughter of Theodore Kozoyedov. You don\u2019t remember!\r\n\r\nYASHA. Oh, you little cucumber!\r\n\r\n[Looks round and embraces her. She screams and drops a saucer. YASHA goes out quickly.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. [In the doorway: In an angry voice] What\u2019s that?\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. [Through her tears] I\u2019ve broken a saucer.\r\n\r\nVARYA. It may bring luck.\r\n\r\nANYA. [Coming out of her room] We must tell mother that Peter\u2019s here.\r\n\r\nVARYA. I told them not to wake him.\r\n\r\nANYA. [Thoughtfully] Father died six years ago, and a month later my brother Grisha was drowned in the river\u2014such a dear little boy of seven! Mother couldn\u2019t bear it; she went away, away, without looking round.... [Shudders] How I understand her; if only she knew! [Pause] And Peter Trofimov was Grisha\u2019s tutor, he might tell her....\r\n\r\n[Enter FIERS in a short jacket and white waistcoat.]\r\n\r\nFIERS. [Goes to the coffee-pot, nervously] The mistress is going to have some food here.... [Puts on white gloves] Is the coffee ready? [To DUNYASHA, severely] You! Where\u2019s the cream?\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. Oh, dear me...! [Rapid exit.]\r\n\r\nFIERS. [Fussing round the coffee-pot] Oh, you bungler.... [Murmurs to himself] Back from Paris... the master went to Paris once... in a carriage.... [Laughs.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. What are you talking about, Fiers?\r\n\r\nFIERS. I beg your pardon? [Joyfully] The mistress is home again. I\u2019ve lived to see her! Don\u2019t care if I die now.... [Weeps with joy.]\r\n\r\n[Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, GAEV, LOPAKHIN, and SIMEONOV-PISCHIN, the latter in a long jacket of thin cloth and loose trousers. GAEV, coming in, moves his arms and body about as if he is playing billiards.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Let me remember now. Red into the corner! Twice into the centre!\r\n\r\nGAEV. Right into the pocket! Once upon a time you and I used both to sleep in this room, and now I\u2019m fifty-one; it does seem strange.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Yes, time does go.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Who does?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I said that time does go.\r\n\r\nGAEV. It smells of patchouli here.\r\n\r\nANYA. I\u2019m going to bed. Good-night, mother. [Kisses her.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. My lovely little one. [Kisses her hand] Glad to be at home? I can\u2019t get over it.\r\n\r\nANYA. Good-night, uncle.\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Kisses her face and hands] God be with you. How you do resemble your mother! [To his sister] You were just like her at her age, Luba.\r\n\r\n[ANYA gives her hand to LOPAKHIN and PISCHIN and goes out, shutting the door behind her.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. She\u2019s awfully tired.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. It\u2019s a very long journey.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [To LOPAKHIN and PISCHIN] Well, sirs, it\u2019s getting on for three, quite time you went.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Laughs] You\u2019re just the same as ever, Varya. [Draws her close and kisses her] I\u2019ll have some coffee now, then we\u2019ll all go. [FIERS lays a cushion under her feet] Thank you, dear. I\u2019m used to coffee. I drink it day and night. Thank you, dear old man. [Kisses FIERS.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. I\u2019ll go and see if they\u2019ve brought in all the luggage. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Is it really I who am sitting here? [Laughs] I want to jump about and wave my arms. [Covers her face with her hands] But suppose I\u2019m dreaming! God knows I love my own country, I love it deeply; I couldn\u2019t look out of the railway carriage, I cried so much. [Through her tears] Still, I must have my coffee. Thank you, Fiers. Thank you, dear old man. I\u2019m so glad you\u2019re still with us.\r\n\r\nFIERS. The day before yesterday.\r\n\r\nGAEV. He doesn\u2019t hear well.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I\u2019ve got to go off to Kharkov by the five o\u2019clock train. I\u2019m awfully sorry! I should like to have a look at you, to gossip a little. You\u2019re as fine-looking as ever.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Breathes heavily] Even finer-looking... dressed in Paris fashions... confound it all.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Your brother, Leonid Andreyevitch, says I\u2019m a snob, a usurer, but that is absolutely nothing to me. Let him talk. Only I do wish you would believe in me as you once did, that your wonderful, touching eyes would look at me as they did before. Merciful God! My father was the serf of your grandfather and your own father, but you\u2014you more than anybody else\u2014did so much for me once upon a time that I\u2019ve forgotten everything and love you as if you belonged to my family... and even more.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I can\u2019t sit still, I\u2019m not in a state to do it. [Jumps up and walks about in great excitement] I\u2019ll never survive this happiness.... You can laugh at me; I\u2019m a silly woman.... My dear little cupboard. [Kisses cupboard] My little table.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Nurse has died in your absence.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Sits and drinks coffee] Yes, bless her soul. I heard by letter.\r\n\r\nGAEV. And Anastasius has died too. Peter Kosoy has left me and now lives in town with the Commissioner of Police. [Takes a box of sugar-candy out of his pocket and sucks a piece.]\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. My daughter, Dashenka, sends her love.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I want to say something very pleasant, very delightful, to you. [Looks at his watch] I\u2019m going away at once, I haven\u2019t much time... but I\u2019ll tell you all about it in two or three words. As you already know, your cherry orchard is to be sold to pay your debts, and the sale is fixed for August 22; but you needn\u2019t be alarmed, dear madam, you may sleep in peace; there\u2019s a way out. Here\u2019s my plan. Please attend carefully! Your estate is only thirteen miles from the town, the railway runs by, and if the cherry orchard and the land by the river are broken up into building lots and are then leased off for villas you\u2019ll get at least twenty-five thousand roubles a year profit out of it.\r\n\r\nGAEV. How utterly absurd!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I don\u2019t understand you at all, Ermolai Alexeyevitch.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. You will get twenty-five roubles a year for each dessiatin from the leaseholders at the very least, and if you advertise now I\u2019m willing to bet that you won\u2019t have a vacant plot left by the autumn; they\u2019ll all go. In a word, you\u2019re saved. I congratulate you. Only, of course, you\u2019ll have to put things straight, and clean up.... For instance, you\u2019ll have to pull down all the old buildings, this house, which isn\u2019t any use to anybody now, and cut down the old cherry orchard....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Cut it down? My dear man, you must excuse me, but you don\u2019t understand anything at all. If there\u2019s anything interesting or remarkable in the whole province, it\u2019s this cherry orchard of ours.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. The only remarkable thing about the orchard is that it\u2019s very large. It only bears fruit every other year, and even then you don\u2019t know what to do with them; nobody buys any.\r\n\r\nGAEV. This orchard is mentioned in the \u201cEncyclopaedic Dictionary.\u201d\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Looks at his watch] If we can\u2019t think of anything and don\u2019t make up our minds to anything, then on August 22, both the cherry orchard and the whole estate will be up for auction. Make up your mind! I swear there\u2019s no other way out, I\u2019ll swear it again.\r\n\r\nFIERS. In the old days, forty or fifty years back, they dried the cherries, soaked them and pickled them, and made jam of them, and it used to happen that...\r\n\r\nGAEV. Be quiet, Fiers.\r\n\r\nFIERS. And then we\u2019d send the dried cherries off in carts to Moscow and Kharkov. And money! And the dried cherries were soft, juicy, sweet, and nicely scented.... They knew the way....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. What was the way?\r\n\r\nFIERS. They\u2019ve forgotten. Nobody remembers.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] What about Paris? Eh? Did you eat frogs?\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I ate crocodiles.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. To think of that, now.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Up to now in the villages there were only the gentry and the labourers, and now the people who live in villas have arrived. All towns now, even small ones, are surrounded by villas. And it\u2019s safe to say that in twenty years\u2019 time the villa resident will be all over the place. At present he sits on his balcony and drinks tea, but it may well come to pass that he\u2019ll begin to cultivate his patch of land, and then your cherry orchard will be happy, rich, splendid....\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Angry] What rot!\r\n\r\n[Enter VARYA and YASHA.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. There are two telegrams for you, little mother. [Picks out a key and noisily unlocks an antique cupboard] Here they are.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. They\u2019re from Paris.... [Tears them up without reading them] I\u2019ve done with Paris.\r\n\r\nGAEV. And do you know, Luba, how old this case is? A week ago I took out the bottom drawer; I looked and saw figures burnt out in it. That case was made exactly a hundred years ago. What do you think of that? What? We could celebrate its jubilee. It hasn\u2019t a soul of its own, but still, say what you will, it\u2019s a fine bookcase.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Astonished] A hundred years.... Think of that!\r\n\r\nGAEV. Yes... it\u2019s a real thing. [Handling it] My dear and honoured case! I congratulate you on your existence, which has already for more than a hundred years been directed towards the bright ideals of good and justice; your silent call to productive labour has not grown less in the hundred years [Weeping] during which you have upheld virtue and faith in a better future to the generations of our race, educating us up to ideals of goodness and to the knowledge of a common consciousness. [Pause.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Yes....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. You\u2019re just the same as ever, Leon.\r\n\r\nGAEV. [A little confused] Off the white on the right, into the corner pocket. Red ball goes into the middle pocket!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Looks at his watch] It\u2019s time I went.\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Giving LUBOV ANDREYEVNA her medicine] Will you take your pills now?\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. You oughtn\u2019t to take medicines, dear madam; they do you neither harm nor good.... Give them here, dear madam. [Takes the pills, turns them out into the palm of his hand, blows on them, puts them into his mouth, and drinks some kvass] There!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Frightened] You\u2019re off your head!\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. I\u2019ve taken all the pills.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Gormandizer! [All laugh.]\r\n\r\nFIERS. They were here in Easter week and ate half a pailful of cucumbers.... [Mumbles.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. What\u2019s he driving at?\r\n\r\nVARYA. He\u2019s been mumbling away for three years. We\u2019re used to that.\r\n\r\nYASHA. Senile decay.\r\n\r\n[CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA crosses the stage, dressed in white: she is very thin and tightly laced; has a lorgnette at her waist.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Excuse me, Charlotta Ivanovna, I haven\u2019t said \u201cHow do you do\u201d to you yet. [Tries to kiss her hand.]\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. [Takes her hand away] If you let people kiss your hand, then they\u2019ll want your elbow, then your shoulder, and then...\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. My luck\u2019s out to-day! [All laugh] Show us a trick, Charlotta Ivanovna!\r\n\r\nLUBOV ANDREYEVNA. Charlotta, do us a trick.\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. It\u2019s not necessary. I want to go to bed. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. We shall see each other in three weeks. [Kisses LUBOV ANDREYEVNA\u2019S hand] Now, good-bye. It\u2019s time to go. [To GAEV] See you again. [Kisses PISCHIN] Au revoir. [Gives his hand to VARYA, then to FIERS and to YASHA] I don\u2019t want to go away. [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA]. If you think about the villas and make up your mind, then just let me know, and I\u2019ll raise a loan of 50,000 roubles at once. Think about it seriously.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Angrily] Do go, now!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I\u2019m going, I\u2019m going.... [Exit.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. Snob. Still, I beg pardon.... Varya\u2019s going to marry him, he\u2019s Varya\u2019s young man.\r\n\r\nVARYA. Don\u2019t talk too much, uncle.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Why not, Varya? I should be very glad. He\u2019s a good man.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. To speak the honest truth... he\u2019s a worthy man.... And my Dashenka... also says that... she says lots of things. [Snores, but wakes up again at once] But still, dear madam, if you could lend me... 240 roubles... to pay the interest on my mortgage to-morrow...\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Frightened] We haven\u2019t got it, we haven\u2019t got it!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. It\u2019s quite true. I\u2019ve nothing at all.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. I\u2019ll find it all right [Laughs] I never lose hope. I used to think, \u201cEverything\u2019s lost now. I\u2019m a dead man,\u201d when, lo and behold, a railway was built over my land... and they paid me for it. And something else will happen to-day or to-morrow. Dashenka may win 20,000 roubles... she\u2019s got a lottery ticket.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. The coffee\u2019s all gone, we can go to bed.\r\n\r\nFIERS. [Brushing GAEV\u2019S trousers; in an insistent tone] You\u2019ve put on the wrong trousers again. What am I to do with you?\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Quietly] Anya\u2019s asleep. [Opens window quietly] The sun has risen already; it isn\u2019t cold. Look, little mother: what lovely trees! And the air! The starlings are singing!\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Opens the other window] The whole garden\u2019s white. You haven\u2019t forgotten, Luba? There\u2019s that long avenue going straight, straight, like a stretched strap; it shines on moonlight nights. Do you remember? You haven\u2019t forgotten?\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Looks out into the garden] Oh, my childhood, days of my innocence! In this nursery I used to sleep; I used to look out from here into the orchard. Happiness used to wake with me every morning, and then it was just as it is now; nothing has changed. [Laughs from joy] It\u2019s all, all white! Oh, my orchard! After the dark autumns and the cold winters, you\u2019re young again, full of happiness, the angels of heaven haven\u2019t left you.... If only I could take my heavy burden off my breast and shoulders, if I could forget my past!\r\n\r\nGAEV. Yes, and they\u2019ll sell this orchard to pay off debts. How strange it seems!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Look, there\u2019s my dead mother going in the orchard... dressed in white! [Laughs from joy] That\u2019s she.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Where?\r\n\r\nVARYA. God bless you, little mother.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. There\u2019s nobody there; I thought I saw somebody. On the right, at the turning by the summer-house, a white little tree bent down, looking just like a woman. [Enter TROFIMOV in a worn student uniform and spectacles] What a marvellous garden! White masses of flowers, the blue sky....\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Lubov Andreyevna! [She looks round at him] I only want to show myself, and I\u2019ll go away. [Kisses her hand warmly] I was told to wait till the morning, but I didn\u2019t have the patience.\r\n\r\n[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA looks surprised.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Crying] It\u2019s Peter Trofimov.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Peter Trofimov, once the tutor of your Grisha.... Have I changed so much?\r\n\r\n[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA embraces him and cries softly.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Confused] That\u2019s enough, that\u2019s enough, Luba.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Weeps] But I told you, Peter, to wait till to-morrow.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. My Grisha... my boy... Grisha... my son.\r\n\r\nVARYA. What are we to do, little mother? It\u2019s the will of God.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [Softly, through his tears] It\u2019s all right, it\u2019s all right.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Still weeping] My boy\u2019s dead; he was drowned. Why? Why, my friend? [Softly] Anya\u2019s asleep in there. I am speaking so loudly, making such a noise.... Well, Peter? What\u2019s made you look so bad? Why have you grown so old?\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. In the train an old woman called me a decayed gentleman.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. You were quite a boy then, a nice little student, and now your hair is not at all thick and you wear spectacles. Are you really still a student? [Goes to the door.]\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. I suppose I shall always be a student.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Kisses her brother, then VARYA] Well, let\u2019s go to bed.... And you\u2019ve grown older, Leonid.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Follows her] Yes, we\u2019ve got to go to bed.... Oh, my gout! I\u2019ll stay the night here. If only, Lubov Andreyevna, my dear, you could get me 240 roubles to-morrow morning\u2014\r\n\r\nGAEV. Still the same story.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. Two hundred and forty roubles... to pay the interest on the mortgage.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I haven\u2019t any money, dear man.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. I\u2019ll give it back... it\u2019s a small sum....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Well, then, Leonid will give it to you.... Let him have it, Leonid.\r\n\r\nGAEV. By all means; hold out your hand.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Why not? He wants it; he\u2019ll give it back.\r\n\r\n[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, TROFIMOV, PISCHIN, and FIERS go out. GAEV, VARYA, and YASHA remain.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. My sister hasn\u2019t lost the habit of throwing money about. [To YASHA] Stand off, do; you smell of poultry.\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Grins] You are just the same as ever, Leonid Andreyevitch.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Really? [To VARYA] What\u2019s he saying?\r\n\r\nVARYA. [To YASHA] Your mother\u2019s come from the village; she\u2019s been sitting in the servants\u2019 room since yesterday, and wants to see you....\r\n\r\nYASHA. Bless the woman!\r\n\r\nVARYA. Shameless man.\r\n\r\nYASHA. A lot of use there is in her coming. She might have come tomorrow just as well. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. Mother hasn\u2019t altered a scrap, she\u2019s just as she always was. She\u2019d give away everything, if the idea only entered her head.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Yes.... [Pause] If there\u2019s any illness for which people offer many remedies, you may be sure that particular illness is incurable, I think. I work my brains to their hardest. I\u2019ve several remedies, very many, and that really means I\u2019ve none at all. It would be nice to inherit a fortune from somebody, it would be nice to marry our Anya to a rich man, it would be nice to go to Yaroslav and try my luck with my aunt the Countess. My aunt is very, very rich.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Weeps] If only God helped us.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Don\u2019t cry. My aunt\u2019s very rich, but she doesn\u2019t like us. My sister, in the first place, married an advocate, not a noble.... [ANYA appears in the doorway] She not only married a man who was not a noble, but she behaved herself in a way which cannot be described as proper. She\u2019s nice and kind and charming, and I\u2019m very fond of her, but say what you will in her favour and you still have to admit that she\u2019s wicked; you can feel it in her slightest movements.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Whispers] Anya\u2019s in the doorway.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Really? [Pause] It\u2019s curious, something\u2019s got into my right eye... I can\u2019t see properly out of it. And on Thursday, when I was at the District Court...\r\n\r\n[Enter ANYA.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. Why aren\u2019t you in bed, Anya?\r\n\r\nANYA. Can\u2019t sleep. It\u2019s no good.\r\n\r\nGAEV. My darling! [Kisses ANYA\u2019S face and hands] My child.... [Crying] You\u2019re not my niece, you\u2019re my angel, you\u2019re my all.... Believe in me, believe...\r\n\r\nANYA. I do believe in you, uncle. Everybody loves you and respects you... but, uncle dear, you ought to say nothing, no more than that. What were you saying just now about my mother, your own sister? Why did you say those things?\r\n\r\nGAEV. Yes, yes. [Covers his face with her hand] Yes, really, it was awful. Save me, my God! And only just now I made a speech before a bookcase... it\u2019s so silly! And only when I\u2019d finished I knew how silly it was.\r\n\r\nVARYA. Yes, uncle dear, you really ought to say less. Keep quiet, that\u2019s all.\r\n\r\nANYA. You\u2019d be so much happier in yourself if you only kept quiet.\r\n\r\nGAEV. All right, I\u2019ll be quiet. [Kisses their hands] I\u2019ll be quiet. But let\u2019s talk business. On Thursday I was in the District Court, and a lot of us met there together, and we began to talk of this, that, and the other, and now I think I can arrange a loan to pay the interest into the bank.\r\n\r\nVARYA. If only God would help us!\r\n\r\nGAEV. I\u2019ll go on Tuesday. I\u2019ll talk with them about it again. [To VARYA] Don\u2019t howl. [To ANYA] Your mother will have a talk to Lopakhin; he, of course, won\u2019t refuse... And when you\u2019ve rested you\u2019ll go to Yaroslav to the Countess, your grandmother. So you see, we\u2019ll have three irons in the fire, and we\u2019ll be safe. We\u2019ll pay up the interest. I\u2019m certain. [Puts some sugar-candy into his mouth] I swear on my honour, on anything you will, that the estate will not be sold! [Excitedly] I swear on my happiness! Here\u2019s my hand. You may call me a dishonourable wretch if I let it go to auction! I swear by all I am!\r\n\r\nANYA. [She is calm again and happy] How good and clever you are, uncle. [Embraces him] I\u2019m happy now! I\u2019m happy! All\u2019s well!\r\n\r\n[Enter FIERS.]\r\n\r\nFIERS. [Reproachfully] Leonid Andreyevitch, don\u2019t you fear God? When are you going to bed?\r\n\r\nGAEV. Soon, soon. You go away, Fiers. I\u2019ll undress myself. Well, children, bye-bye...! I\u2019ll give you the details to-morrow, but let\u2019s go to bed now. [Kisses ANYA and VARYA] I\u2019m a man of the eighties.... People don\u2019t praise those years much, but I can still say that I\u2019ve suffered for my beliefs. The peasants don\u2019t love me for nothing, I assure you. We\u2019ve got to learn to know the peasants! We ought to learn how....\r\n\r\nANYA. You\u2019re doing it again, uncle!\r\n\r\nVARYA. Be quiet, uncle!\r\n\r\nFIERS. [Angrily] Leonid Andreyevitch!\r\n\r\nGAEV. I\u2019m coming, I\u2019m coming.... Go to bed now. Off two cushions into the middle! I turn over a new leaf.... [Exit. FIERS goes out after him.]\r\n\r\nANYA. I\u2019m quieter now. I don\u2019t want to go to Yaroslav, I don\u2019t like grandmother; but I\u2019m calm now; thanks to uncle. [Sits down.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. It\u2019s time to go to sleep. I\u2019ll go. There\u2019s been an unpleasantness here while you were away. In the old servants\u2019 part of the house, as you know, only the old people live\u2014little old Efim and Polya and Evstigney, and Karp as well. They started letting some tramps or other spend the night there\u2014I said nothing. Then I heard that they were saying that I had ordered them to be fed on peas and nothing else; from meanness, you see.... And it was all Evstigney\u2019s doing.... Very well, I thought, if that\u2019s what the matter is, just you wait. So I call Evstigney.... [Yawns] He comes. \u201cWhat\u2019s this,\u201d I say, \u201cEvstigney, you old fool.\u201d... [Looks at ANYA] Anya dear! [Pause] She\u2019s dropped off.... [Takes ANYA\u2019S arm] Let\u2019s go to bye-bye.... Come along!... [Leads her] My darling\u2019s gone to sleep! Come on.... [They go. In the distance, the other side of the orchard, a shepherd plays his pipe. TROFIMOV crosses the stage and stops on seeing VARYA and ANYA] Sh! She\u2019s asleep, asleep. Come on, dear.\r\n\r\nANYA. [Quietly, half-asleep] I\u2019m so tired... all the bells... uncle, dear! Mother and uncle!\r\n\r\nVARYA. Come on, dear, come on! [They go into ANYA\u2019S room.]\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [Moved] My sun! My spring!\r\n\r\nCurtain.\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\n
\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n
ACT TWO<\/h2>\r\n[In a field. An old, crooked shrine, which has been long abandoned; near it a well and large stones, which apparently are old tombstones, and an old garden seat. The road is seen to GAEV\u2019S estate. On one side rise dark poplars, behind them begins the cherry orchard. In the distance is a row of telegraph poles, and far, far away on the horizon are the indistinct signs of a large town, which can only be seen on the finest and clearest days. It is close on sunset. CHARLOTTA, YASHA, and DUNYASHA are sitting on the seat; EPIKHODOV stands by and plays on a guitar; all seem thoughtful. CHARLOTTA wears a man\u2019s old peaked cap; she has unslung a rifle from her shoulders and is putting to rights the buckle on the strap.]\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. [Thoughtfully] I haven\u2019t a real passport. I don\u2019t know how old I am, and I think I\u2019m young. When I was a little girl my father and mother used to go round fairs and give very good performances and I used to do the salto mortale<\/i> and various little things. And when papa and mamma died a German lady took me to her and began to teach me. I liked it. I grew up and became a governess. And where I came from and who I am, I don\u2019t know.... Who my parents were\u2014perhaps they weren\u2019t married\u2014I don\u2019t know. [Takes a cucumber out of her pocket and eats] I don\u2019t know anything. [Pause] I do want to talk, but I haven\u2019t anybody to talk to... I haven\u2019t anybody at all.\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. [Plays on the guitar and sings]\r\n
   \u201cWhat is this noisy earth to me,\r\n   What matter friends and foes?\u201d\r\n    I do like playing on the mandoline!\r\n<\/pre>\r\nDUNYASHA. That\u2019s a guitar, not a mandoline. [Looks at herself in a little mirror and powders herself.]\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. For the enamoured madman, this is a mandoline. [Sings]\r\n
   \u201cOh that the heart was warmed,\r\n   By all the flames of love returned!\u201d\r\n<\/pre>\r\n[YASHA sings too.]\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. These people sing terribly.... Foo! Like jackals.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. [To YASHA] Still, it must be nice to live abroad.\r\n\r\nYASHA. Yes, certainly. I cannot differ from you there. [Yawns and lights a cigar.]\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. That is perfectly natural. Abroad everything is in full complexity.\r\n\r\nYASHA. That goes without saying.\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. I\u2019m an educated man, I read various remarkable books, but I cannot understand the direction I myself want to go\u2014whether to live or to shoot myself, as it were. So, in case, I always carry a revolver about with me. Here it is. [Shows a revolver.]\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. I\u2019ve done. Now I\u2019ll go. [Slings the rifle] You, Epikhodov, are a very clever man and very terrible; women must be madly in love with you. Brrr! [Going] These wise ones are all so stupid. I\u2019ve nobody to talk to. I\u2019m always alone, alone; I\u2019ve nobody at all... and I don\u2019t know who I am or why I live. [Exit slowly.]\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. As a matter of fact, independently of everything else, I must express my feeling, among other things, that fate has been as pitiless in her dealings with me as a storm is to a small ship. Suppose, let us grant, I am wrong; then why did I wake up this morning, to give an example, and behold an enormous spider on my chest, like that. [Shows with both hands] And if I do drink some kvass, why is it that there is bound to be something of the most indelicate nature in it, such as a beetle? [Pause] Have you read Buckle? [Pause] I should like to trouble you, Avdotya Fedorovna, for two words.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. Say on.\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. I should prefer to be alone with you. [Sighs.]\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. [Shy] Very well, only first bring me my little cloak.... It\u2019s by the cupboard. It\u2019s a little damp here.\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. Very well... I\u2019ll bring it.... Now I know what to do with my revolver. [Takes guitar and exits, strumming.]\r\n\r\nYASHA. Two-and-twenty troubles! A silly man, between you and me and the gatepost. [Yawns.]\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. I hope to goodness he won\u2019t shoot himself. [Pause] I\u2019m so nervous, I\u2019m worried. I went into service when I was quite a little girl, and now I\u2019m not used to common life, and my hands are white, white as a lady\u2019s. I\u2019m so tender and so delicate now; respectable and afraid of everything.... I\u2019m so frightened. And I don\u2019t know what will happen to my nerves if you deceive me, Yasha.\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Kisses her] Little cucumber! Of course, every girl must respect herself; there\u2019s nothing I dislike more than a badly behaved girl.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. I\u2019m awfully in love with you; you\u2019re educated, you can talk about everything. [Pause.]\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Yawns] Yes. I think this: if a girl loves anybody, then that means she\u2019s immoral. [Pause] It\u2019s nice to smoke a cigar out in the open air.... [Listens] Somebody\u2019s coming. It\u2019s the mistress, and people with her. [DUNYASHA embraces him suddenly] Go to the house, as if you\u2019d been bathing in the river; go by this path, or they\u2019ll meet you and will think I\u2019ve been meeting you. I can\u2019t stand that sort of thing.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. [Coughs quietly] My head\u2019s aching because of your cigar.\r\n\r\n[Exit. YASHA remains, sitting by the shrine. Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, GAEV, and LOPAKHIN.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. You must make up your mind definitely\u2014there\u2019s no time to waste. The question is perfectly plain. Are you willing to let the land for villas or no? Just one word, yes or no? Just one word!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Who\u2019s smoking horrible cigars here? [Sits.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. They built that railway; that\u2019s made this place very handy. [Sits] Went to town and had lunch... red in the middle! I\u2019d like to go in now and have just one game.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. You\u2019ll have time.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Just one word! [Imploringly] Give me an answer!\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Yawns] Really!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Looks in her purse] I had a lot of money yesterday, but there\u2019s very little to-day. My poor Varya feeds everybody on milk soup to save money, in the kitchen the old people only get peas, and I spend recklessly. [Drops the purse, scattering gold coins] There, they are all over the place.\r\n\r\nYASHA. Permit me to pick them up. [Collects the coins.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Please do, Yasha. And why did I go and have lunch there?... A horrid restaurant with band and tablecloths smelling of soap.... Why do you drink so much, Leon? Why do you eat so much? Why do you talk so much? You talked again too much to-day in the restaurant, and it wasn\u2019t at all to the point\u2014about the seventies and about decadents. And to whom? Talking to the waiters about decadents!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Yes.\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Waves his hand] I can\u2019t be cured, that\u2019s obvious.... [Irritably to YASHA] What\u2019s the matter? Why do you keep twisting about in front of me?\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Laughs] I can\u2019t listen to your voice without laughing.\r\n\r\nGAEV. [To his sister] Either he or I...\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Go away, Yasha; get out of this....\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Gives purse to LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] I\u2019ll go at once. [Hardly able to keep from laughing] This minute.... [Exit.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. That rich man Deriganov is preparing to buy your estate. They say he\u2019ll come to the sale himself.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Where did you hear that?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. They say so in town.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Our Yaroslav aunt has promised to send something, but I don\u2019t know when or how much.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. How much will she send? A hundred thousand roubles? Or two, perhaps?\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I\u2019d be glad of ten or fifteen thousand.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. You must excuse my saying so, but I\u2019ve never met such frivolous people as you before, or anybody so unbusinesslike and peculiar. Here I am telling you in plain language that your estate will be sold, and you don\u2019t seem to understand.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. What are we to do? Tell us, what?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I tell you every day. I say the same thing every day. Both the cherry orchard and the land must be leased off for villas and at once, immediately\u2014the auction is staring you in the face: Understand! Once you do definitely make up your minds to the villas, then you\u2019ll have as much money as you want and you\u2019ll be saved.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Villas and villa residents\u2014it\u2019s so vulgar, excuse me.\r\n\r\nGAEV. I entirely agree with you.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I must cry or yell or faint. I can\u2019t stand it! You\u2019re too much for me! [To GAEV] You old woman!\r\n\r\nGAEV. Really!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Old woman! [Going out.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Frightened] No, don\u2019t go away, do stop; be a dear. Please. Perhaps we\u2019ll find some way out!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. What\u2019s the good of trying to think!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Please don\u2019t go away. It\u2019s nicer when you\u2019re here.... [Pause] I keep on waiting for something to happen, as if the house is going to collapse over our heads.\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Thinking deeply] Double in the corner... across the middle....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. We have been too sinful....\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. What sins have you committed?\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Puts candy into his mouth] They say that I\u2019ve eaten all my substance in sugar-candies. [Laughs.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Oh, my sins.... I\u2019ve always scattered money about without holding myself in, like a madwoman, and I married a man who made nothing but debts. My husband died of champagne\u2014he drank terribly\u2014and to my misfortune, I fell in love with another man and went off with him, and just at that time\u2014it was my first punishment, a blow that hit me right on the head\u2014here, in the river... my boy was drowned, and I went away, quite away, never to return, never to see this river again...I shut my eyes and ran without thinking, but he<\/i> ran after me... without pity, without respect. I bought a villa near Mentone because he<\/i> fell ill there, and for three years I knew no rest either by day or night; the sick man wore me out, and my soul dried up. And last year, when they had sold the villa to pay my debts, I went away to Paris, and there he robbed me of all I had and threw me over and went off with another woman. I tried to poison myself.... It was so silly, so shameful.... And suddenly I longed to be back in Russia, my own land, with my little girl.... [Wipes her tears] Lord, Lord be merciful to me, forgive me my sins! Punish me no more! [Takes a telegram out of her pocket] I had this to-day from Paris.... He begs my forgiveness, he implores me to return.... [Tears it up] Don\u2019t I hear music? [Listens.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. That is our celebrated Jewish band. You remember\u2014four violins, a flute, and a double-bass.\r\n\r\nLUBOV So it still exists? It would be nice if they came along some evening.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Listens] I can\u2019t hear.... [Sings quietly] \u201cFor money will the Germans make a Frenchman of a Russian.\u201d [Laughs] I saw such an awfully funny thing at the theatre last night.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I\u2019m quite sure there wasn\u2019t anything at all funny. You oughtn\u2019t to go and see plays, you ought to go and look at yourself. What a grey life you lead, what a lot you talk unnecessarily.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. It\u2019s true. To speak the straight truth, we live a silly life. [Pause] My father was a peasant, an idiot, he understood nothing, he didn\u2019t teach me, he was always drunk, and always used a stick on me. In point of fact, I\u2019m a fool and an idiot too. I\u2019ve never learned anything, my handwriting is bad, I write so that I\u2019m quite ashamed before people, like a pig!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. You ought to get married, my friend.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Yes... that\u2019s true.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Why not to our Varya? She\u2019s a nice girl.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Yes.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. She\u2019s quite homely in her ways, works all day, and, what matters most, she\u2019s in love with you. And you\u2019ve liked her for a long time.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Well? I don\u2019t mind... she\u2019s a nice girl. [Pause.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. I\u2019m offered a place in a bank. Six thousand roubles a year.... Did you hear?\r\n\r\nLUBOV. What\u2019s the matter with you! Stay where you are....\r\n\r\n[Enter FIERS with an overcoat.]\r\n\r\nFIERS. [To GAEV] Please, sir, put this on, it\u2019s damp.\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Putting it on] You\u2019re a nuisance, old man.\r\n\r\nFIERS It\u2019s all very well.... You went away this morning without telling me. [Examining GAEV.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. How old you\u2019ve grown, Fiers!\r\n\r\nFIERS. I beg your pardon?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. She says you\u2019ve grown very old!\r\n\r\nFIERS. I\u2019ve been alive a long time. They were already getting ready to marry me before your father was born.... [Laughs] And when the Emancipation came I was already first valet. Only I didn\u2019t agree with the Emancipation and remained with my people.... [Pause] I remember everybody was happy, but they didn\u2019t know why.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. It was very good for them in the old days. At any rate, they used to beat them.\r\n\r\nFIERS. [Not hearing] Rather. The peasants kept their distance from the masters and the masters kept their distance from the peasants, but now everything\u2019s all anyhow and you can\u2019t understand anything.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Be quiet, Fiers. I\u2019ve got to go to town tomorrow. I\u2019ve been promised an introduction to a General who may lend me money on a bill.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Nothing will come of it. And you won\u2019t pay your interest, don\u2019t you worry.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. He\u2019s talking rubbish. There\u2019s no General at all.\r\n\r\n[Enter TROFIMOV, ANYA, and VARYA.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. Here they are.\r\n\r\nANYA. Mother\u2019s sitting down here.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Tenderly] Come, come, my dears.... [Embracing ANYA and VARYA] If you two only knew how much I love you. Sit down next to me, like that. [All sit down.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Our eternal student is always with the ladies.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. That\u2019s not your business.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. He\u2019ll soon be fifty, and he\u2019s still a student.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Leave off your silly jokes!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Getting angry, eh, silly?\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Shut up, can\u2019t you.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Laughs] I wonder what you think of me?\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. I think, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, that you\u2019re a rich man, and you\u2019ll soon be a millionaire. Just as the wild beast which eats everything it finds is needed for changes to take place in matter, so you are needed too.\r\n\r\n[All laugh.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. Better tell us something about the planets, Peter.\r\n\r\nLUBOV ANDREYEVNA. No, let\u2019s go on with yesterday\u2019s talk!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. About what?\r\n\r\nGAEV. About the proud man.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Yesterday we talked for a long time but we didn\u2019t come to anything in the end. There\u2019s something mystical about the proud man, in your sense. Perhaps you are right from your point of view, but if you take the matter simply, without complicating it, then what pride can there be, what sense can there be in it, if a man is imperfectly made, physiologically speaking, if in the vast majority of cases he is coarse and stupid and deeply unhappy? We must stop admiring one another. We must work, nothing more.\r\n\r\nGAEV. You\u2019ll die, all the same.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Who knows? And what does it mean\u2014you\u2019ll die? Perhaps a man has a hundred senses, and when he dies only the five known to us are destroyed and the remaining ninety-five are left alive.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. How clever of you, Peter!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Ironically] Oh, awfully!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. The human race progresses, perfecting its powers. Everything that is unattainable now will some day be near at hand and comprehensible, but we must work, we must help with all our strength those who seek to know what fate will bring. Meanwhile in Russia only a very few of us work. The vast majority of those intellectuals whom I know seek for nothing, do nothing, and are at present incapable of hard work. They call themselves intellectuals, but they use \u201cthou\u201d and \u201cthee\u201d to their servants, they treat the peasants like animals, they learn badly, they read nothing seriously, they do absolutely nothing, about science they only talk, about art they understand little. They are all serious, they all have severe faces, they all talk about important things. They philosophize, and at the same time, the vast majority of us, ninety-nine out of a hundred, live like savages, fighting and cursing at the slightest opportunity, eating filthily, sleeping in the dirt, in stuffiness, with fleas, stinks, smells, moral filth, and so on... And it\u2019s obvious that all our nice talk is only carried on to distract ourselves and others. Tell me, where are those cr\u00e9ches we hear so much of? and where are those reading-rooms? People only write novels about them; they don\u2019t really exist. Only dirt, vulgarity, and Asiatic plagues really exist.... I\u2019m afraid, and I don\u2019t at all like serious faces; I don\u2019t like serious conversations. Let\u2019s be quiet sooner.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. You know, I get up at five every morning, I work from morning till evening, I am always dealing with money\u2014my own and other people\u2019s\u2014and I see what people are like. You\u2019ve only got to begin to do anything to find out how few honest, honourable people there are. Sometimes, when I can\u2019t sleep, I think: \u201cOh Lord, you\u2019ve given us huge forests, infinite fields, and endless horizons, and we, living here, ought really to be giants.\u201d\r\n\r\nLUBOV. You want giants, do you?... They\u2019re only good in stories, and even there they frighten one. [EPIKHODOV enters at the back of the stage playing his guitar. Thoughtfully:] Epikhodov\u2019s there.\r\n\r\nANYA. [Thoughtfully] Epikhodov\u2019s there.\r\n\r\nGAEV. The sun\u2019s set, ladies and gentlemen.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Yes.\r\n\r\nGAEV [Not loudly, as if declaiming] O Nature, thou art wonderful, thou shinest with eternal radiance! Oh, beautiful and indifferent one, thou whom we call mother, thou containest in thyself existence and death, thou livest and destroyest....\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Entreatingly] Uncle, dear!\r\n\r\nANYA. Uncle, you\u2019re doing it again!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. You\u2019d better double the red into the middle.\r\n\r\nGAEV. I\u2019ll be quiet, I\u2019ll be quiet.\r\n\r\n[They all sit thoughtfully. It is quiet. Only the mumbling of FIERS is heard. Suddenly a distant sound is heard as if from the sky, the sound of a breaking string, which dies away sadly.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. What\u2019s that?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I don\u2019t know. It may be a bucket fallen down a well somewhere. But it\u2019s some way off.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Or perhaps it\u2019s some bird... like a heron.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Or an owl.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Shudders] It\u2019s unpleasant, somehow. [A pause.]\r\n\r\nFIERS. Before the misfortune the same thing happened. An owl screamed and the samovar hummed without stopping.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Before what misfortune?\r\n\r\nFIERS. Before the Emancipation. [A pause.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. You know, my friends, let\u2019s go in; it\u2019s evening now. [To ANYA] You\u2019ve tears in your eyes.... What is it, little girl? [Embraces her.]\r\n\r\nANYA. It\u2019s nothing, mother.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Some one\u2019s coming.\r\n\r\n[Enter a TRAMP in an old white peaked cap and overcoat. He is a little drunk.]\r\n\r\nTRAMP. Excuse me, may I go this way straight through to the station?\r\n\r\nGAEV. You may. Go along this path.\r\n\r\nTRAMP. I thank you from the bottom of my heart. [Hiccups] Lovely weather.... [Declaims] My brother, my suffering brother.... Come out on the Volga, you whose groans... [To VARYA] Mademoiselle, please give a hungry Russian thirty copecks....\r\n\r\n[VARYA screams, frightened.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Angrily] There\u2019s manners everybody\u2019s got to keep!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [With a start] Take this... here you are.... [Feels in her purse] There\u2019s no silver.... It doesn\u2019t matter, here\u2019s gold.\r\n\r\nTRAMP. I am deeply grateful to you! [Exit. Laughter.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Frightened] I\u2019m going, I\u2019m going.... Oh, little mother, at home there\u2019s nothing for the servants to eat, and you gave him gold.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. What is to be done with such a fool as I am! At home I\u2019ll give you everything I\u2019ve got. Ermolai Alexeyevitch, lend me some more!...\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Very well.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Let\u2019s go, it\u2019s time. And Varya, we\u2019ve settled your affair; I congratulate you.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Crying] You shouldn\u2019t joke about this, mother.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Oh, feel me, get thee to a nunnery.\r\n\r\nGAEV. My hands are all trembling; I haven\u2019t played billiards for a long time.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Oh, feel me, nymph, remember me in thine orisons.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Come along; it\u2019ll soon be supper-time.\r\n\r\nVARYA. He did frighten me. My heart is beating hard.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Let me remind you, ladies and gentlemen, on August 22 the cherry orchard will be sold. Think of that!... Think of that!...\r\n\r\n[All go out except TROFIMOV and ANYA.]\r\n\r\nANYA. [Laughs] Thanks to the tramp who frightened Barbara, we\u2019re alone now.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Varya\u2019s afraid we may fall in love with each other and won\u2019t get away from us for days on end. Her narrow mind won\u2019t allow her to understand that we are above love. To escape all the petty and deceptive things which prevent our being happy and free, that is the aim and meaning of our lives. Forward! We go irresistibly on to that bright star which burns there, in the distance! Don\u2019t lag behind, friends!\r\n\r\nANYA. [Clapping her hands] How beautifully you talk! [Pause] It is glorious here to-day!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Yes, the weather is wonderful.\r\n\r\nANYA. What have you done to me, Peter? I don\u2019t love the cherry orchard as I used to. I loved it so tenderly, I thought there was no better place in the world than our orchard.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. All Russia is our orchard. The land is great and beautiful, there are many marvellous places in it. [Pause] Think, Anya, your grandfather, your great-grandfather, and all your ancestors were serf-owners, they owned living souls; and now, doesn\u2019t something human look at you from every cherry in the orchard, every leaf and every stalk? Don\u2019t you hear voices...? Oh, it\u2019s awful, your orchard is terrible; and when in the evening or at night you walk through the orchard, then the old bark on the trees sheds a dim light and the old cherry-trees seem to be dreaming of all that was a hundred, two hundred years ago, and are oppressed by their heavy visions. Still, at any rate, we\u2019ve left those two hundred years behind us. So far we\u2019ve gained nothing at all\u2014we don\u2019t yet know what the past is to be to us\u2014we only philosophize, we complain that we are dull, or we drink vodka. For it\u2019s so clear that in order to begin to live in the present we must first redeem the past, and that can only be done by suffering, by strenuous, uninterrupted labour. Understand that, Anya.\r\n\r\nANYA. The house in which we live has long ceased to be our house; I shall go away. I give you my word.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. If you have the housekeeping keys, throw them down the well and go away. Be as free as the wind.\r\n\r\nANYA. [Enthusiastically] How nicely you said that!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Believe me, Anya, believe me! I\u2019m not thirty yet, I\u2019m young, I\u2019m still a student, but I have undergone a great deal! I\u2019m as hungry as the winter, I\u2019m ill, I\u2019m shaken. I\u2019m as poor as a beggar, and where haven\u2019t I been\u2014fate has tossed me everywhere! But my soul is always my own; every minute of the day and the night it is filled with unspeakable presentiments. I know that happiness is coming, Anya, I see it already....\r\n\r\nANYA. [Thoughtful] The moon is rising.\r\n\r\n[EPIKHODOV is heard playing the same sad song on his guitar. The moon rises. Somewhere by the poplars VARYA is looking for ANYA and calling, \u201cAnya, where are you?\u201d]\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Yes, the moon has risen. [Pause] There is happiness, there it comes; it comes nearer and nearer; I hear its steps already. And if we do not see it we shall not know it, but what does that matter? Others will see it!\r\n\r\nTHE VOICE OF VARYA. Anya! Where are you?\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. That\u2019s Varya again! [Angry] Disgraceful!\r\n\r\nANYA. Never mind. Let\u2019s go to the river. It\u2019s nice there.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV Let\u2019s go. [They go out.]\r\n\r\nTHE VOICE OF VARYA. Anya! Anya!\r\n\r\nCurtain.\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\n
\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n
ACT THREE<\/h2>\r\n[A reception-room cut off from a drawing-room by an arch. Chandelier lighted. A Jewish band, the one mentioned in Act II, is heard playing in another room. Evening. In the drawing-room the grand rond is being danced. Voice of SIMEONOV PISCHIN \u201cPromenade a une paire!\u201d Dancers come into the reception-room; the first pair are PISCHIN and CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA; the second, TROFIMOV and LUBOV ANDREYEVNA; the third, ANYA and the POST OFFICE CLERK; the fourth, VARYA and the STATION-MASTER, and so on. VARYA is crying gently and wipes away her tears as she dances. DUNYASHA is in the last pair. They go off into the drawing-room, PISCHIN shouting, \u201cGrand rond, balancez:\u201d and \u201cLes cavaliers \u00e0 genou et remerciez vos dames!\u201d FIERS, in a dress-coat, carries a tray with seltzer-water across. Enter PISCHIN and TROFIMOV from the drawing-room.]\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. I\u2019m full-blooded and have already had two strokes; it\u2019s hard for me to dance, but, as they say, if you\u2019re in Rome, you must do as Rome does. I\u2019ve got the strength of a horse. My dead father, who liked a joke, peace to his bones, used to say, talking of our ancestors, that the ancient stock of the Simeonov-Pischins was descended from that identical horse that Caligula made a senator.... [Sits] But the trouble is, I\u2019ve no money! A hungry dog only believes in meat. [Snores and wakes up again immediately] So I... only believe in money....\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Yes. There is something equine about your figure.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. Well... a horse is a fine animal... you can sell a horse.\r\n\r\n[Billiard playing can be heard in the next room. VARYA appears under the arch.]\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [Teasing] Madame Lopakhin! Madame Lopakhin!\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Angry] Decayed gentleman!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Yes, I am a decayed gentleman, and I\u2019m proud of it!\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Bitterly] We\u2019ve hired the musicians, but how are they to be paid? [Exit.]\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [To PISCHIN] If the energy which you, in the course of your life, have spent in looking for money to pay interest had been used for something else, then, I believe, after all, you\u2019d be able to turn everything upside down.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. Nietzsche... a philosopher... a very great, a most celebrated man... a man of enormous brain, says in his books that you can forge bank-notes.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. And have you read Nietzsche?\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. Well... Dashenka told me. Now I\u2019m in such a position, I wouldn\u2019t mind forging them... I\u2019ve got to pay 310 roubles the day after to-morrow... I\u2019ve got 130 already.... [Feels his pockets, nervously] I\u2019ve lost the money! The money\u2019s gone! [Crying] Where\u2019s the money? [Joyfully] Here it is behind the lining... I even began to perspire.\r\n\r\n[Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA and CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Humming a Caucasian dance] Why is Leonid away so long? What\u2019s he doing in town? [To DUNYASHA] Dunyasha, give the musicians some tea.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Business is off, I suppose.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. And the musicians needn\u2019t have come, and we needn\u2019t have got up this ball.... Well, never mind.... [Sits and sings softly.]\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. [Gives a pack of cards to PISCHIN] Here\u2019s a pack of cards, think of any one card you like.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. I\u2019ve thought of one.\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. Now shuffle. All right, now. Give them here, oh my dear Mr. Pischin. Ein, zwei, drei<\/i>! Now look and you\u2019ll find it in your coat-tail pocket.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Takes a card out of his coat-tail pocket] Eight of spades, quite right! [Surprised] Think of that now!\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. [Holds the pack of cards on the palm of her hand. To TROFIMOV] Now tell me quickly. What\u2019s the top card?\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Well, the queen of spades.\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. Right! [To PISCHIN] Well now? What card\u2019s on top?\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. Ace of hearts.\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. Right! [Claps her hands, the pack of cards vanishes] How lovely the weather is to-day. [A mysterious woman\u2019s voice answers her, as if from under the floor, \u201cOh yes, it\u2019s lovely weather, madam.\u201d] You are so beautiful, you are my ideal. [Voice, \u201cYou, madam, please me very much too.\u201d]\r\n\r\nSTATION-MASTER. [Applauds] Madame ventriloquist, bravo!\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Surprised] Think of that, now! Delightful, Charlotte Ivanovna... I\u2019m simply in love....\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. In love? [Shrugging her shoulders] Can you love? Guter Mensch aber schlechter Musikant<\/i>.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [Slaps PISCHIN on the shoulder] Oh, you horse!\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. Attention please, here\u2019s another trick. [Takes a shawl from a chair] Here\u2019s a very nice plaid shawl, I\u2019m going to sell it.... [Shakes it] Won\u2019t anybody buy it?\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Astonished] Think of that now!\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. Ein, zwei, drei<\/i>.\r\n\r\n[She quickly lifts up the shawl, which is hanging down. ANYA is standing behind it; she bows and runs to her mother, hugs her and runs back to the drawing-room amid general applause.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Applauds] Bravo, bravo!\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. Once again! Ein, zwei, drei<\/i>!\r\n\r\n[Lifts the shawl. VARYA stands behind it and bows.]\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Astonished] Think of that, now.\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. The end!\r\n\r\n[Throws the shawl at PISCHIN, curtseys and runs into the drawing-room.]\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Runs after her] Little wretch.... What? Would you? [Exit.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Leonid hasn\u2019t come yet. I don\u2019t understand what he\u2019s doing so long in town! Everything must be over by now. The estate must be sold; or, if the sale never came off, then why does he stay so long?\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Tries to soothe her] Uncle has bought it. I\u2019m certain of it.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [Sarcastically] Oh, yes!\r\n\r\nVARYA. Grandmother sent him her authority for him to buy it in her name and transfer the debt to her. She\u2019s doing it for Anya. And I\u2019m certain that God will help us and uncle will buy it.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Grandmother sent fifteen thousand roubles from Yaroslav to buy the property in her name\u2014she won\u2019t trust us\u2014and that wasn\u2019t even enough to pay the interest. [Covers her face with her hands] My fate will be settled to-day, my fate....\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [Teasing VARYA] Madame Lopakhin!\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Angry] Eternal student! He\u2019s already been expelled twice from the university.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Why are you getting angry, Varya? He\u2019s teasing you about Lopakhin, well what of it? You can marry Lopakhin if you want to, he\u2019s a good, interesting man.... You needn\u2019t if you don\u2019t want to; nobody wants to force you against your will, my darling.\r\n\r\nVARYA. I do look at the matter seriously, little mother, to be quite frank. He\u2019s a good man, and I like him.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Then marry him. I don\u2019t understand what you\u2019re waiting for.\r\n\r\nVARYA. I can\u2019t propose to him myself, little mother. People have been talking about him to me for two years now, but he either says nothing, or jokes about it. I understand. He\u2019s getting rich, he\u2019s busy, he can\u2019t bother about me. If I had some money, even a little, even only a hundred roubles, I\u2019d throw up everything and go away. I\u2019d go into a convent.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. How nice!\r\n\r\nVARYA. [To TROFIMOV] A student ought to have sense! [Gently, in tears] How ugly you are now, Peter, how old you\u2019ve grown! [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, no longer crying] But I can\u2019t go on without working, little mother. I want to be doing something every minute.\r\n\r\n[Enter YASHA.]\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Nearly laughing] Epikhodov\u2019s broken a billiard cue! [Exit.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. Why is Epikhodov here? Who said he could play billiards? I don\u2019t understand these people. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Don\u2019t tease her, Peter, you see that she\u2019s quite unhappy without that.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. She takes too much on herself, she keeps on interfering in other people\u2019s business. The whole summer she\u2019s given no peace to me or to Anya, she\u2019s afraid we\u2019ll have a romance all to ourselves. What has it to do with her? As if I\u2019d ever given her grounds to believe I\u2019d stoop to such vulgarity! We are above love.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Then I suppose I must be beneath love. [In agitation] Why isn\u2019t Leonid here? If I only knew whether the estate is sold or not! The disaster seems to me so improbable that I don\u2019t know what to think, I\u2019m all at sea... I may scream... or do something silly. Save me, Peter. Say something, say something.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Isn\u2019t it all the same whether the estate is sold to-day or isn\u2019t? It\u2019s been all up with it for a long time; there\u2019s no turning back, the path\u2019s grown over. Be calm, dear, you shouldn\u2019t deceive yourself, for once in your life at any rate you must look the truth straight in the face.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. What truth? You see where truth is, and where untruth is, but I seem to have lost my sight and see nothing. You boldly settle all important questions, but tell me, dear, isn\u2019t it because you\u2019re young, because you haven\u2019t had time to suffer till you settled a single one of your questions? You boldly look forward, isn\u2019t it because you cannot foresee or expect anything terrible, because so far life has been hidden from your young eyes? You are bolder, more honest, deeper than we are, but think only, be just a little magnanimous, and have mercy on me. I was born here, my father and mother lived here, my grandfather too, I love this house. I couldn\u2019t understand my life without that cherry orchard, and if it really must be sold, sell me with it! [Embraces TROFIMOV, kisses his forehead]. My son was drowned here.... [Weeps] Have pity on me, good, kind man.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. You know I sympathize with all my soul.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Yes, but it ought to be said differently, differently.... [Takes another handkerchief, a telegram falls on the floor] I\u2019m so sick at heart to-day, you can\u2019t imagine. Here it\u2019s so noisy, my soul shakes at every sound. I shake all over, and I can\u2019t go away by myself, I\u2019m afraid of the silence. Don\u2019t judge me harshly, Peter... I loved you, as if you belonged to my family. I\u2019d gladly let Anya marry you, I swear it, only dear, you ought to work, finish your studies. You don\u2019t do anything, only fate throws you about from place to place, it\u2019s so odd.... Isn\u2019t it true? Yes? And you ought to do something to your beard to make it grow better [Laughs] You are funny!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [Picking up telegram] I don\u2019t want to be a Beau Brummel.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. This telegram\u2019s from Paris. I get one every day. Yesterday and to-day. That wild man is ill again, he\u2019s bad again.... He begs for forgiveness, and implores me to come, and I really ought to go to Paris to be near him. You look severe, Peter, but what can I do, my dear, what can I do; he\u2019s ill, he\u2019s alone, unhappy, and who\u2019s to look after him, who\u2019s to keep him away from his errors, to give him his medicine punctually? And why should I conceal it and say nothing about it; I love him, that\u2019s plain, I love him, I love him.... That love is a stone round my neck; I\u2019m going with it to the bottom, but I love that stone and can\u2019t live without it. [Squeezes TROFIMOV\u2019S hand] Don\u2019t think badly of me, Peter, don\u2019t say anything to me, don\u2019t say...\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [Weeping] For God\u2019s sake forgive my speaking candidly, but that man has robbed you!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. No, no, no, you oughtn\u2019t to say that! [Stops her ears.]\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. But he\u2019s a wretch, you alone don\u2019t know it! He\u2019s a petty thief, a nobody....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Angry, but restrained] You\u2019re twenty-six or twenty-seven, and still a schoolboy of the second class!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Why not!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. You ought to be a man, at your age you ought to be able to understand those who love. And you ought to be in love yourself, you must fall in love! [Angry] Yes, yes! You aren\u2019t pure, you\u2019re just a freak, a queer fellow, a funny growth...\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [In horror] What is she saying!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. \u201cI\u2019m above love!\u201d You\u2019re not above love, you\u2019re just what our Fiers calls a bungler. Not to have a mistress at your age!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [In horror] This is awful! What is she saying? [Goes quickly up into the drawing-room, clutching his head] It\u2019s awful... I can\u2019t stand it, I\u2019ll go away. [Exit, but returns at once] All is over between us! [Exit.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Shouts after him] Peter, wait! Silly man, I was joking! Peter! [Somebody is heard going out and falling downstairs noisily. ANYA and VARYA scream; laughter is heard immediately] What\u2019s that?\r\n\r\n[ANYA comes running in, laughing.]\r\n\r\nANYA. Peter\u2019s fallen downstairs! [Runs out again.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. This Peter\u2019s a marvel.\r\n\r\n[The STATION-MASTER stands in the middle of the drawing-room and recites \u201cThe Magdalen\u201d by Tolstoy. He is listened to, but he has only delivered a few lines when a waltz is heard from the front room, and the recitation is stopped. Everybody dances. TROFIMOV, ANYA, VARYA, and LUBOV ANDREYEVNA come in from the front room.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Well, Peter... you pure soul... I beg your pardon... let\u2019s dance.\r\n\r\n[She dances with PETER. ANYA and VARYA dance. FIERS enters and stands his stick by a side door. YASHA has also come in and looks on at the dance.]\r\n\r\nYASHA. Well, grandfather?\r\n\r\nFIERS. I\u2019m not well. At our balls some time back, generals and barons and admirals used to dance, and now we send for post-office clerks and the Station-master, and even they come as a favour. I\u2019m very weak. The dead master, the grandfather, used to give everybody sealing-wax when anything was wrong. I\u2019ve taken sealing-wax every day for twenty years, and more; perhaps that\u2019s why I still live.\r\n\r\nYASHA. I\u2019m tired of you, grandfather. [Yawns] If you\u2019d only hurry up and kick the bucket.\r\n\r\nFIERS. Oh you... bungler! [Mutters.]\r\n\r\n[TROFIMOV and LUBOV ANDREYEVNA dance in the reception-room, then into the sitting-room.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Merci<\/i>. I\u2019ll sit down. [Sits] I\u2019m tired.\r\n\r\n[Enter ANYA.]\r\n\r\nANYA. [Excited] Somebody in the kitchen was saying just now that the cherry orchard was sold to-day.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Sold to whom?\r\n\r\nANYA. He didn\u2019t say to whom. He\u2019s gone now. [Dances out into the reception-room with TROFIMOV.]\r\n\r\nYASHA. Some old man was chattering about it a long time ago. A stranger!\r\n\r\nFIERS. And Leonid Andreyevitch isn\u2019t here yet, he hasn\u2019t come. He\u2019s wearing a light, demi-saison<\/i> overcoat. He\u2019ll catch cold. Oh these young fellows.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I\u2019ll die of this. Go and find out, Yasha, to whom it\u2019s sold.\r\n\r\nYASHA. Oh, but he\u2019s been gone a long time, the old man. [Laughs.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Slightly vexed] Why do you laugh? What are you glad about?\r\n\r\nYASHA. Epikhodov\u2019s too funny. He\u2019s a silly man. Two-and-twenty troubles.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Fiers, if the estate is sold, where will you go?\r\n\r\nFIERS. I\u2019ll go wherever you order me to go.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Why do you look like that? Are you ill? I think you ought to go to bed....\r\n\r\nFIERS. Yes... [With a smile] I\u2019ll go to bed, and who\u2019ll hand things round and give orders without me? I\u2019ve the whole house on my shoulders.\r\n\r\nYASHA. [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] Lubov Andreyevna! I want to ask a favour of you, if you\u2019ll be so kind! If you go to Paris again, then please take me with you. It\u2019s absolutely impossible for me to stop here. [Looking round; in an undertone] What\u2019s the good of talking about it, you see for yourself that this is an uneducated country, with an immoral population, and it\u2019s so dull. The food in the kitchen is beastly, and here\u2019s this Fiers walking about mumbling various inappropriate things. Take me with you, be so kind!\r\n\r\n[Enter PISCHIN.]\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. I come to ask for the pleasure of a little waltz, dear lady.... [LUBOV ANDREYEVNA goes to him] But all the same, you wonderful woman, I must have 180 little roubles from you... I must.... [They dance] 180 little roubles.... [They go through into the drawing-room.]\r\n
YASHA. [Sings softly]   \u201cOh, will you understand\r\n   My soul\u2019s deep restlessness?\u201d\r\n<\/pre>\r\n[In the drawing-room a figure in a grey top-hat and in baggy check trousers is waving its hands and jumping about; there are cries of \u201cBravo, Charlotta Ivanovna!\u201d]\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. [Stops to powder her face] The young mistress tells me to dance\u2014there are a lot of gentlemen, but few ladies\u2014and my head goes round when I dance, and my heart beats, Fiers Nicolaevitch; the Post-office clerk told me something just now which made me catch my breath. [The music grows faint.]\r\n\r\nFIERS. What did he say to you?\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. He says, \u201cYou\u2019re like a little flower.\u201d\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Yawns] Impolite.... [Exit.]\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. Like a little flower. I\u2019m such a delicate girl; I simply love words of tenderness.\r\n\r\nFIERS. You\u2019ll lose your head.\r\n\r\n[Enter EPIKHODOV.]\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. You, Avdotya Fedorovna, want to see me no more than if I was some insect. [Sighs] Oh, life!\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. What do you want?\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. Undoubtedly, perhaps, you may be right. [Sighs] But, certainly, if you regard the matter from the aspect, then you, if I may say so, and you must excuse my candidness, have absolutely reduced me to a state of mind. I know my fate, every day something unfortunate happens to me, and I\u2019ve grown used to it a long time ago, I even look at my fate with a smile. You gave me your word, and though I...\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. Please, we\u2019ll talk later on, but leave me alone now. I\u2019m meditating now. [Plays with her fan.]\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. Every day something unfortunate happens to me, and I, if I may so express myself, only smile, and even laugh.\r\n\r\n[VARYA enters from the drawing-room.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. Haven\u2019t you gone yet, Simeon? You really have no respect for anybody. [To DUNYASHA] You go away, Dunyasha. [To EPIKHODOV] You play billiards and break a cue, and walk about the drawing-room as if you were a visitor!\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. You cannot, if I may say so, call me to order.\r\n\r\nVARYA. I\u2019m not calling you to order, I\u2019m only telling you. You just walk about from place to place and never do your work. Goodness only knows why we keep a clerk.\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. [Offended] Whether I work, or walk about, or eat, or play billiards, is only a matter to be settled by people of understanding and my elders.\r\n\r\nVARYA. You dare to talk to me like that! [Furious] You dare? You mean that I know nothing? Get out of here! This minute!\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. [Nervous] I must ask you to express yourself more delicately.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Beside herself] Get out this minute. Get out! [He goes to the door, she follows] Two-and-twenty troubles! I don\u2019t want any sign of you here! I don\u2019t want to see anything of you! [EPIKHODOV has gone out; his voice can be heard outside: \u201cI\u2019ll make a complaint against you.\u201d] What, coming back? [Snatches up the stick left by FIERS by the door] Go... go... go, I\u2019ll show you.... Are you going? Are you going? Well, then take that. [She hits out as LOPAKHIN enters.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Much obliged.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Angry but amused] I\u2019m sorry.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Never mind. I thank you for my pleasant reception.\r\n\r\nVARYA. It isn\u2019t worth any thanks. [Walks away, then looks back and asks gently] I didn\u2019t hurt you, did I?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. No, not at all. There\u2019ll be an enormous bump, that\u2019s all.\r\n\r\nVOICES FROM THE DRAWING-ROOM. Lopakhin\u2019s returned! Ermolai Alexeyevitch!\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. Now we\u2019ll see what there is to see and hear what there is to hear... [Kisses LOPAKHIN] You smell of cognac, my dear, my soul. And we\u2019re all having a good time.\r\n\r\n[Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Is that you, Ermolai Alexeyevitch? Why were you so long? Where\u2019s Leonid?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Leonid Andreyevitch came back with me, he\u2019s coming....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Excited] Well, what? Is it sold? Tell me?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Confused, afraid to show his pleasure] The sale ended up at four o\u2019clock.... We missed the train, and had to wait till half-past nine. [Sighs heavily] Ooh! My head\u2019s going round a little.\r\n\r\n[Enter GAEV; in his right hand he carries things he has bought, with his left he wipes away his tears.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Leon, what\u2019s happened? Leon, well? [Impatiently, in tears] Quick, for the love of God....\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Says nothing to her, only waves his hand; to FIERS, weeping] Here, take this.... Here are anchovies, herrings from Kertch.... I\u2019ve had no food to-day.... I have had a time! [The door from the billiard-room is open; the clicking of the balls is heard, and YASHA\u2019S voice, \u201cSeven, eighteen!\u201d GAEV\u2019S expression changes, he cries no more] I\u2019m awfully tired. Help me change my clothes, Fiers.\r\n\r\n[Goes out through the drawing-room; FIERS after him.]\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. What happened? Come on, tell us!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Is the cherry orchard sold?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. It is sold.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Who bought it?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I bought it.\r\n\r\n[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA is overwhelmed; she would fall if she were not standing by an armchair and a table. VARYA takes her keys off her belt, throws them on the floor, into the middle of the room and goes out.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I bought it! Wait, ladies and gentlemen, please, my head\u2019s going round, I can\u2019t talk.... [Laughs] When we got to the sale, Deriganov was there already. Leonid Andreyevitch had only fifteen thousand roubles, and Deriganov offered thirty thousand on top of the mortgage to begin with. I saw how matters were, so I grabbed hold of him and bid forty. He went up to forty-five, I offered fifty-five. That means he went up by fives and I went up by tens.... Well, it came to an end. I bid ninety more than the mortgage; and it stayed with me. The cherry orchard is mine now, mine! [Roars with laughter] My God, my God, the cherry orchard\u2019s mine! Tell me I\u2019m drunk, or mad, or dreaming.... [Stamps his feet] Don\u2019t laugh at me! If my father and grandfather rose from their graves and looked at the whole affair, and saw how their Ermolai, their beaten and uneducated Ermolai, who used to run barefoot in the winter, how that very Ermolai has bought an estate, which is the most beautiful thing in the world! I\u2019ve bought the estate where my grandfather and my father were slaves, where they weren\u2019t even allowed into the kitchen. I\u2019m asleep, it\u2019s only a dream, an illusion.... It\u2019s the fruit of imagination, wrapped in the fog of the unknown.... [Picks up the keys, nicely smiling] She threw down the keys, she wanted to show she was no longer mistress here.... [Jingles keys] Well, it\u2019s all one! [Hears the band tuning up] Eh, musicians, play, I want to hear you! Come and look at Ermolai Lopakhin laying his axe to the cherry orchard, come and look at the trees falling! We\u2019ll build villas here, and our grandsons and great-grandsons will see a new life here.... Play on, music! [The band plays. LUBOV ANDREYEVNA sinks into a chair and weeps bitterly. LOPAKHIN continues reproachfully] Why then, why didn\u2019t you take my advice? My poor, dear woman, you can\u2019t go back now. [Weeps] Oh, if only the whole thing was done with, if only our uneven, unhappy life were changed!\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Takes his arm; in an undertone] She\u2019s crying. Let\u2019s go into the drawing-room and leave her by herself... come on.... [Takes his arm and leads him out.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. What\u2019s that? Bandsmen, play nicely! Go on, do just as I want you to! [Ironically] The new owner, the owner of the cherry orchard is coming! [He accidentally knocks up against a little table and nearly upsets the candelabra] I can pay for everything! [Exit with PISCHIN]\r\n\r\n[In the reception-room and the drawing-room nobody remains except LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, who sits huddled up and weeping bitterly. The band plays softly. ANYA and TROFIMOV come in quickly. ANYA goes up to her mother and goes on her knees in front of her. TROFIMOV stands at the drawing-room entrance.]\r\n\r\nANYA. Mother! mother, are you crying? My dear, kind, good mother, my beautiful mother, I love you! Bless you! The cherry orchard is sold, we\u2019ve got it no longer, it\u2019s true, true, but don\u2019t cry mother, you\u2019ve still got your life before you, you\u2019ve still your beautiful pure soul... Come with me, come, dear, away from here, come! We\u2019ll plant a new garden, finer than this, and you\u2019ll see it, and you\u2019ll understand, and deep joy, gentle joy will sink into your soul, like the evening sun, and you\u2019ll smile, mother! Come, dear, let\u2019s go!\r\n\r\nCurtain.\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\n
\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n
ACT FOUR<\/h2>\r\n[The stage is set as for Act I. There are no curtains on the windows, no pictures; only a few pieces of furniture are left; they are piled up in a corner as if for sale. The emptiness is felt. By the door that leads out of the house and at the back of the stage, portmanteaux and travelling paraphernalia are piled up. The door on the left is open; the voices of VARYA and ANYA can be heard through it. LOPAKHIN stands and waits. YASHA holds a tray with little tumblers of champagne. Outside, EPIKHODOV is tying up a box. Voices are heard behind the stage. The peasants have come to say good-bye. The voice of GAEV is heard: \u201cThank you, brothers, thank you.\u201d]\r\n\r\nYASHA. The common people have come to say good-bye. I am of the opinion, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, that they\u2019re good people, but they don\u2019t understand very much.\r\n\r\n[The voices die away. LUBOV ANDREYEVNA and GAEV enter. She is not crying but is pale, and her face trembles; she can hardly speak.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. You gave them your purse, Luba. You can\u2019t go on like that, you can\u2019t!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I couldn\u2019t help myself, I couldn\u2019t! [They go out.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [In the doorway, calling after them] Please, I ask you most humbly! Just a little glass to say good-bye. I didn\u2019t remember to bring any from town and I only found one bottle at the station. Please, do! [Pause] Won\u2019t you really have any? [Goes away from the door] If I only knew\u2014I wouldn\u2019t have bought any. Well, I shan\u2019t drink any either. [YASHA carefully puts the tray on a chair] You have a drink, Yasha, at any rate.\r\n\r\nYASHA. To those departing! And good luck to those who stay behind! [Drinks] I can assure you that this isn\u2019t real champagne.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Eight roubles a bottle. [Pause] It\u2019s devilish cold here.\r\n\r\nYASHA. There are no fires to-day, we\u2019re going away. [Laughs]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. What\u2019s the matter with you?\r\n\r\nYASHA. I\u2019m just pleased.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. It\u2019s October outside, but it\u2019s as sunny and as quiet as if it were summer. Good for building. [Looking at his watch and speaking through the door] Ladies and gentlemen, please remember that it\u2019s only forty-seven minutes till the train goes! You must go off to the station in twenty minutes. Hurry up.\r\n\r\n[TROFIMOV, in an overcoat, comes in from the grounds.]\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. I think it\u2019s time we went. The carriages are waiting. Where the devil are my goloshes? They\u2019re lost. [Through the door] Anya, I can\u2019t find my goloshes! I can\u2019t!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. I\u2019ve got to go to Kharkov. I\u2019m going in the same train as you. I\u2019m going to spend the whole winter in Kharkov. I\u2019ve been hanging about with you people, going rusty without work. I can\u2019t live without working. I must have something to do with my hands; they hang about as if they weren\u2019t mine at all.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. We\u2019ll go away now and then you\u2019ll start again on your useful labours.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Have a glass.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. I won\u2019t.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. So you\u2019re off to Moscow now?\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV Yes. I\u2019ll see them into town and to-morrow I\u2019m off to Moscow.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Yes.... I expect the professors don\u2019t lecture nowadays; they\u2019re waiting till you turn up!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. That\u2019s not your business.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. How many years have you been going to the university?\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Think of something fresh. This is old and flat. [Looking for his goloshes] You know, we may not meet each other again, so just let me give you a word of advice on parting: \u201cDon\u2019t wave your hands about! Get rid of that habit of waving them about. And then, building villas and reckoning on their residents becoming freeholders in time\u2014that\u2019s the same thing; it\u2019s all a matter of waving your hands about.... Whether I want to or not, you know, I like you. You\u2019ve thin, delicate fingers, like those of an artist, and you\u2019ve a thin, delicate soul....\u201d\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Embraces him] Good-bye, dear fellow. Thanks for all you\u2019ve said. If you want any, take some money from me for the journey.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Why should I? I don\u2019t want it.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. But you\u2019ve nothing!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Yes, I have, thank you; I\u2019ve got some for a translation. Here it is in my pocket. [Nervously] But I can\u2019t find my goloshes!\r\n\r\nVARYA. [From the other room] Take your rubbish away! [Throws a pair of rubber goloshes on to the stage.]\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Why are you angry, Varya? Hm! These aren\u2019t my goloshes!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. In the spring I sowed three thousand acres of poppies, and now I\u2019ve made forty thousand roubles net profit. And when my poppies were in flower, what a picture it was! So I, as I was saying, made forty thousand roubles, and I mean I\u2019d like to lend you some, because I can afford it. Why turn up your nose at it? I\u2019m just a simple peasant....\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Your father was a peasant, mine was a chemist, and that means absolutely nothing. [LOPAKHIN takes out his pocket-book] No, no.... Even if you gave me twenty thousand I should refuse. I\u2019m a free man. And everything that all you people, rich and poor, value so highly and so dearly hasn\u2019t the least influence over me; it\u2019s like a flock of down in the wind. I can do without you, I can pass you by. I\u2019m strong and proud. Mankind goes on to the highest truths and to the highest happiness such as is only possible on earth, and I go in the front ranks!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Will you get there?\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. I will. [Pause] I\u2019ll get there and show others the way. [Axes cutting the trees are heard in the distance.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Well, good-bye, old man. It\u2019s time to go. Here we stand pulling one another\u2019s noses, but life goes its own way all the time. When I work for a long time, and I don\u2019t get tired, then I think more easily, and I think I get to understand why I exist. And there are so many people in Russia, brother, who live for nothing at all. Still, work goes on without that. Leonid Andreyevitch, they say, has accepted a post in a bank; he will get sixty thousand roubles a year.... But he won\u2019t stand it; he\u2019s very lazy.\r\n\r\nANYA. [At the door] Mother asks if you will stop them cutting down the orchard until she has gone away.\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Yes, really, you ought to have enough tact not to do that. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN, All right, all right... yes, he\u2019s right. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nANYA. Has Fiers been sent to the hospital?\r\n\r\nYASHA. I gave the order this morning. I suppose they\u2019ve sent him.\r\n\r\nANYA. [To EPIKHODOV, who crosses the room] Simeon Panteleyevitch, please make inquiries if Fiers has been sent to the hospital.\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Offended] I told Egor this morning. What\u2019s the use of asking ten times!\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. The aged Fiers, in my conclusive opinion, isn\u2019t worth mending; his forefathers had better have him. I only envy him. [Puts a trunk on a hat-box and squashes it] Well, of course. I thought so! [Exit.]\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Grinning] Two-and-twenty troubles.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Behind the door] Has Fiers been taken away to the hospital?\r\n\r\nANYA. Yes.\r\n\r\nVARYA. Why didn\u2019t they take the letter to the doctor?\r\n\r\nANYA. It\u2019ll have to be sent after him. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. [In the next room] Where\u2019s Yasha? Tell him his mother\u2019s come and wants to say good-bye to him.\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Waving his hand] She\u2019ll make me lose all patience!\r\n\r\n[DUNYASHA has meanwhile been bustling round the luggage; now that YASHA is left alone, she goes up to him.]\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. If you only looked at me once, Yasha. You\u2019re going away, leaving me behind.\r\n\r\n[Weeps and hugs him round the neck.]\r\n\r\nYASHA. What\u2019s the use of crying? [Drinks champagne] In six days I\u2019ll be again in Paris. To-morrow we get into the express and off we go. I can hardly believe it. Vive la France! It doesn\u2019t suit me here, I can\u2019t live here... it\u2019s no good. Well, I\u2019ve seen the uncivilized world; I have had enough of it. [Drinks champagne] What do you want to cry for? You behave yourself properly, and then you won\u2019t cry.\r\n\r\nDUNYASHA. [Looks in a small mirror and powders her face] Send me a letter from Paris. You know I loved you, Yasha, so much! I\u2019m a sensitive creature, Yasha.\r\n\r\nYASHA. Somebody\u2019s coming.\r\n\r\n[He bustles around the luggage, singing softly. Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, GAEV, ANYA, and CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. We\u2019d better be off. There\u2019s no time left. [Looks at YASHA] Somebody smells of herring!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. We needn\u2019t get into our carriages for ten minutes.... [Looks round the room] Good-bye, dear house, old grandfather. The winter will go, the spring will come, and then you\u2019ll exist no more, you\u2019ll be pulled down. How much these walls have seen! [Passionately kisses her daughter] My treasure, you\u2019re radiant, your eyes flash like two jewels! Are you happy? Very?\r\n\r\nANYA. Very! A new life is beginning, mother!\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Gaily] Yes, really, everything\u2019s all right now. Before the cherry orchard was sold we all were excited and we suffered, and then, when the question was solved once and for all, we all calmed down, and even became cheerful. I\u2019m a bank official now, and a financier... red in the middle; and you, Luba, for some reason or other, look better, there\u2019s no doubt about it.\r\n\r\nLUBOV Yes. My nerves are better, it\u2019s true. [She puts on her coat and hat] I sleep well. Take my luggage out, Yasha. It\u2019s time. [To ANYA] My little girl, we\u2019ll soon see each other again.... I\u2019m off to Paris. I\u2019ll live there on the money your grandmother from Yaroslav sent along to buy the estate\u2014bless her!\u2014though it won\u2019t last long.\r\n\r\nANYA. You\u2019ll come back soon, soon, mother, won\u2019t you? I\u2019ll get ready, and pass the exam at the Higher School, and then I\u2019ll work and help you. We\u2019ll read all sorts of books to one another, won\u2019t we? [Kisses her mother\u2019s hands] We\u2019ll read in the autumn evenings; we\u2019ll read many books, and a beautiful new world will open up before us.... [Thoughtfully] You\u2019ll come, mother....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I\u2019ll come, my darling. [Embraces her.]\r\n\r\n[Enter LOPAKHIN. CHARLOTTA is singing to herself.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. Charlotta is happy; she sings!\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. [Takes a bundle, looking like a wrapped-up baby] My little baby, bye-bye. [The baby seems to answer, \u201cOua! Oua!\u201d] Hush, my nice little boy. [\u201cOua! Oua!\u201d] I\u2019m so sorry for you! [Throws the bundle back] So please find me a new place. I can\u2019t go on like this.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. We\u2019ll find one, Charlotta Ivanovna, don\u2019t you be afraid.\r\n\r\nGAEV. Everybody\u2019s leaving us. Varya\u2019s going away... we\u2019ve suddenly become unnecessary.\r\n\r\nCHARLOTTA. I\u2019ve nowhere to live in town. I must go away. [Hums] Never mind.\r\n\r\n[Enter PISCHIN.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Nature\u2019s marvel!\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Puffing] Oh, let me get my breath back.... I\u2019m fagged out... My most honoured, give me some water....\r\n\r\nGAEV. Come for money, what? I\u2019m your humble servant, and I\u2019m going out of the way of temptation. [Exit.]\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. I haven\u2019t been here for ever so long... dear madam. [To LOPAKHIN] You here? Glad to see you... man of immense brain... take this... take it.... [Gives LOPAKHIN money] Four hundred roubles.... That leaves 840....\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Shrugs his shoulders in surprise] As if I were dreaming. Where did you get this from?\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. Stop... it\u2019s hot.... A most unexpected thing happened. Some Englishmen came along and found some white clay on my land.... [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] And here\u2019s four hundred for you... beautiful lady.... [Gives her money] Give you the rest later.... [Drinks water] Just now a young man in the train was saying that some great philosopher advises us all to jump off roofs. \u201cJump!\u201d he says, and that\u2019s all. [Astonished] To think of that, now! More water!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Who were these Englishmen?\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. I\u2019ve leased off the land with the clay to them for twenty-four years.... Now, excuse me, I\u2019ve no time.... I must run off.... I must go to Znoikov and to Kardamonov... I owe them all money.... [Drinks] Good-bye. I\u2019ll come in on Thursday.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. We\u2019re just off to town, and to-morrow I go abroad.\r\n\r\nPISCHIN. [Agitated] What? Why to town? I see furniture... trunks.... Well, never mind. [Crying] Never mind. These Englishmen are men of immense intellect.... Never mind.... Be happy.... God will help you.... Never mind.... Everything in this world comes to an end.... [Kisses LUBOV ANDREYEVNA\u2019S hand] And if you should happen to hear that my end has come, just remember this old... horse and say: \u201cThere was one such and such a Simeonov-Pischin, God bless his soul....\u201d Wonderful weather... yes.... [Exit deeply moved, but returns at once and says in the door] Dashenka sent her love! [Exit.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Now we can go. I\u2019ve two anxieties, though. The first is poor Fiers [Looks at her watch] We\u2019ve still five minutes....\r\n\r\nANYA. Mother, Fiers has already been sent to the hospital. Yasha sent him off this morning.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. The second is Varya. She\u2019s used to getting up early and to work, and now she\u2019s no work to do she\u2019s like a fish out of water. She\u2019s grown thin and pale, and she cries, poor thing.... [Pause] You know very well, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, that I used to hope to marry her to you, and I suppose you are going to marry somebody? [Whispers to ANYA, who nods to CHARLOTTA, and they both go out] She loves you, she\u2019s your sort, and I don\u2019t understand, I really don\u2019t, why you seem to be keeping away from each other. I don\u2019t understand!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. To tell the truth, I don\u2019t understand it myself. It\u2019s all so strange.... If there\u2019s still time, I\u2019ll be ready at once... Let\u2019s get it over, once and for all; I don\u2019t feel as if I could ever propose to her without you.\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Excellent. It\u2019ll only take a minute. I\u2019ll call her.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. The champagne\u2019s very appropriate. [Looking at the tumblers] They\u2019re empty, somebody\u2019s already drunk them. [YASHA coughs] I call that licking it up....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [Animated] Excellent. We\u2019ll go out. Yasha, allez. I\u2019ll call her in.... [At the door] Varya, leave that and come here. Come! [Exit with YASHA.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [Looks at his watch] Yes.... [Pause.]\r\n\r\n[There is a restrained laugh behind the door, a whisper, then VARYA comes in.]\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Looking at the luggage in silence] I can\u2019t seem to find it....\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. What are you looking for?\r\n\r\nVARYA. I packed it myself and I don\u2019t remember. [Pause.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Where are you going to now, Barbara Mihailovna?\r\n\r\nVARYA. I? To the Ragulins.... I\u2019ve got an agreement to go and look after their house... as housekeeper or something.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Is that at Yashnevo? It\u2019s about fifty miles. [Pause] So life in this house is finished now....\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Looking at the luggage] Where is it?... perhaps I\u2019ve put it away in the trunk.... Yes, there\u2019ll be no more life in this house....\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. And I\u2019m off to Kharkov at once... by this train. I\u2019ve a lot of business on hand. I\u2019m leaving Epikhodov here... I\u2019ve taken him on.\r\n\r\nVARYA. Well, well!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Last year at this time the snow was already falling, if you remember, and now it\u2019s nice and sunny. Only it\u2019s rather cold.... There\u2019s three degrees of frost.\r\n\r\nVARYA. I didn\u2019t look. [Pause] And our thermometer\u2019s broken.... [Pause.]\r\n\r\nVOICE AT THE DOOR. Ermolai Alexeyevitch!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. [As if he has long been waiting to be called] This minute. [Exit quickly.]\r\n\r\n[VARYA, sitting on the floor, puts her face on a bundle of clothes and weeps gently. The door opens. LUBOV ANDREYEVNA enters carefully.]\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Well? [Pause] We must go.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Not crying now, wipes her eyes] Yes, it\u2019s quite time, little mother. I\u2019ll get to the Ragulins to-day, if I don\u2019t miss the train....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. [At the door] Anya, put on your things. [Enter ANYA, then GAEV, CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA. GAEV wears a warm overcoat with a cape. A servant and drivers come in. EPIKHODOV bustles around the luggage] Now we can go away.\r\n\r\nANYA. [Joyfully] Away!\r\n\r\nGAEV. My friends, my dear friends! Can I be silent, in leaving this house for evermore?\u2014can I restrain myself, in saying farewell, from expressing those feelings which now fill my whole being...?\r\n\r\nANYA. [Imploringly] Uncle!\r\n\r\nVARYA. Uncle, you shouldn\u2019t!\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Stupidly] Double the red into the middle.... I\u2019ll be quiet.\r\n\r\n[Enter TROFIMOV, then LOPAKHIN.]\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Well, it\u2019s time to be off.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Epikhodov, my coat!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. I\u2019ll sit here one more minute. It\u2019s as if I\u2019d never really noticed what the walls and ceilings of this house were like, and now I look at them greedily, with such tender love....\r\n\r\nGAEV. I remember, when I was six years old, on Trinity Sunday, I sat at this window and looked and saw my father going to church....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Have all the things been taken away?\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Yes, all, I think. [To EPIKHODOV, putting on his coat] You see that everything\u2019s quite straight, Epikhodov.\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. [Hoarsely] You may depend upon me, Ermolai Alexeyevitch!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. What\u2019s the matter with your voice?\r\n\r\nEPIKHODOV. I swallowed something just now; I was having a drink of water.\r\n\r\nYASHA. [Suspiciously] What manners....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. We go away, and not a soul remains behind.\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Till the spring.\r\n\r\nVARYA. [Drags an umbrella out of a bundle, and seems to be waving it about. LOPAKHIN appears to be frightened] What are you doing?... I never thought...\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Come along, let\u2019s take our seats... it\u2019s time! The train will be in directly.\r\n\r\nVARYA. Peter, here they are, your goloshes, by that trunk. [In tears] And how old and dirty they are....\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. [Putting them on] Come on!\r\n\r\nGAEV. [Deeply moved, nearly crying] The train... the station.... Cross in the middle, a white double in the corner....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. Let\u2019s go!\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Are you all here? There\u2019s nobody else? [Locks the side-door on the left] There\u2019s a lot of things in there. I must lock them up. Come!\r\n\r\nANYA. Good-bye, home! Good-bye, old life!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV. Welcome, new life! [Exit with ANYA.]\r\n\r\n[VARYA looks round the room and goes out slowly. YASHA and CHARLOTTA, with her little dog, go out.]\r\n\r\nLOPAKHIN. Till the spring, then! Come on... till we meet again! [Exit.]\r\n\r\n[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA and GAEV are left alone. They might almost have been waiting for that. They fall into each other\u2019s arms and sob restrainedly and quietly, fearing that somebody might hear them.]\r\n\r\nGAEV. [In despair] My sister, my sister....\r\n\r\nLUBOV. My dear, my gentle, beautiful orchard! My life, my youth, my happiness, good-bye! Good-bye!\r\n\r\nANYA\u2019S VOICE. [Gaily] Mother!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV\u2019S VOICE. [Gaily, excited] Coo-ee!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. To look at the walls and the windows for the last time.... My dead mother used to like to walk about this room....\r\n\r\nGAEV. My sister, my sister!\r\n\r\nANYA\u2019S VOICE. Mother!\r\n\r\nTROFIMOV\u2019S VOICE. Coo-ee!\r\n\r\nLUBOV. We\u2019re coming! [They go out.]\r\n\r\n[The stage is empty. The sound of keys being turned in the locks is heard, and then the noise of the carriages going away. It is quiet. Then the sound of an axe against the trees is heard in the silence sadly and by itself. Steps are heard. FIERS comes in from the door on the right. He is dressed as usual, in a short jacket and white waistcoat; slippers on his feet. He is ill. He goes to the door and tries the handle.]\r\n\r\nFIERS. It\u2019s locked. They\u2019ve gone away. [Sits on a sofa] They\u2019ve forgotten about me.... Never mind, I\u2019ll sit here.... And Leonid Andreyevitch will have gone in a light overcoat instead of putting on his fur coat.... [Sighs anxiously] I didn\u2019t see.... Oh, these young people! [Mumbles something that cannot be understood] Life\u2019s gone on as if I\u2019d never lived. [Lying down] I\u2019ll lie down.... You\u2019ve no strength left in you, nothing left at all.... Oh, you... bungler!\r\n\r\n[He lies without moving. The distant sound is heard, as if from the sky, of a breaking string, dying away sadly. Silence follows it, and only the sound is heard, some way away in the orchard, of the axe falling on the trees.]\r\n\r\nCurtain.\r\n\r\n \r\n
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Anton Pavlovich Chekhov<\/b> (29 January 1860\u00a0\u2013 15 July 1904)\u00a0was a Russian playwright and short story writer, who is considered to be among the greatest writers of short fiction in history. His career as a playwright produced four classics and his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics.\u00a0Along with Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg, Chekhov is often referred to as one of the three seminal figures in the birth of early modernism in the theatre.\u00a0Chekhov practiced as a medical doctor throughout most of his literary career: \u201cMedicine is my lawful wife,\u201d he once said, \u201cand literature is my mistress.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n
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<\/div>\r\n<\/section>","rendered":"
THE CHERRY ORCHARD<\/h2>\n
A COMEDY IN FOUR ACTS<\/h3>\n
CHARACTERS<\/p>\n
     LUBOV ANDREYEVNA RANEVSKY (Mme. RANEVSKY), a landowner\r\n     ANYA, her daughter, aged seventeen\r\n     VARYA (BARBARA), her adopted daughter, aged twenty-seven\r\n     LEONID ANDREYEVITCH GAEV, Mme. Ranevsky\u2019s brother\r\n     ERMOLAI ALEXEYEVITCH LOPAKHIN, a merchant\r\n     PETER SERGEYEVITCH TROFIMOV, a student\r\n     BORIS BORISOVITCH SIMEONOV-PISCHIN, a landowner\r\n     CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA, a governess\r\n     SIMEON PANTELEYEVITCH EPIKHODOV, a clerk\r\n     DUNYASHA (AVDOTYA FEDOROVNA), a maidservant\r\n     FIERS, an old footman, aged eighty-seven\r\n     YASHA, a young footman\r\n     A TRAMP\r\n     A STATION-MASTER\r\n     POST-OFFICE CLERK\r\n     GUESTS\r\n     A SERVANT\r\n<\/pre>\n
The action takes place on Mme. RANEVSKY\u2019S estate<\/p>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n<\/div>\n
ACT ONE<\/h2>\n
[A room which is still called the nursery. One of the doors leads into ANYA\u2019S room. It is close on sunrise. It is May. The cherry-trees are in flower but it is chilly in the garden. There is an early frost. The windows of the room are shut. DUNYASHA comes in with a candle, and LOPAKHIN with a book in his hand.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. The train\u2019s arrived, thank God. What\u2019s the time?<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. It will soon be two. [Blows out candle] It is light already.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. How much was the train late? Two hours at least. [Yawns and stretches himself] I have made a rotten mess of it! I came here on purpose to meet them at the station, and then overslept myself… in my chair. It\u2019s a pity. I wish you\u2019d wakened me.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. I thought you\u2019d gone away. [Listening] I think I hear them coming.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Listens] No…. They\u2019ve got to collect their luggage and so on…. [Pause] Lubov Andreyevna has been living abroad for five years; I don\u2019t know what she\u2019ll be like now…. She\u2019s a good sort\u2014an easy, simple person. I remember when I was a boy of fifteen, my father, who is dead\u2014he used to keep a shop in the village here\u2014hit me on the face with his fist, and my nose bled…. We had gone into the yard together for something or other, and he was a little drunk. Lubov Andreyevna, as I remember her now, was still young, and very thin, and she took me to the washstand here in this very room, the nursery. She said, \u201cDon\u2019t cry, little man, it\u2019ll be all right in time for your wedding.\u201d [Pause] \u201cLittle man\u201d…. My father was a peasant, it\u2019s true, but here I am in a white waistcoat and yellow shoes… a pearl out of an oyster. I\u2019m rich now, with lots of money, but just think about it and examine me, and you\u2019ll find I\u2019m still a peasant down to the marrow of my bones. [Turns over the pages of his book] Here I\u2019ve been reading this book, but I understood nothing. I read and fell asleep. [Pause.]<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. The dogs didn\u2019t sleep all night; they know that they\u2019re coming.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. What\u2019s up with you, Dunyasha…?<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. My hands are shaking. I shall faint.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. You\u2019re too sensitive, Dunyasha. You dress just like a lady, and you do your hair like one too. You oughtn\u2019t. You should know your place.<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. [Enters with a bouquet. He wears a short jacket and brilliantly polished boots which squeak audibly. He drops the bouquet as he enters, then picks it up] The gardener sent these; says they\u2019re to go into the dining-room. [Gives the bouquet to DUNYASHA.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. And you\u2019ll bring me some kvass.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. Very well. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. There\u2019s a frost this morning\u2014three degrees, and the cherry-trees are all in flower. I can\u2019t approve of our climate. [Sighs] I can\u2019t. Our climate is indisposed to favour us even this once. And, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, allow me to say to you, in addition, that I bought myself some boots two days ago, and I beg to assure you that they squeak in a perfectly unbearable manner. What shall I put on them?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Go away. You bore me.<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. Some misfortune happens to me every day. But I don\u2019t complain; I\u2019m used to it, and I can smile. [DUNYASHA comes in and brings LOPAKHIN some kvass] I shall go. [Knocks over a chair] There…. [Triumphantly] There, you see, if I may use the word, what circumstances I am in, so to speak. It is even simply marvellous. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. I may confess to you, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, that Epikhodov has proposed to me.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Ah!<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. I don\u2019t know what to do about it. He\u2019s a nice young man, but every now and again, when he begins talking, you can\u2019t understand a word he\u2019s saying. I think I like him. He\u2019s madly in love with me. He\u2019s an unlucky man; every day something happens. We tease him about it. They call him \u201cTwo-and-twenty troubles.\u201d<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Listens] There they come, I think.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. They\u2019re coming! What\u2019s the matter with me? I\u2019m cold all over.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. There they are, right enough. Let\u2019s go and meet them. Will she know me? We haven\u2019t seen each other for five years.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. [Excited] I shall faint in a minute…. Oh, I\u2019m fainting!<\/p>\n
[Two carriages are heard driving up to the house. LOPAKHIN and DUNYASHA quickly go out. The stage is empty. A noise begins in the next room. FIERS, leaning on a stick, walks quickly across the stage; he has just been to meet LUBOV ANDREYEVNA. He wears an old-fashioned livery and a tall hat. He is saying something to himself, but not a word of it can be made out. The noise behind the stage gets louder and louder. A voice is heard: \u201cLet\u2019s go in there.\u201d Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, ANYA, and CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA with a little dog on a chain, and all dressed in travelling clothes, VARYA in a long coat and with a kerchief on her head. GAEV, SIMEONOV-PISCHIN, LOPAKHIN, DUNYASHA with a parcel and an umbrella, and a servant with luggage\u2014all cross the room.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. Let\u2019s come through here. Do you remember what this room is, mother?<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Joyfully, through her tears] The nursery!<\/p>\n
VARYA. How cold it is! My hands are quite numb. [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] Your rooms, the white one and the violet one, are just as they used to be, mother.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. My dear nursery, oh, you beautiful room…. I used to sleep here when I was a baby. [Weeps] And here I am like a little girl again. [Kisses her brother, VARYA, then her brother again] And Varya is just as she used to be, just like a nun. And I knew Dunyasha. [Kisses her.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. The train was two hours late. There now; how\u2019s that for punctuality?<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. [To PISCHIN] My dog eats nuts too.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Astonished] To think of that, now!<\/p>\n
[All go out except ANYA and DUNYASHA.]<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. We did have to wait for you!<\/p>\n
[Takes off ANYA\u2019S cloak and hat.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. I didn\u2019t get any sleep for four nights on the journey…. I\u2019m awfully cold.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. You went away during Lent, when it was snowing and frosty, but now? Darling! [Laughs and kisses her] We did have to wait for you, my joy, my pet…. I must tell you at once, I can\u2019t bear to wait a minute.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Tired] Something else now…?<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. The clerk, Epikhodov, proposed to me after Easter.<\/p>\n
ANYA. Always the same…. [Puts her hair straight] I\u2019ve lost all my hairpins…. [She is very tired, and even staggers as she walks.]<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. I don\u2019t know what to think about it. He loves me, he loves me so much!<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Looks into her room; in a gentle voice] My room, my windows, as if I\u2019d never gone away. I\u2019m at home! To-morrow morning I\u2019ll get up and have a run in the garden….Oh, if I could only get to sleep! I didn\u2019t sleep the whole journey, I was so bothered.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. Peter Sergeyevitch came two days ago.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Joyfully] Peter!<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. He sleeps in the bath-house, he lives there. He said he was afraid he\u2019d be in the way. [Looks at her pocket-watch] I ought to wake him, but Barbara Mihailovna told me not to. \u201cDon\u2019t wake him,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
[Enter VARYA, a bunch of keys on her belt.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. Dunyasha, some coffee, quick. Mother wants some.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. This minute. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. Well, you\u2019ve come, glory be to God. Home again. [Caressing her] My darling is back again! My pretty one is back again!<\/p>\n
ANYA. I did have an awful time, I tell you.<\/p>\n
VARYA. I can just imagine it!<\/p>\n
ANYA. I went away in Holy Week; it was very cold then. Charlotta talked the whole way and would go on performing her tricks. Why did you tie Charlotta on to me?<\/p>\n
VARYA. You couldn\u2019t go alone, darling, at seventeen!<\/p>\n
ANYA. We went to Paris; it\u2019s cold there and snowing. I talk French perfectly horribly. My mother lives on the fifth floor. I go to her, and find her there with various Frenchmen, women, an old abb\u00e9 with a book, and everything in tobacco smoke and with no comfort at all. I suddenly became very sorry for mother\u2014so sorry that I took her head in my arms and hugged her and wouldn\u2019t let her go. Then mother started hugging me and crying….<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Weeping] Don\u2019t say any more, don\u2019t say any more….<\/p>\n
ANYA. She\u2019s already sold her villa near Mentone; she\u2019s nothing left, nothing. And I haven\u2019t a copeck left either; we only just managed to get here. And mother won\u2019t understand! We had dinner at a station; she asked for all the expensive things, and tipped the waiters one rouble each. And Charlotta too. Yasha wants his share too\u2014it\u2019s too bad. Mother\u2019s got a footman now, Yasha; we\u2019ve brought him here.<\/p>\n
VARYA. I saw the wretch.<\/p>\n
ANYA. How\u2019s business? Has the interest been paid?<\/p>\n
VARYA. Not much chance of that.<\/p>\n
ANYA. Oh God, oh God…<\/p>\n
VARYA. The place will be sold in August.<\/p>\n
ANYA. O God….<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Looks in at the door and moos] Moo!… [Exit.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Through her tears] I\u2019d like to…. [Shakes her fist.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Embraces VARYA, softly] Varya, has he proposed to you? [VARYA shakes head] But he loves you…. Why don\u2019t you make up your minds? Why do you keep on waiting?<\/p>\n
VARYA. I think that it will all come to nothing. He\u2019s a busy man. I\u2019m not his affair… he pays no attention to me. Bless the man, I don\u2019t want to see him…. But everybody talks about our marriage, everybody congratulates me, and there\u2019s nothing in it at all, it\u2019s all like a dream. [In another tone] You\u2019ve got a brooch like a bee.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Sadly] Mother bought it. [Goes into her room, and talks lightly, like a child] In Paris I went up in a balloon!<\/p>\n
VARYA. My darling\u2019s come back, my pretty one\u2019s come back! [DUNYASHA has already returned with the coffee-pot and is making the coffee, VARYA stands near the door] I go about all day, looking after the house, and I think all the time, if only you could marry a rich man, then I\u2019d be happy and would go away somewhere by myself, then to Kiev… to Moscow, and so on, from one holy place to another. I\u2019d tramp and tramp. That would be splendid!<\/p>\n
ANYA. The birds are singing in the garden. What time is it now?<\/p>\n
VARYA. It must be getting on for three. Time you went to sleep, darling. [Goes into ANYA\u2019S room] Splendid!<\/p>\n
[Enter YASHA with a plaid shawl and a travelling bag.]<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Crossing the stage: Politely] May I go this way?<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. I hardly knew you, Yasha. You have changed abroad.<\/p>\n
YASHA. Hm… and who are you?<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. When you went away I was only so high. [Showing with her hand] I\u2019m Dunyasha, the daughter of Theodore Kozoyedov. You don\u2019t remember!<\/p>\n
YASHA. Oh, you little cucumber!<\/p>\n
[Looks round and embraces her. She screams and drops a saucer. YASHA goes out quickly.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. [In the doorway: In an angry voice] What\u2019s that?<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. [Through her tears] I\u2019ve broken a saucer.<\/p>\n
VARYA. It may bring luck.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Coming out of her room] We must tell mother that Peter\u2019s here.<\/p>\n
VARYA. I told them not to wake him.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Thoughtfully] Father died six years ago, and a month later my brother Grisha was drowned in the river\u2014such a dear little boy of seven! Mother couldn\u2019t bear it; she went away, away, without looking round…. [Shudders] How I understand her; if only she knew! [Pause] And Peter Trofimov was Grisha\u2019s tutor, he might tell her….<\/p>\n
[Enter FIERS in a short jacket and white waistcoat.]<\/p>\n
FIERS. [Goes to the coffee-pot, nervously] The mistress is going to have some food here…. [Puts on white gloves] Is the coffee ready? [To DUNYASHA, severely] You! Where\u2019s the cream?<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. Oh, dear me…! [Rapid exit.]<\/p>\n
FIERS. [Fussing round the coffee-pot] Oh, you bungler…. [Murmurs to himself] Back from Paris… the master went to Paris once… in a carriage…. [Laughs.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. What are you talking about, Fiers?<\/p>\n
FIERS. I beg your pardon? [Joyfully] The mistress is home again. I\u2019ve lived to see her! Don\u2019t care if I die now…. [Weeps with joy.]<\/p>\n
[Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, GAEV, LOPAKHIN, and SIMEONOV-PISCHIN, the latter in a long jacket of thin cloth and loose trousers. GAEV, coming in, moves his arms and body about as if he is playing billiards.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Let me remember now. Red into the corner! Twice into the centre!<\/p>\n
GAEV. Right into the pocket! Once upon a time you and I used both to sleep in this room, and now I\u2019m fifty-one; it does seem strange.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Yes, time does go.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Who does?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I said that time does go.<\/p>\n
GAEV. It smells of patchouli here.<\/p>\n
ANYA. I\u2019m going to bed. Good-night, mother. [Kisses her.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. My lovely little one. [Kisses her hand] Glad to be at home? I can\u2019t get over it.<\/p>\n
ANYA. Good-night, uncle.<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Kisses her face and hands] God be with you. How you do resemble your mother! [To his sister] You were just like her at her age, Luba.<\/p>\n
[ANYA gives her hand to LOPAKHIN and PISCHIN and goes out, shutting the door behind her.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. She\u2019s awfully tired.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. It\u2019s a very long journey.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [To LOPAKHIN and PISCHIN] Well, sirs, it\u2019s getting on for three, quite time you went.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Laughs] You\u2019re just the same as ever, Varya. [Draws her close and kisses her] I\u2019ll have some coffee now, then we\u2019ll all go. [FIERS lays a cushion under her feet] Thank you, dear. I\u2019m used to coffee. I drink it day and night. Thank you, dear old man. [Kisses FIERS.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. I\u2019ll go and see if they\u2019ve brought in all the luggage. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Is it really I who am sitting here? [Laughs] I want to jump about and wave my arms. [Covers her face with her hands] But suppose I\u2019m dreaming! God knows I love my own country, I love it deeply; I couldn\u2019t look out of the railway carriage, I cried so much. [Through her tears] Still, I must have my coffee. Thank you, Fiers. Thank you, dear old man. I\u2019m so glad you\u2019re still with us.<\/p>\n
FIERS. The day before yesterday.<\/p>\n
GAEV. He doesn\u2019t hear well.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I\u2019ve got to go off to Kharkov by the five o\u2019clock train. I\u2019m awfully sorry! I should like to have a look at you, to gossip a little. You\u2019re as fine-looking as ever.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Breathes heavily] Even finer-looking… dressed in Paris fashions… confound it all.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Your brother, Leonid Andreyevitch, says I\u2019m a snob, a usurer, but that is absolutely nothing to me. Let him talk. Only I do wish you would believe in me as you once did, that your wonderful, touching eyes would look at me as they did before. Merciful God! My father was the serf of your grandfather and your own father, but you\u2014you more than anybody else\u2014did so much for me once upon a time that I\u2019ve forgotten everything and love you as if you belonged to my family… and even more.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I can\u2019t sit still, I\u2019m not in a state to do it. [Jumps up and walks about in great excitement] I\u2019ll never survive this happiness…. You can laugh at me; I\u2019m a silly woman…. My dear little cupboard. [Kisses cupboard] My little table.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Nurse has died in your absence.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Sits and drinks coffee] Yes, bless her soul. I heard by letter.<\/p>\n
GAEV. And Anastasius has died too. Peter Kosoy has left me and now lives in town with the Commissioner of Police. [Takes a box of sugar-candy out of his pocket and sucks a piece.]<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. My daughter, Dashenka, sends her love.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I want to say something very pleasant, very delightful, to you. [Looks at his watch] I\u2019m going away at once, I haven\u2019t much time… but I\u2019ll tell you all about it in two or three words. As you already know, your cherry orchard is to be sold to pay your debts, and the sale is fixed for August 22; but you needn\u2019t be alarmed, dear madam, you may sleep in peace; there\u2019s a way out. Here\u2019s my plan. Please attend carefully! Your estate is only thirteen miles from the town, the railway runs by, and if the cherry orchard and the land by the river are broken up into building lots and are then leased off for villas you\u2019ll get at least twenty-five thousand roubles a year profit out of it.<\/p>\n
GAEV. How utterly absurd!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I don\u2019t understand you at all, Ermolai Alexeyevitch.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. You will get twenty-five roubles a year for each dessiatin from the leaseholders at the very least, and if you advertise now I\u2019m willing to bet that you won\u2019t have a vacant plot left by the autumn; they\u2019ll all go. In a word, you\u2019re saved. I congratulate you. Only, of course, you\u2019ll have to put things straight, and clean up…. For instance, you\u2019ll have to pull down all the old buildings, this house, which isn\u2019t any use to anybody now, and cut down the old cherry orchard….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Cut it down? My dear man, you must excuse me, but you don\u2019t understand anything at all. If there\u2019s anything interesting or remarkable in the whole province, it\u2019s this cherry orchard of ours.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. The only remarkable thing about the orchard is that it\u2019s very large. It only bears fruit every other year, and even then you don\u2019t know what to do with them; nobody buys any.<\/p>\n
GAEV. This orchard is mentioned in the \u201cEncyclopaedic Dictionary.\u201d<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Looks at his watch] If we can\u2019t think of anything and don\u2019t make up our minds to anything, then on August 22, both the cherry orchard and the whole estate will be up for auction. Make up your mind! I swear there\u2019s no other way out, I\u2019ll swear it again.<\/p>\n
FIERS. In the old days, forty or fifty years back, they dried the cherries, soaked them and pickled them, and made jam of them, and it used to happen that…<\/p>\n
GAEV. Be quiet, Fiers.<\/p>\n
FIERS. And then we\u2019d send the dried cherries off in carts to Moscow and Kharkov. And money! And the dried cherries were soft, juicy, sweet, and nicely scented…. They knew the way….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. What was the way?<\/p>\n
FIERS. They\u2019ve forgotten. Nobody remembers.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] What about Paris? Eh? Did you eat frogs?<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I ate crocodiles.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. To think of that, now.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Up to now in the villages there were only the gentry and the labourers, and now the people who live in villas have arrived. All towns now, even small ones, are surrounded by villas. And it\u2019s safe to say that in twenty years\u2019 time the villa resident will be all over the place. At present he sits on his balcony and drinks tea, but it may well come to pass that he\u2019ll begin to cultivate his patch of land, and then your cherry orchard will be happy, rich, splendid….<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Angry] What rot!<\/p>\n
[Enter VARYA and YASHA.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. There are two telegrams for you, little mother. [Picks out a key and noisily unlocks an antique cupboard] Here they are.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. They\u2019re from Paris…. [Tears them up without reading them] I\u2019ve done with Paris.<\/p>\n
GAEV. And do you know, Luba, how old this case is? A week ago I took out the bottom drawer; I looked and saw figures burnt out in it. That case was made exactly a hundred years ago. What do you think of that? What? We could celebrate its jubilee. It hasn\u2019t a soul of its own, but still, say what you will, it\u2019s a fine bookcase.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Astonished] A hundred years…. Think of that!<\/p>\n
GAEV. Yes… it\u2019s a real thing. [Handling it] My dear and honoured case! I congratulate you on your existence, which has already for more than a hundred years been directed towards the bright ideals of good and justice; your silent call to productive labour has not grown less in the hundred years [Weeping] during which you have upheld virtue and faith in a better future to the generations of our race, educating us up to ideals of goodness and to the knowledge of a common consciousness. [Pause.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Yes….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. You\u2019re just the same as ever, Leon.<\/p>\n
GAEV. [A little confused] Off the white on the right, into the corner pocket. Red ball goes into the middle pocket!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Looks at his watch] It\u2019s time I went.<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Giving LUBOV ANDREYEVNA her medicine] Will you take your pills now?<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. You oughtn\u2019t to take medicines, dear madam; they do you neither harm nor good…. Give them here, dear madam. [Takes the pills, turns them out into the palm of his hand, blows on them, puts them into his mouth, and drinks some kvass] There!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Frightened] You\u2019re off your head!<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. I\u2019ve taken all the pills.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Gormandizer! [All laugh.]<\/p>\n
FIERS. They were here in Easter week and ate half a pailful of cucumbers…. [Mumbles.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. What\u2019s he driving at?<\/p>\n
VARYA. He\u2019s been mumbling away for three years. We\u2019re used to that.<\/p>\n
YASHA. Senile decay.<\/p>\n
[CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA crosses the stage, dressed in white: she is very thin and tightly laced; has a lorgnette at her waist.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Excuse me, Charlotta Ivanovna, I haven\u2019t said \u201cHow do you do\u201d to you yet. [Tries to kiss her hand.]<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. [Takes her hand away] If you let people kiss your hand, then they\u2019ll want your elbow, then your shoulder, and then…<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. My luck\u2019s out to-day! [All laugh] Show us a trick, Charlotta Ivanovna!<\/p>\n
LUBOV ANDREYEVNA. Charlotta, do us a trick.<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. It\u2019s not necessary. I want to go to bed. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. We shall see each other in three weeks. [Kisses LUBOV ANDREYEVNA\u2019S hand] Now, good-bye. It\u2019s time to go. [To GAEV] See you again. [Kisses PISCHIN] Au revoir. [Gives his hand to VARYA, then to FIERS and to YASHA] I don\u2019t want to go away. [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA]. If you think about the villas and make up your mind, then just let me know, and I\u2019ll raise a loan of 50,000 roubles at once. Think about it seriously.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Angrily] Do go, now!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I\u2019m going, I\u2019m going…. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. Snob. Still, I beg pardon…. Varya\u2019s going to marry him, he\u2019s Varya\u2019s young man.<\/p>\n
VARYA. Don\u2019t talk too much, uncle.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Why not, Varya? I should be very glad. He\u2019s a good man.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. To speak the honest truth… he\u2019s a worthy man…. And my Dashenka… also says that… she says lots of things. [Snores, but wakes up again at once] But still, dear madam, if you could lend me… 240 roubles… to pay the interest on my mortgage to-morrow…<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Frightened] We haven\u2019t got it, we haven\u2019t got it!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. It\u2019s quite true. I\u2019ve nothing at all.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. I\u2019ll find it all right [Laughs] I never lose hope. I used to think, \u201cEverything\u2019s lost now. I\u2019m a dead man,\u201d when, lo and behold, a railway was built over my land… and they paid me for it. And something else will happen to-day or to-morrow. Dashenka may win 20,000 roubles… she\u2019s got a lottery ticket.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. The coffee\u2019s all gone, we can go to bed.<\/p>\n
FIERS. [Brushing GAEV\u2019S trousers; in an insistent tone] You\u2019ve put on the wrong trousers again. What am I to do with you?<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Quietly] Anya\u2019s asleep. [Opens window quietly] The sun has risen already; it isn\u2019t cold. Look, little mother: what lovely trees! And the air! The starlings are singing!<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Opens the other window] The whole garden\u2019s white. You haven\u2019t forgotten, Luba? There\u2019s that long avenue going straight, straight, like a stretched strap; it shines on moonlight nights. Do you remember? You haven\u2019t forgotten?<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Looks out into the garden] Oh, my childhood, days of my innocence! In this nursery I used to sleep; I used to look out from here into the orchard. Happiness used to wake with me every morning, and then it was just as it is now; nothing has changed. [Laughs from joy] It\u2019s all, all white! Oh, my orchard! After the dark autumns and the cold winters, you\u2019re young again, full of happiness, the angels of heaven haven\u2019t left you…. If only I could take my heavy burden off my breast and shoulders, if I could forget my past!<\/p>\n
GAEV. Yes, and they\u2019ll sell this orchard to pay off debts. How strange it seems!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Look, there\u2019s my dead mother going in the orchard… dressed in white! [Laughs from joy] That\u2019s she.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Where?<\/p>\n
VARYA. God bless you, little mother.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. There\u2019s nobody there; I thought I saw somebody. On the right, at the turning by the summer-house, a white little tree bent down, looking just like a woman. [Enter TROFIMOV in a worn student uniform and spectacles] What a marvellous garden! White masses of flowers, the blue sky….<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Lubov Andreyevna! [She looks round at him] I only want to show myself, and I\u2019ll go away. [Kisses her hand warmly] I was told to wait till the morning, but I didn\u2019t have the patience.<\/p>\n
[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA looks surprised.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Crying] It\u2019s Peter Trofimov.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Peter Trofimov, once the tutor of your Grisha…. Have I changed so much?<\/p>\n
[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA embraces him and cries softly.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Confused] That\u2019s enough, that\u2019s enough, Luba.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Weeps] But I told you, Peter, to wait till to-morrow.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. My Grisha… my boy… Grisha… my son.<\/p>\n
VARYA. What are we to do, little mother? It\u2019s the will of God.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [Softly, through his tears] It\u2019s all right, it\u2019s all right.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Still weeping] My boy\u2019s dead; he was drowned. Why? Why, my friend? [Softly] Anya\u2019s asleep in there. I am speaking so loudly, making such a noise…. Well, Peter? What\u2019s made you look so bad? Why have you grown so old?<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. In the train an old woman called me a decayed gentleman.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. You were quite a boy then, a nice little student, and now your hair is not at all thick and you wear spectacles. Are you really still a student? [Goes to the door.]<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. I suppose I shall always be a student.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Kisses her brother, then VARYA] Well, let\u2019s go to bed…. And you\u2019ve grown older, Leonid.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Follows her] Yes, we\u2019ve got to go to bed…. Oh, my gout! I\u2019ll stay the night here. If only, Lubov Andreyevna, my dear, you could get me 240 roubles to-morrow morning\u2014<\/p>\n
GAEV. Still the same story.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. Two hundred and forty roubles… to pay the interest on the mortgage.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I haven\u2019t any money, dear man.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. I\u2019ll give it back… it\u2019s a small sum….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Well, then, Leonid will give it to you…. Let him have it, Leonid.<\/p>\n
GAEV. By all means; hold out your hand.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Why not? He wants it; he\u2019ll give it back.<\/p>\n
[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, TROFIMOV, PISCHIN, and FIERS go out. GAEV, VARYA, and YASHA remain.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. My sister hasn\u2019t lost the habit of throwing money about. [To YASHA] Stand off, do; you smell of poultry.<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Grins] You are just the same as ever, Leonid Andreyevitch.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Really? [To VARYA] What\u2019s he saying?<\/p>\n
VARYA. [To YASHA] Your mother\u2019s come from the village; she\u2019s been sitting in the servants\u2019 room since yesterday, and wants to see you….<\/p>\n
YASHA. Bless the woman!<\/p>\n
VARYA. Shameless man.<\/p>\n
YASHA. A lot of use there is in her coming. She might have come tomorrow just as well. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. Mother hasn\u2019t altered a scrap, she\u2019s just as she always was. She\u2019d give away everything, if the idea only entered her head.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Yes…. [Pause] If there\u2019s any illness for which people offer many remedies, you may be sure that particular illness is incurable, I think. I work my brains to their hardest. I\u2019ve several remedies, very many, and that really means I\u2019ve none at all. It would be nice to inherit a fortune from somebody, it would be nice to marry our Anya to a rich man, it would be nice to go to Yaroslav and try my luck with my aunt the Countess. My aunt is very, very rich.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Weeps] If only God helped us.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Don\u2019t cry. My aunt\u2019s very rich, but she doesn\u2019t like us. My sister, in the first place, married an advocate, not a noble…. [ANYA appears in the doorway] She not only married a man who was not a noble, but she behaved herself in a way which cannot be described as proper. She\u2019s nice and kind and charming, and I\u2019m very fond of her, but say what you will in her favour and you still have to admit that she\u2019s wicked; you can feel it in her slightest movements.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Whispers] Anya\u2019s in the doorway.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Really? [Pause] It\u2019s curious, something\u2019s got into my right eye… I can\u2019t see properly out of it. And on Thursday, when I was at the District Court…<\/p>\n
[Enter ANYA.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. Why aren\u2019t you in bed, Anya?<\/p>\n
ANYA. Can\u2019t sleep. It\u2019s no good.<\/p>\n
GAEV. My darling! [Kisses ANYA\u2019S face and hands] My child…. [Crying] You\u2019re not my niece, you\u2019re my angel, you\u2019re my all…. Believe in me, believe…<\/p>\n
ANYA. I do believe in you, uncle. Everybody loves you and respects you… but, uncle dear, you ought to say nothing, no more than that. What were you saying just now about my mother, your own sister? Why did you say those things?<\/p>\n
GAEV. Yes, yes. [Covers his face with her hand] Yes, really, it was awful. Save me, my God! And only just now I made a speech before a bookcase… it\u2019s so silly! And only when I\u2019d finished I knew how silly it was.<\/p>\n
VARYA. Yes, uncle dear, you really ought to say less. Keep quiet, that\u2019s all.<\/p>\n
ANYA. You\u2019d be so much happier in yourself if you only kept quiet.<\/p>\n
GAEV. All right, I\u2019ll be quiet. [Kisses their hands] I\u2019ll be quiet. But let\u2019s talk business. On Thursday I was in the District Court, and a lot of us met there together, and we began to talk of this, that, and the other, and now I think I can arrange a loan to pay the interest into the bank.<\/p>\n
VARYA. If only God would help us!<\/p>\n
GAEV. I\u2019ll go on Tuesday. I\u2019ll talk with them about it again. [To VARYA] Don\u2019t howl. [To ANYA] Your mother will have a talk to Lopakhin; he, of course, won\u2019t refuse… And when you\u2019ve rested you\u2019ll go to Yaroslav to the Countess, your grandmother. So you see, we\u2019ll have three irons in the fire, and we\u2019ll be safe. We\u2019ll pay up the interest. I\u2019m certain. [Puts some sugar-candy into his mouth] I swear on my honour, on anything you will, that the estate will not be sold! [Excitedly] I swear on my happiness! Here\u2019s my hand. You may call me a dishonourable wretch if I let it go to auction! I swear by all I am!<\/p>\n
ANYA. [She is calm again and happy] How good and clever you are, uncle. [Embraces him] I\u2019m happy now! I\u2019m happy! All\u2019s well!<\/p>\n
[Enter FIERS.]<\/p>\n
FIERS. [Reproachfully] Leonid Andreyevitch, don\u2019t you fear God? When are you going to bed?<\/p>\n
GAEV. Soon, soon. You go away, Fiers. I\u2019ll undress myself. Well, children, bye-bye…! I\u2019ll give you the details to-morrow, but let\u2019s go to bed now. [Kisses ANYA and VARYA] I\u2019m a man of the eighties…. People don\u2019t praise those years much, but I can still say that I\u2019ve suffered for my beliefs. The peasants don\u2019t love me for nothing, I assure you. We\u2019ve got to learn to know the peasants! We ought to learn how….<\/p>\n
ANYA. You\u2019re doing it again, uncle!<\/p>\n
VARYA. Be quiet, uncle!<\/p>\n
FIERS. [Angrily] Leonid Andreyevitch!<\/p>\n
GAEV. I\u2019m coming, I\u2019m coming…. Go to bed now. Off two cushions into the middle! I turn over a new leaf…. [Exit. FIERS goes out after him.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. I\u2019m quieter now. I don\u2019t want to go to Yaroslav, I don\u2019t like grandmother; but I\u2019m calm now; thanks to uncle. [Sits down.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. It\u2019s time to go to sleep. I\u2019ll go. There\u2019s been an unpleasantness here while you were away. In the old servants\u2019 part of the house, as you know, only the old people live\u2014little old Efim and Polya and Evstigney, and Karp as well. They started letting some tramps or other spend the night there\u2014I said nothing. Then I heard that they were saying that I had ordered them to be fed on peas and nothing else; from meanness, you see…. And it was all Evstigney\u2019s doing…. Very well, I thought, if that\u2019s what the matter is, just you wait. So I call Evstigney…. [Yawns] He comes. \u201cWhat\u2019s this,\u201d I say, \u201cEvstigney, you old fool.\u201d… [Looks at ANYA] Anya dear! [Pause] She\u2019s dropped off…. [Takes ANYA\u2019S arm] Let\u2019s go to bye-bye…. Come along!… [Leads her] My darling\u2019s gone to sleep! Come on…. [They go. In the distance, the other side of the orchard, a shepherd plays his pipe. TROFIMOV crosses the stage and stops on seeing VARYA and ANYA] Sh! She\u2019s asleep, asleep. Come on, dear.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Quietly, half-asleep] I\u2019m so tired… all the bells… uncle, dear! Mother and uncle!<\/p>\n
VARYA. Come on, dear, come on! [They go into ANYA\u2019S room.]<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [Moved] My sun! My spring!<\/p>\n
Curtain.<\/p>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n<\/div>\n
ACT TWO<\/h2>\n
[In a field. An old, crooked shrine, which has been long abandoned; near it a well and large stones, which apparently are old tombstones, and an old garden seat. The road is seen to GAEV\u2019S estate. On one side rise dark poplars, behind them begins the cherry orchard. In the distance is a row of telegraph poles, and far, far away on the horizon are the indistinct signs of a large town, which can only be seen on the finest and clearest days. It is close on sunset. CHARLOTTA, YASHA, and DUNYASHA are sitting on the seat; EPIKHODOV stands by and plays on a guitar; all seem thoughtful. CHARLOTTA wears a man\u2019s old peaked cap; she has unslung a rifle from her shoulders and is putting to rights the buckle on the strap.]<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. [Thoughtfully] I haven\u2019t a real passport. I don\u2019t know how old I am, and I think I\u2019m young. When I was a little girl my father and mother used to go round fairs and give very good performances and I used to do the salto mortale<\/i> and various little things. And when papa and mamma died a German lady took me to her and began to teach me. I liked it. I grew up and became a governess. And where I came from and who I am, I don\u2019t know…. Who my parents were\u2014perhaps they weren\u2019t married\u2014I don\u2019t know. [Takes a cucumber out of her pocket and eats] I don\u2019t know anything. [Pause] I do want to talk, but I haven\u2019t anybody to talk to… I haven\u2019t anybody at all.<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. [Plays on the guitar and sings]<\/p>\n
   \u201cWhat is this noisy earth to me,\r\n   What matter friends and foes?\u201d\r\n    I do like playing on the mandoline!\r\n<\/pre>\n
DUNYASHA. That\u2019s a guitar, not a mandoline. [Looks at herself in a little mirror and powders herself.]<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. For the enamoured madman, this is a mandoline. [Sings]<\/p>\n
   \u201cOh that the heart was warmed,\r\n   By all the flames of love returned!\u201d\r\n<\/pre>\n
[YASHA sings too.]<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. These people sing terribly…. Foo! Like jackals.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. [To YASHA] Still, it must be nice to live abroad.<\/p>\n
YASHA. Yes, certainly. I cannot differ from you there. [Yawns and lights a cigar.]<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. That is perfectly natural. Abroad everything is in full complexity.<\/p>\n
YASHA. That goes without saying.<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. I\u2019m an educated man, I read various remarkable books, but I cannot understand the direction I myself want to go\u2014whether to live or to shoot myself, as it were. So, in case, I always carry a revolver about with me. Here it is. [Shows a revolver.]<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. I\u2019ve done. Now I\u2019ll go. [Slings the rifle] You, Epikhodov, are a very clever man and very terrible; women must be madly in love with you. Brrr! [Going] These wise ones are all so stupid. I\u2019ve nobody to talk to. I\u2019m always alone, alone; I\u2019ve nobody at all… and I don\u2019t know who I am or why I live. [Exit slowly.]<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. As a matter of fact, independently of everything else, I must express my feeling, among other things, that fate has been as pitiless in her dealings with me as a storm is to a small ship. Suppose, let us grant, I am wrong; then why did I wake up this morning, to give an example, and behold an enormous spider on my chest, like that. [Shows with both hands] And if I do drink some kvass, why is it that there is bound to be something of the most indelicate nature in it, such as a beetle? [Pause] Have you read Buckle? [Pause] I should like to trouble you, Avdotya Fedorovna, for two words.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. Say on.<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. I should prefer to be alone with you. [Sighs.]<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. [Shy] Very well, only first bring me my little cloak…. It\u2019s by the cupboard. It\u2019s a little damp here.<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. Very well… I\u2019ll bring it…. Now I know what to do with my revolver. [Takes guitar and exits, strumming.]<\/p>\n
YASHA. Two-and-twenty troubles! A silly man, between you and me and the gatepost. [Yawns.]<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. I hope to goodness he won\u2019t shoot himself. [Pause] I\u2019m so nervous, I\u2019m worried. I went into service when I was quite a little girl, and now I\u2019m not used to common life, and my hands are white, white as a lady\u2019s. I\u2019m so tender and so delicate now; respectable and afraid of everything…. I\u2019m so frightened. And I don\u2019t know what will happen to my nerves if you deceive me, Yasha.<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Kisses her] Little cucumber! Of course, every girl must respect herself; there\u2019s nothing I dislike more than a badly behaved girl.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. I\u2019m awfully in love with you; you\u2019re educated, you can talk about everything. [Pause.]<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Yawns] Yes. I think this: if a girl loves anybody, then that means she\u2019s immoral. [Pause] It\u2019s nice to smoke a cigar out in the open air…. [Listens] Somebody\u2019s coming. It\u2019s the mistress, and people with her. [DUNYASHA embraces him suddenly] Go to the house, as if you\u2019d been bathing in the river; go by this path, or they\u2019ll meet you and will think I\u2019ve been meeting you. I can\u2019t stand that sort of thing.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. [Coughs quietly] My head\u2019s aching because of your cigar.<\/p>\n
[Exit. YASHA remains, sitting by the shrine. Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, GAEV, and LOPAKHIN.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. You must make up your mind definitely\u2014there\u2019s no time to waste. The question is perfectly plain. Are you willing to let the land for villas or no? Just one word, yes or no? Just one word!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Who\u2019s smoking horrible cigars here? [Sits.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. They built that railway; that\u2019s made this place very handy. [Sits] Went to town and had lunch… red in the middle! I\u2019d like to go in now and have just one game.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. You\u2019ll have time.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Just one word! [Imploringly] Give me an answer!<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Yawns] Really!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Looks in her purse] I had a lot of money yesterday, but there\u2019s very little to-day. My poor Varya feeds everybody on milk soup to save money, in the kitchen the old people only get peas, and I spend recklessly. [Drops the purse, scattering gold coins] There, they are all over the place.<\/p>\n
YASHA. Permit me to pick them up. [Collects the coins.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Please do, Yasha. And why did I go and have lunch there?… A horrid restaurant with band and tablecloths smelling of soap…. Why do you drink so much, Leon? Why do you eat so much? Why do you talk so much? You talked again too much to-day in the restaurant, and it wasn\u2019t at all to the point\u2014about the seventies and about decadents. And to whom? Talking to the waiters about decadents!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Yes.<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Waves his hand] I can\u2019t be cured, that\u2019s obvious…. [Irritably to YASHA] What\u2019s the matter? Why do you keep twisting about in front of me?<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Laughs] I can\u2019t listen to your voice without laughing.<\/p>\n
GAEV. [To his sister] Either he or I…<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Go away, Yasha; get out of this….<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Gives purse to LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] I\u2019ll go at once. [Hardly able to keep from laughing] This minute…. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. That rich man Deriganov is preparing to buy your estate. They say he\u2019ll come to the sale himself.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Where did you hear that?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. They say so in town.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Our Yaroslav aunt has promised to send something, but I don\u2019t know when or how much.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. How much will she send? A hundred thousand roubles? Or two, perhaps?<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I\u2019d be glad of ten or fifteen thousand.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. You must excuse my saying so, but I\u2019ve never met such frivolous people as you before, or anybody so unbusinesslike and peculiar. Here I am telling you in plain language that your estate will be sold, and you don\u2019t seem to understand.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. What are we to do? Tell us, what?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I tell you every day. I say the same thing every day. Both the cherry orchard and the land must be leased off for villas and at once, immediately\u2014the auction is staring you in the face: Understand! Once you do definitely make up your minds to the villas, then you\u2019ll have as much money as you want and you\u2019ll be saved.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Villas and villa residents\u2014it\u2019s so vulgar, excuse me.<\/p>\n
GAEV. I entirely agree with you.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I must cry or yell or faint. I can\u2019t stand it! You\u2019re too much for me! [To GAEV] You old woman!<\/p>\n
GAEV. Really!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Old woman! [Going out.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Frightened] No, don\u2019t go away, do stop; be a dear. Please. Perhaps we\u2019ll find some way out!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. What\u2019s the good of trying to think!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Please don\u2019t go away. It\u2019s nicer when you\u2019re here…. [Pause] I keep on waiting for something to happen, as if the house is going to collapse over our heads.<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Thinking deeply] Double in the corner… across the middle….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. We have been too sinful….<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. What sins have you committed?<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Puts candy into his mouth] They say that I\u2019ve eaten all my substance in sugar-candies. [Laughs.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Oh, my sins…. I\u2019ve always scattered money about without holding myself in, like a madwoman, and I married a man who made nothing but debts. My husband died of champagne\u2014he drank terribly\u2014and to my misfortune, I fell in love with another man and went off with him, and just at that time\u2014it was my first punishment, a blow that hit me right on the head\u2014here, in the river… my boy was drowned, and I went away, quite away, never to return, never to see this river again…I shut my eyes and ran without thinking, but he<\/i> ran after me… without pity, without respect. I bought a villa near Mentone because he<\/i> fell ill there, and for three years I knew no rest either by day or night; the sick man wore me out, and my soul dried up. And last year, when they had sold the villa to pay my debts, I went away to Paris, and there he robbed me of all I had and threw me over and went off with another woman. I tried to poison myself…. It was so silly, so shameful…. And suddenly I longed to be back in Russia, my own land, with my little girl…. [Wipes her tears] Lord, Lord be merciful to me, forgive me my sins! Punish me no more! [Takes a telegram out of her pocket] I had this to-day from Paris…. He begs my forgiveness, he implores me to return…. [Tears it up] Don\u2019t I hear music? [Listens.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. That is our celebrated Jewish band. You remember\u2014four violins, a flute, and a double-bass.<\/p>\n
LUBOV So it still exists? It would be nice if they came along some evening.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Listens] I can\u2019t hear…. [Sings quietly] \u201cFor money will the Germans make a Frenchman of a Russian.\u201d [Laughs] I saw such an awfully funny thing at the theatre last night.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I\u2019m quite sure there wasn\u2019t anything at all funny. You oughtn\u2019t to go and see plays, you ought to go and look at yourself. What a grey life you lead, what a lot you talk unnecessarily.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. It\u2019s true. To speak the straight truth, we live a silly life. [Pause] My father was a peasant, an idiot, he understood nothing, he didn\u2019t teach me, he was always drunk, and always used a stick on me. In point of fact, I\u2019m a fool and an idiot too. I\u2019ve never learned anything, my handwriting is bad, I write so that I\u2019m quite ashamed before people, like a pig!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. You ought to get married, my friend.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Yes… that\u2019s true.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Why not to our Varya? She\u2019s a nice girl.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Yes.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. She\u2019s quite homely in her ways, works all day, and, what matters most, she\u2019s in love with you. And you\u2019ve liked her for a long time.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Well? I don\u2019t mind… she\u2019s a nice girl. [Pause.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. I\u2019m offered a place in a bank. Six thousand roubles a year…. Did you hear?<\/p>\n
LUBOV. What\u2019s the matter with you! Stay where you are….<\/p>\n
[Enter FIERS with an overcoat.]<\/p>\n
FIERS. [To GAEV] Please, sir, put this on, it\u2019s damp.<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Putting it on] You\u2019re a nuisance, old man.<\/p>\n
FIERS It\u2019s all very well…. You went away this morning without telling me. [Examining GAEV.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. How old you\u2019ve grown, Fiers!<\/p>\n
FIERS. I beg your pardon?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. She says you\u2019ve grown very old!<\/p>\n
FIERS. I\u2019ve been alive a long time. They were already getting ready to marry me before your father was born…. [Laughs] And when the Emancipation came I was already first valet. Only I didn\u2019t agree with the Emancipation and remained with my people…. [Pause] I remember everybody was happy, but they didn\u2019t know why.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. It was very good for them in the old days. At any rate, they used to beat them.<\/p>\n
FIERS. [Not hearing] Rather. The peasants kept their distance from the masters and the masters kept their distance from the peasants, but now everything\u2019s all anyhow and you can\u2019t understand anything.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Be quiet, Fiers. I\u2019ve got to go to town tomorrow. I\u2019ve been promised an introduction to a General who may lend me money on a bill.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Nothing will come of it. And you won\u2019t pay your interest, don\u2019t you worry.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. He\u2019s talking rubbish. There\u2019s no General at all.<\/p>\n
[Enter TROFIMOV, ANYA, and VARYA.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. Here they are.<\/p>\n
ANYA. Mother\u2019s sitting down here.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Tenderly] Come, come, my dears…. [Embracing ANYA and VARYA] If you two only knew how much I love you. Sit down next to me, like that. [All sit down.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Our eternal student is always with the ladies.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. That\u2019s not your business.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. He\u2019ll soon be fifty, and he\u2019s still a student.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Leave off your silly jokes!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Getting angry, eh, silly?<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Shut up, can\u2019t you.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Laughs] I wonder what you think of me?<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. I think, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, that you\u2019re a rich man, and you\u2019ll soon be a millionaire. Just as the wild beast which eats everything it finds is needed for changes to take place in matter, so you are needed too.<\/p>\n
[All laugh.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. Better tell us something about the planets, Peter.<\/p>\n
LUBOV ANDREYEVNA. No, let\u2019s go on with yesterday\u2019s talk!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. About what?<\/p>\n
GAEV. About the proud man.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Yesterday we talked for a long time but we didn\u2019t come to anything in the end. There\u2019s something mystical about the proud man, in your sense. Perhaps you are right from your point of view, but if you take the matter simply, without complicating it, then what pride can there be, what sense can there be in it, if a man is imperfectly made, physiologically speaking, if in the vast majority of cases he is coarse and stupid and deeply unhappy? We must stop admiring one another. We must work, nothing more.<\/p>\n
GAEV. You\u2019ll die, all the same.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Who knows? And what does it mean\u2014you\u2019ll die? Perhaps a man has a hundred senses, and when he dies only the five known to us are destroyed and the remaining ninety-five are left alive.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. How clever of you, Peter!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Ironically] Oh, awfully!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. The human race progresses, perfecting its powers. Everything that is unattainable now will some day be near at hand and comprehensible, but we must work, we must help with all our strength those who seek to know what fate will bring. Meanwhile in Russia only a very few of us work. The vast majority of those intellectuals whom I know seek for nothing, do nothing, and are at present incapable of hard work. They call themselves intellectuals, but they use \u201cthou\u201d and \u201cthee\u201d to their servants, they treat the peasants like animals, they learn badly, they read nothing seriously, they do absolutely nothing, about science they only talk, about art they understand little. They are all serious, they all have severe faces, they all talk about important things. They philosophize, and at the same time, the vast majority of us, ninety-nine out of a hundred, live like savages, fighting and cursing at the slightest opportunity, eating filthily, sleeping in the dirt, in stuffiness, with fleas, stinks, smells, moral filth, and so on… And it\u2019s obvious that all our nice talk is only carried on to distract ourselves and others. Tell me, where are those cr\u00e9ches we hear so much of? and where are those reading-rooms? People only write novels about them; they don\u2019t really exist. Only dirt, vulgarity, and Asiatic plagues really exist…. I\u2019m afraid, and I don\u2019t at all like serious faces; I don\u2019t like serious conversations. Let\u2019s be quiet sooner.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. You know, I get up at five every morning, I work from morning till evening, I am always dealing with money\u2014my own and other people\u2019s\u2014and I see what people are like. You\u2019ve only got to begin to do anything to find out how few honest, honourable people there are. Sometimes, when I can\u2019t sleep, I think: \u201cOh Lord, you\u2019ve given us huge forests, infinite fields, and endless horizons, and we, living here, ought really to be giants.\u201d<\/p>\n
LUBOV. You want giants, do you?… They\u2019re only good in stories, and even there they frighten one. [EPIKHODOV enters at the back of the stage playing his guitar. Thoughtfully:] Epikhodov\u2019s there.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Thoughtfully] Epikhodov\u2019s there.<\/p>\n
GAEV. The sun\u2019s set, ladies and gentlemen.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Yes.<\/p>\n
GAEV [Not loudly, as if declaiming] O Nature, thou art wonderful, thou shinest with eternal radiance! Oh, beautiful and indifferent one, thou whom we call mother, thou containest in thyself existence and death, thou livest and destroyest….<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Entreatingly] Uncle, dear!<\/p>\n
ANYA. Uncle, you\u2019re doing it again!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. You\u2019d better double the red into the middle.<\/p>\n
GAEV. I\u2019ll be quiet, I\u2019ll be quiet.<\/p>\n
[They all sit thoughtfully. It is quiet. Only the mumbling of FIERS is heard. Suddenly a distant sound is heard as if from the sky, the sound of a breaking string, which dies away sadly.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. What\u2019s that?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I don\u2019t know. It may be a bucket fallen down a well somewhere. But it\u2019s some way off.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Or perhaps it\u2019s some bird… like a heron.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Or an owl.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Shudders] It\u2019s unpleasant, somehow. [A pause.]<\/p>\n
FIERS. Before the misfortune the same thing happened. An owl screamed and the samovar hummed without stopping.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Before what misfortune?<\/p>\n
FIERS. Before the Emancipation. [A pause.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. You know, my friends, let\u2019s go in; it\u2019s evening now. [To ANYA] You\u2019ve tears in your eyes…. What is it, little girl? [Embraces her.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. It\u2019s nothing, mother.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Some one\u2019s coming.<\/p>\n
[Enter a TRAMP in an old white peaked cap and overcoat. He is a little drunk.]<\/p>\n
TRAMP. Excuse me, may I go this way straight through to the station?<\/p>\n
GAEV. You may. Go along this path.<\/p>\n
TRAMP. I thank you from the bottom of my heart. [Hiccups] Lovely weather…. [Declaims] My brother, my suffering brother…. Come out on the Volga, you whose groans… [To VARYA] Mademoiselle, please give a hungry Russian thirty copecks….<\/p>\n
[VARYA screams, frightened.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Angrily] There\u2019s manners everybody\u2019s got to keep!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [With a start] Take this… here you are…. [Feels in her purse] There\u2019s no silver…. It doesn\u2019t matter, here\u2019s gold.<\/p>\n
TRAMP. I am deeply grateful to you! [Exit. Laughter.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Frightened] I\u2019m going, I\u2019m going…. Oh, little mother, at home there\u2019s nothing for the servants to eat, and you gave him gold.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. What is to be done with such a fool as I am! At home I\u2019ll give you everything I\u2019ve got. Ermolai Alexeyevitch, lend me some more!…<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Very well.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Let\u2019s go, it\u2019s time. And Varya, we\u2019ve settled your affair; I congratulate you.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Crying] You shouldn\u2019t joke about this, mother.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Oh, feel me, get thee to a nunnery.<\/p>\n
GAEV. My hands are all trembling; I haven\u2019t played billiards for a long time.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Oh, feel me, nymph, remember me in thine orisons.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Come along; it\u2019ll soon be supper-time.<\/p>\n
VARYA. He did frighten me. My heart is beating hard.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Let me remind you, ladies and gentlemen, on August 22 the cherry orchard will be sold. Think of that!… Think of that!…<\/p>\n
[All go out except TROFIMOV and ANYA.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Laughs] Thanks to the tramp who frightened Barbara, we\u2019re alone now.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Varya\u2019s afraid we may fall in love with each other and won\u2019t get away from us for days on end. Her narrow mind won\u2019t allow her to understand that we are above love. To escape all the petty and deceptive things which prevent our being happy and free, that is the aim and meaning of our lives. Forward! We go irresistibly on to that bright star which burns there, in the distance! Don\u2019t lag behind, friends!<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Clapping her hands] How beautifully you talk! [Pause] It is glorious here to-day!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Yes, the weather is wonderful.<\/p>\n
ANYA. What have you done to me, Peter? I don\u2019t love the cherry orchard as I used to. I loved it so tenderly, I thought there was no better place in the world than our orchard.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. All Russia is our orchard. The land is great and beautiful, there are many marvellous places in it. [Pause] Think, Anya, your grandfather, your great-grandfather, and all your ancestors were serf-owners, they owned living souls; and now, doesn\u2019t something human look at you from every cherry in the orchard, every leaf and every stalk? Don\u2019t you hear voices…? Oh, it\u2019s awful, your orchard is terrible; and when in the evening or at night you walk through the orchard, then the old bark on the trees sheds a dim light and the old cherry-trees seem to be dreaming of all that was a hundred, two hundred years ago, and are oppressed by their heavy visions. Still, at any rate, we\u2019ve left those two hundred years behind us. So far we\u2019ve gained nothing at all\u2014we don\u2019t yet know what the past is to be to us\u2014we only philosophize, we complain that we are dull, or we drink vodka. For it\u2019s so clear that in order to begin to live in the present we must first redeem the past, and that can only be done by suffering, by strenuous, uninterrupted labour. Understand that, Anya.<\/p>\n
ANYA. The house in which we live has long ceased to be our house; I shall go away. I give you my word.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. If you have the housekeeping keys, throw them down the well and go away. Be as free as the wind.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Enthusiastically] How nicely you said that!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Believe me, Anya, believe me! I\u2019m not thirty yet, I\u2019m young, I\u2019m still a student, but I have undergone a great deal! I\u2019m as hungry as the winter, I\u2019m ill, I\u2019m shaken. I\u2019m as poor as a beggar, and where haven\u2019t I been\u2014fate has tossed me everywhere! But my soul is always my own; every minute of the day and the night it is filled with unspeakable presentiments. I know that happiness is coming, Anya, I see it already….<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Thoughtful] The moon is rising.<\/p>\n
[EPIKHODOV is heard playing the same sad song on his guitar. The moon rises. Somewhere by the poplars VARYA is looking for ANYA and calling, \u201cAnya, where are you?\u201d]<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Yes, the moon has risen. [Pause] There is happiness, there it comes; it comes nearer and nearer; I hear its steps already. And if we do not see it we shall not know it, but what does that matter? Others will see it!<\/p>\n
THE VOICE OF VARYA. Anya! Where are you?<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. That\u2019s Varya again! [Angry] Disgraceful!<\/p>\n
ANYA. Never mind. Let\u2019s go to the river. It\u2019s nice there.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV Let\u2019s go. [They go out.]<\/p>\n
THE VOICE OF VARYA. Anya! Anya!<\/p>\n
Curtain.<\/p>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n<\/div>\n
ACT THREE<\/h2>\n
[A reception-room cut off from a drawing-room by an arch. Chandelier lighted. A Jewish band, the one mentioned in Act II, is heard playing in another room. Evening. In the drawing-room the grand rond is being danced. Voice of SIMEONOV PISCHIN \u201cPromenade a une paire!\u201d Dancers come into the reception-room; the first pair are PISCHIN and CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA; the second, TROFIMOV and LUBOV ANDREYEVNA; the third, ANYA and the POST OFFICE CLERK; the fourth, VARYA and the STATION-MASTER, and so on. VARYA is crying gently and wipes away her tears as she dances. DUNYASHA is in the last pair. They go off into the drawing-room, PISCHIN shouting, \u201cGrand rond, balancez:\u201d and \u201cLes cavaliers \u00e0 genou et remerciez vos dames!\u201d FIERS, in a dress-coat, carries a tray with seltzer-water across. Enter PISCHIN and TROFIMOV from the drawing-room.]<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. I\u2019m full-blooded and have already had two strokes; it\u2019s hard for me to dance, but, as they say, if you\u2019re in Rome, you must do as Rome does. I\u2019ve got the strength of a horse. My dead father, who liked a joke, peace to his bones, used to say, talking of our ancestors, that the ancient stock of the Simeonov-Pischins was descended from that identical horse that Caligula made a senator…. [Sits] But the trouble is, I\u2019ve no money! A hungry dog only believes in meat. [Snores and wakes up again immediately] So I… only believe in money….<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Yes. There is something equine about your figure.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. Well… a horse is a fine animal… you can sell a horse.<\/p>\n
[Billiard playing can be heard in the next room. VARYA appears under the arch.]<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [Teasing] Madame Lopakhin! Madame Lopakhin!<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Angry] Decayed gentleman!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Yes, I am a decayed gentleman, and I\u2019m proud of it!<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Bitterly] We\u2019ve hired the musicians, but how are they to be paid? [Exit.]<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [To PISCHIN] If the energy which you, in the course of your life, have spent in looking for money to pay interest had been used for something else, then, I believe, after all, you\u2019d be able to turn everything upside down.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. Nietzsche… a philosopher… a very great, a most celebrated man… a man of enormous brain, says in his books that you can forge bank-notes.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. And have you read Nietzsche?<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. Well… Dashenka told me. Now I\u2019m in such a position, I wouldn\u2019t mind forging them… I\u2019ve got to pay 310 roubles the day after to-morrow… I\u2019ve got 130 already…. [Feels his pockets, nervously] I\u2019ve lost the money! The money\u2019s gone! [Crying] Where\u2019s the money? [Joyfully] Here it is behind the lining… I even began to perspire.<\/p>\n
[Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA and CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Humming a Caucasian dance] Why is Leonid away so long? What\u2019s he doing in town? [To DUNYASHA] Dunyasha, give the musicians some tea.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Business is off, I suppose.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. And the musicians needn\u2019t have come, and we needn\u2019t have got up this ball…. Well, never mind…. [Sits and sings softly.]<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. [Gives a pack of cards to PISCHIN] Here\u2019s a pack of cards, think of any one card you like.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. I\u2019ve thought of one.<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. Now shuffle. All right, now. Give them here, oh my dear Mr. Pischin. Ein, zwei, drei<\/i>! Now look and you\u2019ll find it in your coat-tail pocket.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Takes a card out of his coat-tail pocket] Eight of spades, quite right! [Surprised] Think of that now!<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. [Holds the pack of cards on the palm of her hand. To TROFIMOV] Now tell me quickly. What\u2019s the top card?<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Well, the queen of spades.<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. Right! [To PISCHIN] Well now? What card\u2019s on top?<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. Ace of hearts.<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. Right! [Claps her hands, the pack of cards vanishes] How lovely the weather is to-day. [A mysterious woman\u2019s voice answers her, as if from under the floor, \u201cOh yes, it\u2019s lovely weather, madam.\u201d] You are so beautiful, you are my ideal. [Voice, \u201cYou, madam, please me very much too.\u201d]<\/p>\n
STATION-MASTER. [Applauds] Madame ventriloquist, bravo!<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Surprised] Think of that, now! Delightful, Charlotte Ivanovna… I\u2019m simply in love….<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. In love? [Shrugging her shoulders] Can you love? Guter Mensch aber schlechter Musikant<\/i>.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [Slaps PISCHIN on the shoulder] Oh, you horse!<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. Attention please, here\u2019s another trick. [Takes a shawl from a chair] Here\u2019s a very nice plaid shawl, I\u2019m going to sell it…. [Shakes it] Won\u2019t anybody buy it?<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Astonished] Think of that now!<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. Ein, zwei, drei<\/i>.<\/p>\n
[She quickly lifts up the shawl, which is hanging down. ANYA is standing behind it; she bows and runs to her mother, hugs her and runs back to the drawing-room amid general applause.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Applauds] Bravo, bravo!<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. Once again! Ein, zwei, drei<\/i>!<\/p>\n
[Lifts the shawl. VARYA stands behind it and bows.]<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Astonished] Think of that, now.<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. The end!<\/p>\n
[Throws the shawl at PISCHIN, curtseys and runs into the drawing-room.]<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Runs after her] Little wretch…. What? Would you? [Exit.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Leonid hasn\u2019t come yet. I don\u2019t understand what he\u2019s doing so long in town! Everything must be over by now. The estate must be sold; or, if the sale never came off, then why does he stay so long?<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Tries to soothe her] Uncle has bought it. I\u2019m certain of it.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [Sarcastically] Oh, yes!<\/p>\n
VARYA. Grandmother sent him her authority for him to buy it in her name and transfer the debt to her. She\u2019s doing it for Anya. And I\u2019m certain that God will help us and uncle will buy it.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Grandmother sent fifteen thousand roubles from Yaroslav to buy the property in her name\u2014she won\u2019t trust us\u2014and that wasn\u2019t even enough to pay the interest. [Covers her face with her hands] My fate will be settled to-day, my fate….<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [Teasing VARYA] Madame Lopakhin!<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Angry] Eternal student! He\u2019s already been expelled twice from the university.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Why are you getting angry, Varya? He\u2019s teasing you about Lopakhin, well what of it? You can marry Lopakhin if you want to, he\u2019s a good, interesting man…. You needn\u2019t if you don\u2019t want to; nobody wants to force you against your will, my darling.<\/p>\n
VARYA. I do look at the matter seriously, little mother, to be quite frank. He\u2019s a good man, and I like him.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Then marry him. I don\u2019t understand what you\u2019re waiting for.<\/p>\n
VARYA. I can\u2019t propose to him myself, little mother. People have been talking about him to me for two years now, but he either says nothing, or jokes about it. I understand. He\u2019s getting rich, he\u2019s busy, he can\u2019t bother about me. If I had some money, even a little, even only a hundred roubles, I\u2019d throw up everything and go away. I\u2019d go into a convent.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. How nice!<\/p>\n
VARYA. [To TROFIMOV] A student ought to have sense! [Gently, in tears] How ugly you are now, Peter, how old you\u2019ve grown! [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, no longer crying] But I can\u2019t go on without working, little mother. I want to be doing something every minute.<\/p>\n
[Enter YASHA.]<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Nearly laughing] Epikhodov\u2019s broken a billiard cue! [Exit.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. Why is Epikhodov here? Who said he could play billiards? I don\u2019t understand these people. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Don\u2019t tease her, Peter, you see that she\u2019s quite unhappy without that.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. She takes too much on herself, she keeps on interfering in other people\u2019s business. The whole summer she\u2019s given no peace to me or to Anya, she\u2019s afraid we\u2019ll have a romance all to ourselves. What has it to do with her? As if I\u2019d ever given her grounds to believe I\u2019d stoop to such vulgarity! We are above love.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Then I suppose I must be beneath love. [In agitation] Why isn\u2019t Leonid here? If I only knew whether the estate is sold or not! The disaster seems to me so improbable that I don\u2019t know what to think, I\u2019m all at sea… I may scream… or do something silly. Save me, Peter. Say something, say something.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Isn\u2019t it all the same whether the estate is sold to-day or isn\u2019t? It\u2019s been all up with it for a long time; there\u2019s no turning back, the path\u2019s grown over. Be calm, dear, you shouldn\u2019t deceive yourself, for once in your life at any rate you must look the truth straight in the face.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. What truth? You see where truth is, and where untruth is, but I seem to have lost my sight and see nothing. You boldly settle all important questions, but tell me, dear, isn\u2019t it because you\u2019re young, because you haven\u2019t had time to suffer till you settled a single one of your questions? You boldly look forward, isn\u2019t it because you cannot foresee or expect anything terrible, because so far life has been hidden from your young eyes? You are bolder, more honest, deeper than we are, but think only, be just a little magnanimous, and have mercy on me. I was born here, my father and mother lived here, my grandfather too, I love this house. I couldn\u2019t understand my life without that cherry orchard, and if it really must be sold, sell me with it! [Embraces TROFIMOV, kisses his forehead]. My son was drowned here…. [Weeps] Have pity on me, good, kind man.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. You know I sympathize with all my soul.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Yes, but it ought to be said differently, differently…. [Takes another handkerchief, a telegram falls on the floor] I\u2019m so sick at heart to-day, you can\u2019t imagine. Here it\u2019s so noisy, my soul shakes at every sound. I shake all over, and I can\u2019t go away by myself, I\u2019m afraid of the silence. Don\u2019t judge me harshly, Peter… I loved you, as if you belonged to my family. I\u2019d gladly let Anya marry you, I swear it, only dear, you ought to work, finish your studies. You don\u2019t do anything, only fate throws you about from place to place, it\u2019s so odd…. Isn\u2019t it true? Yes? And you ought to do something to your beard to make it grow better [Laughs] You are funny!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [Picking up telegram] I don\u2019t want to be a Beau Brummel.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. This telegram\u2019s from Paris. I get one every day. Yesterday and to-day. That wild man is ill again, he\u2019s bad again…. He begs for forgiveness, and implores me to come, and I really ought to go to Paris to be near him. You look severe, Peter, but what can I do, my dear, what can I do; he\u2019s ill, he\u2019s alone, unhappy, and who\u2019s to look after him, who\u2019s to keep him away from his errors, to give him his medicine punctually? And why should I conceal it and say nothing about it; I love him, that\u2019s plain, I love him, I love him…. That love is a stone round my neck; I\u2019m going with it to the bottom, but I love that stone and can\u2019t live without it. [Squeezes TROFIMOV\u2019S hand] Don\u2019t think badly of me, Peter, don\u2019t say anything to me, don\u2019t say…<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [Weeping] For God\u2019s sake forgive my speaking candidly, but that man has robbed you!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. No, no, no, you oughtn\u2019t to say that! [Stops her ears.]<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. But he\u2019s a wretch, you alone don\u2019t know it! He\u2019s a petty thief, a nobody….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Angry, but restrained] You\u2019re twenty-six or twenty-seven, and still a schoolboy of the second class!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Why not!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. You ought to be a man, at your age you ought to be able to understand those who love. And you ought to be in love yourself, you must fall in love! [Angry] Yes, yes! You aren\u2019t pure, you\u2019re just a freak, a queer fellow, a funny growth…<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [In horror] What is she saying!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. \u201cI\u2019m above love!\u201d You\u2019re not above love, you\u2019re just what our Fiers calls a bungler. Not to have a mistress at your age!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [In horror] This is awful! What is she saying? [Goes quickly up into the drawing-room, clutching his head] It\u2019s awful… I can\u2019t stand it, I\u2019ll go away. [Exit, but returns at once] All is over between us! [Exit.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Shouts after him] Peter, wait! Silly man, I was joking! Peter! [Somebody is heard going out and falling downstairs noisily. ANYA and VARYA scream; laughter is heard immediately] What\u2019s that?<\/p>\n
[ANYA comes running in, laughing.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. Peter\u2019s fallen downstairs! [Runs out again.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. This Peter\u2019s a marvel.<\/p>\n
[The STATION-MASTER stands in the middle of the drawing-room and recites \u201cThe Magdalen\u201d by Tolstoy. He is listened to, but he has only delivered a few lines when a waltz is heard from the front room, and the recitation is stopped. Everybody dances. TROFIMOV, ANYA, VARYA, and LUBOV ANDREYEVNA come in from the front room.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Well, Peter… you pure soul… I beg your pardon… let\u2019s dance.<\/p>\n
[She dances with PETER. ANYA and VARYA dance. FIERS enters and stands his stick by a side door. YASHA has also come in and looks on at the dance.]<\/p>\n
YASHA. Well, grandfather?<\/p>\n
FIERS. I\u2019m not well. At our balls some time back, generals and barons and admirals used to dance, and now we send for post-office clerks and the Station-master, and even they come as a favour. I\u2019m very weak. The dead master, the grandfather, used to give everybody sealing-wax when anything was wrong. I\u2019ve taken sealing-wax every day for twenty years, and more; perhaps that\u2019s why I still live.<\/p>\n
YASHA. I\u2019m tired of you, grandfather. [Yawns] If you\u2019d only hurry up and kick the bucket.<\/p>\n
FIERS. Oh you… bungler! [Mutters.]<\/p>\n
[TROFIMOV and LUBOV ANDREYEVNA dance in the reception-room, then into the sitting-room.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Merci<\/i>. I\u2019ll sit down. [Sits] I\u2019m tired.<\/p>\n
[Enter ANYA.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Excited] Somebody in the kitchen was saying just now that the cherry orchard was sold to-day.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Sold to whom?<\/p>\n
ANYA. He didn\u2019t say to whom. He\u2019s gone now. [Dances out into the reception-room with TROFIMOV.]<\/p>\n
YASHA. Some old man was chattering about it a long time ago. A stranger!<\/p>\n
FIERS. And Leonid Andreyevitch isn\u2019t here yet, he hasn\u2019t come. He\u2019s wearing a light, demi-saison<\/i> overcoat. He\u2019ll catch cold. Oh these young fellows.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I\u2019ll die of this. Go and find out, Yasha, to whom it\u2019s sold.<\/p>\n
YASHA. Oh, but he\u2019s been gone a long time, the old man. [Laughs.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Slightly vexed] Why do you laugh? What are you glad about?<\/p>\n
YASHA. Epikhodov\u2019s too funny. He\u2019s a silly man. Two-and-twenty troubles.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Fiers, if the estate is sold, where will you go?<\/p>\n
FIERS. I\u2019ll go wherever you order me to go.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Why do you look like that? Are you ill? I think you ought to go to bed….<\/p>\n
FIERS. Yes… [With a smile] I\u2019ll go to bed, and who\u2019ll hand things round and give orders without me? I\u2019ve the whole house on my shoulders.<\/p>\n
YASHA. [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] Lubov Andreyevna! I want to ask a favour of you, if you\u2019ll be so kind! If you go to Paris again, then please take me with you. It\u2019s absolutely impossible for me to stop here. [Looking round; in an undertone] What\u2019s the good of talking about it, you see for yourself that this is an uneducated country, with an immoral population, and it\u2019s so dull. The food in the kitchen is beastly, and here\u2019s this Fiers walking about mumbling various inappropriate things. Take me with you, be so kind!<\/p>\n
[Enter PISCHIN.]<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. I come to ask for the pleasure of a little waltz, dear lady…. [LUBOV ANDREYEVNA goes to him] But all the same, you wonderful woman, I must have 180 little roubles from you… I must…. [They dance] 180 little roubles…. [They go through into the drawing-room.]<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Sings softly]   \u201cOh, will you understand\r\n   My soul\u2019s deep restlessness?\u201d\r\n<\/pre>\n
[In the drawing-room a figure in a grey top-hat and in baggy check trousers is waving its hands and jumping about; there are cries of \u201cBravo, Charlotta Ivanovna!\u201d]<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. [Stops to powder her face] The young mistress tells me to dance\u2014there are a lot of gentlemen, but few ladies\u2014and my head goes round when I dance, and my heart beats, Fiers Nicolaevitch; the Post-office clerk told me something just now which made me catch my breath. [The music grows faint.]<\/p>\n
FIERS. What did he say to you?<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. He says, \u201cYou\u2019re like a little flower.\u201d<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Yawns] Impolite…. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. Like a little flower. I\u2019m such a delicate girl; I simply love words of tenderness.<\/p>\n
FIERS. You\u2019ll lose your head.<\/p>\n
[Enter EPIKHODOV.]<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. You, Avdotya Fedorovna, want to see me no more than if I was some insect. [Sighs] Oh, life!<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. What do you want?<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. Undoubtedly, perhaps, you may be right. [Sighs] But, certainly, if you regard the matter from the aspect, then you, if I may say so, and you must excuse my candidness, have absolutely reduced me to a state of mind. I know my fate, every day something unfortunate happens to me, and I\u2019ve grown used to it a long time ago, I even look at my fate with a smile. You gave me your word, and though I…<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. Please, we\u2019ll talk later on, but leave me alone now. I\u2019m meditating now. [Plays with her fan.]<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. Every day something unfortunate happens to me, and I, if I may so express myself, only smile, and even laugh.<\/p>\n
[VARYA enters from the drawing-room.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. Haven\u2019t you gone yet, Simeon? You really have no respect for anybody. [To DUNYASHA] You go away, Dunyasha. [To EPIKHODOV] You play billiards and break a cue, and walk about the drawing-room as if you were a visitor!<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. You cannot, if I may say so, call me to order.<\/p>\n
VARYA. I\u2019m not calling you to order, I\u2019m only telling you. You just walk about from place to place and never do your work. Goodness only knows why we keep a clerk.<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. [Offended] Whether I work, or walk about, or eat, or play billiards, is only a matter to be settled by people of understanding and my elders.<\/p>\n
VARYA. You dare to talk to me like that! [Furious] You dare? You mean that I know nothing? Get out of here! This minute!<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. [Nervous] I must ask you to express yourself more delicately.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Beside herself] Get out this minute. Get out! [He goes to the door, she follows] Two-and-twenty troubles! I don\u2019t want any sign of you here! I don\u2019t want to see anything of you! [EPIKHODOV has gone out; his voice can be heard outside: \u201cI\u2019ll make a complaint against you.\u201d] What, coming back? [Snatches up the stick left by FIERS by the door] Go… go… go, I\u2019ll show you…. Are you going? Are you going? Well, then take that. [She hits out as LOPAKHIN enters.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Much obliged.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Angry but amused] I\u2019m sorry.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Never mind. I thank you for my pleasant reception.<\/p>\n
VARYA. It isn\u2019t worth any thanks. [Walks away, then looks back and asks gently] I didn\u2019t hurt you, did I?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. No, not at all. There\u2019ll be an enormous bump, that\u2019s all.<\/p>\n
VOICES FROM THE DRAWING-ROOM. Lopakhin\u2019s returned! Ermolai Alexeyevitch!<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. Now we\u2019ll see what there is to see and hear what there is to hear… [Kisses LOPAKHIN] You smell of cognac, my dear, my soul. And we\u2019re all having a good time.<\/p>\n
[Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Is that you, Ermolai Alexeyevitch? Why were you so long? Where\u2019s Leonid?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Leonid Andreyevitch came back with me, he\u2019s coming….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Excited] Well, what? Is it sold? Tell me?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Confused, afraid to show his pleasure] The sale ended up at four o\u2019clock…. We missed the train, and had to wait till half-past nine. [Sighs heavily] Ooh! My head\u2019s going round a little.<\/p>\n
[Enter GAEV; in his right hand he carries things he has bought, with his left he wipes away his tears.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Leon, what\u2019s happened? Leon, well? [Impatiently, in tears] Quick, for the love of God….<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Says nothing to her, only waves his hand; to FIERS, weeping] Here, take this…. Here are anchovies, herrings from Kertch…. I\u2019ve had no food to-day…. I have had a time! [The door from the billiard-room is open; the clicking of the balls is heard, and YASHA\u2019S voice, \u201cSeven, eighteen!\u201d GAEV\u2019S expression changes, he cries no more] I\u2019m awfully tired. Help me change my clothes, Fiers.<\/p>\n
[Goes out through the drawing-room; FIERS after him.]<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. What happened? Come on, tell us!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Is the cherry orchard sold?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. It is sold.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Who bought it?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I bought it.<\/p>\n
[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA is overwhelmed; she would fall if she were not standing by an armchair and a table. VARYA takes her keys off her belt, throws them on the floor, into the middle of the room and goes out.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I bought it! Wait, ladies and gentlemen, please, my head\u2019s going round, I can\u2019t talk…. [Laughs] When we got to the sale, Deriganov was there already. Leonid Andreyevitch had only fifteen thousand roubles, and Deriganov offered thirty thousand on top of the mortgage to begin with. I saw how matters were, so I grabbed hold of him and bid forty. He went up to forty-five, I offered fifty-five. That means he went up by fives and I went up by tens…. Well, it came to an end. I bid ninety more than the mortgage; and it stayed with me. The cherry orchard is mine now, mine! [Roars with laughter] My God, my God, the cherry orchard\u2019s mine! Tell me I\u2019m drunk, or mad, or dreaming…. [Stamps his feet] Don\u2019t laugh at me! If my father and grandfather rose from their graves and looked at the whole affair, and saw how their Ermolai, their beaten and uneducated Ermolai, who used to run barefoot in the winter, how that very Ermolai has bought an estate, which is the most beautiful thing in the world! I\u2019ve bought the estate where my grandfather and my father were slaves, where they weren\u2019t even allowed into the kitchen. I\u2019m asleep, it\u2019s only a dream, an illusion…. It\u2019s the fruit of imagination, wrapped in the fog of the unknown…. [Picks up the keys, nicely smiling] She threw down the keys, she wanted to show she was no longer mistress here…. [Jingles keys] Well, it\u2019s all one! [Hears the band tuning up] Eh, musicians, play, I want to hear you! Come and look at Ermolai Lopakhin laying his axe to the cherry orchard, come and look at the trees falling! We\u2019ll build villas here, and our grandsons and great-grandsons will see a new life here…. Play on, music! [The band plays. LUBOV ANDREYEVNA sinks into a chair and weeps bitterly. LOPAKHIN continues reproachfully] Why then, why didn\u2019t you take my advice? My poor, dear woman, you can\u2019t go back now. [Weeps] Oh, if only the whole thing was done with, if only our uneven, unhappy life were changed!<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Takes his arm; in an undertone] She\u2019s crying. Let\u2019s go into the drawing-room and leave her by herself… come on…. [Takes his arm and leads him out.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. What\u2019s that? Bandsmen, play nicely! Go on, do just as I want you to! [Ironically] The new owner, the owner of the cherry orchard is coming! [He accidentally knocks up against a little table and nearly upsets the candelabra] I can pay for everything! [Exit with PISCHIN]<\/p>\n
[In the reception-room and the drawing-room nobody remains except LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, who sits huddled up and weeping bitterly. The band plays softly. ANYA and TROFIMOV come in quickly. ANYA goes up to her mother and goes on her knees in front of her. TROFIMOV stands at the drawing-room entrance.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. Mother! mother, are you crying? My dear, kind, good mother, my beautiful mother, I love you! Bless you! The cherry orchard is sold, we\u2019ve got it no longer, it\u2019s true, true, but don\u2019t cry mother, you\u2019ve still got your life before you, you\u2019ve still your beautiful pure soul… Come with me, come, dear, away from here, come! We\u2019ll plant a new garden, finer than this, and you\u2019ll see it, and you\u2019ll understand, and deep joy, gentle joy will sink into your soul, like the evening sun, and you\u2019ll smile, mother! Come, dear, let\u2019s go!<\/p>\n
Curtain.<\/p>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n<\/div>\n
ACT FOUR<\/h2>\n
[The stage is set as for Act I. There are no curtains on the windows, no pictures; only a few pieces of furniture are left; they are piled up in a corner as if for sale. The emptiness is felt. By the door that leads out of the house and at the back of the stage, portmanteaux and travelling paraphernalia are piled up. The door on the left is open; the voices of VARYA and ANYA can be heard through it. LOPAKHIN stands and waits. YASHA holds a tray with little tumblers of champagne. Outside, EPIKHODOV is tying up a box. Voices are heard behind the stage. The peasants have come to say good-bye. The voice of GAEV is heard: \u201cThank you, brothers, thank you.\u201d]<\/p>\n
YASHA. The common people have come to say good-bye. I am of the opinion, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, that they\u2019re good people, but they don\u2019t understand very much.<\/p>\n
[The voices die away. LUBOV ANDREYEVNA and GAEV enter. She is not crying but is pale, and her face trembles; she can hardly speak.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. You gave them your purse, Luba. You can\u2019t go on like that, you can\u2019t!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I couldn\u2019t help myself, I couldn\u2019t! [They go out.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [In the doorway, calling after them] Please, I ask you most humbly! Just a little glass to say good-bye. I didn\u2019t remember to bring any from town and I only found one bottle at the station. Please, do! [Pause] Won\u2019t you really have any? [Goes away from the door] If I only knew\u2014I wouldn\u2019t have bought any. Well, I shan\u2019t drink any either. [YASHA carefully puts the tray on a chair] You have a drink, Yasha, at any rate.<\/p>\n
YASHA. To those departing! And good luck to those who stay behind! [Drinks] I can assure you that this isn\u2019t real champagne.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Eight roubles a bottle. [Pause] It\u2019s devilish cold here.<\/p>\n
YASHA. There are no fires to-day, we\u2019re going away. [Laughs]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. What\u2019s the matter with you?<\/p>\n
YASHA. I\u2019m just pleased.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. It\u2019s October outside, but it\u2019s as sunny and as quiet as if it were summer. Good for building. [Looking at his watch and speaking through the door] Ladies and gentlemen, please remember that it\u2019s only forty-seven minutes till the train goes! You must go off to the station in twenty minutes. Hurry up.<\/p>\n
[TROFIMOV, in an overcoat, comes in from the grounds.]<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. I think it\u2019s time we went. The carriages are waiting. Where the devil are my goloshes? They\u2019re lost. [Through the door] Anya, I can\u2019t find my goloshes! I can\u2019t!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. I\u2019ve got to go to Kharkov. I\u2019m going in the same train as you. I\u2019m going to spend the whole winter in Kharkov. I\u2019ve been hanging about with you people, going rusty without work. I can\u2019t live without working. I must have something to do with my hands; they hang about as if they weren\u2019t mine at all.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. We\u2019ll go away now and then you\u2019ll start again on your useful labours.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Have a glass.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. I won\u2019t.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. So you\u2019re off to Moscow now?<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV Yes. I\u2019ll see them into town and to-morrow I\u2019m off to Moscow.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Yes…. I expect the professors don\u2019t lecture nowadays; they\u2019re waiting till you turn up!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. That\u2019s not your business.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. How many years have you been going to the university?<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Think of something fresh. This is old and flat. [Looking for his goloshes] You know, we may not meet each other again, so just let me give you a word of advice on parting: \u201cDon\u2019t wave your hands about! Get rid of that habit of waving them about. And then, building villas and reckoning on their residents becoming freeholders in time\u2014that\u2019s the same thing; it\u2019s all a matter of waving your hands about…. Whether I want to or not, you know, I like you. You\u2019ve thin, delicate fingers, like those of an artist, and you\u2019ve a thin, delicate soul….\u201d<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Embraces him] Good-bye, dear fellow. Thanks for all you\u2019ve said. If you want any, take some money from me for the journey.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Why should I? I don\u2019t want it.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. But you\u2019ve nothing!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Yes, I have, thank you; I\u2019ve got some for a translation. Here it is in my pocket. [Nervously] But I can\u2019t find my goloshes!<\/p>\n
VARYA. [From the other room] Take your rubbish away! [Throws a pair of rubber goloshes on to the stage.]<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Why are you angry, Varya? Hm! These aren\u2019t my goloshes!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. In the spring I sowed three thousand acres of poppies, and now I\u2019ve made forty thousand roubles net profit. And when my poppies were in flower, what a picture it was! So I, as I was saying, made forty thousand roubles, and I mean I\u2019d like to lend you some, because I can afford it. Why turn up your nose at it? I\u2019m just a simple peasant….<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Your father was a peasant, mine was a chemist, and that means absolutely nothing. [LOPAKHIN takes out his pocket-book] No, no…. Even if you gave me twenty thousand I should refuse. I\u2019m a free man. And everything that all you people, rich and poor, value so highly and so dearly hasn\u2019t the least influence over me; it\u2019s like a flock of down in the wind. I can do without you, I can pass you by. I\u2019m strong and proud. Mankind goes on to the highest truths and to the highest happiness such as is only possible on earth, and I go in the front ranks!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Will you get there?<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. I will. [Pause] I\u2019ll get there and show others the way. [Axes cutting the trees are heard in the distance.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Well, good-bye, old man. It\u2019s time to go. Here we stand pulling one another\u2019s noses, but life goes its own way all the time. When I work for a long time, and I don\u2019t get tired, then I think more easily, and I think I get to understand why I exist. And there are so many people in Russia, brother, who live for nothing at all. Still, work goes on without that. Leonid Andreyevitch, they say, has accepted a post in a bank; he will get sixty thousand roubles a year…. But he won\u2019t stand it; he\u2019s very lazy.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [At the door] Mother asks if you will stop them cutting down the orchard until she has gone away.<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Yes, really, you ought to have enough tact not to do that. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN, All right, all right… yes, he\u2019s right. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
ANYA. Has Fiers been sent to the hospital?<\/p>\n
YASHA. I gave the order this morning. I suppose they\u2019ve sent him.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [To EPIKHODOV, who crosses the room] Simeon Panteleyevitch, please make inquiries if Fiers has been sent to the hospital.<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Offended] I told Egor this morning. What\u2019s the use of asking ten times!<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. The aged Fiers, in my conclusive opinion, isn\u2019t worth mending; his forefathers had better have him. I only envy him. [Puts a trunk on a hat-box and squashes it] Well, of course. I thought so! [Exit.]<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Grinning] Two-and-twenty troubles.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Behind the door] Has Fiers been taken away to the hospital?<\/p>\n
ANYA. Yes.<\/p>\n
VARYA. Why didn\u2019t they take the letter to the doctor?<\/p>\n
ANYA. It\u2019ll have to be sent after him. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. [In the next room] Where\u2019s Yasha? Tell him his mother\u2019s come and wants to say good-bye to him.<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Waving his hand] She\u2019ll make me lose all patience!<\/p>\n
[DUNYASHA has meanwhile been bustling round the luggage; now that YASHA is left alone, she goes up to him.]<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. If you only looked at me once, Yasha. You\u2019re going away, leaving me behind.<\/p>\n
[Weeps and hugs him round the neck.]<\/p>\n
YASHA. What\u2019s the use of crying? [Drinks champagne] In six days I\u2019ll be again in Paris. To-morrow we get into the express and off we go. I can hardly believe it. Vive la France! It doesn\u2019t suit me here, I can\u2019t live here… it\u2019s no good. Well, I\u2019ve seen the uncivilized world; I have had enough of it. [Drinks champagne] What do you want to cry for? You behave yourself properly, and then you won\u2019t cry.<\/p>\n
DUNYASHA. [Looks in a small mirror and powders her face] Send me a letter from Paris. You know I loved you, Yasha, so much! I\u2019m a sensitive creature, Yasha.<\/p>\n
YASHA. Somebody\u2019s coming.<\/p>\n
[He bustles around the luggage, singing softly. Enter LUBOV ANDREYEVNA, GAEV, ANYA, and CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. We\u2019d better be off. There\u2019s no time left. [Looks at YASHA] Somebody smells of herring!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. We needn\u2019t get into our carriages for ten minutes…. [Looks round the room] Good-bye, dear house, old grandfather. The winter will go, the spring will come, and then you\u2019ll exist no more, you\u2019ll be pulled down. How much these walls have seen! [Passionately kisses her daughter] My treasure, you\u2019re radiant, your eyes flash like two jewels! Are you happy? Very?<\/p>\n
ANYA. Very! A new life is beginning, mother!<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Gaily] Yes, really, everything\u2019s all right now. Before the cherry orchard was sold we all were excited and we suffered, and then, when the question was solved once and for all, we all calmed down, and even became cheerful. I\u2019m a bank official now, and a financier… red in the middle; and you, Luba, for some reason or other, look better, there\u2019s no doubt about it.<\/p>\n
LUBOV Yes. My nerves are better, it\u2019s true. [She puts on her coat and hat] I sleep well. Take my luggage out, Yasha. It\u2019s time. [To ANYA] My little girl, we\u2019ll soon see each other again…. I\u2019m off to Paris. I\u2019ll live there on the money your grandmother from Yaroslav sent along to buy the estate\u2014bless her!\u2014though it won\u2019t last long.<\/p>\n
ANYA. You\u2019ll come back soon, soon, mother, won\u2019t you? I\u2019ll get ready, and pass the exam at the Higher School, and then I\u2019ll work and help you. We\u2019ll read all sorts of books to one another, won\u2019t we? [Kisses her mother\u2019s hands] We\u2019ll read in the autumn evenings; we\u2019ll read many books, and a beautiful new world will open up before us…. [Thoughtfully] You\u2019ll come, mother….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I\u2019ll come, my darling. [Embraces her.]<\/p>\n
[Enter LOPAKHIN. CHARLOTTA is singing to herself.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. Charlotta is happy; she sings!<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. [Takes a bundle, looking like a wrapped-up baby] My little baby, bye-bye. [The baby seems to answer, \u201cOua! Oua!\u201d] Hush, my nice little boy. [\u201cOua! Oua!\u201d] I\u2019m so sorry for you! [Throws the bundle back] So please find me a new place. I can\u2019t go on like this.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. We\u2019ll find one, Charlotta Ivanovna, don\u2019t you be afraid.<\/p>\n
GAEV. Everybody\u2019s leaving us. Varya\u2019s going away… we\u2019ve suddenly become unnecessary.<\/p>\n
CHARLOTTA. I\u2019ve nowhere to live in town. I must go away. [Hums] Never mind.<\/p>\n
[Enter PISCHIN.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Nature\u2019s marvel!<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Puffing] Oh, let me get my breath back…. I\u2019m fagged out… My most honoured, give me some water….<\/p>\n
GAEV. Come for money, what? I\u2019m your humble servant, and I\u2019m going out of the way of temptation. [Exit.]<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. I haven\u2019t been here for ever so long… dear madam. [To LOPAKHIN] You here? Glad to see you… man of immense brain… take this… take it…. [Gives LOPAKHIN money] Four hundred roubles…. That leaves 840….<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Shrugs his shoulders in surprise] As if I were dreaming. Where did you get this from?<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. Stop… it\u2019s hot…. A most unexpected thing happened. Some Englishmen came along and found some white clay on my land…. [To LUBOV ANDREYEVNA] And here\u2019s four hundred for you… beautiful lady…. [Gives her money] Give you the rest later…. [Drinks water] Just now a young man in the train was saying that some great philosopher advises us all to jump off roofs. \u201cJump!\u201d he says, and that\u2019s all. [Astonished] To think of that, now! More water!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Who were these Englishmen?<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. I\u2019ve leased off the land with the clay to them for twenty-four years…. Now, excuse me, I\u2019ve no time…. I must run off…. I must go to Znoikov and to Kardamonov… I owe them all money…. [Drinks] Good-bye. I\u2019ll come in on Thursday.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. We\u2019re just off to town, and to-morrow I go abroad.<\/p>\n
PISCHIN. [Agitated] What? Why to town? I see furniture… trunks…. Well, never mind. [Crying] Never mind. These Englishmen are men of immense intellect…. Never mind…. Be happy…. God will help you…. Never mind…. Everything in this world comes to an end…. [Kisses LUBOV ANDREYEVNA\u2019S hand] And if you should happen to hear that my end has come, just remember this old… horse and say: \u201cThere was one such and such a Simeonov-Pischin, God bless his soul….\u201d Wonderful weather… yes…. [Exit deeply moved, but returns at once and says in the door] Dashenka sent her love! [Exit.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Now we can go. I\u2019ve two anxieties, though. The first is poor Fiers [Looks at her watch] We\u2019ve still five minutes….<\/p>\n
ANYA. Mother, Fiers has already been sent to the hospital. Yasha sent him off this morning.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. The second is Varya. She\u2019s used to getting up early and to work, and now she\u2019s no work to do she\u2019s like a fish out of water. She\u2019s grown thin and pale, and she cries, poor thing…. [Pause] You know very well, Ermolai Alexeyevitch, that I used to hope to marry her to you, and I suppose you are going to marry somebody? [Whispers to ANYA, who nods to CHARLOTTA, and they both go out] She loves you, she\u2019s your sort, and I don\u2019t understand, I really don\u2019t, why you seem to be keeping away from each other. I don\u2019t understand!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. To tell the truth, I don\u2019t understand it myself. It\u2019s all so strange…. If there\u2019s still time, I\u2019ll be ready at once… Let\u2019s get it over, once and for all; I don\u2019t feel as if I could ever propose to her without you.<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Excellent. It\u2019ll only take a minute. I\u2019ll call her.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. The champagne\u2019s very appropriate. [Looking at the tumblers] They\u2019re empty, somebody\u2019s already drunk them. [YASHA coughs] I call that licking it up….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [Animated] Excellent. We\u2019ll go out. Yasha, allez. I\u2019ll call her in…. [At the door] Varya, leave that and come here. Come! [Exit with YASHA.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [Looks at his watch] Yes…. [Pause.]<\/p>\n
[There is a restrained laugh behind the door, a whisper, then VARYA comes in.]<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Looking at the luggage in silence] I can\u2019t seem to find it….<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. What are you looking for?<\/p>\n
VARYA. I packed it myself and I don\u2019t remember. [Pause.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Where are you going to now, Barbara Mihailovna?<\/p>\n
VARYA. I? To the Ragulins…. I\u2019ve got an agreement to go and look after their house… as housekeeper or something.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Is that at Yashnevo? It\u2019s about fifty miles. [Pause] So life in this house is finished now….<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Looking at the luggage] Where is it?… perhaps I\u2019ve put it away in the trunk…. Yes, there\u2019ll be no more life in this house….<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. And I\u2019m off to Kharkov at once… by this train. I\u2019ve a lot of business on hand. I\u2019m leaving Epikhodov here… I\u2019ve taken him on.<\/p>\n
VARYA. Well, well!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Last year at this time the snow was already falling, if you remember, and now it\u2019s nice and sunny. Only it\u2019s rather cold…. There\u2019s three degrees of frost.<\/p>\n
VARYA. I didn\u2019t look. [Pause] And our thermometer\u2019s broken…. [Pause.]<\/p>\n
VOICE AT THE DOOR. Ermolai Alexeyevitch!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. [As if he has long been waiting to be called] This minute. [Exit quickly.]<\/p>\n
[VARYA, sitting on the floor, puts her face on a bundle of clothes and weeps gently. The door opens. LUBOV ANDREYEVNA enters carefully.]<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Well? [Pause] We must go.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Not crying now, wipes her eyes] Yes, it\u2019s quite time, little mother. I\u2019ll get to the Ragulins to-day, if I don\u2019t miss the train….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. [At the door] Anya, put on your things. [Enter ANYA, then GAEV, CHARLOTTA IVANOVNA. GAEV wears a warm overcoat with a cape. A servant and drivers come in. EPIKHODOV bustles around the luggage] Now we can go away.<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Joyfully] Away!<\/p>\n
GAEV. My friends, my dear friends! Can I be silent, in leaving this house for evermore?\u2014can I restrain myself, in saying farewell, from expressing those feelings which now fill my whole being…?<\/p>\n
ANYA. [Imploringly] Uncle!<\/p>\n
VARYA. Uncle, you shouldn\u2019t!<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Stupidly] Double the red into the middle…. I\u2019ll be quiet.<\/p>\n
[Enter TROFIMOV, then LOPAKHIN.]<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Well, it\u2019s time to be off.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Epikhodov, my coat!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. I\u2019ll sit here one more minute. It\u2019s as if I\u2019d never really noticed what the walls and ceilings of this house were like, and now I look at them greedily, with such tender love….<\/p>\n
GAEV. I remember, when I was six years old, on Trinity Sunday, I sat at this window and looked and saw my father going to church….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Have all the things been taken away?<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Yes, all, I think. [To EPIKHODOV, putting on his coat] You see that everything\u2019s quite straight, Epikhodov.<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. [Hoarsely] You may depend upon me, Ermolai Alexeyevitch!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. What\u2019s the matter with your voice?<\/p>\n
EPIKHODOV. I swallowed something just now; I was having a drink of water.<\/p>\n
YASHA. [Suspiciously] What manners….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. We go away, and not a soul remains behind.<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Till the spring.<\/p>\n
VARYA. [Drags an umbrella out of a bundle, and seems to be waving it about. LOPAKHIN appears to be frightened] What are you doing?… I never thought…<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Come along, let\u2019s take our seats… it\u2019s time! The train will be in directly.<\/p>\n
VARYA. Peter, here they are, your goloshes, by that trunk. [In tears] And how old and dirty they are….<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. [Putting them on] Come on!<\/p>\n
GAEV. [Deeply moved, nearly crying] The train… the station…. Cross in the middle, a white double in the corner….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. Let\u2019s go!<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Are you all here? There\u2019s nobody else? [Locks the side-door on the left] There\u2019s a lot of things in there. I must lock them up. Come!<\/p>\n
ANYA. Good-bye, home! Good-bye, old life!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV. Welcome, new life! [Exit with ANYA.]<\/p>\n
[VARYA looks round the room and goes out slowly. YASHA and CHARLOTTA, with her little dog, go out.]<\/p>\n
LOPAKHIN. Till the spring, then! Come on… till we meet again! [Exit.]<\/p>\n
[LUBOV ANDREYEVNA and GAEV are left alone. They might almost have been waiting for that. They fall into each other\u2019s arms and sob restrainedly and quietly, fearing that somebody might hear them.]<\/p>\n
GAEV. [In despair] My sister, my sister….<\/p>\n
LUBOV. My dear, my gentle, beautiful orchard! My life, my youth, my happiness, good-bye! Good-bye!<\/p>\n
ANYA\u2019S VOICE. [Gaily] Mother!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV\u2019S VOICE. [Gaily, excited] Coo-ee!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. To look at the walls and the windows for the last time…. My dead mother used to like to walk about this room….<\/p>\n
GAEV. My sister, my sister!<\/p>\n
ANYA\u2019S VOICE. Mother!<\/p>\n
TROFIMOV\u2019S VOICE. Coo-ee!<\/p>\n
LUBOV. We\u2019re coming! [They go out.]<\/p>\n
[The stage is empty. The sound of keys being turned in the locks is heard, and then the noise of the carriages going away. It is quiet. Then the sound of an axe against the trees is heard in the silence sadly and by itself. Steps are heard. FIERS comes in from the door on the right. He is dressed as usual, in a short jacket and white waistcoat; slippers on his feet. He is ill. He goes to the door and tries the handle.]<\/p>\n
FIERS. It\u2019s locked. They\u2019ve gone away. [Sits on a sofa] They\u2019ve forgotten about me…. Never mind, I\u2019ll sit here…. And Leonid Andreyevitch will have gone in a light overcoat instead of putting on his fur coat…. [Sighs anxiously] I didn\u2019t see…. Oh, these young people! [Mumbles something that cannot be understood] Life\u2019s gone on as if I\u2019d never lived. [Lying down] I\u2019ll lie down…. You\u2019ve no strength left in you, nothing left at all…. Oh, you… bungler!<\/p>\n
[He lies without moving. The distant sound is heard, as if from the sky, of a breaking string, dying away sadly. Silence follows it, and only the sound is heard, some way away in the orchard, of the axe falling on the trees.]<\/p>\n
Curtain.<\/p>\n
 <\/p>\n
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Anton Pavlovich Chekhov<\/b> (29 January 1860\u00a0\u2013 15 July 1904)\u00a0was a Russian playwright and short story writer, who is considered to be among the greatest writers of short fiction in history. His career as a playwright produced four classics and his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics.\u00a0Along with Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg, Chekhov is often referred to as one of the three seminal figures in the birth of early modernism in the theatre.\u00a0Chekhov practiced as a medical doctor throughout most of his literary career: \u201cMedicine is my lawful wife,\u201d he once said, \u201cand literature is my mistress.\u201d<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t 
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CC licensed content, Shared previously<\/div>