Plays by Anton Chekhov, Second Series
and the smaller fry is mostly in the country, making love or occupied
with amateur theatricals. Everybody is so sleepy, tired, and done up
that you can’t get any sense out of them. The Secretary’s duties are in
the hands of an individual who is deaf in the left ear and in love; the
public has lost its memory; everybody is running about angry and raging,
and there is such a hullabaloo that you can’t hear yourself speak.
Confusion and smoke everywhere. And my work is deathly: always the same,
always the same--first a correction, then a reference back, another
correction, another reference back; it’s all as monotonous as the waves
of the sea. One’s eyes, you understand, simply crawl out of one’s head.
Give me some water.... You come out a broken, exhausted man. You would
like to dine and fall asleep, but you don’t!--You remember that you live
in the country--that is, you are a slave, a rag, a bit of string, a bit
of limp flesh, and you’ve got to run round and do errands. Where we live
a pleasant custom has grown up: when a man goes to town every wretched
female inhabitant, not to mention one’s own wife, has the power and the
right to give him a crowd of commissions. The wife orders you to run
into the modiste’s and curse her for making a bodice too wide across the
chest and too narrow across the shoulders; little Sonya wants a new pair
of shoes; your sister-in-law wants some scarlet silk like the pattern
at twenty copecks and three arshins long.... Just wait; I’ll read you.
[Takes a note out of his pocket and reads] A globe for the lamp; one
pound of pork sausages; five copecks’ worth of cloves and cinnamon;
castor-oil for Misha; ten pounds of granulated sugar. To bring with you
from home: a copper jar for the sugar; carbolic acid; insect powder, ten
copecks’ worth; twenty bottles of beer; vinegar; and corsets for Mlle.
Shanceau at No. 82.... Ouf! And to bring home Misha’s winter coat and
goloshes. That is the order of my wife and family. Then there are
the commissions of our dear friends and neighbours--devil take them!
To-morrow is the name-day of Volodia Vlasin; I have to buy a bicycle
for him. The wife of Lieutenant-Colonel Virkhin is in an interesting
condition, and I am therefore bound to call in at the midwife’s every
day and invite her to come. And so on, and so on. There are five notes
in my pocket and my handkerchief is all knots. And so, my dear fellow,
you spend the time between your office and your train, running about the
town like a dog with your tongue hanging out, running and running and
cursing life. From the clothier’s to the chemist’s, from the chemist’s
to the modiste’s, from the modiste’s to the pork butcher’s, and then
back again to the chemist’s. In one place you stumble, in a second you
lose your money, in a third you forget to pay and they raise a hue and
cry after you, in a fourth you tread on the train of a lady’s dress....
Tfoo! You get so shaken up from all this that your bones ache all night
and you dream of crocodiles. Well, you’ve made all your purchases, but
how are you to pack all these things? For instance, how are you to put a
heavy copper jar together with the lamp-globe or the carbolic acid with
the tea? How are you to make a combination of beer-bottles and this
bicycle? It’s the labours of Hercules, a puzzle, a rebus! Whatever
tricks you think of, in the long run you’re bound to smash or scatter
something, and at the station and in the train you have to stand with
your arms apart, holding up some parcel or other under your chin, with
parcels, cardboard boxes, and such-like rubbish all over you. The train
starts, the passengers begin to throw your luggage about on all sides:
you’ve got your things on somebody else’s seat. They yell, they call for
the conductor, they threaten to have you put out, but what can I do? I
just stand and blink my eyes like a whacked donkey. Now listen to this.
I get home. You think I’d like to have a nice little drink after my
righteous labours and a good square meal--isn’t that so?--but there is
no chance of that. My spouse has been on the look-out for me for some
time. You’ve hardly started on your soup when she has her claws into
you, wretched slave that you are--and wouldn’t you like to go to some
amateur theatricals or to a dance? You can’t protest. You are a husband,
and the word husband when translated into the language of summer
residents in the country means a dumb beast which you can load to
any extent without fear of the interference of the Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. So you go and blink at “A Family
Scandal” or something, you applaud when your wife tells you to, and you
feel worse and worse and worse until you expect an apoplectic fit to
happen any moment. If you go to a dance you have to find partners
for your wife, and if there is a shortage of them then you dance the
quadrilles yourself. You get back from the theatre or the dance after
midnight, when you are no longer a man but a useless, limp rag. Well,
at last you’ve got what you want; you unrobe and get into bed. It’s
excellent--you can close your eyes and sleep.... Everything is so nice,
poetic, and warm, you understand; there are no children squealing
behind the wall, and you’ve got rid of your wife, and your conscience is
clear--what more can you want? You fall asleep--and suddenly... you
hear a buzz!... Gnats! [Jumps up] Gnats! Be they triply accursed Gnats!
[Shakes his fist] Gnats! It’s one of the plagues of Egypt, one of the
tortures of the Inquisition! Buzz! It sounds so pitiful, so pathetic, as
if it’s begging your pardon, but the villain stings so that you have
to scratch yourself for an hour after. You smoke, and go for them, and
cover yourself from head to foot, but it is no good! At last you have
to sacrifice yourself and let the cursed things devour you. You’ve no
sooner got used to the gnats when another plague begins: downstairs
your wife begins practising sentimental songs with her two friends. They
sleep by day and rehearse for amateur concerts by night. Oh, my God!
Those tenors are a torture with which no gnats on earth can compare.
[He sings] “Oh, tell me not my youth has ruined you.” “Before thee do I
stand enchanted.” Oh, the beastly things! They’ve about killed me! So
as to deafen myself a little I do this: I drum on my ears. This goes on
till four o’clock. Oh, give me some more water, brother!... I can’t...
Well, not having slept, you get up at six o’clock in the morning and
off you go to the station. You run so as not to be late, and it’s muddy,
foggy, cold--brr! Then you get to town and start all over again. So
there, brother. It’s a horrible life; I wouldn’t wish one like it for my
enemy. You understand--I’m ill! Got asthma, heartburn--I’m always afraid
of something. I’ve got indigestion, everything is thick before me...
I’ve become a regular psychopath.... [Looking round] Only, between
ourselves, I want to go down to see Chechotte or Merzheyevsky. There’s
some devil in me, brother. In moments of despair and suffering, when the
gnats are stinging or the tenors sing, everything suddenly grows dim;
you jump up and race round the whole house like a lunatic and shout, “I
want blood! Blood!” And really all the time you do want to let a knife
into somebody or hit him over the head with a chair. That’s what life
in a summer villa leads to! And nobody has any sympathy for me, and
everybody seems to think it’s all as it should be. People even laugh.
But understand, I am a living being and I want to live! This isn’t
farce, it’s tragedy! I say, if you don’t give me your revolver, you
might at any rate sympathize.
MURASHKIN. I do sympathize.
TOLKACHOV. I see how much you sympathize.... Good-bye. I’ve got to buy
some anchovies and some sausage... and some tooth-powder, and then to
the station.
MURASHKIN. Where are you living?
TOLKACHOV. At Carrion River.
MURASHKIN. [Delighted] Really? Then you’ll know Olga Pavlovna Finberg,
who lives there?
TOLKACHOV. I know her. We are even acquainted.
MURASHKIN. How perfectly splendid! That’s so convenient, and it would be
so good of you...
TOLKACHOV. What’s that?
MURASHKIN. My dear fellow, wouldn’t you do one little thing for me? Be a
friend! Promise me now.
TOLKACHOV. What’s that?
MURASHKIN. It would be such a friendly action! I implore you, my dear
man. In the first place, give Olga Pavlovna my very kind regards. In the
second place, there’s a little thing I’d like you to take down to her.
She asked me to get a sewing-machine but I haven’t anybody to send it
down to her by.... You take it, my dear! And you might at the same time
take down this canary in its cage... only be careful, or you’ll break
the door.... What are you looking at me like that for?
TOLKACHOV. A sewing-machine... a canary in a cage... siskins,
chaffinches...
MURASHKIN. Ivan Ivanovitch, what’s the matter with you? Why are you
turning purple?
TOLKACHOV. [Stamping] Give me the sewing-machine! Where’s the bird-cage?
Now get on top yourself! Eat me! Tear me to pieces! Kill me! [Clenching
his fists] I want blood! Blood! Blood!
MURASHKIN. You’ve gone mad!
TOLKACHOV. [Treading on his feet] I want blood! Blood!
MURASHKIN. [In horror] He’s gone mad! [Shouts] Peter! Maria! Where are
you? Help!
TOLKACHOV. [Chasing him round the room] I want blood! Blood!
Curtain.
THE ANNIVERSARY
CHARACTERS
ANDREY ANDREYEVITCH SHIPUCHIN, Chairman of the N---- Joint Stock
Bank, a middle-aged man, with a monocle
TATIANA ALEXEYEVNA, his wife, aged 25
KUSMA NICOLAIEVITCH KHIRIN, the bank’s aged book-keeper
NASTASYA FYODOROVNA MERCHUTKINA, an old woman wearing an old-fashioned
cloak
DIRECTORS OF THE BANK
EMPLOYEES OF THE BANK
The action takes place at the Bank
[The private office of the Chairman of Directors. On the left is a door,
leading into the public department. There are two desks. The furniture
aims at a deliberately luxurious effect, with armchairs covered in
velvet, flowers, statues, carpets, and a telephone. It is midday. KHIRIN
is alone; he wears long felt boots, and is shouting through the door.]
KHIRIN. Send out to the chemist for 15 copecks’ worth of valerian drops,
and tell them to bring some drinking water into the Directors’ office!
This is the hundredth time I’ve asked! [Goes to a desk] I’m absolutely
tired out. This is the fourth day I’ve been working, without a chance of
shutting my eyes. From morning to evening I work here, from evening to
morning at home. [Coughs] And I’ve got an inflammation all over me.
I’m hot and cold, and I cough, and my legs ache, and there’s something
dancing before my eyes. [Sits] Our scoundrel of a Chairman, the brute,
is going to read a report at a general meeting. “Our Bank, its Present
and Future.” You’d think he was a Gambetta.... [At work] Two... one...
one... six... nought... seven.... Next, six... nought... one... six....
He just wants to throw dust into people’s eyes, and so I sit here and
work for him like a galley-slave! This report of his is poetic fiction
and nothing more, and here I’ve got to sit day after day and add
figures, devil take his soul! [Rattles on his counting-frame] I can’t
stand it! [Writing] That is, one... three... seven... two... one...
nought.... He promised to reward me for my work. If everything goes well
to-day and the public is properly put into blinkers, he’s promised me a
gold charm and 300 roubles bonus.... We’ll see. [Works] Yes, but if
my work all goes for nothing, then you’d better look out.... I’m very
excitable.... If I lose my temper I’m capable of committing some crime,
so look out! Yes!
[Noise and applause behind the scenes. SHIPUCHIN’S voice: “Thank
you! Thank you! I am extremely grateful.” Enter SHIPUCHIN. He wears