The Sea-Gull

ACT I

The scene is laid in the park on SORIN'S es­tate. A broad av­enue of trees leads away from the au­di­ence to­ward a lake which lies lost in the depths of the park. The av­enue is ob­struct­ed by a rough stage, tem­porar­ily erect­ed for the per­for­mance of am­ateur the­atri­cals, and which screens the lake from view. There is a dense growth of bush­es to the left and right of the stage. A few chairs and a lit­tle ta­ble are placed in front of the stage. The sun has just set. JA­COB and some oth­er work­men are heard ham­mer­ing and cough­ing on the stage be­hind the low­ered cur­tain.

MASHA and MED­VIEDENKO come in from the left, re­turn­ing from a walk.

MED­VIEDENKO. Why do you al­ways wear mourn­ing?

MASHA. I dress in black to match my life. I am un­hap­py.

MED­VIEDENKO. Why should you be un­hap­py? [Think­ing it over] I don't un­der­stand it. You are healthy, and though your fa­ther is not rich, he has a good com­pe­ten­cy. My life is far hard­er than yours. I on­ly have twen­ty-​three rou­bles a month to live on, but I don't wear mourn­ing. [They sit down].

MASHA. Hap­pi­ness does not de­pend on rich­es; poor men are of­ten hap­py.

MED­VIEDENKO. In the­ory, yes, but not in re­al­ity. Take my case, for in­stance; my moth­er, my two sis­ters, my lit­tle broth­er and I must all live some­how on my salary of twen­ty-​three rou­bles a month. We have to eat and drink, I take it. You wouldn't have us go with­out tea and sug­ar, would you? Or to­bac­co? An­swer me that, if you can.

MASHA. [Look­ing in the di­rec­tion of the stage] The play will soon be­gin.

MED­VIEDENKO. Yes, Ni­na Za­ri­etch­naya is go­ing to act in Trepli­eff's play. They love one an­oth­er, and their two souls will unite to-​night in the ef­fort to in­ter­pret the same idea by dif­fer­ent means. There is no ground on which your soul and mine can meet. I love you. Too rest­less and sad to stay at home, I tramp here ev­ery day, six miles and back, to be met on­ly by your in­dif­fer­ence. I am poor, my fam­ily is large, you can have no in­duce­ment to mar­ry a man who can­not even find suf­fi­cient food for his own mouth.

MASHA. It is not that. [She takes snuff] I am touched by your af­fec­tion, but I can­not re­turn it, that is all. [She of­fers him the snuff-​box] Will you take some?

MED­VIEDENKO. No, thank you. [A pause.]

MASHA. The air is sul­try; a storm is brew­ing for to-​night. You do noth­ing but moralise or else talk about mon­ey. To you, pover­ty is the great­est mis­for­tune that can be­fall a man, but I think it is a thou­sand times eas­ier to go beg­ging in rags than to-- You wouldn't un­der­stand that, though.

SORIN lean­ing on a cane, and TREPLI­EFF come in.

SORIN. For some rea­son, my boy, coun­try life doesn't suit me, and I am sure I shall nev­er get used to it. Last night I went to bed at ten and woke at nine this morn­ing, feel­ing as if, from over­sleep, my brain had stuck to my skull. [Laugh­ing] And yet I ac­ci­den­tal­ly dropped off to sleep again af­ter din­ner, and feel ut­ter­ly done up at this mo­ment. It is like a night­mare.

TREPLI­EFF. There is no doubt that you should live in town. [He catch­es sight of MASHA and MED­VIEDENKO] You shall be called when the play be­gins, my friends, but you must not stay here now. Go away, please.

SORIN. Miss Masha, will you kind­ly ask your fa­ther to leave the dog un­chained? It howled so last night that my sis­ter was un­able to sleep.

MASHA. You must speak to my fa­ther your­self. Please ex­cuse me; I can't do so. [To MED­VIEDENKO] Come, let us go.

MED­VIEDENKO. You will let us know when the play be­gins?

MASHA and MED­VIEDENKO go out.

SORIN. I fore­see that that dog is go­ing to howl all night again. It is al­ways this way in the coun­try; I have nev­er been able to live as I like here. I come down for a month's hol­iday, to rest and all, and am plagued so by their non­sense that I long to es­cape af­ter the first day. [Laugh­ing] I have al­ways been glad to get away from this place, but I have been re­tired now, and this was the on­ly place I had to come to. Willy-​nil­ly, one must live some­where.

JA­COB. [To TREPLI­EFF] We are go­ing to take a swim, Mr. Con­stan­tine.

TREPLI­EFF. Very well, but you must be back in ten min­utes.

JA­COB. We will, sir.

TREPLI­EFF. [Look­ing at the stage] Just like a re­al the­atre! See, there we have the cur­tain, the fore­ground, the back­ground, and all. No ar­ti­fi­cial scenery is need­ed. The eye trav­els di­rect to the lake, and rests on the hori­zon. The cur­tain will be raised as the moon ris­es at half-​past eight.

SORIN. Splen­did!

TREPLI­EFF. Of course the whole ef­fect will be ru­ined if Ni­na is late. She should be here by now, but her fa­ther and step­moth­er watch her so close­ly that it is like steal­ing her from a prison to get her away from home. [He straight­ens SORIN'S col­lar] Your hair and beard are all on end. Oughtn't you to have them trimmed?

SORIN. [Smooth­ing his beard] They are the tragedy of my ex­is­tence. Even when I was young I al­ways looked as if I were drunk, and all. Wom­en have nev­er liked me. [Sit­ting down] Why is my sis­ter out of tem­per?

TREPLI­EFF. Why? Be­cause she is jeal­ous and bored. [Sit­ting down be­side SORIN] She is not act­ing this evening, but Ni­na is, and so she has set her­self against me, and against the per­for­mance of the play, and against the play it­self, which she hates with­out ev­er hav­ing read it.

SORIN. [Laugh­ing] Does she, re­al­ly?

TREPLI­EFF. Yes, she is fu­ri­ous be­cause Ni­na is go­ing to have a suc­cess on this lit­tle stage. [Look­ing at his watch] My moth­er is a psy­cho­log­ical cu­rios­ity. With­out doubt bril­liant and tal­ent­ed, ca­pa­ble of sob­bing over a nov­el, of recit­ing all Nekra­soff's po­et­ry by heart, and of nurs­ing the sick like an an­gel of heav­en, you should see what hap­pens if any one be­gins prais­ing Duse to her! She alone must be praised and writ­ten about, raved over, her mar­vel­lous act­ing in “La Dame aux Camelias” ex­tolled to the skies. As she can­not get all that rub­bish in the coun­try, she grows pee­vish and cross, and thinks we are all against her, and to blame for it all. She is su­per­sti­tious, too. She dreads burn­ing three can­dles, and fears the thir­teenth day of the month. Then she is stingy. I know for a fact that she has sev­en­ty thou­sand rou­bles in a bank at Odessa, but she is ready to burst in­to tears if you ask her to lend you a pen­ny.

SORIN. You have tak­en it in­to your head that your moth­er dis­likes your play, and the thought of it has ex­cit­ed you, and all. Keep calm; your moth­er adores you.

TREPLI­EFF. [Pulling a flow­er to pieces] She loves me, loves me not; loves--loves me not; loves--loves me not! [Laugh­ing] You see, she doesn't love me, and why should she? She likes life and love and gay clothes, and I am al­ready twen­ty-​five years old; a suf­fi­cient re­minder to her that she is no longer young. When I am away she is on­ly thir­ty-​two, in my pres­ence she is forty-​three, and she hates me for it. She knows, too, that I de­spise the mod­ern stage. She adores it, and imag­ines that she is work­ing on it for the ben­efit of hu­man­ity and her sa­cred art, but to me the the­atre is mere­ly the ve­hi­cle of con­ven­tion and prej­udice. When the cur­tain ris­es on that lit­tle three-​walled room, when those mighty ge­nius­es, those high-​priests of art, show us peo­ple in the act of eat­ing, drink­ing, lov­ing, walk­ing, and wear­ing their coats, and at­tempt to ex­tract a moral from their in­sipid talk; when play­wrights give us un­der a thou­sand dif­fer­ent guis­es the same, same, same old stuff, then I must needs run from it, as Mau­pas­sant ran from the Eif­fel Tow­er that was about to crush him by its vul­gar­ity.

SORIN. But we can't do with­out a the­atre.

TREPLI­EFF. No, but we must have it un­der a new form. If we can't do that, let us rather not have it at all. [Look­ing at his watch] I love my moth­er, I love her de­vot­ed­ly, but I think she leads a stupid life. She al­ways has this man of let­ters of hers on her mind, and the news­pa­pers are al­ways fright­en­ing her to death, and I am tired of it. Plain, hu­man ego­ism some­times speaks in my heart, and I re­gret that my moth­er is a fa­mous ac­tress. If she were an or­di­nary wom­an I think I should be a hap­pi­er man. What could be more in­tol­er­able and fool­ish than my po­si­tion, Un­cle, when I find my­self the on­ly nonen­ti­ty among a crowd of her guests, all cel­ebrat­ed au­thors and artists? I feel that they on­ly en­dure me be­cause I am her son. Per­son­al­ly I am noth­ing, no­body. I pulled through my third year at col­lege by the skin of my teeth, as they say. I have nei­ther mon­ey nor brains, and on my pass­port you may read that I am sim­ply a cit­izen of Kiev. So was my fa­ther, but he was a well-​known ac­tor. When the celebri­ties that fre­quent my moth­er's draw­ing-​room deign to no­tice me at all, I know they on­ly look at me to mea­sure my in­signif­icance; I read their thoughts, and suf­fer from hu­mil­ia­tion.

SORIN. Tell me, by the way, what is Trig­orin like? I can't un­der­stand him, he is al­ways so silent.

TREPLI­EFF. Trig­orin is clever, sim­ple, well-​man­nered, and a lit­tle, I might say, melan­cholic in dis­po­si­tion. Though still un­der forty, he is sur­feit­ed with praise. As for his sto­ries, they are--how shall I put it?--pleas­ing, full of tal­ent, but if you have read Tol­stoi or Zo­la you some­how don't en­joy Trig­orin.

SORIN. Do you know, my boy, I like lit­er­ary men. I once pas­sion­ate­ly de­sired two things: to mar­ry, and to be­come an au­thor. I have suc­ceed­ed in nei­ther. It must be pleas­ant to be even an in­signif­icant au­thor.

TREPLI­EFF. [Lis­ten­ing] I hear foot­steps! [He em­braces his un­cle] I can­not live with­out her; even the sound of her foot­steps is mu­sic to me. I am mad­ly hap­py. [He goes quick­ly to meet NI­NA, who comes in at that mo­ment] My en­chantress! My girl of dreams!

NI­NA. [Ex­cit­ed­ly] It can't be that I am late? No, I am not late.

TREPLI­EFF. [Kiss­ing her hands] No, no, no!

NI­NA. I have been in a fever all day, I was so afraid my fa­ther would pre­vent my com­ing, but he and my step­moth­er have just gone driv­ing. The sky is clear, the moon is ris­ing. How I hur­ried to get here! How I urged my horse to go faster and faster! [Laugh­ing] I am _so_ glad to see you! [She shakes hands with SORIN.]

SORIN. Oho! Your eyes look as if you had been cry­ing. You mustn't do that.

NI­NA. It is noth­ing, noth­ing. Do let us hur­ry. I must go in half an hour. No, no, for heav­en's sake do not urge me to stay. My fa­ther doesn't know I am here.

TREPLI­EFF. As a mat­ter of fact, it is time to be­gin now. I must call the au­di­ence.

SORIN. Let me call them--and all--I am go­ing this minute. [He goes to­ward the right, be­gins to sing “The Two Grenadiers,” then stops.] I was singing that once when a fel­low-​lawyer said to me: “You have a pow­er­ful voice, sir.” Then he thought a mo­ment and added, “But it is a dis­agree­able one!” [He goes out laugh­ing.]

NI­NA. My fa­ther and his wife nev­er will let me come here; they call this place Bo­hemia and are afraid I shall be­come an ac­tress. But this lake at­tracts me as it does the gulls. My heart is full of you. [She glances about her.]

TREPLI­EFF. We are alone.

NI­NA. Isn't that some one over there?

TREPLI­EFF. No. [They kiss one an­oth­er.]

NI­NA. What is that tree?

TREPLI­EFF. An elm.

NI­NA. Why does it look so dark?

TREPLI­EFF. It is evening; ev­ery­thing looks dark now. Don't go away ear­ly, I im­plore you.

NI­NA. I must.

TREPLI­EFF. What if I were to fol­low you, Ni­na? I shall stand in your gar­den all night with my eyes on your win­dow.

NI­NA. That would be im­pos­si­ble; the watch­man would see you, and Trea­sure is not used to you yet, and would bark.

TREPLI­EFF. I love you.

NI­NA. Hush!

TREPLI­EFF. [Lis­ten­ing to ap­proach­ing foot­steps] Who is that? Is it you, Ja­cob?

JA­COB. [On the stage] Yes, sir.

TREPLI­EFF. To your places then. The moon is ris­ing; the play must com­mence.

NI­NA. Yes, sir.

TREPLI­EFF. Is the al­co­hol ready? Is the sul­phur ready? There must be fumes of sul­phur in the air when the red eyes shine out. [To NI­NA] Go, now, ev­ery­thing is ready. Are you ner­vous?

NI­NA. Yes, very. I am not so much afraid of your moth­er as I am of Trig­orin. I am ter­ri­fied and ashamed to act be­fore him; he is so fa­mous. Is he young?

TREPLI­EFF. Yes.

NI­NA. What beau­ti­ful sto­ries he writes!

TREPLI­EFF. [Cold­ly] I have nev­er read any of them, so I can't say.

NI­NA. Your play is very hard to act; there are no liv­ing char­ac­ters in it.

TREPLI­EFF. Liv­ing char­ac­ters! Life must be rep­re­sent­ed not as it is, but as it ought to be; as it ap­pears in dreams.

NI­NA. There is so lit­tle ac­tion; it seems more like a recita­tion. I think love should al­ways come in­to ev­ery play.

NI­NA and TREPLI­EFF go up on­to the lit­tle stage; PAULI­NA and DORN come in.

PAULI­NA. It is get­ting damp. Go back and put on your golosh­es.

DORN. I am quite warm.

PAULI­NA. You nev­er will take care of your­self; you are quite ob­sti­nate about it, and yet you are a doc­tor, and know quite well that damp air is bad for you. You like to see me suf­fer, that's what it is. You sat out on the ter­race all yes­ter­day evening on pur­pose.

DORN. [Sings]

“Oh, tell me not that youth is wast­ed.”

PAULI­NA. You were so en­chant­ed by the con­ver­sa­tion of Madame Arkad­ina that you did not even no­tice the cold. Con­fess that you ad­mire her.

DORN. I am fifty-​five years old.

PAULI­NA. A tri­fle. That is not old for a man. You have kept your looks mag­nif­icent­ly, and wom­en still like you.

DORN. What are you try­ing to tell me?

PAULI­NA. You men are all ready to go down on your knees to an ac­tress, all of you.

DORN. [Sings]

“Once more I stand be­fore thee.”

It is on­ly right that artists should be made much of by so­ci­ety and treat­ed dif­fer­ent­ly from, let us say, mer­chants. It is a kind of ide­al­ism.

PAULI­NA. When wom­en have loved you and thrown them­selves at your head, has that been ide­al­ism?

DORN. [Shrug­ging his shoul­ders] I can't say. There has been a great deal that was ad­mirable in my re­la­tions with wom­en. In me they liked, above all, the su­pe­ri­or doc­tor. Ten years ago, you re­mem­ber, I was the on­ly de­cent doc­tor they had in this part of the coun­try--and then, I have al­ways act­ed like a man of hon­our.

PAULI­NA. [Seizes his hand] Dear­est!

DORN. Be qui­et! Here they come.

ARKAD­INA comes in on SORIN'S arm; al­so TRIG­ORIN, SHAM­RA­EFF, MED­VIEDENKO, and MASHA.

SHAM­RA­EFF. She act­ed most beau­ti­ful­ly at the Polta­va Fair in 1873; she was re­al­ly mag­nif­icent. But tell me, too, where Tchadin the co­me­di­an is now? He was inim­itable as Ras­plu­eff, bet­ter than Sad­of­ski. Where is he now?

ARKAD­INA. Don't ask me where all those an­te­dilu­vians are! I know noth­ing about them. [She sits down.]

SHAM­RA­EFF. [Sigh­ing] Pash­ka Tchadin! There are none left like him. The stage is not what it was in his time. There were stur­dy oaks grow­ing on it then, where now but stumps re­main.

DORN. It is true that we have few daz­zling ge­nius­es these days, but, on the oth­er hand, the av­er­age of act­ing is much high­er.

SHAM­RA­EFF. I can­not agree with you; how­ev­er, that is a mat­ter of taste, _de gustibus._

En­ter TREPLI­EFF from be­hind the stage.

ARKAD­INA. When will the play be­gin, my dear boy?

TREPLI­EFF. In a mo­ment. I must ask you to have pa­tience.

ARKAD­INA. [Quot­ing from Ham­let] My son,

“Thou turn'st mine eyes in­to my very soul; And there I see such black grained spots As will not leave their tinct.”

[A horn is blown be­hind the stage.]

TREPLI­EFF. At­ten­tion, ladies and gen­tle­men! The play is about to be­gin. [A pause] I shall com­mence. [He taps the door with a stick, and speaks in a loud voice] O, ye time-​hon­oured, an­cient mists that drive at night across the sur­face of this lake, blind you our eyes with sleep, and show us in our dreams that which will be in twice ten thou­sand years!

SORIN. There won't be any­thing in twice ten thou­sand years.

TREPLI­EFF. Then let them now show us that noth­ing­ness.

ARKAD­INA. Yes, let them--we are asleep.

The cur­tain ris­es. A vista opens across the lake. The moon hangs low above the hori­zon and is re­flect­ed in the wa­ter. NI­NA, dressed in white, is seen seat­ed on a great rock.

NI­NA. All men and beasts, li­ons, ea­gles, and quails, horned stags, geese, spi­ders, silent fish that in­hab­it the waves, starfish from the sea, and crea­tures in­vis­ible to the eye--in one word, life--all, all life, com­plet­ing the drea­ry round im­posed up­on it, has died out at last. A thou­sand years have passed since the earth last bore a liv­ing crea­ture on her breast, and the un­hap­py moon now lights her lamp in vain. No longer are the cries of storks heard in the mead­ows, or the drone of bee­tles in the groves of limes. All is cold, cold. All is void, void, void. All is ter­ri­ble, ter­ri­ble-- [A pause] The bod­ies of all liv­ing crea­tures have dropped to dust, and eter­nal mat­ter has trans­formed them in­to stones and wa­ter and clouds; but their spir­its have flowed to­geth­er in­to one, and that great world-​soul am I! In me is the spir­it of the great Alexan­der, the spir­it of Napoleon, of Cae­sar, of Shake­speare, and of the tini­est leech that swims. In me the con­scious­ness of man has joined hands with the in­stinct of the an­imal; I un­der­stand all, all, all, and each life lives again in me.

[The will-​o-​the-​wisps flick­er out along the lake shore.]

ARKAD­INA. [Whis­pers] What deca­dent rub­bish is this?

TREPLI­EFF. [Im­plor­ing­ly] Moth­er!

NI­NA. I am alone. Once in a hun­dred years my lips are opened, my voice echoes mourn­ful­ly across the desert earth, and no one hears. And you, poor lights of the marsh, you do not hear me. You are en­gen­dered at sun­set in the pu­trid mud, and flit wa­ver­ing about the lake till dawn, un­con­scious, un­rea­son­ing, un­warmed by the breath of life. Sa­tan, fa­ther of eter­nal mat­ter, trem­bling lest the spark of life should glow in you, has or­dered an un­ceas­ing move­ment of the atoms that com­pose you, and so you shift and change for ev­er. I, the spir­it of the uni­verse, I alone am im­mutable and eter­nal. [A pause] Like a cap­tive in a dun­geon deep and void, I know not where I am, nor what awaits me. One thing on­ly is not hid­den from me: in my fierce and ob­sti­nate bat­tle with Sa­tan, the source of the forces of mat­ter, I am des­tined to be vic­to­ri­ous in the end. Mat­ter and spir­it will then be one at last in glo­ri­ous har­mo­ny, and the reign of free­dom will be­gin on earth. But this can on­ly come to pass by slow de­grees, when af­ter count­less eons the moon and earth and shin­ing Sir­ius him­self shall fall to dust. Un­til that hour, oh, hor­ror! hor­ror! hor­ror! [A pause. Two glow­ing red points are seen shin­ing across the lake] Sa­tan, my mighty foe, ad­vances; I see his dread and lurid eyes.

ARKAD­INA. I smell sul­phur. Is that done on pur­pose?

TREPLI­EFF. Yes.

ARKAD­INA. Oh, I see; that is part of the ef­fect.

TREPLI­EFF. Moth­er!

NI­NA. He longs for man--

PAULI­NA. [To DORN] You have tak­en off your hat again! Put it on, you will catch cold.

ARKAD­INA. The doc­tor has tak­en off his hat to Sa­tan fa­ther of eter­nal mat­ter--

TREPLI­EFF. [Loud­ly and an­gri­ly] Enough of this! There's an end to the per­for­mance. Down with the cur­tain!

ARKAD­INA. Why, what are you so an­gry about?

TREPLI­EFF. [Stamp­ing his foot] The cur­tain; down with it! [The cur­tain falls] Ex­cuse me, I for­got that on­ly a cho­sen few might write plays or act them. I have in­fringed the monopoly. I-- I---

He would like to say more, but waves his hand in­stead, and goes out to the left.

ARKAD­INA. What is the mat­ter with him?

SORIN. You should not han­dle youth­ful ego­ism so rough­ly, sis­ter.

ARKAD­INA. What did I say to him?

SORIN. You hurt his feel­ings.

ARKAD­INA. But he told me him­self that this was all in fun, so I treat­ed his play as if it were a com­edy.

SORIN. Nev­er­the­less---

ARKAD­INA. Now it ap­pears that he has pro­duced a mas­ter­piece, if you please! I sup­pose it was not meant to amuse us at all, but that he ar­ranged the per­for­mance and fu­mi­gat­ed us with sul­phur to demon­strate to us how plays should be writ­ten, and what is worth act­ing. I am tired of him. No one could stand his con­stant thrusts and sal­lies. He is a wil­ful, ego­tis­tic boy.

SORIN. He had hoped to give you plea­sure.

ARKAD­INA. Is that so? I no­tice, though, that he did not choose an or­di­nary play, but forced his deca­dent trash on us. I am will­ing to lis­ten to any rav­ing, so long as it is not meant se­ri­ous­ly, but in show­ing us this, he pre­tend­ed to be in­tro­duc­ing us to a new form of art, and in­au­gu­rat­ing a new era. In my opin­ion, there was noth­ing new about it, it was sim­ply an ex­hi­bi­tion of bad tem­per.

TRIG­ORIN. Ev­ery­body must write as he feels, and as best he may.

ARKAD­INA. Let him write as he feels and can, but let him spare me his non­sense.

DORN. Thou art an­gry, O Jove!

ARKAD­INA. I am a wom­an, not Jove. [She lights a cigarette] And I am not an­gry, I am on­ly sor­ry to see a young man fool­ish­ly wast­ing his time. I did not mean to hurt him.

MED­VIEDENKO. No one has any ground for sep­arat­ing life from mat­ter, as the spir­it may well con­sist of the union of ma­te­ri­al atoms. [Ex­cit­ed­ly, to TRIG­ORIN] Some day you should write a play, and put on the stage the life of a school­mas­ter. It is a hard, hard life.

ARKAD­INA. I agree with you, but do not let us talk about plays or atoms now. This is such a love­ly evening. Lis­ten to the singing, friends, how sweet it sounds.

PAULI­NA. Yes, they are singing across the wa­ter. [A pause.]

ARKAD­INA. [To TRIG­ORIN] Sit down be­side me here. Ten or fif­teen years ago we had mu­sic and singing on this lake al­most all night. There are six hous­es on its shores. All was noise and laugh­ter and ro­mance then, such ro­mance! The young star and idol of them all in those days was this man here, [Nods to­ward DORN] Doc­tor Eu­gene Dorn. He is fas­ci­nat­ing now, but he was ir­re­sistible then. But my con­science is be­gin­ning to prick me. Why did I hurt my poor boy? I am un­easy about him. [Loud­ly] Con­stan­tine! Con­stan­tine!

MASHA. Shall I go and find him?

ARKAD­INA. If you please, my dear.

MASHA. [Goes off to the left, call­ing] Mr. Con­stan­tine! Oh, Mr. Con­stan­tine!

NI­NA. [Comes in from be­hind the stage] I see that the play will nev­er be fin­ished, so now I can go home. Good evening. [She kiss­es ARKAD­INA and PAULI­NA.]

SORIN. Bra­vo! Bra­vo!

ARKAD­INA. Bra­vo! Bra­vo! We were quite charmed by your act­ing. With your looks and such a love­ly voice it is a crime for you to hide your­self in the coun­try. You must be very tal­ent­ed. It is your du­ty to go on the stage, do you hear me?

NI­NA. It is the dream of my life, which will nev­er come true.

ARKAD­INA. Who knows? Per­haps it will. But let me present Mon­sieur Boris Trig­orin.

NI­NA. I am de­light­ed to meet you. [Em­bar­rassed] I have read all your books.

ARKAD­INA. [Draw­ing NI­NA down be­side her] Don't be afraid of him, dear. He is a sim­ple, good-​na­tured soul, even if he is a celebri­ty. See, he is em­bar­rassed him­self.

DORN. Couldn't the cur­tain be raised now? It is de­press­ing to have it down.

SHAM­RA­EFF. [Loud­ly] Ja­cob, my man! Raise the cur­tain!

NI­NA. [To TRIG­ORIN] It was a cu­ri­ous play, wasn't it?

TRIG­ORIN. Very. I couldn't un­der­stand it at all, but I watched it with the great­est plea­sure be­cause you act­ed with such sin­cer­ity, and the set­ting was beau­ti­ful. [A pause] There must be a lot of fish in this lake.

NI­NA. Yes, there are.

TRIG­ORIN. I love fish­ing. I know of noth­ing pleas­an­ter than to sit on a lake shore in the evening with one's eyes on a float­ing cork.

NI­NA. Why, I should think that for one who has tast­ed the joys of cre­ation, no oth­er plea­sure could ex­ist.

ARKAD­INA. Don't talk like that. He al­ways be­gins to floun­der when peo­ple say nice things to him.

SHAM­RA­EFF. I re­mem­ber when the fa­mous Sil­va was singing once in the Opera House at Moscow, how de­light­ed we all were when he took the low C. Well, you can imag­ine our as­ton­ish­ment when one of the church can­tors, who hap­pened to be sit­ting in the gallery, sud­den­ly boomed out: “Bra­vo, Sil­va!” a whole oc­tave low­er. Like this: [In a deep bass voice] “Bra­vo, Sil­va!” The au­di­ence was left breath­less. [A pause.]

DORN. An an­gel of si­lence is fly­ing over our heads.

NI­NA. I must go. Good-​bye.

ARKAD­INA. Where to? Where must you go so ear­ly? We shan't al­low it.

NI­NA. My fa­ther is wait­ing for me.

ARKAD­INA. How cru­el he is, re­al­ly. [They kiss each oth­er] Then I sup­pose we can't keep you, but it is very hard in­deed to let you go.

NI­NA. If you on­ly knew how hard it is for me to leave you all.

ARKAD­INA. Some­body must see you home, my pet.

NI­NA. [Star­tled] No, no!

SORIN. [Im­plor­ing­ly] Don't go!

NI­NA. I must.

SORIN. Stay just one hour more, and all. Come now, re­al­ly, you know.

NI­NA. [Strug­gling against her de­sire to stay; through her tears] No, no, I can't. [She shakes hands with him and quick­ly goes out.]

ARKAD­INA. An un­lucky girl! They say that her moth­er left the whole of an im­mense for­tune to her hus­band, and now the child is pen­ni­less be­cause the fa­ther has al­ready willed ev­ery­thing away to his sec­ond wife. It is piti­ful.

DORN. Yes, her pa­pa is a per­fect beast, and I don't mind say­ing so--it is what he de­serves.

SORIN. [Rub­bing his chilled hands] Come, let us go in; the night is damp, and my legs are aching.

ARKAD­INA. Yes, you act as if they were turned to stone; you can hard­ly move them. Come, you un­for­tu­nate old man. [She takes his arm.]

SHAM­RA­EFF. [Of­fer­ing his arm to his wife] Per­mit me, madame.

SORIN. I hear that dog howl­ing again. Won't you please have it un­chained, Sham­ra­eff?

SHAM­RA­EFF. No, I re­al­ly can't, sir. The gra­nary is full of mil­let, and I am afraid thieves might break in if the dog were not there. [Walk­ing be­side MED­VIEDENKO] Yes, a whole oc­tave low­er: “Bra­vo, Sil­va!” and he wasn't a singer ei­ther, just a sim­ple church can­tor.

MED­VIEDENKO. What salary does the church pay its singers? [All go out ex­cept DORN.]

DORN. I may have lost my judg­ment and my wits, but I must con­fess I liked that play. There was some­thing in it. When the girl spoke of her soli­tude and the Dev­il's eyes gleamed across the lake, I felt my hands shak­ing with ex­cite­ment. It was so fresh and naive. But here he comes; let me say some­thing pleas­ant to him.

TREPLI­EFF comes in.

TREPLI­EFF. All gone al­ready?

DORN. I am here.

TREPLI­EFF. Masha has been yelling for me all over the park. An in­suf­fer­able crea­ture.

DORN. Con­stan­tine, your play de­light­ed me. It was strange, of course, and I did not hear the end, but it made a deep im­pres­sion on me. You have a great deal of tal­ent, and must per­se­vere in your work.

TREPLI­EFF seizes his hand and squeezes it hard, then kiss­es him im­petu­ous­ly.

DORN. Tut, tut! how ex­cit­ed you are. Your eyes are full of tears. Lis­ten to me. You chose your sub­ject in the realm of ab­stract thought, and you did quite right. A work of art should in­vari­ably em­body some lofty idea. On­ly that which is se­ri­ous­ly meant can ev­er be beau­ti­ful. How pale you are!

TREPLI­EFF. So you ad­vise me to per­se­vere?

DORN. Yes, but use your tal­ent to ex­press on­ly deep and eter­nal truths. I have led a qui­et life, as you know, and am a con­tent­ed man, but if I should ev­er ex­pe­ri­ence the ex­al­ta­tion that an artist feels dur­ing his mo­ments of cre­ation, I think I should spurn this ma­te­ri­al en­ve­lope of my soul and ev­ery­thing con­nect­ed with it, and should soar away in­to heights above this earth.

TREPLI­EFF. I beg your par­don, but where is Ni­na?

DORN. And yet an­oth­er thing: ev­ery work of art should have a def­inite ob­ject in view. You should know why you are writ­ing, for if you fol­low the road of art with­out a goal be­fore your eyes, you will lose your­self, and your ge­nius will be your ru­in.

TREPLI­EFF. [Im­petu­ous­ly] Where is Ni­na?

DORN. She has gone home.

TREPLI­EFF. [In de­spair] Gone home? What shall I do? I want to see her; I must see her! I shall fol­low her.

DORN. My dear boy, keep qui­et.

TREPLI­EFF. I am go­ing. I must go.

MASHA comes in.

MASHA. Your moth­er wants you to come in, Mr. Con­stan­tine. She is wait­ing for you, and is very un­easy.

TREPLI­EFF. Tell her I have gone away. And for heav­en's sake, all of you, leave me alone! Go away! Don't fol­low me about!

DORN. Come, come, old chap, don't act like this; it isn't kind at all.

TREPLI­EFF. [Through his tears] Good-​bye, doc­tor, and thank you.

TREPLI­EFF goes out.

DORN. [Sigh­ing] Ah, youth, youth!

MASHA. It is al­ways “Youth, youth,” when there is noth­ing else to be said.

She takes snuff. DORN takes the snuff-​box out of her hands and flings it in­to the bush­es.

DORN. Don't do that, it is hor­rid. [A pause] I hear mu­sic in the house. I must go in.

MASHA. Wait a mo­ment.

DORN. What do you want?

MASHA. Let me tell you again. I feel like talk­ing. [She grows more and more ex­cit­ed] I do not love my fa­ther, but my heart turns to you. For some rea­son, I feel with all my soul that you are near to me. Help me! Help me, or I shall do some­thing fool­ish and mock at my life, and ru­in it. I am at the end of my strength.

DORN. What is the mat­ter? How can I help you?

MASHA. I am in agony. No one, no one can imag­ine how I suf­fer. [She lays her head on his shoul­der and speaks soft­ly] I love Con­stan­tine.

DORN. Oh, how ex­citable you all are! And how much love there is about this lake of spells! [Ten­der­ly] But what can I do for you, my child? What? What?

The cur­tain falls.