by PETER
PETRO
Department of Central,
Eastern and Northern European Studies
Chekhov may have been dying as he wrote his play,
but his handiwork still speaks to us with verve,
vitality, and the freshness of the cherry blossom.
Anton
Chekhov, born in 1860, lived his life with zest,
humour,
and unbounded energy, witnessed by his prolific
output of stories
and plays. However, in 1904, as he was completing
his last play,
The Cherry
Orchard, he was dying of tuberculosis.
His relationship
with his actress wife, Olga Knipper, also became
complicated,
raising interesting questions with regard to
the play. What are we
to think of the fact that he wanted Olga to
play Madame
Ranevskaya at the premiere? She certainly is
a character that he
ridicules in his play. Was some of that ridicule
aimed at his wife?
Beyond the fact that certain characters are
ridiculed, why did
Chekhov insist that his play was a comedy?
A family loses its
estate - is that supposed to be funny? But
let's look at it another
way: who regrets the passing of the old order
in the play? Only
the funny old servant Firs, and they forget
about him when the
house is sold. Are we to think that in the
modern era tragedy is no
longer what it used to be?
Perhaps the way out of such puzzles offered by
the play is to put aside the heavy overlay of symbolism
and meaning attached to it by generations of critics
and interpreters and try to enjoy it without such
preconceived notions as the passing of the old
order, or of the symbolism of the orchard that
changes according to each character who talks about
it. After all, Chekhov taught us that it was not
the role of an artist to preach to his audience,
but to capture the essence of the time in which
he lived. |
|
This, Chekhov did brilliantly. In The
Cherry Orchard, he reveals that a new
era is dawning: the era of the common man. His
noblemen are far from noble and his servants
are claiming a place among the masters, so that
the masters are not quite masters and servants
are no longer servants. It is a reversal heralded
by Lopakhin who, while generally underestimated,
is the only character talking sense and the only
one with a plan to save the Cherry Orchard estate,
even though he does not really need it. Lopakhin
is a man of the new Russia: a nation that is
making her presence felt in the world through
encroaching industrialization. Factories, railways,
and business overshadow the cherry blossoms that
used to make such a lovely backdrop for the parties
of the nobility.
We can also look at the young
men and women for interesting commentary on
Chekhov's era. They seem
to be so caught up in the tenor of the time that
they fail to succeed in what the young always
do best: fall in love, wallow in romance, or be
irresponsible.
They talk about it, wish for it, but their actions
lead nowhere.
Chekhov denies us the comfort of a satisfying
finish: the marriage that comedies crave. Yet it
is with this sense of discomfort that we make a
connection with the play and appreciate its newness
and revolutionary quality. Watching the play, we
are not surprised that Chekhov has been called
one of the fathers of the new theatre, including
the theatre of the absurd. There is something comforting
in the dilemmas of his confused and lost characters.
Do we not recognize them? Are they not our contemporaries?
Are their problems not timeless? Thus Chekhov invites
us to reflect on our lives and to reconsider what
we take for granted. Chekhov may have been dying
as he wrote his play, but his handiwork still speaks
to us with verve, vitality, and the freshness of
the cherry blossom.
Chekhov taught us that
it was not the role of an artist to preach to his
audience, but to capture the essence of the time
in which he lived. |
