Analysis of the first chapter of the cherry orchard. Literary classics and "The Cherry Orchard" A
In his work "The Cherry Orchard" the author describes Russia as a whole. He showed her past, drew a dying present, and looked into the distant future. Chekhov expressed his own attitude to the events taking place in the country. He predicted impending changes awaiting the country, although he himself was no longer destined to see them. This is the author's last play, written shortly before his death and taking an honorable place in the classics of Russian literature. Below is a brief literary analysis of the work of the outstanding playwright.
Brief analysis
Year of writing - 1903
History of creation - The personal example of the writer's father, who was forced to sell his family estate, suggested the plot of the play to the writer.
Composition- The composition of the piece consists of 4 acts.
genre- According to the author himself, he wrote a comedy. From the point of view of modernity, the genre of "The Cherry Orchard" is more attributed to the genre of tragedy.
Direction- Realism.
History of creation
It is known from Chekhov's letter to his wife that the author began work on his new play in 1901. The impetus for the creation of this work was the writer's personal family tragedy. Life circumstances developed in such a way that Anton Pavlovich's father had to sell his family estate in order to get out of debt.
The writer was close and understandable the feelings with which he endowed the heroes of the play. And this happened not only in his family. Everywhere, throughout great Russia, there was a degeneration of the nobility as a class. Wealthy strong farms were ruined, a huge number of the former richest estates went under the hammer. This was the beginning of a new milestone in the history of the country.
This whole destructive process could not leave aside the genius of the Russian writer, and from the pen of the author came his last play, which became the pinnacle of the work of the playwright. At the time of the creation of this masterpiece of Russian classics, the writer was already seriously ill, the work did not move as fast as he wanted, and was completed only in 1903.
Topic
The main theme of the play- sale of the estate of Ranevskaya. And it is with this example that the writer describes the situation in Russia.
The whole action in the play unfolds around the cherry orchard, the author puts a very deep meaning into this concept. Chekhov personifies the image of the cherry orchard with Russia. In the days of the nobility, virtually all estates were surrounded by gardens, this was their hallmark. The situation in the country is compared with them: in the past everything was good, there was a riot of gardens and greenery. The cherry orchard blooms, filling everything around with its fragrance. And the country rose and flourished. But the gardens in bloom do not last more than a week, the time comes, and the color flies around. So in Russia everything starts to fall apart.
The time comes when another generation appears. It is ready to cut down these gardens mercilessly. The degeneration of an entire class begins, the nobility dies. The estates are sold under the hammer, the trees are being cut down. The next generation is still at a crossroads, and what it will choose is unknown. With the sale of ancestral nests, the memory of the past is also destroyed, the connection between generations is disrupted. The present is full of uncertainty, and the future is frightening. Changes are coming, but what they bring is difficult to understand. The link between generations is destroyed, monuments that preserve the history of the clan are crumbling, and without the past, you cannot build a future.
The system of images in Chekhov's play is divided into three categories, by the example of which the life of the country is described. Her past is symbolized by Ranevskaya, her brother Gaev, the old servant Firs. This is the generation that lives without thinking about tomorrow. They came to everything ready, without making any effort or trying to improve or change anything. It turned out to be a time of stagnation, which inevitably led them to ruin and impoverishment. To impoverishment, not only material, but also spiritual, when the history of the race no longer has any value for them.
The hero of this country is Lopakhin. This is a stratum of the population that has broken out into people from the very bottom of human society, who have become rich by their own labor. But this generation is also poor spiritually. Their goal in life is to preserve and increase their wealth, the accumulation of material values.
The future of Russia is personified by representatives of the younger generation. Ranevskaya's daughter Anya and Petya Trofimov dream of a future that they see as bright and happy. These heroes are at a crossroads, they are not ready to change something themselves. Chances are they will go through trial and error. They have a whole life ahead of them, and maybe they will be able to build a happy future.
Composition
The play is divided into four acts. Exposition - the inhabitants of the estate are awaiting the arrival of their mistress from abroad. Everyone is saying something, completely not paying attention to each other, not listening to the interlocutor. Thus, Chekhov showed the many-sidedness of the divided Russia.
In the first act, a set-up takes place - the owner of the estate, Lyubov Andreevna Ranevskaya, finally appears and those around it become aware that the estate is on the verge of ruin. Nothing can be done anymore. Lopakhin, a former serf and now a rich landowner, offers to somehow save the estate. The essence of his proposal is to cut down the cherry orchard and lease the vacated plots.
In the second act, the development of the plot continues. The fate of the estate is still being discussed. Ranevskaya does not take any decisive action, she is nostalgic for the irrevocably leaving past.
The climax occurs in the third act. Lyubov Andreevna arranges a farewell ball at the estate, which is acquired at the auction by the former serf Ranevsky, the current merchant from the Lopakhin family, Yermolai.
In the fourth act of the play, the story comes to an end. Lyubov Andreevna leaves her native country again. Her plans are short-sighted and stupid. She will squander her last savings, and she has nothing more to hope for. The former owner of the estate is so irresponsible and frivolous that she forgets the old and devoted servant Firs in the house. The servant, unnecessary and forgotten by everyone, remains in the boarded-up house, where he dies. A lonely knock of an ax on the trees of a cherry orchard being cut down sounds as a farewell chord for the passing past.
genre
It is difficult to define the genre of this work. The author himself admitted that he began to write a comedy, and it turned into a farce. When the play came out on the stage of the theater, it was given the definition of "drama." From the point of view of modernity, it can easily be classified as a tragedy genre. There is still no definite answer to this question. Chekhov pondered the fate of Russia, thought about what awaited her. The philosophical orientation of this work gives everyone the opportunity to determine this from their own point of view. The main thing is that the play will not leave anyone indifferent. She makes everyone think about themselves, and about the meaning of life, and about the fate of their Motherland.
Chekhov's last play became an outstanding work of world drama of the 20th century.
Actors, directors, readers, and spectators of all countries have and are addressing the comprehension of its meaning. Therefore, as in the case of Chekhov's stories, when we try to understand the play, we need to keep in mind not only what it worried about Chekhov's contemporaries, and not only what it is understandable and interesting to us, the playwright's compatriots, but also this universal , its all-human and all-time content.
The author of The Cherry Orchard (1903) sees life differently, human relationships and speaks about it differently than his predecessors. And we will understand the meaning of the play if we do not reduce it to sociological or historical explanations, but try to understand this method of depicting life in a dramatic work developed by Chekhov.
If we do not take into account the novelty of Chekhov's dramatic language, much in his play will seem strange, incomprehensible, overloaded with unnecessary (from the point of view of the previous theatrical aesthetics).
But the main thing - let's not forget: behind the special Chekhovian form there is a special concept of life and man. “Let everything on stage be as complicated and at the same time as simple as in life,” Chekhov said. “People are having dinner, just having dinner, and at this time their happiness is formed and their lives are destroyed”.
FEATURE OF DRAMATURGIC CONFLICT. Let's start with the striking one: how are the dialogues in The Cherry Orchard structured? It is unconventional when a replica is a response to the previous one and requires a response in the next replica. Most often, the writer reproduces a disordered conversation (take at least a disordered chorus of remarks and exclamations immediately upon Ranevskaya's arrival from the station). The characters do not seem to hear each other, and if they listen, they answer out of place (Dunyasha - Anya, Lopakhin - Ranevskaya and Gaev, Pete - everyone else, except Anya, and even she clearly reacts not to the meaning, but to the sound of Petya's monologues: “ How well you speak! .. (Delighted.) How well you said! ”).
What is behind this dialogue structure? Striving for more believability (to show how it happens in life)? Yes, but not only that. Disunity, self-absorption, inability to take the point of view of another - this is seen and shown in the communication of people by Chekhov.
Again, arguing with his predecessors, Chekhov the playwright completely abandons external intrigue, the struggle of a group of characters around something (for example, inheritance, transferring money to someone, permission or prohibition of marriage or marriage, etc.).
The nature of the conflict, the arrangement of the characters in her play are completely different, which will be discussed later. Each episode is not a stepping stone in the unfolding of intrigue; episodes are filled with dinner, seemingly incoherent conversations, trifles of everyday life, insignificant details, but at the same time they are colored by a single mood, which then turns into another. Not from intrigue to intrigue, but rather from mood to mood, the play unfolds, and here an analogy with a plotless piece of music is appropriate.
There is no intrigue, but what then does the event consist of - something without which there can be no dramatic work? The most talked about event - the sale of an estate at auction - does not take place on the stage. Beginning with “The Seagull” and even earlier, with “Ivanov,” Chekhov consistently carried out this technique - to take the main “incident” behind the stage, leaving only its reflections, echoes in the speeches of the characters. Invisible (by the viewer), non-stage events and characters (in The Cherry Orchard they are Yaroslavl's aunt, Parisian lover, Pischik's daughter Dasha, etc.) are important in the play in their own way. But their absence on the stage emphasizes that for the author they are only a background, an excuse, a concomitant circumstance of what is basic. Despite the apparent absence of the traditional external "action" in Chekhov, as always, a rich, continuous and intense inner action.
The main events take place, as it were, in the minds of the characters: the discovery of something new or clinging to habitual stereotypes, understanding or misunderstanding - “movement and displacement of ideas”, to use the formula of Osip Mandelstam. As a result of this movement and displacement of representations (events that are invisible, but quite real), someone's fates are broken or formed, hopes are lost or arise, love succeeds or fails ...
These significant events in the life of every person are revealed not in spectacular gestures and actions (everything that strikes the effect Chekhov consistently presents in an ironic light), but in modest, everyday, everyday manifestations. There is no underlining of them, artificial attraction of attention to them, much of the text goes into subtext. "Undercurrent" - this is how the Art Theater called this development of action, characteristic of Chekhov's plays. For example, in the first act, Anya and Varya first talk about whether the estate has been paid for, then whether Lopakhin is going to propose to Varya, then about a brooch in the shape of a bee. Anya replies sadly: "Mom bought it." It is sad - since both felt the hopelessness of the main thing on which their fate depends.
The line of behavior of each character and especially the relationship between the characters is not built in deliberate clarity. Rather, it is outlined in dotted lines (actors and directors should draw a solid line - this is the difficulty and at the same time the allure of staging Chekhov's plays on stage). Much the playwright leaves to the reader's imagination, giving the text basic guidelines for correct understanding.
So, the main line of the play is associated with Lopakhin. His relationship with Varya results in his antics, incomprehensible to her and others. But everything falls into place if the actors play the absolute incompatibility of these characters and, at the same time, Lopakhin's special feeling towards Lyubov Andreevna.
The famous scene of a failed explanation between Lopakhin and Varya in the last act: the heroes talk about the weather, about the broken thermometer - and not a word about what is obviously important at that moment. Why does the relationship between Lopakhin and Varya end in nothing, when the explanation did not take place, love did not take place, happiness did not take place? The point, of course, is not that Lopakhin is a businessman incapable of expressing feelings. This is approximately how Varya explains to herself their relationship: “He has a lot to do, he has no time for me”; “He is either silent or joking. I understand that he is getting rich, busy with business, he has no time for me. " But much closer to the Chekhovian subtext, to the Chekhovian technique of “underwater current”, the actors will come up if, by the time of the explanation between these characters, they will clearly make the viewer feel that Varya is really not a match for Lopakhin, she is not worth him. Lopakhin is a man of great scope, capable of mentally glancing around like an eagle, "huge forests, vast fields, the deepest horizons." Varya, if we continue this comparison, is a gray jackdaw, whose horizons are limited by economy, economy, keys on the belt ... The gray jackdaw and the eagle, of course, is an unconscious feeling of this and prevents Lopakhin from taking the initiative where any merchant in his place saw would be the possibility of a "decent" marriage for themselves.
According to his position, Lopakhin can only count on Varya at best. And in the play, another line is distinctly, although dotted, outlined: Lopakhin, “like a native, more than a native,” loves Ranevskaya. This would seem ridiculous, unthinkable to Ranevskaya and everyone around him, and he himself, apparently, is not fully aware of his feelings. But it is enough to trace how Lopakhin behaves, say, in the second act, after Ranevskaya tells him to propose to Varya. It was after this that he, with irritation, talks about how good it was before, when the peasants could be torn apart, he begins to tease Petya tactlessly. All this is the result of a downturn in his mood after he clearly sees that Ranevskaya does not even think of taking his feelings seriously. And further in the play, this unrequited tenderness of Lopakhin will break through several more times. During the monologues of The Cherry Orchard characters about a failed life, Lopakhin's unspoken feeling can sound like one of the most nagging notes of the play (by the way, this is how Lopakhin was played by the best performers of this genus in performances of recent years - Vladimir Vysotsky and Andrei Mironov).
So, already all these external methods of organizing the material (the nature of the dialogue, the event, the development of the action) Chekhov persistently repeats, plays up - and in them his idea of life is manifested.
But the nature of the conflict distinguishes Chekhov's plays even more from the preceding dramaturgy.
So, in Ostrovsky's plays, the conflict stems mainly from differences in the estate status of the heroes - the rich and the poor, tyrants and their victims, possessing power and dependent: the first, initial driver of Ostrovsky's action is the difference between the characters (estate, money, family), from which their conflicts and clashes result. Instead of death in other plays, on the contrary, there may be a triumph over a tyrant, an oppressor, an intriguer, etc. The outcomes can be arbitrarily different, but the opposition within the conflict between the victim and the oppressor, the side of the suffering and the side that causes the suffering, is invariable.
It’s different with Chekhov. His plays are built not on opposition, but on the unity, commonality of all the characters.
Let's take a closer look at the text of The Cherry Orchard, at the persistent and clear indications of the meaning of what is happening, placed in it by the author. Chekhov consistently moves away from the traditional formulation of the author's thought "through the lips of a character." Indications of the author's meaning of the work, as usual in Chekhov, are expressed primarily in repetitions.
In the first act, there is a repeating phrase that is applied in different ways to almost every character.
Lyubov Andreevna, who had not seen her adopted daughter for five years, when she heard how she was giving orders around the house, said: "You are still the same, Varya." And even before that he remarks: "And Varya is still the same, she looks like a nun." Varya, in turn, states sadly: “Mommy is the same as she was, has not changed at all. If she had the will, she would give everything away. ” At the very beginning of the action, Lopakhin asks the question: “Lyubov Andreevna has lived abroad for five years, I don’t know what she has become now.” And after some two hours, he is convinced: “You are all the same gorgeous”. Ranevskaya herself, entering the nursery, defines her constant trait differently: “I slept here when I was little ... And now I’m like a little one ...” - but this is the same confession: I am the same.
“You are still the same, Lenya”; “And you, Leonid Andreevich, are still the same as you were”; "You again, uncle!" - this is Lyubov Andreevna, Yasha, Anya talking about Gaev's invariable grandeur. And Firs laments, pointing out the constant behavior of his master: “Again they put on the wrong trousers. And what can I do with you! "
"You (you, she) are all the same (the same)." This is a constant indicated by the author at the very beginning of the play. This is the property of all the actors, in this they vyingly assure themselves, each other.
“And this one is all his own,” says Gaev about Pishchik, when he once again asks for a loan. “You're all about one thing ...” - Anya, half asleep, answers Dunyashino's news about her next boyfriend. “He's been muttering for three years. We are used to it ”- this is about Firs. “Charlotte speaks all the way, presents tricks ...”, “Every day some misfortune happens to me” - this is Epikhodov.
Each hero leads his own theme (sometimes with variations): Epikhodov talks about his misfortunes, Pischik - about debts, Varya - about the economy, Gaev inappropriately falls into pathos, Petya - into denunciations, etc. The constancy, immutability of some characters is enshrined in their nicknames: “twenty-two misfortunes”, “eternal student”. And the most common thing, Firsovo: "idiot."
When repetition (endowing everyone with the same sign) is so many times as in the first act of The Cherry Orchard that it cannot but catch the eye, this is the most powerful means of expressing the author's thought.
In parallel with this repeating motive, inseparably from it, persistently and in the same way in relation to everyone, another one is repeated, as if the opposite. As if frozen in their immutability, the characters now and then talk about how much has changed, how time flies.
“When you left here, I was like that ...” - with a gesture indicates the distance between the past and the present of Dunyasha. She kind of echoes Ranevskaya's recollection of when she “was little”. Lopakhin, in his very first monologue, compares what happened (“I remember when I was a boy of about fifteen ... Lyubov Andreevna, as I remember now, is still young ...”) and what has become now (“just now rich, a lot of money , but if you think about it and figure it out ... "). "Once ..." - Gaev begins to remember, also about childhood, and concludes: "... and now I am fifty-one years old, oddly enough ..." The theme of childhood (irrevocably gone) or parents (deceased or forgotten) is repeated in different ways also by Charlotte, and Yasha, and Pischik, and Trofimov, and Firs. Ancient Firs, like a living historical calendar, now and then from what is, returns to what "happened", what was done "once," "before."
A retrospective - from the present to the past - is opened by almost every character, albeit to a different depth. Firs has been muttering for three years. Six years ago, her husband died and the son of Lyubov Andreevna drowned. Forty-fifty years ago, they still remembered the methods of processing cherries. A wardrobe was made exactly one hundred years ago. And stones that were once tombstones remind of very gray antiquity ... In the other direction, from the present to the future, a perspective opens, but also to a different distance for different characters: for Yasha, for Ani, for Varya, for Lopakhin, for Petya, for Ranevskaya, even for Firs, boarded up and forgotten in the house.
“Yes, time is ticking,” Lopakhin notes. And this feeling is familiar to everyone in the play; it is also a constant, a constant circumstance on which each of the characters depends, no matter what he thinks and speaks about himself and about others, no matter how he defines himself and his path. Everyone is destined to be grains of sand, splinters in the stream of time.
And one more repetitive motive covering all the characters. This is the theme of confusion, misunderstanding in the face of ruthlessly running time.
In the first act, these are Ranevskaya's puzzled questions. What is death for? Why are we getting old? Why does everything go away without a trace? Why is everything that has been forgotten? Why does time, like a stone, fall on the chest and shoulders with a weight of mistakes and misfortunes? Further in the course of the play, everyone else echoes it. Lost in rare moments of reflection, although Gaev is incorrigibly careless. “Who I am, why I am, is unknown,” - says Charlotte, bewildered. Epikhodov's bewilderment: "... I just can't understand the direction, what I actually want, live or shoot myself ..." It would seem that for Lopakhin the course and state of affairs is clearer than for the others, but he also admits that he only sometimes “seems” as if he understands why he exists in the world. They turn a blind eye to their position, Ranevskaya, Gaev, Dunyasha do not want to understand it.
It seems that many characters are still opposed to each other and contrasting pairs can be distinguished in some way. “I am lower than love” by Ranevskaya and “we are higher than love” by Petya Trofimov. Firs has all the best in the past, Anya is recklessly looking into the future. Varya has an old woman giving up herself for the sake of her family, she keeps her estate, Gayev has purely childish egoism, he “ate” the estate on candies ”. The complex of a loser for Epikhodov and a brazen conqueror for Yasha. The heroes of The Cherry Orchard often oppose themselves to each other.
Charlotte: "These smart guys are all so stupid, I have no one to talk to." Gaev is arrogant in relation to Lopakhin, to Yasha. Firs teaches Dunyasha. Yasha, in turn, thinks of himself higher and more enlightened than others. And how much inordinate pride in Petya's words: “And everything that you all, rich and poor, value so highly, does not have the slightest power over me ...” Lopakhin correctly comments on this endlessly repeating situation: “We are sniffing at each other, but know for yourself life passes. "
The heroes are convinced of the absolute opposite of their "truths". The author, on the other hand, points out each time the commonality between them, a hidden similarity, which they do not notice or reject with indignation.
Doesn't Anya repeat in many ways Ranevskaya, and Trofimov does not often remind the idiot Epikhodov, and Lopakhin's confusion does not echo Charlotte's bewilderment? In Chekhov's play, the principle of repetition and mutual reflection of characters is not selective, directed against one group, but total, all-encompassing. To stand firmly on one's own, to be absorbed in one's own "truth", not noticing the similarities with the others - for Chekhov it looks like a common lot, an irreplaceable feature of human existence. In itself, this is neither good nor bad: it is natural. What comes from the addition, the interaction of various truths, representations, modes of action - this is what Chekhov studies.
All relationships between the characters are illuminated by the light of a common understanding. It is not just a matter of new, more complex accents in the old conflict. The conflict itself is new: a visible opposite with a hidden similarity.
Unchanging (each holding on to his own) people against the background of time consuming everything and everyone, confused and not understanding the course of life ... This misunderstanding is revealed in relation to the garden. Everyone contributes to his ultimate destiny.
A beautiful garden, against the background of which heroes are shown, who do not understand the course of things or understand it in a limited way, is associated with the fates of several of their generations - past, present and future. The situation in the life of individual people is internally correlated in the play with the situation in the life of the country. The multifaceted symbolic content of the garden's image: beauty, past culture, and finally, all of Russia ... Some see the garden as it was in the irreversible past, for others, talking about the garden is just an excuse for fanaberia, others, thinking about saving the garden, in fact ruining it, the fourth greet the death of this garden ...
GENRE PERSONALITY. COMIC IN A PLAY. The dying garden and the failed, even unnoticed love - two cross-cutting, internally connected themes - give the play a sad and poetic character. However, Chekhov insisted that he had created not "a drama, but a comedy, sometimes even a farce." Remaining true to his principle of endowing the heroes with an equally passive position in relation to a life they do not understand, a hidden community (which does not exclude an amazing variety of external manifestations), Chekhov found in his last great play a completely special genre form, adequate to this principle.
An unambiguous genre reading - only sad or only comic - the play does not lend itself to. It is obvious that Chekhov implemented in his “comedy” special principles of combining the dramatic and the comic.
In The Cherry Orchard, it is not individual characters such as Charlotte, Epikhodov, Varya that are comical. Misunderstanding of each other, inconsistency of opinions, illogical inferences, remarks and answers inappropriately - such imperfections in thinking and behavior, making it possible for a comic presentation, are endowed with all heroes.
The comic of resemblance, the comic of repetition is the basis of the comic in The Cherry Orchard. Everyone is funny in their own way, and everyone participates in the sad event, accelerates its onset - this is what determines the ratio of the comic and the serious in Chekhov's play.
Chekhov puts all heroes in the position of a constant, continuous transition from drama to comic, from tragedy to vaudeville, from pathos to farce. In this position is not one group of heroes as opposed to another. The principle of such a continuous genre transition is all-encompassing in The Cherry Orchard. Every now and then in the play there is a deepening of the funny (limited and relative) to sympathy for him and vice versa - a simplification of the serious to the ridiculous.
The play, designed for a qualified, sophisticated spectator, able to catch its lyrical, symbolic implication, Chekhov saturated with the techniques of areal theater, booth: falls from stairs, gluttony, blows on the head with a stick, tricks, etc. After the pathetic, agitated monologues that almost every character in the play has - up to Gayev, Pishchik, Dunyasha, Firs - a farcical decline immediately follows, then a lyrical note appears again, allowing us to understand the subjective emotion of the hero, and again his self-absorption turns into a mockery above it (this is how Lopakhin's famous monologue in the third act is constructed: “I bought it! ..”).
What conclusions does Chekhov lead to in such unconventional ways?
A.P. Skaftmov in his works showed that the author makes the main object of the image in "The Cherry Orchard" not just any of the characters, but the device, the order of life. Unlike the works of the previous drama, in Chekhov's play, it is not the person himself who is the culprit of his failures, and it is not the evil will of the other person that is to blame. There are no guilty ones, “the source of sad ugliness and bitter dissatisfaction is the very formation of life”.
But does Chekhov remove responsibility from the heroes and shift it to the “addition of life” that exists outside of their ideas, actions, and relationships? Having undertaken a voluntary trip to the convict island of Sakhalin, he spoke about the responsibility of everyone for the existing order, for the general course of things: "We are all to blame." Not "there are no guilty ones," but "we are all guilty."
LOPAKHIN'S IMAGE. The persistence with which Chekhov pointed to the role of Lopakhin as central to the play is well known. He insisted that Stanislavsky played Lopakhin. He repeatedly emphasized that the role of Lopakhin is “central”, that “if it does not succeed, then the whole play will fail,” that only a first-class actor, “only Konstantin Sergeevich,” can play this role, but it’s not just a talented actor. force, he “will either be very pale, or he will play off”, make Lopakhin “a fist ... After all, this is not a merchant in the vulgar sense of the word, one must understand this.” Chekhov warned against a simplified, shallow understanding of this image, obviously dear to him.
Let's try to understand what in the play itself confirms the conviction of the playwright in the central position of the role of Lopakhin among other roles.
The first, but not the only and not the most important, is the significance and uniqueness of Lopakhin's personality.
It is clear that Chekhov created the image of a merchant, unconventional for Russian literature. A businessman, and very successful, Lopakhin is a man “with the soul of an artist”. When he talks about Russia, it sounds like a declaration of love for his homeland. His words are reminiscent of Gogol's lyrical digressions in Dead Souls, Chekhov's lyrical digressions in the story "The Steppe" about the heroic sweep of the Russian steppe road, which would be like "huge people walking widely." And the most heartfelt words about the cherry orchard in the play - one should not lose sight of this - belong to Lopakhin: "an estate that is not more beautiful in the world."
In the image of this hero - a merchant and at the same time an artist in his soul - Chekhov introduced features characteristic of a certain part of Russian entrepreneurs who left a noticeable mark in the history of Russian culture at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. These are Stanislavsky himself (the owner of the Alekseev factory), the millionaire Savva Morozov, who gave money for the construction of the Art Theater, and the creators of art galleries and theaters Tretyakov, Shchukin, Mamontov, and the publisher Sytin ... natures of many of these merchants with the characteristic traits of businessmen and money-gamblers. Without making Lopakhin look like any of them individually, Chekhov introduces into the character of his hero features that unite him with many of these entrepreneurs.
And the final assessment that Petya Trofimov gives to his seemingly antagonist (“After all, I love you after all. You have thin, gentle fingers, like an artist, you have a thin, gentle soul ...”), finds a well-known parallel in Gorky's response about Savva Morozov: “And when I see Morozov behind the scenes of the theater, in the dust and awe for the success of the play, I’m ready to forgive him all his factories, which he, however, does not need, I love him, because he disinterestedly loves art, which I almost feel in his peasant, merchant, acquisitive soul ”. K.S. Stanislavsky bequeathed to the future performers of Lopakhin to give him “the scope of Chaliapin”.
The division of the garden into summer cottages - the idea that Lopakhin is obsessed with - is not just the destruction of the cherry orchard, but its reconstruction, the device, so to speak, of a public cherry orchard. With the former, luxurious, which served only as a small garden, this new, thinned out and accessible to anyone for a moderate fee, the Lopakhin garden is related as a democratic urban culture of the Chekhov era with the wondrous manor culture of the past.
Chekhov offered an image that was clearly unconventional, unexpected for the reader and viewer, breaking the established literary and theatrical canons.
The main storyline of The Cherry Orchard is also connected with Lopakhin. Something expected and prepared in the first action (saving the garden), as a result of a number of circumstances, turns into something directly opposite in the last action (the garden is chopped down). Lopakhin at first sincerely seeks to save the garden for Lyubov Andreevna, but in the end he “accidentally” takes possession of it himself.
But at the end of the play, Lopakhin, who has achieved success, is shown by Chekhov not as a winner. The entire content of "The Cherry Orchard" reinforces the words of this hero about "awkward, unhappy life", which "know it for yourself passes." In fact, a person who alone is able to truly appreciate what a cherry orchard is should ruin it with his own hands (after all, there are no other ways out of this situation). With merciless sobriety, Chekhov shows in The Cherry Orchard a fatal discrepancy between a person's personal good qualities, his subjectively good intentions and the results of his social activities. And personal happiness is not given to Lopakhin.
The play begins with the fact that Lopakhin is obsessed with the idea of saving the cherry orchard, but in the end everything turns out wrong: he did not save the garden for Ranevskaya, as he wanted, and his luck turns into a mockery of the best hopes. Why this is so - the hero himself cannot understand, no one around him could explain this.
In a word, it is with Lopakhin that one of the long-standing and basic themes of Chekhov's work enters into the play - hostility, unbearable complexity, incomprehensibility of life for an ordinary (“average”) Russian person, whoever he is (remember Ionya). In the image of Lopakhin, Chekhov remained faithful to his theme to the end. This is one of the heroes who stand on the main line of Chekhov's work, being related to many of the characters in the previous works of the writer.
SYMBOLISM.“Distant, as if from the sky, the sound of a broken string, fading, sad”, the clatter of an ax announcing the death of the garden, like the very image of the cherry orchard, were perceived by contemporaries as deep and capacious symbols.
Chekhov's symbolism differs from the concept of a symbol in works of art and theories of symbolism. He even has the most mysterious sound - not from the sky, but "as if from the sky." The point is not only that Chekhov leaves the possibility of a real explanation ("... somewhere in the mines a bucket fell off. But somewhere very far away"). The heroes explain the origin of the sound, perhaps incorrectly, but the surreal, mystical is not required here. There is a mystery, but it is a mystery generated by an earthly cause, although unknown to the heroes or misunderstood by them, not fully realized.
The cherry orchard and its death are symbolically ambiguous, not reducible to visible reality, but there is no mystical or surreal content. Chekhov's symbols expand horizons, but do not lead away from the earthly. The very degree of assimilation and comprehension of everyday life in Chekhov's works is such that the existential, the general and the eternal shine through in them.
The mysterious sound, twice mentioned in "The Cherry Orchard", Chekhov really heard in childhood. But, in addition to the real predecessor, one can also recall one literary predecessor. This is the sound that the boys heard in Turgenev's story "Bezhin Meadow". This parallel is reminded of the similarity between the environment in which an incomprehensible sound is heard, and the moods that it evokes in the heroes of the story and the play: someone shudders and gets scared, someone thinks, someone reacts calmly and judiciously.
Turgenev's sound in "The Cherry Orchard" acquired new shades, became like the sound of a broken string. In the last play by Chekhov, he combined the symbolism of life and homeland, Russia: a reminder of its immensity and of the time flowing over it, something familiar, eternally sounding over the Russian expanses, accompanying the countless comings and goings of all new generations.
In his last play, Chekhov captured the state of Russian society when only a step remained from general disunity, listening only to oneself to final disintegration and general enmity. He urged not to delude oneself with one's own idea of truth, not to absolutize many “truths”, which in fact turn out to be “false ideas”, to realize the guilt of each, the responsibility of each for the general course of things. In Chekhov's portrayal of Russian historical problems, humanity saw problems that concern all people at any time, in any society.
Chekhov himself called "The Cherry Orchard" a comedy, although he later admitted that "I came out ... a comedy, sometimes even a farce." And the great director KS Stanislavsky called the work a tragedy: "This is a tragedy ..." and funny, but after all, in The Cherry Orchard, there seems to be no tragic, so, the usual collapse of not very lucky people who continue to live on, not looking very much back - which is why they forget old Firs in the house abandoned by everyone .. At the same time, this "comedy" shows the deepest inner tragedy of people who have outlived their time and are feverishly trying to somehow get settled in a new, so incomprehensible to them, even hostile to them, life, the departure of a whole historical era, to replace which was the era of the greatest social and moral upheavals. Only this is now clear to us what will happen "after" Ranevskaya and Gaev, what will replace the "cherry orchard" they felt good and which they would like to keep for themselves forever.
The peculiarity of the era determined the main external conflict of the play "The Cherry Orchard": it is the conflict between the past, present and future. However, not only he determines the plot and composition of the work, it is permeated with internal conflicts, almost every image-character carries a duality, he not only opposes reality, but also painfully tries to reconcile himself with his own soul, which turns out to be the most difficult thing. Chekhov's characters cannot be divided into "positive" and "negative", they are real people, in whom there is a lot of both good and not so, who behave the way they think they need to behave in the situations in which they find themselves - and it can be funny, and not very, and completely sad.
The image of Lyubov Andreevna Ranevskaya is a pivotal image, all the other characters are somehow connected with her. Ranevskaya combines sincerity and spiritual callousness, ardent love for the Motherland and complete indifference to her; they say about her that she is a "good", "easy" person - and this is true, as well as the fact that it is unbearably difficult to live next to her ... First of all, it should be noted that the inconsistency of Ranevskaya's image does not mean that she is some special, complex, incomprehensible person, rather, on the contrary: she is always the way she is, just to those around her such behavior seems to some extravagant, and to some extraordinarily attractive. The contradictory behavior of Lyubov Andreevna is explained by the fact that she did not really understand that life had changed, she continues to live in a life when she did not need to think about a piece of bread, when the cherry orchard provided an easy and carefree life for its owners. Therefore, she wastes money, repenting herself of this, so she does not think about the future ("everything will be fine!"), That is why she is so cheerful. She spends money on her "fatal passion", realizing that thereby complicates the life of her daughters, and at the end of the play she again returns to Paris, where she can live as she used to. Ranevskaya is one of the best manifestations of the old life (it is no coincidence that Lopakhin worships her, who from childhood sees an unattainable ideal in her), however, like all this life, she must leave - and the viewer perceives her departure with sympathy and pity, because by -humanly she is so sweet and attractive.
Little can be said about Ranevskaya's brother, Gaev. He is very similar to his sister, but he does not have her lightness and charm, he is simply ridiculous in his unwillingness and inability to look life in the eyes and "grow up" - Chekhov emphasizes that the lackey Firs still perceives him as a little boy, which, in essence, he is. Gayev's inappropriate, tearful monologues (referring to the closet!) Are not just ridiculous, they acquire a shade of tragedy, since such a blatant isolation from the life of an elderly person cannot but frighten.
Much attention in the play "The Cherry Orchard" is paid to the problem of the future. Chekhov shows us, if I may say so, two options for the future: the future "according to Peta Trofimov" and the future "according to Yermolai Lopakhin." In different periods of history, each of these options for the future had its adherents and opponents.
Petya Trofimov, with his vague appeals, loud assurances that "All Russia is our garden", with the exposure of modernity during the creation of the play was perceived as a positive hero, his words "I anticipate happiness, Anya, I already see it ..." auditorium with great enthusiasm. However, Chekhov himself was wary of this hero: we see Petya, who, the "shabby gentleman", does practically nothing. Behind his beautiful words, it is difficult to see truly real deeds, moreover, he constantly finds himself in a ridiculous position. Even when at the beginning of Act IV he loudly promises Lopakhin that he will reach "the highest truth, the highest happiness that is possible on earth," because in this movement of mankind towards them he is "in the forefront!" can find ... his own galoshes, and this makes his confidence ridiculous: he swings at such things, but he cannot find galoshes! ..
The future "according to Yermolai Lopakhin" is portrayed in a completely different way. A former serf who bought "an estate where grandfather and father were slaves, where they were not even allowed into the kitchen," who gets up "at five o'clock in the morning" and works day-to-day, who has made millions and knows what needs to be done with the cherry orchard ( "Both the cherry orchard and the land must be rented out for summer residences, do it now, as soon as possible"), in fact, he knows practically nothing about relations between people, he is tormented by the fact that wealth does not give him a feeling of happiness. The image of Lopakhin is an image close to a tragic one, because for this person the meaning of life has become the accumulation of money, he succeeded, but why is he then so desperately, "with tears", exclaims at the end of the third act, when he has already become the owner of the estate , "there is nothing more beautiful in the world": "Oh, would rather all this pass, would rather change somehow our awkward, unhappy life"? A millionaire - and an unhappy life? .. But in fact: he understands that he has remained a "man a man", he loves Varya in his own way, but he does not dare to explain himself to her, he is able to feel beauty ("I in the spring he sowed a thousand acres of poppy seeds and now earned forty thousand pure. ... What despair is heard in his words: "We will set up summer cottages, and our grandchildren and great-grandchildren will see a new life here ..."! Grandchildren and great-grandchildren - this is understandable, but what is left for yourself in life? ..
An interesting image of the old servant Firs, for whom the liberation of the serfs was a "misfortune". He cannot imagine a life other than a life in slavery, therefore he remains in the house - to die with the cherry orchard, for which not Ermolai Lopakhin "will have enough with an ax," but time itself. The image of the "cherry orchard" is a semi-symbolic image of the past, which is doomed and from which you need to get rid of for the sake of the future, but we have already seen what it can be, this future. The historical doom of the past is obvious, but it in no way explains what, in fact, this future, longed for by some and cursed by other heroes, can become, therefore, the entire play of Chekhov is permeated with anxious expectations that make the life of the heroes even more bleak, and parting with the "cherry orchard" is especially painful - isn't that why Lopakhin is in a hurry, ordering to cut down trees when the old owners have not yet left the doomed estate?
The Cherry Orchard, which we analyzed, was created by Chekhov on the eve of dramatic changes in Russian life, and the author, welcoming them, fervently wishing for a change in life for the better, could not help but see that any changes are always destruction, they carry with them then drama and tragedy, "progress" necessarily denies something that earlier, at one time, was also progressive. This realization determined the moral pathos of Chekhov's "comedy", his moral position: he welcomes the change in life and at the same time worries him about what it can bring to people; he understands the historical doom of his heroes and humanly sympathizes with them, who find themselves "between the past and the future" and are trying to find their place in a new, frightening life for them. As a matter of fact, Chekhov's play "The Cherry Orchard" is very relevant today as well, since now Russia is again "between the past and the future," and I really want us to be happier than the heroes of "The Cherry Orchard".
The play "The Cherry Orchard" is the last dramatic work in which Anton Pavlovich Chekhov pays tribute to his time, the nobles and such a vast concept as "estate", so valued by the author at all times.
The "Cherry Orchard" genre has always been a source of controversy and gossip. Chekhov himself wished to classify the play as a comedy genre, thereby going against the critics and connoisseurs of literature, who in a voice convinced everyone that the work belonged to tragicomedy and drama. Thus, Anton Pavlovich gave readers the opportunity to judge his creation for themselves, observe and experience the variety of genres presented on the pages of the book.
The cherry orchard is the leitmotif of all scenes in the play, because it is not just a background against which a whole series of events take place, but also a symbol of the course of life in the estate. Throughout his career, the author gravitated towards symbolism, not giving up on it in this play either. It is against the background of the cherry orchard that both external and internal conflicts develop.
The reader (or viewer) sees the owners of the house, replacing each other, as well as the sale of the estate for debts. On a cursory reading, it is noticeable that all the opposing forces are represented in the play: young people, noble Russia and aspiring entrepreneurs. Of course, social confrontation, often taken as the main line of conflict, is obvious. However, more attentive readers may notice that the key reason for the collision is not social confrontation at all, but the conflict of key characters with their environment and reality.
The “underwater” course of the play is no less interesting than its main plot. Chekhov builds his narrative on semitones, where, among the unambiguous and indisputable events, taken as fact and for granted, from time to time there are questions of life that emerge throughout the play. “Who am I and what do I want?” Firs, Epikhodov, Charlotte Ivanovna and many other heroes ask themselves. Thus, it becomes obvious that the leading motive of The Cherry Orchard is not at all the opposition of social strata, but loneliness that haunts every hero throughout his life.
Teffi described "The Cherry Orchard" with only one saying: "Laughter through tears", analyzing this immortal work. It is both funny and sad to read it, realizing that both conflicts raised by the author are relevant to this day.
In addition to the analysis of the play "The Cherry Orchard", there are other compositions:
- Analysis of the story by A.P. Chekhov "Ionych"
- "Tosca", analysis of the work of Chekhov, composition
- "Death of an official", analysis of Chekhov's story, composition
- "Thick and Thin", analysis of Chekhov's story
The author's play "The Cherry Orchard" by the famous writer Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was written in a mixture of two styles. Anton Pavlovich wrote the play more inclined towards the comedy genre, trying to reveal the theme of family estates, to resort to such a valued concept as "estate", to develop the idea of the future of the population of his country. However, literary critics note that this work belongs to tragedy and drama. Thanks to such divergences in the genre, each reader can observe how the drama flows into the tragicomedy.
The plot of The Cherry Orchard contains various stories of people who at that time fell into a crisis of their own finances, were deprived of their own ancestral estates.
The central image of the play itself is the cherry orchard. The owner of such a property is Lyubov Ranevskaya, whom one of the heroes persuades to sell the family estate. The cherry orchard itself is the leitmotif of all scenes, combining different time plans. For Ranevskaya, the garden is something tremulous from a bright childhood that gives warm memories, this is a place where the soul is fed with positive energy. The plot of the play is built around the fate of the family estate. In the first act, a plan is built to save the pledged estate from trading, in the third, the estate is sold, and the fourth action reveals to the reader a lyrical note of parting with the past.
A characteristic feature of this work is that Chekhov does not divide heroes into good or bad and major and minor. He divides them into three groups, distinguishing them according to time frames. The first group includes representatives of the past generation - this is Lyubov Ranevskaya herself, Gaev, and lackey Firs. The second group includes people of the present time, in the plot of the play this is the only hero in the person of the enterprising merchant Lopakhin. And, finally, the third group brings together the progressive youth of that time, Pyotr Trofimov and Ani.
In the center of the plot lies the fate of the cherry orchard, the sale of the family estate, in which the confrontation between the new and the old era unfolds. The climax of the storyline lies in the third act of the play, where the family estate is sold and the final denouement is revealed in the final fourth scene. The old familiar noble Russia is being replaced by young people and aspiring entrepreneurs. The main reason for the emergence of a conflict is not social confrontation, but the struggle of the characters themselves with the conditions surrounding them. Such a conflict in time is revealed only through the knowledge of future changes in the life of the people.
In The Cherry Orchard, Chekhov wanted to encourage his reader to think philosophically about the future future, about a new era that is reviving around, resorting to introspection.
Option 2
The work is a lyrical comedy, the key theme of which is the author's reflections on the future of the country and its population. The play is based on the story of the forced auction sale of a family estate by an impoverished noble family.
The originality of the work is its genre presentation, which, from the point of view of the writer, is a comedy, and from the point of view of the literary society and theatergoers, it demonstrates dramatic elements. Thus, by alternating between dramatic and comic scenes, the writer achieves the artistic reality of the play.
A distinctive feature of the work is the author's innovation, expressed in the absence of a division of the characters of the play as either negative or positive characters, breaking them into only three categories, the first of which represents people of the past generation in the person of the noble aristocrats Ranevskaya, Gaev and lackey Firs, to the second the group includes people of the present time in the vivid representation of the enterprising merchant Lopakhin, and in the third category the author classifies the people of the future in the person of the progressive youth of that period, Peter Trofimov and Ani.
The structural composition of the play consists of four acts, which are not divided into independent scenes, while the time span of the play is about six months, starting in spring and ending in mid-autumn. In the first act, the mise-en-scène of the plot line is presented, which increases with tension in the second act, the third act is characterized by the culmination of the plot in the form of the sale of the generic name, and the fourth is the final denouement. The artistic content of the play develops an emotional and psychological background, which consists in describing the inner experiences of the characters.
The work is also distinguished by the complete absence of pronounced external conflicts, as well as dynamism and unpredictable plot twists, which are emphasized by the author's remarks, monologues, pauses, which create an impression of special understatement and give the work a unique refined lyricism.
Analysis 3
The famous writer Anton Pavlovich Chekhov managed to compose not only stories, but also original plays. His play known today is The Cherry Orchard, which was written from 1903 to 1904. Zealous over his creation, Chekhov clearly showed the change in social structures.
Getting acquainted with the work, it becomes clear that the Cherry Orchard itself is at the center of the play. Its owner is Lyubov Ranevskaya, whom Lopakhin persuades to sell beautiful beauty in order to rent it out and receive a decent amount of income. But what's the problem? The failure lies in the fact that for Ranevskaya, the garden is, first of all, childhood, these are bright memories that sweep around with just the idea of \ u200b \ u200bthe wonderful expanses of their native place. This is joy, this is happiness, this is her soul mate. She cannot imagine her own life without him! For the heroine, as well as for her brother, the Cherry Orchard is neither real estate, nor a means of subsistence, as Lopakhin thinks. No, it’s not like that. A garden is a home where their heart is, a home where you feel at ease, a home where you are free, your soul gets aesthetic pleasure!
Anton Pavlovich not only analyzed the state of Russian society and its behavior, but also reflected in his heroes an analysis of the past of Russia, reflections on its future. Any of Chekhov's characters is associated with the theme of the past, or the theme of the present or the future.
The old masters who run the garden are responsible for the personification of the past of our country. This is Lyubov Ranevskaya and, accordingly, her brother Leonid Gaev. The main thing that gives them away is their inability to work.
It should be understood that the fate of the characters depends on the fate of the Cherry Orchard. But Ranevskaya's decision leaves much to be desired, for she sells a garden, which was a spiritual asset, the best medicine for adversity. Together with him, the millennial culture of the nobility goes away. Those who own the Cherry Orchard are indecisive, weak-minded in difficult situations. And from their cowardice, these people fail, because their time has passed ... It turns out that the place of the heroine of Ranevskaya is taken by Lopakhin, this new generation, greedy, looking for benefits for themselves in everything. And this is tragic, since the replenishment of the world with such behavioral people negatively affects the lives of others.
While reading Chekhov's book, one feels loneliness, the end blows, a precipice into darkness, from where there is no way out. This shows that the decision that Ranevskaya makes about the garden is wrong, because together with the Cherry Orchard her childhood and soul are being sold ...
Therefore, the work of Anton Pavlovich is so striking in its content and unusual. The play poses many problems that Chekhov saw at one time, he took every detail seriously. Thus, he portrayed what worried and worried him: submission, cowardice of a person in front of a serious decision. You should never give what belongs to you, what brings happiness and incredible joy. You shouldn't say goodbye to this easily! It is important to stand up for your own to the end! You need to be strong and courageous, have a firm character, persistent willpower, so as not to break under the next problem. Chekhov is so surprising: he writes so soulfully that thoughts after reading his stories do not leave alone! It should be so!
Cherry Orchard - analysis for grade 10
The plot of the play by A.P. Chekhov's "The Cherry Orchard" is based on numerous stories related to the sale of ancestral estates by the nobles. At that time, many of them were deprived of their property, suffered serious financial difficulties, and, among other things, were often forced to sell their ancestral nests at auction. Interestingly, a similar situation happened to the author himself, when his father had to sell the shop and the house due to debts. All this greatly influenced the life of Chekhov and his future writing career. In the play The Cherry Orchard, Chekhov examines a similar problem, analyzes the psychological state of people who were destined to lose their own homes.
The classical approach to the analysis of Chekhov's play is as follows. The heroes of the work are divided into three groups according to the time criterion. The first of them include the aristocrats Gaev, Ranevskaya and the lackey Firs - representatives of the old era. The second category of the present tense is represented by a single character - the merchant Lopakhin. The third group is people of the future, including Petya Trofimov and Anya. At the same time, there is no division of heroes into “good” and “bad”, main and secondary characters in the play. This presentation of the plot became a characteristic feature of the author's handwriting of Chekhov, which was later traced in his future plays.
The plot revolves around the sale of a family estate with a cherry orchard, while there is no open conflict in the play. If there is any opposition here, then it is expressed in a certain contradiction of two different eras - the new and the old. The ruined nobles categorically do not want to part with their property, while they are also not ready to lease a plot of land and receive commercial profit for it. This is too new and incomprehensible for them. The temporal conflict in the play is revealed through the awareness of future changes in the life of society, so clearly felt by the author himself. With his work, Chekhov wanted to show this situation from the outside in order to make the reader think about his place and role in this life.
The author's position is ambiguous here. Despite all the tragedy of what is happening, the heroes of the play do not evoke pity or sympathy. Chekhov portrayed them as narrow-minded people, incapable of introspection and deep feelings. The work is rather a philosophical discourse of the author about the future, about that new era, into which Russian society will soon enter.
Several interesting compositions
- Grinev and Shvabrin comparative characteristics essay grade 8
The main characters of the work of A.S. Pushkin's "The Captain's Daughter" are two officers, completely opposite in human qualities, Grinev and Shvabrin.
- Analysis of the legend about Danko from the story of the Old Woman Izergil Gorky
In the story of Maxim Gorky, the Old Woman Izergil, the legend of Danko is a vivid example of love for people and self-sacrifice. The work itself is filled with deep meaning, like most of the works of this author.
- The love story of Vladimir Dubrovsky and Maria Troekurova
The story of the romantic relationship between Vladimir Dubrovsky and Masha Troyekurova is an example of true, selfless love, for which there are no obstacles in the form of different classes. Young people fall in love
Holidays. This word evokes so many positive emotions, memories and new plans. We are always looking forward to them, with a smile we cross out the remaining days on the calendar.
School! How much this word means to me. How much inner trepidation lurks in it. I love very much, and will always love this place where we spend all our childhood and adolescence.