Once It Is Over

Anagnorisis: the moment when a character of the play realizes something.

“GAEV. (…) Before the orchard was sold, we were all worried and wretched, but afterwards, when once the question was settled conclusively, irrevocably, we all felt calm and even cheerful. I am a bank clerk now-I am a financier-cannon off the red.” (Chekhov 112)

Once Gaev says it, Chekhov points out how obvious this statement is. What’s funny is that throughout the whole play the characters fight the idea of selling their beloved orchard and try to avoid the possibility as a solution for their worrying economic situation, and they pity themselves for the terrible decision they have to make and when sold, Gaev recognizes their relieve and Lyubov agrees. It reminds me when I was little and I kicked and cried and screamed when I had to cut my hair and when it was over I walked out of the salon smiling at my new hair and my mom burst out laughing because of the exaggerated and unnecessary drama she had to put up to to cut my hair.

Gaev’s anagnorisis reveal their real situation and his own position as a “bank clerk” only, an employee and his conformism with it. So that’s it! They are not entirely happy, but they are not worried either, what next? The play ends with quiet the same emotion and tone as it began. A decision was made because it had to be made for the sake of everyone. I live a similar situation at my own real home, when my parents talk about business and selling property and they complain and then are relieved and then complain again. Chekhov revives a quotidian event and Gaev comprehends the simplicity of it after it’s over.

Dear Chekhov,

I just finished reading Act III of your play The Cherry Orchard and I, if I may, want to bother you with some doubts. Repeatedly your characters ask questions between each other and the one being questioned fails to answer and instead talks about something completely different.

And then Lyubov argues with Trofimov about his freakiness and superiority, or inferiority, to love.

But Dunyasha trembles and gets anxious and nervous, over nothing, and feels glad that she was compared to a flower by a post-office clerk. And Yasha yawns in jealousy.
Mr. Chekhov I sense each character lives in a world of their own, and care only of the things that directly relate to them. “EPIHODOV. I have a misfortune every day, and if I may venture to express myself, I merely smile at it, I even laugh.” (pg. 103) Charlotta is a ventriloquist, and Varya a nun wannabe.
And you a realist.

What was your purpose in creating a character like Firs? An old man who mutters all the time without any filtration his thoughts and emotions. Well why not? His mutterings reveal the memory of a guy who witnesses a transformation of his country: “In old days we used to have generals, barons and admirals dancing at our balls, and now we send for the post-office clerk and the station master and even they’re not overanxious to come.” (pg. 101) and, rightly, feels mortified. Everyone else feels mortified for their economic situation, relationship status, mortgage, identity, and billiards.

May I ask you why Lopahin, an ordinary merchant happens to be the one that buys the orchard? Surprisingly? I guess I should have seen his protagonist role since he begins the play. I didn’t. That’s realism right?

The unexpected.

You probably had a Cherry Orchard as a garden when you were little at your grandparents’ house, and some random guy bought it, and you had to tell you grandma “And joy, quiet, deep joy, will sink into your soul like the sun at evening! And you will smile, (grandma)! Come, darling, let us go!” (pg. 106)

You didn’t that coming, did you?

Thank you for your response,

Reader.

Dunyasha's Conduct

I read Act II but the long Russian names and quick jumping from person to person dialogues and the incoherence in some responses confused me. So, I saw the play. I realized then I had been making the mistake of reading the play as a novel and forgotten the fact that it should not be read but watched. It’s meant to sense the character’s personality, to hear their tone, to interpret their facial expressions and to feel the drama that is going on. And I understood.

Dunyasha triggers me, she is a maid, comes from a peasant family, and has served Madame Ranevesky since she was little because her family was servants too, but, she seems to be part of the higher class. Dunyasha’s role is key to the theme Chekhov plots of social classes. Yet, it confuses me. The play starts out with a dialogue between her and Lopahin. Watching this dialogue on YouTube it seemed to me that Lopahin, a merchant, felt attracted to Dunyasha. He had a peasant origin like hers but unlike her, he owns wealth now as a merchant. And then Epihodov, more so like Dynuyasha, in terms of money, proposes to her, but it does not appeal to her. In Act II a character is introduced in to us in the emotional life: Yasha. Yasha is a valet, according to the book, but watching the play he seems more like a high class man, well-dresses, smoking cigars, and even disrespectful and arrogant in front of the higher class people. Dunyasha loves this man, his overconfidence attracts her. “I’m passionately in love with you, Yasha; you are a man of culture- you can give your opinion about anything.” He then brags about the validity of his opinion and diminishes her for “loving anyone”, and pushes her away when he hears others approaching. So, why would Dunyasha like this guy? Is it because she is used at being degraded? Although Yasha is her same social class, he behaves contrary to it, making her fall for him. Poor Epihodov who sings to her but she finds him ridiculous, and so does Yasha, who is too of a “cultured” man to like Epihodov.

Social classes implicate a feeling of superiority or inferiority. Duyasha is caught between the two feelings, “I have quiet grown out of peasant ways, and, my hands are white, as white as a lady’s.” She knows her status but feels differently. Yasha on the other hand, feels differently to his status and believes himself from a higher one. Ironically he tells Dunyasha “Of course a girl must never forget herself; what I dislike more than anything in a girl being flighty in her behavior.” (pg.83)That is exactly what his behavior is like. Epihodov acts accordingly and has no rush to be superior. There is a desirability to be from a higher class and rejection to lower the status, we can see that throughout the play. Dunyasha’s conduct portrays this class belonging ambiguity the Russians are going through at the time.