The cherry orchard : a comedy in four acts

287 Pages·2015·0.61 MB·English

by  Chekhov

2
ALSO IN THIS SERIES:
The Inspector
A Month in the Country
3
4
The Cherry Orchard is copyright © 2015 by Richard Nelson,
Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky
The Cherry Orchard is published by Theatre
Communications Group, Inc., 520 8th Avenue, 24th Floor,
New York, NY 10018-4156
All rights reserved. Except for brief passages quoted in
newspaper, magazine, radio or television reviews, no part of
this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or
recording, or by an information storage and retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publisher.
Professionals and amateurs are hereby warned that this
material, being fully protected under the Copyright Laws of
the United States of America and all other countries of the
Berne and Universal Copyright Conventions, is subject to a
royalty. All rights, including but not limited to, professional,
amateur, recording, motion picture, recitation, lecturing,
public reading, radio and television broadcasting, and the
rights of translation into foreign languages are expressly
reserved. Particular emphasis is placed on the question of
readings and all uses of this book by educational institutions,
permission for which must be secured from the authors’
representative: Patrick Herold, ICM Partners, 730 5th
Avenue, New York, NY 10019, [phone].
The publication of The Cherry Orchard, by Richard Nelson,
Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, through TCG’s
Book Program, is made possible in part by the New York
5
State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor
Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.
TCG books are exclusively distributed to the book trade by
Consortium Book Sales and Distribution.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION
DATA
Chekhov, Anton Pavlovich, 1860–1904.
[Vishnevyi sad. English]
The Cherry Orchard : a comedy in four acts / Anton Chekhov
; translated from the Russian by Richard Nelson, Richard
Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky.—First edition.
pages cm.
(TCG Classic Russian Drama series)
ISBN 978-1-55936-793-6 (ebook)
I. Nelson, Richard, 1950—translator. II. Pevear, Richard,
1943—translator.
III. Volokhonsky, Larissa, translator. IV. Title.
PG3456.V5V3 2015
891.72’3—dc23 2015009937
Book design and composition by Lisa Govan
6
Cover design by John Gall
First Edition, July 2015
7
CONTENTS
Introduction
by Richard Pevear
A Note on the 1903 Script
by Richard Nelson
THE CHERRY ORCHARD
1903 Script
1904 Moscow Art Theatre Script
8
9
INTRODUCTION
T
he Cherry Orchard, Anton Chekhov’s last play, opened
at the Moscow Art Theatre on January 17, 1904. The
directors of the theater, and of the play, Konstantin
Stanislavsky and Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko,
scheduled the premiere to coincide with Chekhov’s forty-
fourth name-day (the feast of St. Anthony) and the twenty-
fifth anniversary of his entry into literature. At the end of the
third act, they brought Chekhov on stage, where he had to
endure the applause and congratulations of theater members,
critics and the audience—“endure” because Chekhov hated
such public attention, and also because the tuberculosis he
had suffered from for many years was reaching its final stage
and he was barely able to stand through the twenty-minute
tribute. Stanislavsky describes the moment in My Life in Art:
“He stood deathly pale and thin on the right side of the stage
and could not control his coughing, while gifts were showered
*
on him and speeches in his honor were being made.”
He died less than six months later in a sanatorium in
Badenweiler, Germany.
Chekhov began to think about writing a new play for the
Moscow Art Theatre soon after the production of Three
Sisters in 1901. In a letter from his home in Yalta to the
actress Olga Knipper, whom he was about to marry, he gives
some suggestions for their wedding trip, and adds: “At
moments I experience an overwhelming desire to write a
four-act comedy for the Art Theatre. And I’m going to do so,
if nothing interferes, except that I won’t let the theater have it
10