ACT I
A country house
on a terrace. In front of it a garden. In an
avenue of trees, under an old poplar, stands a
table set for tea, with a samovar, etc. Some
benches and chairs stand near the table. On one
of them is lying a guitar. A hammock is swung
near the table. It is three o'clock in the
afternoon of a cloudy day.
MARINA, a
quiet, grey-haired, little old woman, is sitting
at the table knitting a stocking.
ASTROFF is
walking up and down near her.
MARINA.
[Pouring some tea into a glass] Take a little
tea, my son.
ASTROFF. [Takes
the glass from her unwillingly] Somehow, I don't
seem to want any.
MARINA. Then
will you have a little vodka instead?
ASTROFF. No, I
don't drink vodka every day, and besides, it is
too hot now. [A pause] Tell me, nurse, how long
have we known each other?
MARINA.
[Thoughtfully] Let me see, how long is it?
Lord—help me to remember. You first came here,
into our parts—let me think—when was it? Sonia's
mother was still alive—it was two winters before
she died; that was eleven years
ago—[thoughtfully] perhaps more.
ASTROFF. Have I
changed much since then?
MARINA. Oh,
yes. You were handsome and young then, and now
you are an old man and not handsome any more.
You drink, too.
ASTROFF. Yes,
ten years have made me another man. And why?
Because I am overworked. Nurse, I am on my feet
from dawn till dusk. I know no rest; at night I
tremble under my blankets for fear of being
dragged out to visit some one who is sick; I
have toiled without repose or a day's freedom
since I have known you; could I help growing
old? And then, existence is tedious, anyway; it
is a senseless, dirty business, this life, and
goes heavily. Every one about here is silly, and
after living with them for two or three years
one grows silly oneself. It is inevitable.
[Twisting his moustache] See what a long
moustache I have grown. A foolish, long
moustache. Yes, I am as silly as the rest,
nurse, but not as stupid; no, I have not grown
stupid. Thank God, my brain is not addled yet,
though my feelings have grown numb. I ask
nothing, I need nothing, I love no one, unless
it is yourself alone. [He kisses her head] I had
a nurse just like you when I was a child.
MARINA. Don't
you want a bite of something to eat?
ASTROFF. No.
During the third week of Lent I went to the
epidemic at Malitskoi. It was eruptive typhoid.
The peasants were all lying side by side in
their huts, and the calves and pigs were running
about the floor among the sick. Such dirt there
was, and smoke! Unspeakable! I slaved among
those people all day, not a crumb passed my
lips, but when I got home there was still no
rest for me; a switchman was carried in from the
railroad; I laid him on the operating table and
he went and died in my arms under chloroform,
and then my feelings that should have been
deadened awoke again, my conscience tortured me
as if I had killed the man. I sat down and
closed my eyes—like this—and thought: will our
descendants two hundred years from now, for whom
we are breaking the road, remember to give us a
kind word? No, nurse, they will forget.
MARINA. Man is
forgetful, but God remembers.
ASTROFF. Thank
you for that. You have spoken the truth.
Enter VOITSKI
from the house. He has been asleep after dinner
and looks rather dishevelled. He sits down on
the bench and straightens his collar.
VOITSKI. H'm.
Yes. [A pause] Yes.
ASTROFF. Have
you been asleep?
VOITSKI. Yes,
very much so. [He yawns] Ever since the
Professor and his wife have come, our daily life
seems to have jumped the track. I sleep at the
wrong time, drink wine, and eat all sorts of
messes for luncheon and dinner. It isn't
wholesome. Sonia and I used to work together and
never had an idle moment, but now Sonia works
alone and I only eat and drink and sleep.
Something is wrong.
MARINA.
[Shaking her head] Such a confusion in the
house! The Professor gets up at twelve, the
samovar is kept boiling all the morning, and
everything has to wait for him. Before they came
we used to have dinner at one o'clock, like
everybody else, but now we have it at seven. The
Professor sits up all night writing and reading,
and suddenly, at two o'clock, there goes the
bell! Heavens, what is that? The Professor wants
some tea! Wake the servants, light the samovar!
Lord, what disorder!
ASTROFF. Will
they be here long?
VOITSKI. A
hundred years! The Professor has decided to make
his home here.
MARINA. Look at
this now! The samovar has been on the table for
two hours, and they are all out walking!
VOITSKI. All
right, don't get excited; here they come.
Voices are
heard approaching. SEREBRAKOFF, HELENA, SONIA,
and TELEGIN come in from the depths of the
garden, returning from their walk.
SEREBRAKOFF.
Superb! Superb! What beautiful views!
TELEGIN. They
are wonderful, your Excellency.
SONIA.
To-morrow we shall go into the woods, shall we,
papa?
VOITSKI. Ladies
and gentlemen, tea is ready.
SEREBRAKOFF.
Won't you please be good enough to send my tea
into the library? I still have some work to
finish.
SONIA. I am
sure you will love the woods.
HELENA,
SEREBRAKOFF, and SONIA go into the house.
TELEGIN sits down at the table beside MARINA.
VOITSKI. There
goes our learned scholar on a hot, sultry day
like this, in his overcoat and goloshes and
carrying an umbrella!
ASTROFF. He is
trying to take good care of his health.
VOITSKI. How
lovely she is! How lovely! I have never in my
life seen a more beautiful woman.
TELEGIN. Do you
know, Marina, that as I walk in the fields or in
the shady garden, as I look at this table here,
my heart swells with unbounded happiness. The
weather is enchanting, the birds are singing, we
are all living in peace and contentment—what
more could the soul desire? [Takes a glass of
tea.]
VOITSKI.
[Dreaming] Such eyes—a glorious woman!
ASTROFF. Come,
Ivan, tell us something.
VOITSKI.
[Indolently] What shall I tell you?
ASTROFF.
Haven't you any news for us?
VOITSKI. No, it
is all stale. I am just the same as usual, or
perhaps worse, because I have become lazy. I
don't do anything now but croak like an old
raven. My mother, the old magpie, is still
chattering about the emancipation of woman, with
one eye on her grave and the other on her
learned books, in which she is always looking
for the dawn of a new life.
ASTROFF. And
the Professor?
VOITSKI. The
Professor sits in his library from morning till
night, as usual—
"Straining the mind, wrinkling the brow,
We write, write, write,
Without respite
Or hope of praise in the future or now."
Poor paper! He
ought to write his autobiography; he would make
a really splendid subject for a book! Imagine
it, the life of a retired professor, as stale as
a piece of hardtack, tortured by gout,
headaches, and rheumatism, his liver bursting
with jealousy and envy, living on the estate of
his first wife, although he hates it, because he
can't afford to live in town. He is
everlastingly whining about his hard lot,
though, as a matter of fact, he is
extraordinarily lucky. He is the son of a common
deacon and has attained the professor's chair,
become the son-in-law of a senator, is called
"your Excellency," and so on. But I'll tell you
something; the man has been writing on art for
twenty-five years, and he doesn't know the very
first thing about it. For twenty-five years he
has been chewing on other men's thoughts about
realism, naturalism, and all such foolishness;
for twenty-five years he has been reading and
writing things that clever men have long known
and stupid ones are not interested in; for
twenty-five years he has been making his
imaginary mountains out of molehills. And just
think of the man's self-conceit and presumption
all this time! For twenty-five years he has been
masquerading in false clothes and has now
retired absolutely unknown to any living soul;
and yet see him! stalking across the earth like
a demi-god!
ASTROFF. I
believe you envy him.
VOITSKI. Yes, I
do. Look at the success he has had with women!
Don Juan himself was not more favoured. His
first wife, who was my sister, was a beautiful,
gentle being, as pure as the blue heaven there
above us, noble, great-hearted, with more
admirers than he has pupils, and she loved him
as only beings of angelic purity can love those
who are as pure and beautiful as themselves. His
mother-in-law, my mother, adores him to this
day, and he still inspires a sort of worshipful
awe in her. His second wife is, as you see, a
brilliant beauty; she married him in his old age
and has surrendered all the glory of her beauty
and freedom to him. Why? What for?
ASTROFF. Is she
faithful to him?
VOITSKI. Yes,
unfortunately she is.
ASTROFF. Why
unfortunately?
VOITSKI.
Because such fidelity is false and unnatural,
root and branch. It sounds well, but there is no
logic in it. It is thought immoral for a woman
to deceive an old husband whom she hates, but
quite moral for her to strangle her poor youth
in her breast and banish every vital desire from
her heart.
TELEGIN. [In a
tearful voice] Vanya, I don't like to hear you
talk so. Listen, Vanya; every one who betrays
husband or wife is faithless, and could also
betray his country.
VOITSKI.
[Crossly] Turn off the tap, Waffles.
TELEGIN. No,
allow me, Vanya. My wife ran away with a lover
on the day after our wedding, because my
exterior was unprepossessing. I have never
failed in my duty since then. I love her and am
true to her to this day. I help her all I can
and have given my fortune to educate the
daughter of herself and her lover. I have
forfeited my happiness, but I have kept my
pride. And she? Her youth has fled, her beauty
has faded according to the laws of nature, and
her lover is dead. What has she kept?
HELENA and
SONIA come in; after them comes MME. VOITSKAYA
carrying a book. She sits down and begins to
read. Some one hands her a glass of tea which
she drinks without looking up.
SONIA.
[Hurriedly, to the nurse] There are some
peasants waiting out there. Go and see what they
want. I shall pour the tea. [Pours out some
glasses of tea.]
MARINA goes
out. HELENA takes a glass and sits drinking in
the hammock.
ASTROFF. I have
come to see your husband. You wrote me that he
had rheumatism and I know not what else, and
that he was very ill, but he appears to be as
lively as a cricket.
HELENA. He had
a fit of the blues yesterday evening and
complained of pains in his legs, but he seems
all right again to-day.
ASTROFF. And I
galloped over here twenty miles at break-neck
speed! No matter, though, it is not the first
time. Once here, however, I am going to stay
until to-morrow, and at any rate sleep
quantum satis.
SONIA. Oh,
splendid! You so seldom spend the night with us.
Have you had dinner yet?
ASTROFF. No.
SONIA. Good. So
you will have it with us. We dine at seven now.
[Drinks her tea] This tea is cold!
TELEGIN. Yes,
the samovar has grown cold.
HELENA. Don't
mind, Monsieur Ivan, we will drink cold tea,
then.
TELEGIN. I beg
your pardon, my name is not Ivan, but Ilia,
ma'am—Ilia Telegin, or Waffles, as I am
sometimes called on account of my pock-marked
face. I am Sonia's godfather, and his
Excellency, your husband, knows me very well. I
now live with you, ma'am, on this estate, and
perhaps you will be so good as to notice that I
dine with you every day.
SONIA. He is
our great help, our right-hand man. [Tenderly]
Dear godfather, let me pour you some tea.
MME. VOITSKAYA.
Oh! Oh!
SONIA. What is
it, grandmother?
MME. VOITSKAYA.
I forgot to tell Alexander—I have lost my
memory—I received a letter to-day from Paul
Alexevitch in Kharkoff. He has sent me a new
pamphlet.
ASTROFF. Is it
interesting?
MME. VOITSKAYA.
Yes, but strange. He refutes the very theories
which he defended seven years ago. It is
appalling!
VOITSKI. There
is nothing appalling about it. Drink your tea,
mamma.
MME. VOITSKAYA.
It seems you never want to listen to what I have
to say. Pardon me, Jean, but you have changed so
in the last year that I hardly know you. You
used to be a man of settled convictions and had
an illuminating personality——
VOITSKI. Oh,
yes. I had an illuminating personality, which
illuminated no one. [A pause] I had an
illuminating personality! You couldn't say
anything more biting. I am forty-seven years
old. Until last year I endeavoured, as you do
now, to blind my eyes by your pedantry to the
truths of life. But now—Oh, if you only knew! If
you knew how I lie awake at night, heartsick and
angry, to think how stupidly I have wasted my
time when I might have been winning from life
everything which my old age now forbids.
SONIA. Uncle
Vanya, how dreary!
MME. VOITSKAYA.
[To her son] You speak as if your former
convictions were somehow to blame, but you
yourself, not they, were at fault. You have
forgotten that a conviction, in itself, is
nothing but a dead letter. You should have done
something.
VOITSKI. Done
something! Not every man is capable of being a
writer perpetuum mobile like your Herr
Professor.
MME. VOITSKAYA.
What do you mean by that?
SONIA.
[Imploringly] Mother! Uncle Vanya! I entreat
you!
VOITSKI. I am
silent. I apologise and am silent. [A pause.]
HELENA. What a
fine day! Not too hot. [A pause.]
VOITSKI. A fine
day to hang oneself.
TELEGIN tunes
the guitar. MARINA appears near the house,
calling the chickens.
MARINA. Chick,
chick, chick!
SONIA. What did
the peasants want, nurse?
MARINA. The
same old thing, the same old nonsense. Chick,
chick, chick!
SONIA. Why are
you calling the chickens?
MARINA. The
speckled hen has disappeared with her chicks. I
am afraid the crows have got her.
TELEGIN plays a
polka. All listen in silence. Enter WORKMAN.
WORKMAN. Is the
doctor here? [To ASTROFF] Excuse me, sir, but I
have been sent to fetch you.
ASTROFF. Where
are you from?
WORKMAN. The
factory.
ASTROFF.
[Annoyed] Thank you. There is nothing for it,
then, but to go. [Looking around him for his
cap] Damn it, this is annoying!
SONIA. Yes, it
is too bad, really. You must come back to dinner
from the factory.
ASTROFF. No, I
won't be able to do that. It will be too late.
Now where, where—[To the WORKMAN] Look here, my
man, get me a glass of vodka, will you? [The
WORKMAN goes out] Where—where—[Finds his cap]
One of the characters in Ostroff's plays is a
man with a long moustache and short wits, like
me. However, let me bid you good-bye, ladies and
gentlemen. [To HELENA] I should be really
delighted if you would come to see me some day
with Miss Sonia. My estate is small, but if you
are interested in such things I should like to
show you a nursery and seed-bed whose like you
will not find within a thousand miles of here.
My place is surrounded by government forests.
The forester is old and always ailing, so I
superintend almost all the work myself.
HELENA. I have
always heard that you were very fond of the
woods. Of course one can do a great deal of good
by helping to preserve them, but does not that
work interfere with your real calling?
ASTROFF. God
alone knows what a man's real calling is.
HELENA. And do
you find it interesting?
ASTROFF. Yes,
very.
VOITSKI.
[Sarcastically] Oh, extremely!
HELENA. You are
still young, not over thirty-six or seven, I
should say, and I suspect that the woods do not
interest you as much as you say they do. I
should think you would find them monotonous.
SONIA. No, the
work is thrilling. Dr. Astroff watches over the
old woods and sets out new plantations every
year, and he has already received a diploma and
a bronze medal. If you will listen to what he
can tell you, you will agree with him entirely.
He says that forests are the ornaments of the
earth, that they teach mankind to understand
beauty and attune his mind to lofty sentiments.
Forests temper a stern climate, and in countries
where the climate is milder, less strength is
wasted in the battle with nature, and the people
are kind and gentle. The inhabitants of such
countries are handsome, tractable, sensitive,
graceful in speech and gesture. Their philosophy
is joyous, art and science blossom among them,
their treatment of women is full of exquisite
nobility——
VOITSKI.
[Laughing] Bravo! Bravo! All that is very
pretty, but it is also unconvincing. So, my
friend [To ASTROFF] you must let me go on
burning firewood in my stoves and building my
sheds of planks.
ASTROFF. You
can burn peat in your stoves and build your
sheds of stone. Oh, I don't object, of course,
to cutting wood from necessity, but why destroy
the forests? The woods of Russia are trembling
under the blows of the axe. Millions of trees
have perished. The homes of the wild animals and
birds have been desolated; the rivers are
shrinking, and many beautiful landscapes are
gone forever. And why? Because men are too lazy
and stupid to stoop down and pick up their fuel
from the ground. [To HELENA] Am I not right,
Madame? Who but a stupid barbarian could burn so
much beauty in his stove and destroy that which
he cannot make? Man is endowed with reason and
the power to create, so that he may increase
that which has been given him, but until now he
has not created, but demolished. The forests are
disappearing, the rivers are running dry, the
game is exterminated, the climate is spoiled,
and the earth becomes poorer and uglier every
day. [To VOITSKI] I read irony in your eye; you
do not take what I am saying seriously,
and—and—after all, it may very well be nonsense.
But when I pass peasant-forests that I have
preserved from the axe, or hear the rustling of
the young plantations set out with my own hands,
I feel as if I had had some small share in
improving the climate, and that if mankind is
happy a thousand years from now I will have been
a little bit responsible for their happiness.
When I plant a little birch tree and then see it
budding into young green and swaying in the
wind, my heart swells with pride and I—[Sees the
WORKMAN, who is bringing him a glass of vodka on
a tray] however—[He drinks] I must be off.
Probably it is all nonsense, anyway. Good-bye.
He goes toward
the house. SONIA takes his arm and goes with
him.
SONIA. When are
you coming to see us again?
ASTROFF. I
can't say.
SONIA. In a
month?
ASTROFF and
SONIA go into the house. HELENA and VOITSKI walk
over to the terrace.
HELENA. You
have behaved shockingly again. Ivan, what sense
was there in teasing your mother and talking
about perpetuum mobile? And at breakfast
you quarreled with Alexander again. Really, your
behaviour is too petty.
VOITSKI. But if
I hate him?
HELENA. You
hate Alexander without reason; he is like every
one else, and no worse than you are.
VOITSKI. If you
could only see your face, your gestures! Oh, how
tedious your life must be.
HELENA. It is
tedious, yes, and dreary! You all abuse my
husband and look on me with compassion; you
think, "Poor woman, she is married to an old
man." How well I understand your compassion! As
Astroff said just now, see how you thoughtlessly
destroy the forests, so that there will soon be
none left. So you also destroy mankind, and soon
fidelity and purity and self-sacrifice will have
vanished with the woods. Why cannot you look
calmly at a woman unless she is yours? Because,
the doctor was right, you are all possessed by a
devil of destruction; you have no mercy on the
woods or the birds or on women or on one
another.
VOITSKI. I
don't like your philosophy.
HELENA. That
doctor has a sensitive, weary face—an
interesting face. Sonia evidently likes him, and
she is in love with him, and I can understand
it. This is the third time he has been here
since I have come, and I have not had a real
talk with him yet or made much of him. He thinks
I am disagreeable. Do you know, Ivan, the reason
you and I are such friends? I think it is
because we are both lonely and unfortunate. Yes,
unfortunate. Don't look at me in that way, I
don't like it.
VOITSKI. How
can I look at you otherwise when I love you? You
are my joy, my life, and my youth. I know that
my chances of being loved in return are
infinitely small, do not exist, but I ask
nothing of you. Only let me look at you, listen
to your voice—
HELENA. Hush,
some one will overhear you.
[They go toward
the house.]
VOITSKI.
[Following her] Let me speak to you of my love,
do not drive me away, and this alone will be my
greatest happiness!
HELENA. Ah!
This is agony!
TELEGIN strikes
the strings of his guitar and plays a polka.
MME. VOITSKAYA writes something on the leaves of
her pamphlet.
The curtain
falls.
ACT II
The dining-room
of SEREBRAKOFF'S house. It is night. The tapping
of the WATCHMAN'S rattle is heard in the garden.
SEREBRAKOFF is dozing in an arm-chair by an open
window and HELENA is sitting beside him, also
half asleep.
SEREBRAKOFF.
[Rousing himself] Who is here? Is it you, Sonia?
HELENA. It is
I.
SEREBRAKOFF.
Oh, it is you, Nelly. This pain is intolerable.
HELENA. Your
shawl has slipped down. [She wraps up his legs
in the shawl] Let me shut the window.
SEREBRAKOFF.
No, leave it open; I am suffocating. I dreamt
just now that my left leg belonged to some one
else, and it hurt so that I woke. I don't
believe this is gout, it is more like
rheumatism. What time is it?
HELENA. Half
past twelve. [A pause.]
SEREBRAKOFF. I
want you to look for Batushka's works in the
library to-morrow. I think we have him.
HELENA. What is
that?
SEREBRAKOFF.
Look for Batushka to-morrow morning; we used to
have him, I remember. Why do I find it so hard
to breathe?
HELENA. You are
tired; this is the second night you have had no
sleep.
SEREBRAKOFF.
They say that Turgenieff got angina of the heart
from gout. I am afraid I am getting angina too.
Oh, damn this horrible, accursed old age! Ever
since I have been old I have been hateful to
myself, and I am sure, hateful to you all as
well.
HELENA. You
speak as if we were to blame for your being old.
SEREBRAKOFF. I
am more hateful to you than to any one.
HELENA gets up
and walks away from him, sitting down at a
distance.
SEREBRAKOFF.
You are quite right, of course. I am not an
idiot; I can understand you. You are young and
healthy and beautiful, and longing for life, and
I am an old dotard, almost a dead man already.
Don't I know it? Of course I see that it is
foolish for me to live so long, but wait! I
shall soon set you all free. My life cannot drag
on much longer.
HELENA. You are
overtaxing my powers of endurance. Be quiet, for
God's sake!
SEREBRAKOFF. It
appears that, thanks to me, everybody's power of
endurance is being overtaxed; everybody is
miserable, only I am blissfully triumphant. Oh,
yes, of course!
HELENA. Be
quiet! You are torturing me.
SEREBRAKOFF. I
torture everybody. Of course.
HELENA.
[Weeping] This is unbearable! Tell me, what is
it you want me to do?
SEREBRAKOFF.
Nothing.
HELENA. Then be
quiet, please.
SEREBRAKOFF. It
is funny that everybody listens to Ivan and his
old idiot of a mother, but the moment I open my
lips you all begin to feel ill-treated. You
can't even stand the sound of my voice. Even if
I am hateful, even if I am a selfish tyrant,
haven't I the right to be one at my age? Haven't
I deserved it? Haven't I, I ask you, the right
to be respected, now that I am old?
HELENA. No one
is disputing your rights. [The window slams in
the wind] The wind is rising, I must shut the
window. [She shuts it] We shall have rain in a
moment. Your rights have never been questioned
by anybody.
The WATCHMAN in
the garden sounds his rattle.
SEREBRAKOFF. I
have spent my life working in the interests of
learning. I am used to my library and the
lecture hall and to the esteem and admiration of
my colleagues. Now I suddenly find myself
plunged in this wilderness, condemned to see the
same stupid people from morning till night and
listen to their futile conversation. I want to
live; I long for success and fame and the stir
of the world, and here I am in exile! Oh, it is
dreadful to spend every moment grieving for the
lost past, to see the success of others and sit
here with nothing to do but to fear death. I
cannot stand it! It is more than I can bear. And
you will not even forgive me for being old!
HELENA. Wait,
have patience; I shall be old myself in four or
five years.
SONIA comes in.
SONIA. Father,
you sent for Dr. Astroff, and now when he comes
you refuse to see him. It is not nice to give a
man so much trouble for nothing.
SEREBRAKOFF.
What do I care about your Astroff? He
understands medicine about as well as I
understand astronomy.
SONIA. We can't
send for the whole medical faculty, can we, to
treat your gout?
SEREBRAKOFF. I
won't talk to that madman!
SONIA. Do as
you please. It's all the same to me. [She sits
down.]
SEREBRAKOFF.
What time is it?
HELENA. One
o'clock.
SEREBRAKOFF. It
is stifling in here. Sonia, hand me that bottle
on the table.
SONIA. Here it
is. [She hands him a bottle of medicine.]
SEREBRAKOFF.
[Crossly] No, not that one! Can't you understand
me? Can't I ask you to do a thing?
SONIA. Please
don't be captious with me. Some people may like
it, but you must spare me, if you please,
because I don't. Besides, I haven't the time; we
are cutting the hay to-morrow and I must get up
early.
VOITSKI comes
in dressed in a long gown and carrying a candle.
VOITSKI. A
thunderstorm is coming up. [The lightning
flashes] There it is! Go to bed, Helena and
Sonia. I have come to take your place.
SEREBRAKOFF.
[Frightened] No, n-o, no! Don't leave me alone
with him! Oh, don't. He will begin to lecture
me.
VOITSKI. But
you must give them a little rest. They have not
slept for two nights.
SEREBRAKOFF.
Then let them go to bed, but you go away too!
Thank you. I implore you to go. For the sake of
our former friendship do not protest against
going. We will talk some other time——
VOITSKI. Our
former friendship! Our former——
SONIA. Hush,
Uncle Vanya!
SEREBRAKOFF.
[To his wife] My darling, don't leave me alone
with him. He will begin to lecture me.
VOITSKI. This
is ridiculous.
MARINA comes in
carrying a candle.
SONIA. You must
go to bed, nurse, it is late.
MARINA. I
haven't cleared away the tea things. Can't go to
bed yet.
SEREBRAKOFF. No
one can go to bed. They are all worn out, only I
enjoy perfect happiness.
MARINA. [Goes
up to SEREBRAKOFF and speaks tenderly] What's
the matter, master? Does it hurt? My own legs
are aching too, oh, so badly. [Arranges his
shawl about his legs] You have had this illness
such a long time. Sonia's dead mother used to
stay awake with you too, and wear herself out
for you. She loved you dearly. [A pause] Old
people want to be pitied as much as young ones,
but nobody cares about them somehow. [She kisses
SEREBRAKOFF'S shoulder] Come, master, let me
give you some linden-tea and warm your poor feet
for you. I shall pray to God for you.
SEREBRAKOFF.
[Touched] Let us go, Marina.
MARINA. My own
feet are aching so badly, oh, so badly! [She and
SONIA lead SEREBRAKOFF out] Sonia's mother used
to wear herself out with sorrow and weeping. You
were still little and foolish then, Sonia. Come,
come, master.
SEREBRAKOFF,
SONIA and MARINA go out.
HELENA. I am
absolutely exhausted by him, and can hardly
stand.
VOITSKI. You
are exhausted by him, and I am exhausted by my
own self. I have not slept for three nights.
HELENA.
Something is wrong in this house. Your mother
hates everything but her pamphlets and the
professor; the professor is vexed, he won't
trust me, and fears you; Sonia is angry with her
father, and with me, and hasn't spoken to me for
two weeks; I am at the end of my strength, and
have come near bursting into tears at least
twenty times to-day. Something is wrong in this
house.
VOITSKI. Leave
speculating alone.
HELENA. You are
cultured and intelligent, Ivan, and you surely
understand that the world is not destroyed by
villains and conflagrations, but by hate and
malice and all this spiteful tattling. It is
your duty to make peace, and not to growl at
everything.
VOITSKI. Help
me first to make peace with myself. My darling!
[Seizes her hand.]
HELENA. Let go!
[She drags her hand away] Go away!
VOITSKI. Soon
the rain will be over, and all nature will sigh
and awake refreshed. Only I am not refreshed by
the storm. Day and night the thought haunts me
like a fiend, that my life is lost for ever. My
past does not count, because I frittered it away
on trifles, and the present has so terribly
miscarried! What shall I do with my life and my
love? What is to become of them? This wonderful
feeling of mine will be wasted and lost as a ray
of sunlight is lost that falls into a dark
chasm, and my life will go with it.
HELENA. I am as
it were benumbed when you speak to me of your
love, and I don't know how to answer you.
Forgive me, I have nothing to say to you. [She
tries to go out] Good-night!
VOITSKI.
[Barring the way] If you only knew how I am
tortured by the thought that beside me in this
house is another life that is being lost
forever—it is yours! What are you waiting for?
What accursed philosophy stands in your way? Oh,
understand, understand——
HELENA.
[Looking at him intently] Ivan, you are drunk!
VOITSKI.
Perhaps. Perhaps.
HELENA. Where
is the doctor?
VOITSKI. In
there, spending the night with me. Perhaps I am
drunk, perhaps I am; nothing is impossible.
HELENA. Have
you just been drinking together? Why do you do
that?
VOITSKI.
Because in that way I get a taste of life. Let
me do it, Helena!
HELENA. You
never used to drink, and you never used to talk
so much. Go to bed, I am tired of you.
VOITSKI.
[Falling on his knees before her] My sweetheart,
my beautiful one——
HELENA.
[Angrily] Leave me alone! Really, this has
become too disagreeable.
HELENA goes
out. A pause.
VOITSKI [Alone]
She is gone! I met her first ten years ago, at
her sister's house, when she was seventeen and I
was thirty-seven. Why did I not fall in love
with her then and propose to her? It would have
been so easy! And now she would have been my
wife. Yes, we would both have been waked
to-night by the thunderstorm, and she would have
been frightened, but I would have held her in my
arms and whispered: "Don't be afraid! I am
here." Oh, enchanting dream, so sweet that I
laugh to think of it. [He laughs] But my God! My
head reels! Why am I so old? Why won't she
understand me? I hate all that rhetoric of hers,
that morality of indolence, that absurd talk
about the destruction of the world——[A pause]
Oh, how I have been deceived! For years I have
worshipped that miserable gout-ridden professor.
Sonia and I have squeezed this estate dry for
his sake. We have bartered our butter and curds
and peas like misers, and have never kept a
morsel for ourselves, so that we could scrape
enough pennies together to send to him. I was
proud of him and of his learning; I received all
his words and writings as inspired, and now? Now
he has retired, and what is the total of his
life? A blank! He is absolutely unknown, and his
fame has burst like a soap-bubble. I have been
deceived; I see that now, basely deceived.
ASTROFF comes
in. He has his coat on, but is without his
waistcoat or collar, and is slightly drunk.
TELEGIN follows him, carrying a guitar.
ASTROFF. Play!
TELEGIN. But
every one is asleep.
ASTROFF. Play!
TELEGIN begins
to play softly.
ASTROFF. Are
you alone here? No women about? [Sings with his
arms akimbo.]
"The hut is cold, the fire is dead;
Where shall the master lay his head?"
The
thunderstorm woke me. It was a heavy shower.
What time is it?
VOITSKI. The
devil only knows.
ASTROFF. I
thought I heard Helena's voice.
VOITSKI. She
was here a moment ago.
ASTROFF. What a
beautiful woman! [Looking at the medicine
bottles on the table] Medicine, is it? What a
variety we have; prescriptions from Moscow, from
Kharkoff, from Tula! Why, he has been pestering
all the towns of Russia with his gout! Is he
ill, or simply shamming?
VOITSKI. He is
really ill.
ASTROFF. What
is the matter with you to-night? You seem sad.
Is it because you are sorry for the professor?
VOITSKI. Leave
me alone.
ASTROFF. Or in
love with the professor's wife?
VOITSKI. She is
my friend.
ASTROFF.
Already?
VOITSKI. What
do you mean by "already"?
ASTROFF. A
woman can only become a man's friend after
having first been his acquaintance and then his
beloved—then she becomes his friend.
VOITSKI. What
vulgar philosophy!
ASTROFF. What
do you mean? Yes, I must confess I am getting
vulgar, but then, you see, I am drunk. I usually
only drink like this once a month. At such times
my audacity and temerity know no bounds. I feel
capable of anything. I attempt the most
difficult operations and do them magnificently.
The most brilliant plans for the future take
shape in my head. I am no longer a poor fool of
a doctor, but mankind's greatest benefactor. I
evolve my own system of philosophy and all of
you seem to crawl at my feet like so many
insects or microbes. [To TELEGIN] Play, Waffles!
TELEGIN. My
dear boy, I would with all my heart, but do
listen to reason; everybody in the house is
asleep.
ASTROFF. Play!
TELEGIN plays
softly.
ASTROFF. I want
a drink. Come, we still have some brandy left.
And then, as soon as it is day, you will come
home with me. [He sees SONIA, who comes in at
that moment.]
ASTROFF. I beg
your pardon, I have no collar on.
[He goes out
quickly, followed by TELEGIN.]
SONIA. Uncle
Vanya, you and the doctor have been drinking!
The good fellows have been getting together! It
is all very well for him, he has always done it,
but why do you follow his example? It looks
dreadfully at your age.
VOITSKI. Age
has nothing to do with it. When real life is
wanting one must create an illusion. It is
better than nothing.
SONIA. Our hay
is all cut and rotting in these daily rains, and
here you are busy creating illusions! You have
given up the farm altogether. I have done all
the work alone until I am at the end of my
strength—[Frightened] Uncle! Your eyes are full
of tears!
VOITSKI. Tears?
Nonsense, there are no tears in my eyes. You
looked at me then just as your dead mother used
to, my darling—[He eagerly kisses her face and
hands] My sister, my dearest sister, where are
you now? Ah, if you only knew, if you only knew!
SONIA. If she
only knew what, Uncle?
VOITSKI. My
heart is bursting. It is awful. No matter,
though. I must go. [He goes out.]
SONIA. [Knocks
at the door] Dr. Astroff! Are you awake? Please
come here for a minute.
ASTROFF.
[Behind the door] In a moment.
He appears in a
few seconds. He has put on his collar and
waistcoat.
ASTROFF. What
do you want?
SONIA. Drink as
much as you please yourself if you don't find it
revolting, but I implore you not to let my uncle
do it. It is bad for him.
ASTROFF. Very
well; we won't drink any more. I am going home
at once. That is settled. It will be dawn by the
time the horses are harnessed.
SONIA. It is
still raining; wait till morning.
ASTROFF. The
storm is blowing over. This is only the edge of
it. I must go. And please don't ask me to come
and see your father any more. I tell him he has
gout, and he says it is rheumatism. I tell him
to lie down, and he sits up. To-day he refused
to see me at all.
SONIA. He has
been spoilt. [She looks in the sideboard] Won't
you have a bite to eat?
ASTROFF. Yes,
please. I believe I will.
SONIA. I love
to eat at night. I am sure we shall find
something in here. They say that he has made a
great many conquests in his life, and that the
women have spoiled him. Here is some cheese for
you.
[They stand
eating by the sideboard.]
ASTROFF. I
haven't eaten anything to-day. Your father has a
very difficult nature. [He takes a bottle out of
the sideboard] May I? [He pours himself a glass
of vodka] We are alone here, and I can speak
frankly. Do you know, I could not stand living
in this house for even a month? This atmosphere
would stifle me. There is your father, entirely
absorbed in his books, and his gout; there is
your Uncle Vanya with his hypochondria, your
grandmother, and finally, your step-mother—
SONIA. What
about her?
ASTROFF. A
human being should be entirely beautiful: the
face, the clothes, the mind, the thoughts. Your
step-mother is, of course, beautiful to look at,
but don't you see? She does nothing but sleep
and eat and walk and bewitch us, and that is
all. She has no responsibilities, everything is
done for her—am I not right? And an idle life
can never be a pure one. [A pause] However, I
may be judging her too severely. Like your Uncle
Vanya, I am discontented, and so we are both
grumblers.
SONIA. Aren't
you satisfied with life?
ASTROFF. I like
life as life, but I hate and despise it in a
little Russian country village, and as far as my
own personal life goes, by heaven! there is
absolutely no redeeming feature about it.
Haven't you noticed if you are riding through a
dark wood at night and see a little light
shining ahead, how you forget your fatigue and
the darkness and the sharp twigs that whip your
face? I work, that you know—as no one else in
the country works. Fate beats me on without
rest; at times I suffer unendurably and I see no
light ahead. I have no hope; I do not like
people. It is long since I have loved any one.
SONIA. You love
no one?
ASTROFF. Not a
soul. I only feel a sort of tenderness for your
old nurse for old-times' sake. The peasants are
all alike; they are stupid and live in dirt, and
the educated people are hard to get along with.
One gets tired of them. All our good friends are
petty and shallow and see no farther than their
own noses; in one word, they are dull. Those
that have brains are hysterical, devoured with a
mania for self-analysis. They whine, they hate,
they pick faults everywhere with unhealthy
sharpness. They sneak up to me sideways, look at
me out of a corner of the eye, and say: "That
man is a lunatic," "That man is a wind-bag." Or,
if they don't know what else to label me with,
they say I am strange. I like the woods; that is
strange. I don't eat meat; that is strange, too.
Simple, natural relations between man and man or
man and nature do not exist. [He tries to go
out; SONIA prevents him.]
SONIA. I beg
you, I implore you, not to drink any more!
ASTROFF. Why
not?
SONIA. It is so
unworthy of you. You are well-bred, your voice
is sweet, you are even—more than any one I
know—handsome. Why do you want to resemble the
common people that drink and play cards? Oh,
don't, I beg you! You always say that people do
not create anything, but only destroy what
heaven has given them. Why, oh, why, do you
destroy yourself? Oh, don't, I implore you not
to! I entreat you!
ASTROFF. [Gives
her his hand] I won't drink any more.
SONIA. Promise
me.
ASTROFF. I give
you my word of honour.
SONIA.
[Squeezing his hand] Thank you.
ASTROFF. I have
done with it. You see, I am perfectly sober
again, and so I shall stay till the end of my
life. [He looks his watch] But, as I was saying,
life holds nothing for me; my race is run. I am
old, I am tired, I am trivial; my sensibilities
are dead. I could never attach myself to any one
again. I love no one, and never shall! Beauty
alone has the power to touch me still. I am
deeply moved by it. Helena could turn my head in
a day if she wanted to, but that is not love,
that is not affection—
[He shudders
and covers his face with his hands.]
SONIA. What is
it?
ASTROFF.
Nothing. During Lent one of my patients died
under chloroform.
SONIA. It is
time to forget that. [A pause] Tell me, doctor,
if I had a friend or a younger sister, and if
you knew that she, well—loved you, what would
you do?
ASTROFF.
[Shrugging his shoulders] I don't know. I don't
think I should do anything. I should make her
understand that I could not return her
love—however, my mind is not bothered about
those things now. I must start at once if I am
ever to get off. Good-bye, my dear girl. At this
rate we shall stand here talking till morning.
[He shakes hands with her] I shall go out
through the sitting-room, because I am afraid
your uncle might detain me. [He goes out.]
SONIA. [Alone]
Not a word! His heart and soul are still locked
from me, and yet for some reason I am strangely
happy. I wonder why? [She laughs with pleasure]
I told him that he was well-bred and handsome
and that his voice was sweet. Was that a
mistake? I can still feel his voice vibrating in
the air; it caresses me. [Wringing her hands]
Oh! how terrible it is to be plain! I am plain,
I know it. As I came out of church last Sunday I
overheard a woman say, "She is a dear, noble
girl, but what a pity she is so ugly!" So ugly!
HELENA comes in
and throws open the window.
HELENA. The
storm is over. What delicious air! [A pause]
Where is the doctor?
SONIA. He has
gone. [A pause.]
HELENA. Sonia!
SONIA. Yes?
HELENA. How
much longer are you going to sulk at me? We have
not hurt each other. Why not be friends? We have
had enough of this.
SONIA. I
myself—[She embraces HELENA] Let us make peace.
HELENA. With
all my heart. [They are both moved.]
SONIA. Has papa
gone to bed?
HELENA. No, he
is sitting up in the drawing-room. Heaven knows
what reason you and I had for not speaking to
each other for weeks. [Sees the open sideboard]
Who left the sideboard open?
SONIA. Dr.
Astroff has just had supper.
HELENA. There
is some wine. Let us seal our friendship.
SONIA. Yes, let
us.
HELENA. Out of
one glass. [She fills a wine-glass] So, we are
friends, are we?
SONIA. Yes.
[They drink and kiss each other] I have long
wanted to make friends, but somehow, I was
ashamed to. [She weeps.]
HELENA. Why are
you crying?
SONIA. I don't
know. It is nothing.
HELENA. There,
there, don't cry. [She weeps] Silly! Now I am
crying too. [A pause] You are angry with me
because I seem to have married your father for
his money, but don't believe the gossip you
hear. I swear to you I married him for love. I
was fascinated by his fame and learning. I know
now that it was not real love, but it seemed
real at the time. I am innocent, and yet your
clever, suspicious eyes have been punishing me
for an imaginary crime ever since my marriage.
SONIA. Peace,
peace! Let us forget the past.
HELENA. You
must not look so at people. It is not becoming
to you. You must trust people, or life becomes
impossible.
SONIA. Tell me
truly, as a friend, are you happy?
HELENA. Truly,
no.
SONIA. I knew
it. One more question: do you wish your husband
were young?
HELENA. What a
child you are! Of course I do. Go on, ask
something else.
SONIA. Do you
like the doctor?
HELENA. Yes,
very much indeed.
SONIA.
[Laughing] I have a stupid face, haven't I? He
has just gone out, and his voice is still in my
ears; I hear his step; I see his face in the
dark window. Let me say all I have in my heart!
But no, I cannot speak of it so loudly. I am
ashamed. Come to my room and let me tell you
there. I seem foolish to you, don't I? Talk to
me of him.
HELENA. What
can I say?
SONIA. He is
clever. He can do everything. He can cure the
sick, and plant woods.
HELENA. It is
not a question of medicine and woods, my dear,
he is a man of genius. Do you know what that
means? It means he is brave, profound, and of
clear insight. He plants a tree and his mind
travels a thousand years into the future, and he
sees visions of the happiness of the human race.
People like him are rare and should be loved.
What if he does drink and act roughly at times?
A man of genius cannot be a saint in Russia.
There he lives, cut off from the world by cold
and storm and endless roads of bottomless mud,
surrounded by a rough people who are crushed by
poverty and disease, his life one continuous
struggle, with never a day's respite; how can a
man live like that for forty years and keep
himself sober and unspotted? [Kissing SONIA] I
wish you happiness with all my heart; you
deserve it. [She gets up] As for me, I am a
worthless, futile woman. I have always been
futile; in music, in love, in my husband's
house—in a word, in everything. When you come to
think of it, Sonia, I am really very, very
unhappy. [Walks excitedly up and down] Happiness
can never exist for me in this world. Never. Why
do you laugh?
SONIA.
[Laughing and covering her face with her hands]
I am so happy, so happy!
HELENA. I want
to hear music. I might play a little.
SONIA. Oh, do,
do! [She embraces her] I could not possibly go
to sleep now. Do play!
HELENA. Yes, I
will. Your father is still awake. Music
irritates him when he is ill, but if he says I
may, then I shall play a little. Go, Sonia, and
ask him.
SONIA. Very
well.
[She goes out.
The WATCHMAN'S rattle is heard in the garden.]
HELENA. It is
long since I have heard music. And now, I shall
sit and play, and weep like a fool. [Speaking
out of the window] Is that you rattling out
there, Ephim?
VOICE OF THE
WATCHMAN. It is I.
HELENA. Don't
make such a noise. Your master is ill.
VOICE OF THE
WATCHMAN. I am going away this minute. [Whistles
a tune.]
SONIA. [Comes
back] He says, no.
The curtain
falls.
ACT III
The
drawing-room of SEREBRAKOFF'S house. There are
three doors: one to the right, one to the left,
and one in the centre of the room. VOITSKI and
SONIA are sitting down. HELENA is walking up and
down, absorbed in thought.
VOITSKI. We
were asked by the professor to be here at one
o'clock. [Looks at his watch] It is now a
quarter to one. It seems he has some
communication to make to the world.
HELENA.
Probably a matter of business.
VOITSKI. He
never had any business. He writes twaddle,
grumbles, and eats his heart out with jealousy;
that's all he does.
SONIA.
[Reproachfully] Uncle!
VOITSKI. All
right. I beg your pardon. [He points to HELENA]
Look at her. Wandering up and down from sheer
idleness. A sweet picture, really.
HELENA. I
wonder you are not bored, droning on in the same
key from morning till night. [Despairingly] I am
dying of this tedium. What shall I do?
SONIA.
[Shrugging her shoulders] There is plenty to do
if you would.
HELENA. For
instance?
SONIA. You
could help run this place, teach the children,
care for the sick—isn't that enough? Before you
and papa came, Uncle Vanya and I used to go to
market ourselves to deal in flour.
HELENA. I don't
know anything about such things, and besides,
they don't interest me. It is only in novels
that women go out and teach and heal the
peasants; how can I suddenly begin to do it?
SONIA. How can
you live here and not do it? Wait awhile, you
will get used to it all. [Embraces her] Don't be
sad, dearest. [Laughing] You feel miserable and
restless, and can't seem to fit into this life,
and your restlessness is catching. Look at Uncle
Vanya, he does nothing now but haunt you like a
shadow, and I have left my work to-day to come
here and talk with you. I am getting lazy, and
don't want to go on with it. Dr. Astroff hardly
ever used to come here; it was all we could do
to persuade him to visit us once a month, and
now he has abandoned his forestry and his
practice, and comes every day. You must be a
witch.
VOITSKI. Why
should you languish here? Come, my dearest, my
beauty, be sensible! The blood of a Nixey runs
in your veins. Oh, won't you let yourself be
one? Give your nature the reins for once in your
life; fall head over ears in love with some
other water sprite and plunge down head first
into a deep pool, so that the Herr Professor and
all of us may have our hands free again.
HELENA.
[Angrily] Leave me alone! How cruel you are!
[She tries to go out.]
VOITSKI.
[Preventing her] There, there, my beauty, I
apologise. [He kisses her hand] Forgive me.
HELENA. Confess
that you would try the patience of an angel.
VOITSKI. As a
peace offering I am going to fetch some flowers
which I picked for you this morning: some autumn
roses, beautiful, sorrowful roses. [He goes
out.]
SONIA. Autumn
roses, beautiful, sorrowful roses!
[She and HELENA
stand looking out of the window.]
HELENA.
September already! How shall we live through the
long winter here? [A pause] Where is the doctor?
SONIA. He is
writing in Uncle Vanya's room. I am glad Uncle
Vanya has gone out, I want to talk to you about
something.
HELENA. About
what?
SONIA. About
what?
[She lays her
head on HELENA'S breast.]
HELENA.
[Stroking her hair] There, there, that will do.
Don't, Sonia.
SONIA. I am
ugly!
HELENA. You
have lovely hair.
SONIA. Don't
say that! [She turns to look at herself in the
glass] No, when a woman is ugly they always say
she has beautiful hair or eyes. I have loved him
now for six years, I have loved him more than
one loves one's mother. I seem to hear him
beside me every moment of the day. I feel the
pressure of his hand on mine. If I look up, I
seem to see him coming, and as you see, I run to
you to talk of him. He is here every day now,
but he never looks at me, he does not notice my
presence. It is agony. I have absolutely no
hope, no, no hope. Oh, my God! Give me strength
to endure. I prayed all last night. I often go
up to him and speak to him and look into his
eyes. My pride is gone. I am not mistress of
myself. Yesterday I told Uncle Vanya I couldn't
control myself, and all the servants know it.
Every one knows that I love him.
HELENA. Does
he?
SONIA. No, he
never notices me.
HELENA.
[Thoughtfully] He is a strange man. Listen,
Sonia, will you allow me to speak to him? I
shall be careful, only hint. [A pause] Really,
to be in uncertainty all these years! Let me do
it!
SONIA nods an
affirmative.
HELENA.
Splendid! It will be easy to find out whether he
loves you or not. Don't be ashamed, sweetheart,
don't worry. I shall be careful; he will not
notice a thing. We only want to find out whether
it is yes or no, don't we? [A pause] And if it
is no, then he must keep away from here, is that
so?
SONIA nods.
HELENA. It will
be easier not to see him any more. We won't put
off the examination an instant. He said he had a
sketch to show me. Go and tell him at once that
I want to see him.
SONIA. [In
great excitement] Will you tell me the whole
truth?
HELENA. Of
course I will. I am sure that no matter what it
is, it will be easier for you to bear than this
uncertainty. Trust to me, dearest.
SONIA. Yes,
yes. I shall say that you want to see his
sketch. [She starts out, but stops near the door
and looks back] No, it is better not to know—and
yet—there may be hope.
HELENA. What do
you say?
SONIA. Nothing.
[She goes out.]
HELENA. [Alone]
There is no greater sorrow than to know
another's secret when you cannot help them. [In
deep thought] He is obviously not in love with
her, but why shouldn't he marry her? She is not
pretty, but she is so clever and pure and good,
she would make a splendid wife for a country
doctor of his years. [A pause] I can understand
how the poor child feels. She lives here in this
desperate loneliness with no one around her
except these colourless shadows that go mooning
about talking nonsense and knowing nothing
except that they eat, drink, and sleep. Among
them appears from time to time this Dr. Astroff,
so different, so handsome, so interesting, so
charming. It is like seeing the moon rise on a
dark night. Oh, to surrender oneself to his
embrace! To lose oneself in his arms! I am a
little in love with him myself! Yes, I am lonely
without him, and when I think of him I smile.
That Uncle Vanya says I have the blood of a
Nixey in my veins: "Give rein to your nature for
once in your life!" Perhaps it is right that I
should. Oh, to be free as a bird, to fly away
from all your sleepy faces and your talk and
forget that you have existed at all! But I am a
coward, I am afraid; my conscience torments me.
He comes here every day now. I can guess why,
and feel guilty already; I should like to fall
on my knees at Sonia's feet and beg her
forgiveness, and weep.
ASTROFF comes
in carrying a portfolio.
ASTROFF. How do
you do? [Shakes hands with her] Do you want to
see my sketch?
HELENA. Yes,
you promised to show me what you had been doing.
Have you time now?
ASTROFF. Of
course I have!
He lays the
portfolio on the table, takes out the sketch and
fastens it to the table with thumb-tacks.
ASTROFF. Where
were you born?
HELENA.
[Helping him] In St. Petersburg.
ASTROFF. And
educated?
HELENA. At the
Conservatory there.
ASTROFF. You
don't find this life very interesting, I dare
say?
HELENA. Oh, why
not? It is true I don't know the country very
well, but I have read a great deal about it.
ASTROFF. I have
my own desk there in Ivan's room. When I am
absolutely too exhausted to go on I drop
everything and rush over here to forget myself
in this work for an hour or two. Ivan and Miss
Sonia sit rattling at their counting-boards, the
cricket chirps, and I sit beside them and paint,
feeling warm and peaceful. But I don't permit
myself this luxury very often, only once a
month. [Pointing to the picture] Look there!
That is a map of our country as it was fifty
years ago. The green tints, both dark and light,
represent forests. Half the map, as you see, is
covered with it. Where the green is striped with
red the forests were inhabited by elk and wild
goats. Here on this lake, lived great flocks of
swans and geese and ducks; as the old men say,
there was a power of birds of every kind. Now
they have vanished like a cloud. Beside the
hamlets and villages, you see, I have dotted
down here and there the various settlements,
farms, hermit's caves, and water-mills. This
country carried a great many cattle and horses,
as you can see by the quantity of blue paint.
For instance, see how thickly it lies in this
part; there were great herds of them here, an
average of three horses to every house. [A
pause] Now, look lower down. This is the country
as it was twenty-five years ago. Only a third of
the map is green now with forests. There are no
goats left and no elk. The blue paint is
lighter, and so on, and so on. Now we come to
the third part; our country as it appears
to-day. We still see spots of green, but not
much. The elk, the swans, the black-cock have
disappeared. It is, on the whole, the picture of
a regular and slow decline which it will
evidently only take about ten or fifteen more
years to complete. You may perhaps object that
it is the march of progress, that the old order
must give place to the new, and you might be
right if roads had been run through these ruined
woods, or if factories and schools had taken
their place. The people then would have become
better educated and healthier and richer, but as
it is, we have nothing of the sort. We have the
same swamps and mosquitoes; the same disease and
want; the typhoid, the diphtheria, the burning
villages. We are confronted by the degradation
of our country, brought on by the fierce
struggle for existence of the human race. It is
the consequence of the ignorance and
unconsciousness of starving, shivering, sick
humanity that, to save its children,
instinctively snatches at everything that can
warm it and still its hunger. So it destroys
everything it can lay its hands on, without a
thought for the morrow. And almost everything
has gone, and nothing has been created to take
its place. [Coldly] But I see by your face that
I am not interesting you.
HELENA. I know
so little about such things!
ASTROFF. There
is nothing to know. It simply isn't interesting,
that's all.
HELENA.
Frankly, my thoughts were elsewhere. Forgive me!
I want to submit you to a little examination,
but I am embarrassed and don't know how to
begin.
ASTROFF. An
examination?
HELENA. Yes,
but quite an innocent one. Sit down. [They sit
down] It is about a certain young girl I know.
Let us discuss it like honest people, like
friends, and then forget what has passed between
us, shall we?
ASTROFF. Very
well.
HELENA. It is
about my step-daughter, Sonia. Do you like her?
ASTROFF. Yes, I
respect her.
HELENA. Do you
like her—as a woman?
ASTROFF.
[Slowly] No.
HELENA. One
more word, and that will be the last. You have
not noticed anything?
ASTROFF. No,
nothing.
HELENA. [Taking
his hand] You do not love her. I see that in
your eyes. She is suffering. You must realise
that, and not come here any more.
ASTROFF. My sun
has set, yes, and then I haven't the time.
[Shrugging his shoulders] Where shall I find
time for such things? [He is embarrassed.]
HELENA. Bah!
What an unpleasant conversation! I am as out of
breath as if I had been running three miles
uphill. Thank heaven, that is over! Now let us
forget everything as if nothing had been said.
You are sensible. You understand. [A pause] I am
actually blushing.
ASTROFF. If you
had spoken a month ago I might perhaps have
considered it, but now—[He shrugs his shoulders]
Of course, if she is suffering—but I cannot
understand why you had to put me through this
examination. [He searches her face with his
eyes, and shakes his finger at her] Oho, you are
wily!
HELENA. What
does this mean?
ASTROFF.
[Laughing] You are a wily one! I admit that
Sonia is suffering, but what does this
examination of yours mean? [He prevents her from
retorting, and goes on quickly] Please don't put
on such a look of surprise; you know perfectly
well why I come here every day. Yes, you know
perfectly why and for whose sake I come! Oh, my
sweet tigress! don't look at me in that way; I
am an old bird!
HELENA.
[Perplexed] A tigress? I don't understand you.
ASTROFF.
Beautiful, sleek tigress, you must have your
victims! For a whole month I have done nothing
but seek you eagerly. I have thrown over
everything for you, and you love to see it. Now
then, I am sure you knew all this without
putting me through your examination. [Crossing
his arms and bowing his head] I surrender. Here
you have me—now, eat me.
HELENA. You
have gone mad!
ASTROFF. You
are afraid!
HELENA. I am a
better and stronger woman than you think me.
Good-bye. [She tries to leave the room.]
ASTROFF. Why
good-bye? Don't say good-bye, don't waste words.
Oh, how lovely you are—what hands! [He kisses
her hands.]
HELENA. Enough
of this! [She frees her hands] Leave the room!
You have forgotten yourself.
ASTROFF. Tell
me, tell me, where can we meet to-morrow? [He
puts his arm around her] Don't you see that we
must meet, that it is inevitable?
He kisses her.
VOITSKI comes in carrying a bunch of roses, and
stops in the doorway.
HELENA.
[Without seeing VOITSKI] Have pity! Leave me,
[lays her head on ASTROFF'S shoulder] Don't!
[She tries to break away from him.]
ASTROFF.
[Holding her by the waist] Be in the forest
tomorrow at two o'clock. Will you? Will you?
HELENA. [Sees
VOITSKI] Let me go! [Goes to the window deeply
embarrassed] This is appalling!
VOITSKI.
[Throws the flowers on a chair, and speaks in
great excitement, wiping his face with his
handkerchief] Nothing—yes, yes, nothing.
ASTROFF. The
weather is fine to-day, my dear Ivan; the
morning was overcast and looked like rain, but
now the sun is shining again. Honestly, we have
had a very fine autumn, and the wheat is looking
fairly well. [Puts his map back into the
portfolio] But the days are growing short.
HELENA. [Goes
quickly up to VOITSKI] You must do your best;
you must use all your power to get my husband
and myself away from here to-day! Do you hear? I
say, this very day!
VOITSKI.
[Wiping his face] Oh! Ah! Oh! All right!
I—Helena, I saw everything!
HELENA. [In
great agitation] Do you hear me? I must leave
here this very day!
SEREBRAKOFF,
SONIA, MARINA, and TELEGIN come in.
TELEGIN. I am
not very well myself, your Excellency. I have
been limping for two days, and my head—
SEREBRAKOFF.
Where are the others? I hate this house. It is a
regular labyrinth. Every one is always scattered
through the twenty-six enormous rooms; one never
can find a soul. [Rings] Ask my wife and Madame
Voitskaya to come here!
HELENA. I am
here already.
SEREBRAKOFF.
Please, all of you, sit down.
SONIA. [Goes up
to HELENA and asks anxiously] What did he say?
HELENA. I'll
tell you later.
SONIA. You are
moved. [looking quickly and inquiringly into her
face] I understand; he said he would not come
here any more. [A pause] Tell me, did he?
HELENA nods.
SEREBRAKOFF.
[To TELEGIN] One can, after all, become
reconciled to being an invalid, but not to this
country life. The ways of it stick in my throat
and I feel exactly as if I had been whirled off
the earth and landed on a strange planet. Please
be seated, ladies and gentlemen. Sonia! [SONIA
does not hear. She is standing with her head
bowed sadly forward on her breast] Sonia! [A
pause] She does not hear me. [To MARINA] Sit
down too, nurse. [MARINA sits down and begins to
knit her stocking] I crave your indulgence,
ladies and gentlemen; hang your ears, if I may
say so, on the peg of attention. [He laughs.]
VOITSKI.
[Agitated] Perhaps you do not need me—may I be
excused?
SEREBRAKOFF.
No, you are needed now more than any one.
VOITSKI. What
is it you want of me?
SEREBRAKOFF.
You—but what are you angry about? If it is
anything I have done, I ask you to forgive me.
VOITSKI. Oh,
drop that and come to business; what do you
want?
MME. VOITSKAYA
comes in.
SEREBRAKOFF.
Here is mother. Ladies and gentlemen, I shall
begin. I have asked you to assemble here, my
friends, in order to discuss a very important
matter. I want to ask you for your assistance
and advice, and knowing your unfailing
amiability I think I can count on both. I am a
book-worm and a scholar, and am unfamiliar with
practical affairs. I cannot, I find, dispense
with the help of well-informed people such as
you, Ivan, and you, Telegin, and you, mother.
The truth is, manet omnes una nox, that
is to say, our lives are in the hands of God,
and as I am old and ill, I realise that the time
has come for me to dispose of my property in
regard to the interests of my family. My life is
nearly over, and I am not thinking of myself,
but I have a young wife and daughter. [A pause]
I cannot continue to live in the country; we
were not made for country life, and yet we
cannot afford to live in town on the income
derived from this estate. We might sell the
woods, but that would be an expedient we could
not resort to every year. We must find some
means of guaranteeing to ourselves a certain
more or less fixed yearly income. With this
object in view, a plan has occurred to me which
I now have the honour of presenting to you for
your consideration. I shall only give you a
rough outline, avoiding all details. Our estate
does not pay on an average more than two per
cent on the money invested in it. I propose to
sell it. If we then invest our capital in bonds,
it will earn us four to five per cent, and we
should probably have a surplus over of several
thousand roubles, with which we could buy a
summer cottage in Finland—
VOITSKI. Hold
on! Repeat what you just said; I don't think I
heard you quite right.
SEREBRAKOFF. I
said we would invest the money in bonds and buy
a cottage in Finland with the surplus.
VOITSKI. No,
not Finland—you said something else.
SEREBRAKOFF. I
propose to sell this place.
VOITSKI. Aha!
That was it! So you are going to sell the place?
Splendid. The idea is a rich one. And what do
you propose to do with my old mother and me and
with Sonia here?
SEREBRAKOFF.
That will be decided in due time. We can't do
everything at once.
VOITSKI. Wait!
It is clear that until this moment I have never
had a grain of sense in my head. I have always
been stupid enough to think that the estate
belonged to Sonia. My father bought it as a
wedding present for my sister, and I foolishly
imagined that as our laws were made for Russians
and not Turks, my sister's estate would come
down to her child.
SEREBRAKOFF. Of
course it is Sonia's. Has any one denied it? I
don't want to sell it without Sonia's consent;
on the contrary, what I am doing is for Sonia's
good.
VOITSKI. This
is absolutely incomprehensible. Either I have
gone mad or—or—
MME. VOITSKAYA.
Jean, don't contradict Alexander. Trust to him;
he knows better than we do what is right and
what is wrong.
VOITSKI. I
shan't. Give me some water. [He drinks] Go
ahead! Say anything you please—anything!
SEREBRAKOFF. I
can't imagine why you are so upset. I don't
pretend that my scheme is an ideal one, and if
you all object to it I shall not insist. [A
pause.]
TELEGIN. [With
embarrassment] I not only nourish feelings of
respect toward learning, your Excellency, but I
am also drawn to it by family ties. My brother
Gregory's wife's brother, whom you may know; his
name is Constantine Lakedemonoff, and he used to
be a magistrate—
VOITSKI. Stop,
Waffles. This is business; wait a bit, we will
talk of that later. [To SEREBRAKOFF] There now,
ask him what he thinks; this estate was bought
from his uncle.
SEREBRAKOFF.
Ah! Why should I ask questions? What good would
it do?
VOITSKI. The
price was ninety-five thousand roubles. My
father paid seventy and left a debt of
twenty-five. Now listen! This place could never
have been bought had I not renounced my
inheritance in favour of my sister, whom I
deeply loved—and what is more, I worked for ten
years like an ox, and paid off the debt.
SEREBRAKOFF. I
regret ever having started this conversation.
VOITSKI. Thanks
entirely to my own personal efforts, the place
is entirely clear of debts, and now, when I have
grown old, you want to throw me out, neck and
crop!
SEREBRAKOFF. I
can't imagine what you are driving at.
VOITSKI. For
twenty-five years I have managed this place, and
have sent you the returns from it like the most
honest of servants, and you have never given me
one single word of thanks for my work, not
one—neither in my youth nor now. You allowed me
a meagre salary of five hundred roubles a year,
a beggar's pittance, and have never even thought
of adding a rouble to it.
SEREBRAKOFF.
What did I know about such things, Ivan? I am
not a practical man and don't understand them.
You might have helped yourself to all you
wanted.
VOITSKI. Yes,
why did I not steal? Don't you all despise me
for not stealing, when it would have been only
justice? And I should not now have been a
beggar!
MME. VOITSKAYA.
[Sternly] Jean!
TELEGIN.
[Agitated] Vanya, old man, don't talk in that
way. Why spoil such pleasant relations? [He
embraces him] Do stop!
VOITSKI. For
twenty-five years I have been sitting here with
my mother like a mole in a burrow. Our every
thought and hope was yours and yours only. By
day we talked with pride of you and your work,
and spoke your name with veneration; our nights
we wasted reading the books and papers which my
soul now loathes.
TELEGIN. Don't,
Vanya, don't. I can't stand it.
SEREBRAKOFF.
[Wrathfully] What under heaven do you want,
anyway?
VOITSKI. We
used to think of you as almost superhuman, but
now the scales have fallen from my eyes and I
see you as you are! You write on art without
knowing anything about it. Those books of yours
which I used to admire are not worth one copper
kopeck. You are a hoax!
SEREBRAKOFF.
Can't any one make him stop? I am going!
HELENA. Ivan, I
command you to stop this instant! Do you hear
me?
VOITSKI. I
refuse! [SEREBRAKOFF tries to get out of the
room, but VOITSKI bars the door] Wait! I have
not done yet! You have wrecked my life. I have
never lived. My best years have gone for
nothing, have been ruined, thanks to you. You
are my most bitter enemy!
TELEGIN. I
can't stand it; I can't stand it. I am going.
[He goes out in great excitement.]
SEREBRAKOFF.
But what do you want? What earthly right have
you to use such language to me? Ruination! If
this estate is yours, then take it, and let me
be ruined!
HELENA. I am
going away out of this hell this minute.
[Shrieks] This is too much!
VOITSKI. My
life has been a failure. I am clever and brave
and strong. If I had lived a normal life I might
have become another Schopenhauer or
Dostoieffski. I am losing my head! I am going
crazy! Mother, I am in despair! Oh, mother!
MME. VOITSKAYA.
[Sternly] Listen, Alexander!
SONIA falls on
her knees beside the nurse and nestles against
her.
SONIA. Oh,
nurse, nurse!
VOITSKI.
Mother! What shall I do? But no, don't speak! I
know what to do. [To SEREBRAKOFF] And you will
understand me!
He goes out
through the door in the centre of the room and
MME. VOITSKAYA follows him.
SEREBRAKOFF.
Tell me, what on earth is the matter? Take this
lunatic out of my sight! I cannot possibly live
under the same roof with him. His room [He
points to the centre door] is almost next door
to mine. Let him take himself off into the
village or into the wing of the house, or I
shall leave here at once. I cannot stay in the
same house with him.
HELENA. [To her
husband] We are leaving to-day; we must get
ready at once for our departure.
SEREBRAKOFF.
What a perfectly dreadful man!
SONIA. [On her
knees beside the nurse and turning to her
father. She speaks with emotion] You must be
kind to us, papa. Uncle Vanya and I are so
unhappy! [Controlling her despair] Have pity on
us. Remember how Uncle Vanya and Granny used to
copy and translate your books for you every
night—every, every night. Uncle Vanya has toiled
without rest; he would never spend a penny on
us, we sent it all to you. We have not eaten the
bread of idleness. I am not saying this as I
should like to, but you must understand us,
papa, you must be merciful to us.
HELENA. [Very
excited, to her husband] For heaven's sake,
Alexander, go and have a talk with him—explain!
SEREBRAKOFF.
Very well, I shall have a talk with him, but I
won't apologise for a thing. I am not angry with
him, but you must confess that his behaviour has
been strange, to say the least. Excuse me, I
shall go to him.
[He goes out
through the centre door.]
HELENA. Be
gentle with him; try to quiet him. [She follows
him out.]
SONIA.
[Nestling nearer to MARINA] Nurse, oh, nurse!
MARINA. It's
all right, my baby. When the geese have cackled
they will be still again. First they cackle and
then they stop.
SONIA. Nurse!
MARINA. You are
trembling all over, as if you were freezing.
There, there, little orphan baby, God is
merciful. A little linden-tea, and it will all
pass away. Don't cry, my sweetest. [Looking
angrily at the door in the centre of the room]
See, the geese have all gone now. The devil take
them!
A shot is
heard. HELENA screams behind the scenes. SONIA
shudders.
MARINA. Bang!
What's that?
SEREBRAKOFF.
[Comes in reeling with terror] Hold him! hold
him! He has gone mad!
HELENA and
VOITSKI are seen struggling in the doorway.
HELENA. [Trying
to wrest the revolver from him] Give it to me;
give it to me, I tell you!
VOITSKI. Let me
go, Helena, let me go! [He frees himself and
rushes in, looking everywhere for SEREBRAKOFF]
Where is he? Ah, there he is! [He shoots at him.
A pause] I didn't get him? I missed again?
[Furiously] Damnation! Damnation! To hell with
him!
He flings the
revolver on the floor, and drops helpless into a
chair. SEREBRAKOFF stands as if stupefied.
HELENA leans against the wall, almost fainting.
HELENA. Take me
away! Take me away! I can't stay here—I can't!
VOITSKI. [In
despair] Oh, what shall I do? What shall I do?
SONIA. [Softly]
Oh, nurse, nurse!
The curtain
falls.
ACT IV
VOITSKI'S
bedroom, which is also his office. A table
stands near the window; on it are ledgers,
letter scales, and papers of every description.
Near by stands a smaller table belonging to
ASTROFF, with his paints and drawing materials.
On the wall hangs a cage containing a starling.
There is also a map of Africa on the wall,
obviously of no use to anybody. There is a large
sofa covered with buckram. A door to the left
leads into an inner room; one to the right leads
into the front hall, and before this door lies a
mat for the peasants with their muddy boots to
stand on. It is an autumn evening. The silence
is profound. TELEGIN and MARINA are sitting
facing one another, winding wool.
TELEGIN. Be
quick, Marina, or we shall be called away to say
good-bye before you have finished. The carriage
has already been ordered.
MARINA. [Trying
to wind more quickly] I am a little tired.
TELEGIN. They
are going to Kharkoff to live.
MARINA. They do
well to go.
TELEGIN. They
have been frightened. The professor's wife won't
stay here an hour longer. "If we are going at
all, let's be off," says she, "we shall go to
Kharkoff and look about us, and then we can send
for our things." They are travelling light. It
seems, Marina, that fate has decreed for them
not to live here.
MARINA. And
quite rightly. What a storm they have just
raised! It was shameful!
TELEGIN. It was
indeed. The scene was worthy of the brush of
Aibazofski.
MARINA. I wish
I'd never laid eyes on them. [A pause] Now we
shall have things as they were again: tea at
eight, dinner at one, and supper in the evening;
everything in order as decent folks, as
Christians like to have it. [Sighs] It is a long
time since I have eaten noodles.
TELEGIN. Yes,
we haven't had noodles for ages. [A pause] Not
for ages. As I was going through the village
this morning, Marina, one of the shop-keepers
called after me, "Hi! you hanger-on!" I felt it
bitterly.
MARINA. Don't
pay the least attention to them, master; we are
all dependents on God. You and Sonia and all of
us. Every one must work, no one can sit idle.
Where is Sonia?
TELEGIN. In the
garden with the doctor, looking for Ivan. They
fear he may lay violent hands on himself.
MARINA. Where
is his pistol?
TELEGIN.
[Whispers] I hid it in the cellar.
VOITSKI and
ASTROFF come in.
VOITSKI. Leave
me alone! [To MARINA and TELEGIN] Go away! Go
away and leave me to myself, if but for an hour.
I won't have you watching me like this!
TELEGIN. Yes,
yes, Vanya. [He goes out on tiptoe.]
MARINA. The
gander cackles; ho! ho! ho!
[She gathers up
her wool and goes out.]
VOITSKI. Leave
me by myself!
ASTROFF. I
would, with the greatest pleasure. I ought to
have gone long ago, but I shan't leave you until
you have returned what you took from me.
VOITSKI. I took
nothing from you.
ASTROFF. I am
not jesting, don't detain me, I really must go.
VOITSKI. I took
nothing of yours.
ASTROFF. You
didn't? Very well, I shall have to wait a little
longer, and then you will have to forgive me if
I resort to force. We shall have to bind you and
search you. I mean what I say.
VOITSKI. Do as
you please. [A pause] Oh, to make such a fool of
myself! To shoot twice and miss him both times!
I shall never forgive myself.
ASTROFF. When
the impulse came to shoot, it would have been as
well had you put a bullet through your own head.
VOITSKI.
[Shrugging his shoulders] Strange! I attempted
murder, and am not going to be arrested or
brought to trial. That means they think me mad.
[With a bitter laugh] Me! I am mad, and those
who hide their worthlessness, their dullness,
their crying heartlessness behind a professor's
mask, are sane! Those who marry old men and then
deceive them under the noses of all, are sane! I
saw you kiss her; I saw you in each other's
arms!
ASTROFF. Yes,
sir, I did kiss her; so there. [He puts his
thumb to his nose.]
VOITSKI. [His
eyes on the door] No, it is the earth that is
mad, because she still bears us on her breast.
ASTROFF. That
is nonsense.
VOITSKI. Well?
Am I not a madman, and therefore irresponsible?
Haven't I the right to talk nonsense?
ASTROFF. This
is a farce! You are not mad; you are simply a
ridiculous fool. I used to think every fool was
out of his senses, but now I see that lack of
sense is a man's normal state, and you are
perfectly normal.
VOITSKI.
[Covers his face with his hands] Oh! If you knew
how ashamed I am! These piercing pangs of shame
are like nothing on earth. [In an agonised
voice] I can't endure them! [He leans against
the table] What can I do? What can I do?
ASTROFF.
Nothing.
VOITSKI. You
must tell me something! Oh, my God! I am
forty-seven years old. I may live to sixty; I
still have thirteen years before me; an
eternity! How shall I be able to endure life for
thirteen years? What shall I do? How can I fill
them? Oh, don't you see? [He presses ASTROFF'S
hand convulsively] Don't you see, if only I
could live the rest of my life in some new way!
If I could only wake some still, bright morning
and feel that life had begun again; that the
past was forgotten and had vanished like smoke.
[He weeps] Oh, to begin life anew! Tell me, tell
me how to begin.
ASTROFF.
[Crossly] What nonsense! What sort of a new life
can you and I look forward to? We can have no
hope.
VOITSKI. None?
ASTROFF. None.
Of that I am convinced.
VOITSKI. Tell
me what to do. [He puts his hand to his heart] I
feel such a burning pain here.
ASTROFF.
[Shouts angrily] Stop! [Then, more gently] It
may be that posterity, which will despise us for
our blind and stupid lives, will find some road
to happiness; but we—you and I—have but one
hope, the hope that we may be visited by
visions, perhaps by pleasant ones, as we lie
resting in our graves. [Sighing] Yes, brother,
there were only two respectable, intelligent men
in this county, you and I. Ten years or so of
this life of ours, this miserable life, have
sucked us under, and we have become as
contemptible and petty as the rest. But don't
try to talk me out of my purpose! Give me what
you took from me, will you?
VOITSKI. I took
nothing from you.
ASTROFF. You
took a little bottle of morphine out of my
medicine-case. [A pause] Listen! If you are
positively determined to make an end to
yourself, go into the woods and shoot yourself
there. Give up the morphine, or there will be a
lot of talk and guesswork; people will think I
gave it to you. I don't fancy having to perform
a post-mortem on you. Do you think I should find
it interesting?
SONIA comes in.
VOITSKI. Leave
me alone.
ASTROFF. [To
SONIA] Sonia, your uncle has stolen a bottle of
morphine out of my medicine-case and won't give
it up. Tell him that his behaviour is—well,
unwise. I haven't time, I must be going.
SONIA. Uncle
Vanya, did you take the morphine?
ASTROFF. Yes,
he took it. [A pause] I am absolutely sure.
SONIA. Give it
up! Why do you want to frighten us? [Tenderly]
Give it up, Uncle Vanya! My misfortune is
perhaps even greater than yours, but I am not
plunged in despair. I endure my sorrow, and
shall endure it until my life comes to a natural
end. You must endure yours, too. [A pause] Give
it up! Dear, darling Uncle Vanya. Give it up!
[She weeps] You are so good, I am sure you will
have pity on us and give it up. You must endure
your sorrow, Uncle Vanya; you must endure it.
VOITSKI takes a
bottle from the drawer of the table and hands it
to ASTROFF.
VOITSKI. There
it is! [To SONIA] And now, we must get to work
at once; we must do something, or else I shall
not be able to endure it.
SONIA. Yes,
yes, to work! As soon as we have seen them off
we shall go to work. [She nervously straightens
out the papers on the table] Everything is in a
muddle!
ASTROFF.
[Putting the bottle in his case, which he straps
together] Now I can be off.
HELENA comes
in.
HELENA. Are you
here, Ivan? We are starting in a moment. Go to
Alexander, he wants to speak to you.
SONIA. Go,
Uncle Vanya. [She takes VOITSKI 'S arm] Come,
you and papa must make peace; that is absolutely
necessary.
SONIA and
VOITSKI go out.
HELENA. I am
going away. [She gives ASTROFF her hand]
Good-bye.
ASTROFF. So
soon?
HELENA. The
carriage is waiting.
ASTROFF.
Good-bye.
HELENA. You
promised me you would go away yourself to-day.
ASTROFF. I have
not forgotten. I am going at once. [A pause]
Were you frightened? Was it so terrible?
HELENA. Yes.
ASTROFF.
Couldn't you stay? Couldn't you? To-morrow—in
the forest—
HELENA. No. It
is all settled, and that is why I can look you
so bravely in the face. Our departure is fixed.
One thing I must ask of you: don't think too
badly of me; I should like you to respect me.
ASTROFF. Ah!
[With an impatient gesture] Stay, I implore you!
Confess that there is nothing for you to do in
this world. You have no object in life; there is
nothing to occupy your attention, and sooner or
later your feelings must master you. It is
inevitable. It would be better if it happened
not in Kharkoff or in Kursk, but here, in
nature's lap. It would then at least be
poetical, even beautiful. Here you have the
forests, the houses half in ruins that
Turgenieff writes of.
HELENA. How
comical you are! I am angry with you and yet I
shall always remember you with pleasure. You are
interesting and original. You and I will never
meet again, and so I shall tell you—why should I
conceal it?—that I am just a little in love with
you. Come, one more last pressure of our hands,
and then let us part good friends. Let us not
bear each other any ill will.
ASTROFF.
[Pressing her hand] Yes, go. [Thoughtfully] You
seem to be sincere and good, and yet there is
something strangely disquieting about all your
personality. No sooner did you arrive here with
your husband than every one whom you found busy
and actively creating something was forced to
drop his work and give himself up for the whole
summer to your husband's gout and yourself. You
and he have infected us with your idleness. I
have been swept off my feet; I have not put my
hand to a thing for weeks, during which sickness
has been running its course unchecked among the
people, and the peasants have been pasturing
their cattle in my woods and young plantations.
Go where you will, you and your husband will
always carry destruction in your train. I am
joking of course, and yet I am strangely sure
that had you stayed here we should have been
overtaken by the most immense desolation. I
would have gone to my ruin, and you—you would
not have prospered. So go! E finita la comedia!
HELENA.
[Snatching a pencil off ASTROFF'S table, and
hiding it with a quick movement] I shall take
this pencil for memory!
ASTROFF. How
strange it is. We meet, and then suddenly it
seems that we must part forever. That is the way
in this world. As long as we are alone, before
Uncle Vanya comes in with a bouquet—allow me—to
kiss you good-bye—may I? [He kisses her on the
cheek] So! Splendid!
HELENA. I wish
you every happiness. [She glances about her] For
once in my life, I shall! and scorn the
consequences! [She kisses him impetuously, and
they quickly part] I must go.
ASTROFF. Yes,
go. If the carriage is there, then start at
once. [They stand listening.]
ASTROFF. E
finita!
VOITSKI,
SEREBRAKOFF, MME. VOITSKAYA with her book,
TELEGIN, and SONIA come in.
SEREBRAKOFF.
[To VOITSKI] Shame on him who bears malice for
the past. I have gone through so much in the
last few hours that I feel capable of writing a
whole treatise on the conduct of life for the
instruction of posterity. I gladly accept your
apology, and myself ask your forgiveness. [He
kisses VOITSKI three times.]
HELENA embraces
SONIA.
SEREBRAKOFF.
[Kissing MME. VOITSKAYA'S hand] Mother!
MME. VOITSKAYA.
[Kissing him] Have your picture taken,
Alexander, and send me one. You know how dear
you are to me.
TELEGIN.
Good-bye, your Excellency. Don't forget us.
SEREBRAKOFF.
[Kissing his daughter] Good-bye, good-bye all.
[Shaking hands with ASTROFF] Many thanks for
your pleasant company. I have a deep regard for
your opinions and your enthusiasm, but let me,
as an old man, give one word of advice at
parting: do something, my friend! Work! Do
something! [They all bow] Good luck to you all.
[He goes out followed by MME. VOITSKAYA and
SONIA.]
VOITSKI
[Kissing HELENA'S hand fervently]
Good-bye—forgive me. I shall never see you
again!
HELENA.
[Touched] Good-bye, dear boy.
She lightly
kisses his head as he bends over her hand, and
goes out.
ASTROFF. Tell
them to bring my carriage around too, Waffles.
TELEGIN. All
right, old man.
ASTROFF and
VOITSKI are left behind alone. ASTROFF collects
his paints and drawing materials on the table
and packs them away in a box.
ASTROFF. Why
don't you go to see them off?
VOITSKI. Let
them go! I—I can't go out there. I feel too sad.
I must go to work on something at once. To work!
To work!
He rummages
through his papers on the table. A pause. The
tinkling of bells is heard as the horses trot
away.
ASTROFF. They
have gone! The professor, I suppose, is glad to
go. He couldn't be tempted back now by a
fortune.
MARINA comes
in.
MARINA. They
have gone. [She sits down in an arm-chair and
knits her stocking.]
SONIA comes in
wiping her eyes.
SONIA. They
have gone. God be with them. [To her uncle] And
now, Uncle Vanya, let us do something!
VOITSKI. To
work! To work!
SONIA. It is
long, long, since you and I have sat together at
this table. [She lights a lamp on the table] No
ink! [She takes the inkstand to the cupboard and
fills it from an ink-bottle] How sad it is to
see them go!
MME. VOITSKAYA
comes slowly in.
MME. VOITSKAYA.
They have gone.
She sits down
and at once becomes absorbed in her book. SONIA
sits down at the table and looks through an
account book.
SONIA. First,
Uncle Vanya, let us write up the accounts. They
are in a dreadful state. Come, begin. You take
one and I will take the other.
VOITSKI. In
account with [They sit silently writing.]
MARINA.
[Yawning] The sand-man has come.
ASTROFF. How
still it is. Their pens scratch, the cricket
sings; it is so warm and comfortable. I hate to
go. [The tinkling of bells is heard.]
ASTROFF. My
carriage has come. There now remains but to say
good-bye to you, my friends, and to my table
here, and then—away! [He puts the map into the
portfolio.]
MARINA. Don't
hurry away; sit a little longer with us.
ASTROFF.
Impossible.
VOITSKI.
[Writing] And carry forward from the old debt
two seventy-five—
WORKMAN comes
in.
WORKMAN. Your
carriage is waiting, sir.
ASTROFF. All
right. [He hands the WORKMAN his medicine-case,
portfolio, and box] Look out, don't crush the
portfolio!
WORKMAN. Very
well, sir.
SONIA. When
shall we see you again?
ASTROFF. Hardly
before next summer. Probably not this winter,
though, of course, if anything should happen you
will let me know. [He shakes hands with them]
Thank you for your kindness, for your
hospitality, for everything! [He goes up to
MARINA and kisses her head] Good-bye, old nurse!
MARINA. Are you
going without your tea?
ASTROFF. I
don't want any, nurse.
MARINA. Won't
you have a drop of vodka?
ASTROFF.
[Hesitatingly] Yes, I might.
MARINA goes
out.
ASTROFF. [After
a pause] My off-wheeler has gone lame for some
reason. I noticed it yesterday when Peter was
taking him to water.
VOITSKI. You
should have him re-shod.
ASTROFF. I
shall have to go around by the blacksmith's on
my way home. It can't be avoided. [He stands
looking up at the map of Africa hanging on the
wall] I suppose it is roasting hot in Africa
now.
VOITSKI. Yes, I
suppose it is.
MARINA comes
back carrying a tray on which are a glass of
vodka and a piece of bread.
MARINA. Help
yourself.
ASTROFF drinks
MARINA. To your
good health! [She bows deeply] Eat your bread
with it.
ASTROFF. No, I
like it so. And now, good-bye. [To MARINA] You
needn't come out to see me off, nurse.
He goes out.
SONIA follows him with a candle to light him to
the carriage. MARINA sits down in her armchair.
VOITSKI.
[Writing] On the 2d of February, twenty pounds
of butter; on the 16th, twenty pounds of butter
again. Buckwheat flour—[A pause. Bells are heard
tinkling.]
MARINA. He has
gone. [A pause.]
SONIA comes in
and sets the candle stick on the table.
SONIA. He has
gone.
VOITSKI.
[Adding and writing] Total, fifteen—twenty-five—
SONIA sits down
and begins to write.
[Yawning] Oh,
ho! The Lord have mercy.
TELEGIN comes
in on tiptoe, sits down near the door, and
begins to tune his guitar.
VOITSKI. [To
SONIA, stroking her hair] Oh, my child, I am
miserable; if you only knew how miserable I am!
SONIA. What can
we do? We must live our lives. [A pause] Yes, we
shall live, Uncle Vanya. We shall live through
the long procession of days before us, and
through the long evenings; we shall patiently
bear the trials that fate imposes on us; we
shall work for others without rest, both now and
when we are old; and when our last hour comes we
shall meet it humbly, and there, beyond the
grave, we shall say that we have suffered and
wept, that our life was bitter, and God will
have pity on us. Ah, then dear, dear Uncle, we
shall see that bright and beautiful life; we
shall rejoice and look back upon our sorrow
here; a tender smile—and—we shall rest. I have
faith, Uncle, fervent, passionate faith. [SONIA
kneels down before her uncle and lays her head
on his hands. She speaks in a weary voice] We
shall rest. [TELEGIN plays softly on the guitar]
We shall rest. We shall hear the angels. We
shall see heaven shining like a jewel. We shall
see all evil and all our pain sink away in the
great compassion that shall enfold the world.
Our life will be as peaceful and tender and
sweet as a caress. I have faith; I have faith.
[She wipes away her tears] My poor, poor Uncle
Vanya, you are crying! [Weeping] You have never
known what happiness was, but wait, Uncle Vanya,
wait! We shall rest. [She embraces him] We shall
rest. [The WATCHMAN'S rattle is heard in the
garden; TELEGIN plays softly; MME. VOITSKAYA
writes something on the margin of her pamphlet;
MARINA knits her stocking] We shall rest.
The curtain
slowly falls.
