The Seagull

Anton Chekhov, Richard Nelson, Richard Pevear, Larissa Volokhonsky, Richard Nelson, Richard Pevear, Larissa Volokhonsky

• Publisher: Theatre Communications Group
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN:
  9781559365499
• eBook ISBN:
  9781559368711
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Drama
• Index: Literature

“Pevear and Volokhonsky are at once scrupulous translators and vivid stylists of English.” —James Wood, New Yorker

The Seagull, in this new translation for TCG’s Russian Drama Series, includes lines and variants found in Chekhov’s final version of the play, but omitted from the script for the original performance at the Moscow Art Theatre in 1898, which went on to become the standard printed version. The restored text, a product of the continuing collaboration of playwright Richard Nelson and translators Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, provides valuable insight into Chekhov’s intentions in his groundbreaking play.

Richard Nelson’s many plays include The Apple Family: Scenes from Life in the Country (That Hopey Changey Thing, Sweet and Sad, Sorry, Regular Singing); The Gabriels: Election Year in the Life of One Family (Hungry, What Did You Expect?, Women of a Certain Age); Nikolai and the Others; Goodnight Children Everywhere (Olivier Award for Best Play); Franny’s Way; Some Americans Abroad; Frank’s Home; Two Shakespearean Actors and James Joyce’s The Dead (with Shaun Davey; Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical).

Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky have translated the works of Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Nikolai Gogol, Anton Chekhov, Boris Pasternak and Mikhail Bulgakov. Their translations of The Brothers Karamazov and Anna Karenina won the PEN Translation Prize in 1991 and 2002, respectively. Pevear, a native of Boston, and Volokhonsky, of St. Petersburg, are married and live in France.

 

THE SEAGULL

CHARACTERS

IRÍNA NIKOLÁEVNA ARKÁDINA, an actress

KONSTANTÍN GAVRÍLYCH TREPLYÓV, her son, an aspiring writer

PYÓTR NIKOLÁICH SÓRIN, her brother, a retired state councillor

NÍNA MIKHÁILOVNA ZARÉCHNAYA, a young girl, daughter of a local landowner

ILYÁ AFANÁSYICH SHAMRÁEV, a retired lieutenant, Sorin’s steward

POLÍNA ANDRÉEVNA, his wife

MÁSHA, their daughter

BORÍS ALEXÉICH TRIGÓRIN, a successful writer

EVGÉNY SERGÉICH DORN, a doctor

SEMYÓN SEMYÓNYCH MEDVEDÉNKO, a teacher

YÁKOV, a workman

COOK

MAID

The action takes place on Sorin’s estate. Two years pass between Acts Three and Four.

ACT ONE

Part of the park on Sorin’s estate. A wide alley leading into the park from the audience toward the lake is obstructed by a stage, hastily knocked together for an amateur performance, so that the lake cannot be seen. Bushes to the left and right of the stage.

Several chairs, a little table.

The sun has just set. On the stage, behind the closed curtain, Yakov and other workmen; sounds of coughing and hammering. Masha and Medvedenko enter left, returning from a stroll.

MEDVEDENKO

Why do you always go around in black?

MASHA

It’s in mourning for my life.¹ I’m unhappy.

MEDVEDENKO

Why? (Reflecting) I don’t understand . . . You’re in good health, your father may not be rich but he’s well-off. My life is much harder than yours. I get only twenty-three rubles a month, minus pension deductions, but I don’t wear mourning.

They sit down.

MASHA

The point isn’t money. A poor man can be happy, too.

MEDVEDENKO

That’s in theory, but in practice it turns out like this: me, my mother, my sisters, and my little brother, and my salary’s all of twenty-three rubles. We’ve got to eat and drink, haven’t we? Need tea and sugar? Tobacco? That keeps you juggling.

MASHA

(Looking at the stage) The play will begin soon.

MEDVEDENKO

Yes. Miss Zarechnaya’s acting, and the play is by Konstantin Gavrilych. They’re in love, and today their souls will merge in striving to form one single artistic image. But my soul and yours have no common points of contact. I love you, my longing will not let me stay home, every day I walk four miles here and four miles back, and I only meet with phlegmatism on your part. That’s understandable. I’m without means, I have a big family . . . Who wants to marry a man who has nothing to eat himself?

MASHA

Nonsense. (Takes snuff) Your love touches me, I just can’t reciprocate, that’s all. (Offers him the snuffbox) Help yourself.

MEDVEDENKO

I don’t feel like it.

Pause.

MASHA

It’s stifling. There’ll probably be a thunderstorm tonight. You keep philosophizing or talking about money. In your opinion there’s no greater misfortune than poverty, but in my opinion it’s a thousand times easier to go around in rags and beg, than . . . Anyhow, you won’t understand that . . .

Sorin and Treplyov enter from right.

SORIN

(Leaning on a cane) I somehow feel out of sorts in the country, my boy, and, needless to say, I’ll never get used to it here. Last night I went to bed at ten, and this morning I woke up at nine feeling as if my brain got stuck to my skull from sleeping so long and all that. (Laughs) And after lunch I accidentally fell asleep again, and now I’m a total wreck—it’s a nightmare, finally . . .

TREPLYOV

Right, you ought to live in town. (Seeing Masha and Medvedenko) Wait, we’ll call you when it starts, but you mustn’t be here now. Go away, please.

SORIN

(To Masha) Marya Ilyinichna, kindly ask your father to order the dog untied, otherwise he howls. My sister couldn’t sleep all night again.

[MASHA

Tell him yourself. There’s millet in the barn now, and he says without the dog thieves will get it.

TREPLYOV

To hell with the millet.]

MASHA

You speak to my father, I’m not going to. Spare me that, please. (To Medvedenko) Let’s go!

MEDVEDENKO

(To Treplyov) So let us know before it begins.

They both exit.

SORIN

That means the dog will howl all night again. It’s funny, I’ve never lived in the country the way I wanted. I used to take a month’s vacation and come here to get some rest and all that, but they’d pester you so much with millet and oats that you’d already want to clear out on the first day. (Laughs) I always found it a pleasure to leave this place . . . Well, now I’m retired and I’ve got nowhere to go, finally. Live here, like it or not . . .

YAKOV

(To Treplyov) We’re going for a swim, Konstantin Gavrilych.

TREPLYOV

All right. Only be back in your places in ten minutes. (Looks at his watch) We’ll start soon.

YAKOV

Yes, sir. (Exits)

TREPLYOV

(Looking at the stage) There’s a theater for you. A curtain, then the wings, then empty space. No scenery. The view opens straight onto the lake and the horizon. We’ll raise the curtain at exactly eight thirty, when the moon rises...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction
• A Note on the Translation
• The Seagull
• Notes
• About the Author