Spectacolul lui Răzvan Mureșan e profund novator, poate prea novator. Inovațiile lui ajung până la universul IT, afișat nonșalant în structurile spectacolului. Rezoluțiile sunt motivate din perspectiva situării personajelor în zona unui bovarism generic. Prinse în chingile unor realități nedorite, ele caută în mod susținut să evadeze cu orice chip din mediul provincial anost și manipularea smartphone-lor la îndemână devine dependență și boală curentă. (...) Cehov adus în era digitală face furori pe scena Naționalului clujean.

Adrian Țion, Cehov în era digitală,

His grandfather was a serf on an estate from the province of Vorona but managed to redeem his freedom, alongside his three sons, so that Chekhov’s father was able to open a grocery shop. Between 1967 and 1979, young Chekhov pursued his studies in his own town, visiting the local theatre and editing the students’ magazine. Financial hardship determined the family to move to Moscow, except for Chekhov, who was 16 when he stayed behind all by himself in Taganrog, making a living as a private tutor. After three years, in 1879, he also moved to Moscow, where he was then accepted at the Faculty of Medicine, at the University of Moscow. The same year, in 1880, in order to support his impoverished family, he started collaborating with various humour magazines and published his first short story, Letter to a Learned Neighbour, in the magazine “Strekoza”. Being extremely prolific, he ended up writing 120 short stories by 1883. 
 

1884 is the year of his graduation from the Faculty of Medicine. He works as a doctor in the vicinity of Moscow, in Zvenigorod and Cikinski. At the same time, he publishes his first prose collection, Melpomene’s Tales.
 

In 1885 he writes 129 short stories, including The Man in a Case, which is nonetheless banned by censorship. 
 

In 1886, Chekhov has multiple stories published in “Nove vremea”, the magazine led by Alexei Suvorin (the future editor of a significant part of Chekhov’s work), including The Nightmare, highly praised by the humourist V. Bilibin. The writer D.V. Grigorovich expresses his enthusiasm regarding Chekhov’s talent. Motley Tales appears the same year. He also writes the short story Calhas.   
 

The year 1887 brings Chekhov’s move to the province of Don, where he writes short stories and publishes them in various magazines. His third short story collection, At Dusk, is awarded the “Pushkin” Prize. The literary almanac “Season” hosts the dramatic adaptation of the short story Calhas, which would later be known as The Swan Song; Chekhov would write in a letter that this text was “the shortest piece there’s ever been… I wrote it in one hour and five minutes”. He writes the play Ivanov. He publishes 66 short stories. 
 

In 1888, the number of published short stories decreases dramatically, to only ten. Chekhov publishes The Steppe and other stories, which belong to a new creative age, much more profound. Together with the play Ivanov, these texts make up a new category, “the clinical cases”, bringing to mind Chekhov’s professional formation as a doctor. In February 1888, he writes the one-act play The Bear and, shortly after, A Marriage Proposal, which proves extremely successful on the stage of the Small Theatre and which makes Tolstoy claim that “the situational comedy in A Marriage Proposal is well-sustained. There is no trace of the unpredictable absurdism of the French”. 
 

In 1889, Chekhov leaves for Yalta. He publishes the short stories The Princess, A Banal Story and a few others. In October, he writes the one-act play The Wedding (based on the short story from 1884, Wedding with a General), the one-act farce Involuntary Tragedian (based on the short story One of Many). He starts writing The Soul of the Forest (1888-1889), a long play, in four acts. 
 

At the beginning of the 1890s, he takes a long trip to Sakhalin Island, at the other end of Siberia, the renowned headquarters of a penal colony of the Russian Empire. There, he starts working on Sakhalin Island, meant to be a true sociological research project, which remains baffling to any critic to this day; it was Chekhov’s response to the “accusations regarding his supposed social indifference and propensity for metaphysics” (Monica Săvulescu). He returns to Moscow in December, having visited India, Singapore, Ceylon, Port-Said, and Constantinople.  
 

The shortened, refined version of The Soul of the Forest would eventually result in one of Chekhov’s dramatic masterpieces, Uncle Vanya, with this development taking place at some point between 1890 and 1896. The final version would be published in 1897. 
 

In 1891, Chekhov takes a trip to Europe in the company of A.S. Suvorin and visits Vienna, Venice, Bologna, Florence, Rome, Naples, Genova, Nice, and Paris. During this voyage, he starts working on The Notebooks. He publishes the short story A Duel, seen by Nemirovich-Dancenko as the best text written by Chekhov up to that point. He writes the one-act farce The Jubilee (an adaptation of the short story A Helpless Creature from 1887).

 The Chekhov Memoria House in Melikhovo 

In 1892, Chekhov buys an estate 80 km from Moscow, at Melikhovo, which becomes his residence for six years, until 1896, and where he moves with his parents and his sister, Maria. It is his most prolific period as a short story writer, when he publishes The Fidget, The Tale of a Stranger, The Black Monk, The Murder, Ariadna, Big Volodya and Little Volodya, The Peasants and especially Ward no. 6, which Tolstoy finds especially touching. In the Melikhovo period, in 1894, he also publishes Sakhalin Island, with notes and impressions from the Sakhalin Diary. In 1895, the short story Three Years is published, albeit in a censored version. 
 

Chekhov reading The Seagull in the midst of the actors from The Moscow Art Theatre

By the end of 1895, he finishes writing The Seagull. At the premiere on October 17th 1896, the play is unsuccessful; however, in the next season, 1898-1899, it proves a great success on the stage of the Moscow Art Theatre.  

In 1896 he meets K.S. Stanislavsky, who would later direct his plays.  
 

In March 1897, Chekhov suffers a pulmonary haemorrhage caused by tuberculosis. He is forced to sell the estate Melikhovo and to move to Crimea, at Yalta, where he builds a villa (1899). There, he has visitors such as Gorky, Tolstoy, Kuprin, and Bunin.  

Chekhov and his wife, Olga Knipper
 

In the fall of 1898, Chekhov watches the rehearsals for The Seagull, where he meets his future wife, actress Olga Leonordovna Knipper, whom he marries in the spring of 1899. He publishes the sketches The New House, Work Related, The Lady with the Dog. 
 

On October 26th 1899, at the Moscow Art Theatre, Uncle Vanya is performed for the first time. 
 

The year 1900 brings Chekhov the title of honorary member in the Science Academy. He publishes the short stories For the Holidays and In the Ravine. On October 23rd, he returns from Yalta to Moscow with the text of Three Sisters and watches the first rehearsals at the Art Theatre. In December, he leaves for Nice, then Italy. 
 

In 1901, Chekhov publishes the play Three Sisters. After seeing the performance during its tour in Saint Petersburg, Gorky writes to Chekhov: “Three Sisters is wonderfully acted (…) It is no ordinary stage play, it is a divine harmony”. 

The Chekhov Memorial House in Yalta
 

During his time in Yalta, Chekhov writes fewer short stories but focuses on dramaturgy. After Three Sisters, in 1993 he writes his last play, The Cherry Orchard, which he completes in November. In December, Chekhov once again watches the rehearsals, and the premiere takes place on January 8th 1904. 
 

In May 1904, his illness gets worse. The doctors recommend a treatment in Badenweiler, Germany. 
 

Chekhov dies on July 2/15th 1904 in Badenweiler. His body is brought back to Moscow and laid to rest in the cemetery of Novodevichy Monastery. 

Chekhov’s Grave (in the Novodevichy Cemetery, Moscow)
 

Bibliography

Enciclopedia Universală Britannica, vol.3; C-, Bucharest, Editura Litera, 2010.

Sorin-Manea Dan, A.P. Chekhov, The Cherry Orchard, Bucharest, BPT, Ed. Minerva, 2008.

Șianu Maria, in A.P. Chekhov, The Seagull, Bucharest, BPT, 1967.

About the Author

Gorky paints a remarkable portrait of Chekhov: “His eyes were beautiful when he laughed; there was something almost womanly about him – delicate and soothing. And his almost-voiceless laughter was especially beautiful. When le laughed, his mouth tasted the pleasure of laughter; he was full of joy; I don’t know anyone else who can laugh so – in a way – «spiritually»”. He concludes that: “It is good to remember such a man: your life is instantly refilled with cheer, it is once again traversed by pure meaning. The man is the axis of the world”.  

Simplicity was a trait of the doctor-writer which Gorky could not ignore: “In Anton Pavlovich’s presence, everyone felt the need to be simpler, more honest, to be themselves; more than once I noticed people throwing away the motley ornaments of their language, taken from books, along with their fashionable words and all the other cheap tricks used by the Russians in order to seem European, adorning themselves the way the savages adorn their bodies with shells and fish teeth. Anton Pavlovich didn’t like fish teeth and rooster feathers; anything motley, loud and foreign – anything used by people to seem «more important» – annoyed him, and I noticed that every time he had to deal with an ornamented kind of person, he was seized by the desire to free them of all those tiring and useless decorations, which distorted the true face and the living soul of the interlocutor. A. Chekhov lived his entire life according to the possibilities of his own soul, he was always himself, he was free in his soul and never cared about the others’ expectations of him or even the demands of more boorish people. He didn’t like to discuss «high-brow» subjects (…) Being wonderfully simple, he liked everything straightforward, true, honest – and had his own way of making others simpler in their turn”.  

Chekhov and Gorky in Yalta
 

At the same time, he despised vulgarity and denounced it every occasion he got: “He had mastered the art of uncovering and exposing triviality wherever he encountered it, an art that is only accessible to those who ask a lot from life itself. He always met triviality with harsh, ruthless judgment”. As for banality, Gorky wrote in the same article that: “Banality was his enemy; his entire life he fought against it, ridiculed it, and painted it with his sharp, fearless brush. He knew how to uncover the rot of banality even in those places where, at first sight, everything seemed orderly, comfortable, and even bright”. It was banality that played a final practical joke on him, getting its vengeance “through a vulgar prank, putting his body in a train wagon made to transport oysters”. 
 

Chekhov’s opinion of his critics has also been recorded by Gorky: “Critics are like botflies preventing the horse from ploughing the land. The horse is working, all of its muscles are as tense as a double bass string and, meanwhile, a botfly settles on its flank, tickles and buzzes. The horse is forced to shake it off and move its tail. What is the botfly buzzing about? I think it has no idea. It simply has a restless nature and wants to show it: look, I’m also here! See, I can also buzz, I can buzz about anything at all! For 25 years I have been reading what the critics have to say about my stories and I can’t recall any of them giving me any valuable suggestions, I have never received any good advice”.  
 

Despite claiming not to remember what made him choose the Faculty of Medicine, Chekhov admitted, in a letter written in Yalta (October 11th 1899) to his university colleague G.I. Rossolimo that medicine had quite an impact on his literary activity: “It broadened my field of observation considerably and it enriched my knowledge, whose real value – for me, as a writer – can only be appreciated by those who are doctors themselves. Medical science also had a guiding influence on me (…) My initiation in the natural sciences, in the scientific method made me pay constant attention and try as much as possible to take the scientific elements into account; when this was not possible, I preferred to not write at all (…) I am not one of those writers who take a negative approach to science, though I would not want to be among those who penetrate everything with their mind”. 
 

It might very well be that his scientific formation made Chekhov write to Lidia Alexeevna Avilova – in a letter from 1892 – about his “indifference” towards his own characters: “When writing, you can cry, sigh, even suffer alongside your heroes, but I think this should not be felt by the reader. The more objective you are, the stronger the impact of your writing”. In Chekhov Remembered by His Contemporaries, we find Chekhov’s advice for his interlocutor, who was also a writer: “What you see and feel should be transcribed as simply as possible. I have often been asked what I wanted to say in a certain story, but I never answer such questions (…) You must know that living characters create ideas, but an idea cannot create a character”. “At any time and everywhere, he could find something to notice – unintentionally or even against his own will – due to a habit that had gotten in his blood and which he never lost, namely to study people, to analyse their character and produce observations”.

The Chekhov Monument in Taganrog g
 

In conclusion of this section in the programme, we must also quote the wonderful portrait painted by the writer, playwright, and director Aleksandr Ivanovich Kuprin: “…tall, lean, big-boned, with a somewhat harsh face (…) his whole appearance, his face, voice, and self-expression all spoke of simplicity and humility (…) as well as an apparent nonchalance in his gestures (…) You were captivated by his wide forehead, his white, pure, marvellously shaped beard (…) I remember very well how he shook my hand with his large, dry, warm palm; his handshake was always strong, manly but also reserved, as if he was hiding something. I also remember his handwriting – delicate, no strain, extraordinarily small; at first sight, it seemed negligent and ugly, but – if you paid closer attention – it became clear, delicate, fine, and characteristic, just like everything else about Chekhov”. 

 Eugenia Sarvari
 

Bibliography

Chekhov A.P., The Seagull, Bucharest, BPT, 1967;

Chekhov A.P., The Cherry Orchard, Bucharest, BPT, Ed. Minerva, 2008;

Chekhov A.P., Works, vol. XII, Letters, Bucharest, EPLU, 1963;

Chekhov Remembered by His Contemporaries, translated by C. Toria and E. Mircea, Bucharest, ESPLA Cartea rusă, 1960;

Enciclopedia Universală Britannica, vol.3; C-, Bucharest, Editura Litera, 2010;

Gorky-Chekhov. Letters, Articles, Excerpts, Bucharest, Cartea rusă, 1954;

Săvulescu Monica, Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, Bucharest, Ed. Albatros, 1981.

Three Sisters is the third out of four famous plays written by Chekhov, after The Seagull (completed in 1895) and Uncle Vanya (which premiered on October 26th 1899). On October 23rd 1900, Chekhov returned from Yalta to Moscow with the text of Three Sisters and watched the first rehearsals at the Art Theatre, with the premiere taking place on January 31st 1901 in Moscow. He would then write The Cherry Orchard (which was first performed on January 8th 1904). 
 

The Radiograph of an Entire Inner Universe 

His plays, writes Dumitru Solomon in the Preface to Chekhov’s dramatic collection, are devoid of any “dramatic clashes”. They are different from the conventional dramatic canon established before Chekhov, being characterised by “a hidden vibration, difficult to perceive” and introducing a slower pace. The atmosphere is “onerous”, “the gestures become slow and hesitant”. His heroes – from Nina Zarechnaya to Treplev, from Vanya to Astrov, Helena Andreyevna, Sonya, and even Irina, Masha, Olga, Vershinin – move “in a disarticulated fashion”, “like broken mechanisms”, they say banal things, which are, at the same time, “implausible”. They are “simultaneously cheerful and deeply unhappy”, “they are bored to death”, but “fretful on the inside”, their thoughts and speech are “apparently incoherent, but always full of meaning”. The anecdotal has been eliminated by boredom, and “the dramatic substance” is given by “the structure and the inner events that befall the characters”. 
 

George Steiner also discusses this lack of conflict and the focus on inner disharmony when he states that “a Chekhovian play is not meant primarily to represent a conflict or a controversy; it seeks to externalise, to make perceivable to the senses certain crises that happen in one’s inner life. The characters move in an atmosphere sensitive to the slightest changes in intonation. Every word or gesture appears to go through a magnetic field, making the protagonists undergo a complex disorganisation and the regrouping of their psychological powers”; the essayist concludes that “this kind of drama is immensely difficult to act, since the means it requires have an almost musical quality. A Chekhovian dialogue is a score made to be spoken”. 
 

In a particularly profound analysis, the essayist Ion Vartic notes that “the author of The Cherry Orchard revolutionised theatre not just by seeing his dramas as «comedies», but also through the decisive turning points occurring in his «mythology»”. Vartic quotes Peter Szondi, who argued that: “Their present [the characters’ present] is crushed by the past and the future”. “Hence” – writes Ion Vartic – “the refusal of action and dialogue (…) and the proclivity for quasi-monological daydreaming and speculation”. The comparison he draws between Ibsen and Chekhov brings to light the absence of plot: “Neither Ibsen nor Chekhov builds any sort of «action» anymore, meaning plot, but this happens for different, even contradictory reasons. With Ibsen, only analysis is left, while Chekhov replaces action with reverie: Ibsen’s heroes do nothing but investigate their past, Chekhov’s heroes only dream of a wonderful, illusory future”.
 

Monica Săvulescu highlights the “intermingling of motifs” in Chekhov’s writing, “odd and hidden”, motifs coming together, coalescing, sustaining each other “as they form a specific wiring and a new dramatic concept”. “The character whom we cannot help but pity (…) is condemned from the start by the laws of their destiny and by their own inability (…) to rise against this destiny (…), proving incapable of any action, any redeeming gesture (…) This is where we get to witness Chekhov’s genius at work, this is where he stops the spectators in their tracks, he cuts the thread of argumentation, he introduces a sentence, a word, a line said in the background, in a scene based on parallel synchronism, which blows up the entire structure”. The critic believes that the three sisters are going through the drama of “the failed couple”, since “their much-desired «departure», the «Moscow» they are dreaming of is actually this: the general’s orphaned daughters are stuck in an isolated space, threatened by loneliness; in this sense, Masha’s experience is concrete proof, and her marriage to professor Koolighin is – under the appearance of happiness – an absolute compromise”. The sisters are faced with loneliness and isolation, since “their circumstances only bring forth boring men, such as the gentle professor Koolighin, men made hysterical by the tantrums of their psychopathic wives”, such as Vershinin, or “men completely devoid of any physical charm, such as poor baron Tuzenbach”. 
 

“Chekhov’s heroes” – argues the critic – “are a handful of wretched good people, kind and gentle; they do not commit any voluntary crime, their world is sealed, any unpleasantness is caused by themselves and among themselves, so that they end up living out this autonomous yet real suffering. A few good people suffering on the verge of disaster. Their suffering is skilfully depicted by the author in the perfect aesthetic register – through semitones, musical moods, subtly determined psychological and affective dispositions. However, Chekhov also works with a host of significant details and the elements of an immediate reality, an absolutely concrete one”.  
 

Tudor Vianu writes about “the disconnected dialogue” in Chekhov’s plays, which “has such an important function in the creation of atmosphere”. In this kind of dialogue, “the lines alternate in relative independence from one another, although all of them stem from the shared mood of the characters”. To prove this, Tudor Vianu provides an example from Three Sisters¸ in which “the characters’ successive interventions in the conversation are so weakly connected that at one point the lieutenant Tuzenbach tells the others: «It is difficult, ladies and gentlemen, to have a conversation with you». Indeed, during the same scene, Masha starts laughing at a memory, Vershinin evokes his school years, Tuzenbach crafts a theory about the future of humanity, Chebutykin extracts a piece of information about Balzac from a newspaper, Fedotik speaks about some coloured pencils he bought from a merchant that day”. The concept of “disconnected dialogue” is also recognised by George Steiner: “the structure of the plot is polyphonic. Multiple actions and multiple levels of consciousness develop at the same time”. 
 

…to Moscow, to Moscow… 
 

In The Psychology of Art, L.S. Vygotsky proposes an analysis of the play. He compiles the opinions of multiple critics, writing about “the drama of the train ticket”: “Let us consider the dramas Three Sisters and The Cherry Orchard. The former is generally interpreted – in an entirely erroneous manner – as the embodiment of yearning: three young women from the provinces dream of the intense, wild life of the capital. In fact, on the contrary, in Chekhov’s drama there are absolutely no clues which could have motivated either rationally or materially the sisters’ desire to move to Moscow; and, since for them Moscow is an artistic construct rather than the object of real desire, the play does not have a comical effect but a deeply dramatic one. The day after the premiere, the critics wrote that, in a way, it makes you laugh, as well, because the sisters spend the four acts of the play whining: to Moscow, to Moscow, to Moscow, when, in fact, each of them could very well buy a train ticket and travel to Moscow (…) One critic even labelled it the drama of the train ticket (…) Indeed, making Moscow an absolute centre for the three sisters, it would appear that the author should have somehow explained their yearning. It is true that they had spent their childhood in the capital, but we are told that none of them actually remembers anything about the city. Maybe they cannot leave for Moscow because of certain obstacles? This hypothesis also fails. There is no reason whatsoever why they could not simply take this step. Finally, it may be that they aspire to reach Moscow for other reasons; perhaps, as other critics believe, Moscow is for them the centre of reason and culture, but this interpretation has no textual justification whatsoever; on the contrary, the sisters’ wish is in contrast with the brother’s totally clear and real ambition to leave for Moscow; to him, Moscow is no dream, it is a fact (…) Andrei’s real Moscow is compared with the Moscow imagined by the three sisters; the latter lacks all empirical justification, just like the fact that they cannot get to the capital; of course, this is precisely what sustains the impression left on the public by Chekhov’s drama”. 
 

The author and his stage directions 
 

In his letters, not only does Chekhov describe the creative process behind his play, but he also provides precise indications regarding the way it should be staged, which ended up being more or less observed. Thus, in a letter written on October 16th 1900 and addressed to Gorky (A.M. Peshkov), Chekhov writes: “Three Sisters was very difficult to write. Think about it, you have three heroines, each has to be unique and all three – the daughters of a general. The play is set in a provincial town, such as Perm. The social context: the military, the artillery”.  
 

Chekhov also firmly requested that the play not be read in a salon where the listeners would not necessarily be interested in the tale of the three sisters; in a letter addressed to K.S. Stanislavsky (Nice, January 2nd 1991), he writes: “As for the older play, Three Sisters, I ask that it not be read, under any circumstances, at the countess’ soiree. I beg of you, for God’s sake, do not read it for any reason; it would cause me great distress.
 

I sent Act IV to Vladimir Ivanovich a long time ago, before Christmas. I made many changes. You wrote to me that in Act III, when Natasha walks through the rooms, at night, she turns the lights off and makes sure there are no thieves under the couches. However, I think it would be better if she crossed the stage directly, candle in hand, without turning left or right, just like lady Macbeth: it would be quicker and more impressive”. On January 15th, Chekhov wrote to Stanislavsky: “Of course, you are infinitely right; Tuzenbach’s body should not be seen. I realised it as well while writing, and I actually told you so. It’s no tragedy that the ending is similar to that of Uncle Vanya, since Uncle Vanya is not a stranger’s play but one of mine. And then, if one of your pieces reminds people of you, this is said to be a good sign. The words «Tarara-bumbia... Tarara-bumbia...» must be sung by Chebutykin, not said”. 
 

On the same day, on the French Riviera, Chekhov writes to Olga Knipper, in a loving/affectionate tone: “Please tell me about at least one of the rehearsals for Three Sisters. Should I maybe add or cut something? Are you acting your part well, my heart? Take care! Never let your face be sad, in any act. Displeased, yes, but not sad. The people who have been carrying their pain in their souls for a long time have grown accustomed to it, so that they do nothing but whistle and sometimes fall deep in thought. That’s what you should do, as well, be self-absorbed during any conversation. Do you understand?”
 

Two weeks later, still in Nice, he writes – with detailed instructions – to I.A. Tikhomirov, an actor from the Moscow Art Theatre, and answered some of his questions: “Irina doesn’t know that Tuzenbach is heading for a duel, but she presumes that something bad must have happened the previous day, something that could have serious and, at the same time, unpleasant consequences (…) Chebutykin only sings these words: «Tarara-bumbia... Tarara-bumbia...» They are taken from an opera that was once performed at Ermitage (…) This is the only thing that must be sung by Chebutykin, otherwise the scene of his departure would be too long. Indeed, Solyony imagines himself to be like Lermontov, but of course they are not alike, it would be ridiculous to even imagine it… He must wear Lermontov’s mask, but only in his imagination….”; then, Chekhov expresses his worry that the play was not to the actors’ liking: “Nobody writes to me about the play, and Vladimir Ivanovich didn’t’ say a word while he was here. I was left thinking that you have grown bored of it and it will be unsuccessful. Your letter has somehow abated my melancholia”.  
 

Later, on January 20th 1901, while still in France, he writes to “his dear actress, the exploiter of his soul”: “Well, how’s it going with Three Sisters? Judging by the letters, you are all baffled. Act III is noisy. Why? The clamour is supposed to happen somewhere far, behind the stage, a muffled sound; on stage, however, everyone is tired, they are almost asleep… If you ruin the third act, the whole play is lost, and the public will rave against you – now, in your old age (…) Vershinin pronounces «tram, tram, tram» as a question, while you say it in response, which seems so original to you that you pronounce it with a smile… You say «tram, tram, tram» and almost smile”. He goes on, warning Masha’s actress against the danger of routine: “Meanwhile, make sure you don’t act the way you did in Uncle Vanya [where Olga Knipper had played the role of Helena Andreyevna, our note] but in a more youthful, more cheerful manner. Don’t forget that you laugh and grow angry just as easily”. The next day, Chekhov writes to his partner: “Masha’s confession in the third act is not at all a confession, but an honest conversation. Speak energetically, but not desperately, don’t yell, smile from time to time, and, more than anything, act in a way that conveys the night’s fatigue. It should also transpire that you are cleverer than your sisters, or at least that you believe yourself to be cleverer”. 
 

From Moscow, he writes to L.V. Sredin [a doctor from Yalta, an acquaintance of Chekhov’s (our note)] on September 24th 1901: “Three Sisters is being performed successfully. On stage, it is much more beautiful than the text I wrote. I offered a few stage directions and provided a few small details regarding the text, so that the show is going better now than in the previous season”. 

Stanislavsky on Chekhov and Three Sisters 

Stanislavsky in the role of Vershinin, 1928 - In his memoir, K.S. Stanislavsky captures Chekhov’s intense preoccupation with the life of the Art Theatre. In a certain passage, he describes the beginning of the creative process leading to Three Sisters: “Once the season began, Anton Pavlovich started writing to us quite often (…) His short letters, from which we could deduce how interested he was in our theatre, had a positive influence on all of us, which we only came to recognise and appreciate after his death. He was interested in all of the details and especially the repertory, while we kept asking him to write a new play. From his letters we found out that he was working on a play based on military life. That’s all we knew, that a regiment was moving from one place to another, but judging by his short, fragmentary sentences, we could not decipher the theme in its entirety (…) We didn’t’ know what to believe, either he hadn’t written the play yet or he had finished it long ago and, because he couldn’t bear parting with it, he was keeping it in his desk drawer. Anyway, he kept postponing the moment when he finally had to send it, making all sorts of excuses, including that there were many other wonderful works (…) His excuses exasperated us, and we kept begging him in our letters to send the play as soon as possible, to save our theatre… Back then, we didn’t realise that we were violating the creation of a great artist. 
 

Finally, he sent us one or two acts and we could recognise his small handwriting, which we knew so well. We held a reading but, as with any true dramatic text, its true qualities went unnoticed at first (…) Eventually, Anton Pavlovich (…) brought the play with him. He never read his own texts, but rather witnessed the reading, embarrassed and nervous.  When we started reading it and were asking for explanations, he answered uneasily: «What more can I tell you? I put on paper everything I knew». 
 

Indeed, he was not good at looking at his plays the way a critic would and he listened to other opinions with much interest, even wonder. He was very surprised when he heard that the plays Three Sisters and The Cherry Orchard, written later than the others, were seen as striking dramas of Russian life, and he never came to terms with it. He was convinced he had written two comedies, almost two vaudevilles. I cannot remember him ever defending one of his beliefs as fiercely as he did upon hearing for the first time this dramatic interpretation of his plays. 
 

Of course, we tried to extract from him all the information we were interested in regarding the play, but once again he responded only briefly. Back then, his answers seemed unclear to us, we didn’t understand them; only later did we grasp their meaning and realised how characteristic they were – both of him and his plays (…) He enjoyed the tension that built up during rehearsals and performances, the technicians’ work (…) but he was also truly passionate about the realistic representation of sound. 
 

He went through a variety of emotions regarding the fate of his play, but he was especially concerned about the alarm during the fire happening offstage in the third act. He wanted to make us understand the hollow chime of provincial bells. He often came near one of us, striving to evoke through arm movements, rhythm, and gestures the mood caused by the disturbing call of the alarm bell in the isolated provinces”. 

His partner in life, Olga Knipper, wrote in her memoir: “Chekhov’s plays are very difficult to act. It is not enough to be a good actor and to play your part skilfully. Chekhov’s works must be loved and felt, you must take in the atmosphere of the bits of life depicted in his plays; above all, you must love people the way he did and really live their lives”. Something to consider. 

Translators’ Note  

Should we imagine a different ending… with Elisabeta Pop, the translator of Chekhov’s text 

“My friend, Jeni Sarvari, the literary secretary of the National Theatre of Cluj, invited me to write a few words about the play Three Sisters by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, from the perspective of the translator – translator, as well as former literary secretary… A familiar exercise, either way… 

To be honest, so much has been written about Chekhov’s plays. They have been analysed as seriously as possible, each line, each character, each situation… What more can be said? 

Well, if you really want to, something will come up. For instance, I have found these lines in one of Chekhov’s letters from 1892… 130 years ago, he wrote the following: “The person who will find another ending to my plays will usher in a new era”. Now, you shouldn’t think that I want to “usher in a new era”. God forbid, I simply wish to see how one could change the ending of this play… And I would try to do so in relation to the blessed year 2021 and our Romanian reality, since the performance in Cluj is destined for a Romanian public. 

I suppose (you can never be sure) that in his letter our genius writer was referring to two possibilities: a strictly literary one, in other words, the person who will be able to alter the ending of his plays, making use of serious arguments, of course, will have managed to “see” the world in a different light, provided by their own historical reality. The second possibility is even more sobering and has to do with those people who could revolutionise the world, changing it, radically transforming it into a new one that is if not excellent, then at least reasonable. The doctor Chekhov could not possibly like the world he lived in: poverty, alcoholism, brutality, loneliness, a lack of education and culture, all sorts of anxieties, stifled passions, constant sadness, boredom without any serious reason, in short, UNHAPPINES. 

Considering the year 2021, including the pandemic, we can find striking similarities with the diseases decimating humanity at the end of the nineteenth century… Tuberculosis, which also struck Chekhov down, was a silent killer. Fear of sickness and death… it has remained unchanged. Confusion. The sisters wish to escape their miserable, godforsaken town in the provinces. Where could they go, if not to the capital? And where would they head, should the Russian capital be unavailable to them? What if they were not Russian? We find ourselves in the year 2021, somewhere on Planet Earth. Nobody is leaving, everyone is arriving… Immigration is constantly under way. Hard to stop. 

Since we are being led, almost by force, to new peaks of globalisation, let us assume the three sisters are now able to emigrate. So, they leave. Where? They haven’t studied a lot in their lives, but they can speak foreign languages and are well educated. Masha, beautiful, sensual, will quickly forget about Vershinin and will leave for Switzerland, she will become a millionaire’s mistress: she will wear beautiful dresses, she will remain just as stylish. And carefree. It doesn’t matter that she “was the silliest” of them all (according to Olga). The eldest sister, Olga, will become the governess of a billionaire’s children, in Monaco. She will protect her dignity to the very end. But… She is appalled when she hears that the two children of the esteemed family are encouraged, at school, to choose their own gender. How could that be? She cannot understand. Moreover, she rebels against these modern times. Serious, solemn, she ends up catching the eye of the Lady’s brother-in-law, a rich widower, and she eventually finds if not happiness, then at least peace…

Being a dreamer, Irina will end up taking care of an old German lady. A “badante”? Well, yes. She starts writing poetry, wins a couple of prizes, she works as a translator, feeling accomplished. Anyway, she doesn’t believe she could have been happy as the wife of baron Tuzenbach… She gives Olga a call, on her elegant cell phone, to tell her – indignantly – that her neighbour Carole, a lawyer, has fallen in love with her and has even asked her to be her wife. She cannot accept something like this. Maybe one day she will find a man, no matter if he is rich or not. She wants to have a daughter. She wants it badly…

These girls don’t have much of a choice. Without the support of an important person, Olga would not have gotten her job as a teacher. Every position is taken by somebody’s daughter-in-law, daughter, sister-in-law, goddaughter – someone from the local administrative elite… Masha would have also had no choice but to stay with her underwhelming husband, professor Koolighin. She would have become increasingly sad and withered. 

Speaking of which, what will Koolighin’s fate be? He cannot get accustomed to the workings of a computer, he becomes the enemy of “impossible technology” and finally retires to the countryside, dignified and ridiculous. 

Vershinin is still young and perpetually undecided, so he leaves the army, with a satisfactory pension, devoting his remaining years to bringing up his daughters, deeply impacted as they are by their mother’s nervous illness… When he remembers Masha, a sad smile creeps on his tired face. However, he manages to keep the family together. 

Natalia, defiant and uneducated, will become a union leader in one company or another, or maybe in a women’s association with talkative members, whose demagogical slogans try to disguise their inner void.  

Andrei Prozorov, the brother, never touches a violin again; he is being constantly humiliated by his authoritative wife, he is caught in the whirlwind of gambling, discovering more and more enticing games. He doesn’t end up well. He gets into debt and goes to prison. 

The old doctor Chebutykin, who has forgotten everything – diagnoses, meds, prescriptions – lives in a care home. An expensive one, although the service is lamentable. He keeps dragging around his old samovar and invites the young women to join him, but they make the tea in huge, shiny, modern kettles. But look, they put no plants in the boiling water but rather some green pills. What kind of tea could this be? 

The elderly, the charming elderly characters from Chekhov’s plays – Anfisa, Feers, Marina, Ferapont – nurses, nursemaids, honest and loyal servants, stable boys, all sorts of employees are all sent away from the mercilessly decimated orchards and the boyars’ houses; they seek shelter with their relatives, in a nursing home or, should they be strong enough, they start working on a farm or as porters, housekeepers etc. Some of them simply refuse to do anything anymore and start waiting for their own death…

As for the younger characters, those who were once in the army – Solyony, Tuzenbach, Rode – are now overtaken by the civic (or political?) whirlwind and go away to fight for various lost causes in faraway countries, which they could hardly find on a map back in their school years… They all have mobile phones, rarely talk with each other, and, in spite of their apparent indifference, some will return home as heroes – albeit in a coffin. Solyony, for sure. 

The youngest dream of leaving the planet and going to Mars. Some of them have already visited the Moon, they know what it’s like… They are not eager anymore… but Mars… who knows? Nobody wants to go to Moscow anymore… The girls’ desperate cry – TO MOSCOW, TO MOSCOW – is barely audible. It sounds like a whimper. 

Sic transit gloria mundi...

P.S. The ending I have imagined is not particularly cheerful, rather it is filtered through the lens of our times. But who says it has to be cheerful? And, after all, Chekhov himself named his plays comedies. Perhaps there is something comical in all of this… At least something worthy of a smile…”  

Oradea, August 21st 2021

Translating and Producing Chekhov Today… with Raluca Rădulescu

Three Sisters was my third translation from Chekhov, after The Seagull and The Cherry Orchard, done seven years ago, for a project at the National Theatre of Târgu Mureș. Then, it was produced in Târgoviște. I rewrote it for a performance in Suceava. It was used in a production by the National Radiophonic Theatre. It served as the premise of two theatre workshops in Bacău and Bucharest, as well as a co-production between Arad and Bucharest and Radu Afrim’s production at the National Theatre of Bucharest. Practically, it is the most produced of my translations. Seven times in seven years. During the pandemic, the text was used for all sorts of acting exercises or recorded readings, and this is the eighth production, in a more bizarre formula, the only one I know almost nothing about. However, I have learned that in the dramatic arts there are no limits, unless we create them ourselves. As for Chekhov, he is a free spirit and, in his own way, our contemporary, although every time I translate one of his texts, I am reminded that, despite the relevance of his ideas for today’s world, he did not write using a laptop, he did not have access to the internet, and his world was, perhaps, less hectic. Then, too, people loved, suffered, lived, dreamed, and the famous line – “To Moscow! To Moscow!” – remains the condensed version of the ineffable, imponderable, and intangible happiness that we all desire and dream of, with its immutable force of attraction and seduction! Today, perhaps, more than ever.  

The need for hope and the mirage of happiness, supplemented by the renown of the Three Sisters have made directors return to the text time and again, resulting in the most diverse productions. And this great number of productions can only raise the bar for any new performance of Three Sisters. Yet, it is well-known that, in our age, the mere reading of such a text no longer works; we also need a new, powerful concept in order to convey Chekhov’s message. I have said it before, but for me Chekhov is mathematics, with poetry deriving from the precision of each line. Chekhov’s characters didn’t sit around (nor do they sit around today) for a chat in their salon. Their words build a universe, and each line takes the action one step further. The way they speak is a lifestyle, and, while the contemporary spectator requires an adaptation suited to their contemporary reality, Chekhov’s language remains as vivid and striking as it was more than one hundred years ago; as for Three Sisters, although it was seen by Chekhov himself as a drama, it is the play which gives us the most hope for a better future. A powerful reason and an invitation to abandon our dreary routines and to enter a world which is not necessarily happy but which allows us to dream of happiness. 

September 2021 

Bibliography

Chekhov A.P., The Seagull, Bucharest, BPT, 1967;

Chekhov A.P., Works, vol. XII, Letters, Bucharest, EPLU, 1963;

Chekhov Remembered by his Contemporaries, translated by C. Toria and E. Mircea, Bucharest, ESPLA Cartea Rusă, 1960;

Gorky- Chekhov. Letters, Articles, Excerpts, Bucharest, Cartea rusă, 1954;

Săvulescu Monica, Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, Bucharest, Ed. Albatros, 1981;

Steiner George, The Death of Tragedy, translated from English by Rodica Tiniș, Bucharest, Humanitas, 2008;

Vartic Ion, Ibsen and the “Invisible Theatre”, Bucharest, Editura didactică și pedagogică, 1995;

Vianu Tudor, Writings about Theatre, Bucharest, Editura Eminescu, 1977;

Vygotsky L.S., The Psychology of Art, translated into Romanian by Inna Cristea, Bucharest, Editura Univers, 1973.