Chekhov's Plays: An Opening into Eternity [Hardcover]

Richard Gilman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 1996

In this eloquent and insightful book, an eminent critic examines each of Chekhov's full-length plays, showing how they relate to each other, to Chekhov's short stories, and to his life. Richard Gilman places the plays in the context of Russian and European drama and the larger culture of the period and, offering textual commentary and a discussion of stagecraft and dramaturgy, explores the reasons behind the enduring power of these works.

"(Gilman) has a greater affinity for Chekhov and a surer grasp of his dramatic innovations and method than any predecessor who has written on the subject in English.... (His) book will remain the one indispensable source on Anton Chekhov's plays that we have in English". -- Simon Karlinsky, Times Literary Supplement

"Richard Gilman has written a brilliant, thrilling, and modern work of criticism. He has done for Chekhov what Jan Kott did for Shakespeare. He has shown us that Chekhov could have written his plays yesterday -- that they are immediate, contemporary, and totally relevant for the times in which we live. I recommend this book to anyone who loves Chekhov". -- Andre Gregory

"This brilliant study ... is wonderfully stimulating to read. ... (Gilman) forces you to see Chekhov's plays in a fresh light, and makes you hunger both to read them and see them performed anew". -- Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, New York Times

"(Gilman) makes a deeply persuasive case for the universal humanity of Chekhov's characters and links the innovation of his historically underestimated craft all the way, bless him, to Beckett". -- Linda Winer, The Nation

"This book should change the way Chekhov is staged.... Gilman has written the best kind of criticism, alively reinterpretation that invigorates its subject by celebrating the potential of the imagination". -- Bill Marx, Boston Globe

"Gilman offers new and different ways of understanding, performing, and directing these plays". -- Eileen Fischer, Modern Drama

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In a highly impressive if occasionally meandering series of essays, Yale drama professor Gilman (The Making of Modern Drama) presents an extended look at the dramatic methods employed by Chekhov in each of his plays. Often drawing on Chekhov's letters and fiction, Gilman argues against both the Soviet school of criticism, which perceived Chekhov as writing political drama about the sterility of middle-class lives, and also against those critics who saw his plays as plotless excercises in Naturalism. Instead Gilman argues that Chekhov was a theatrical revolutionary, a deliberately anti-dramatic writer in whose plays events that don't happen are often more important than those that do, and whose disjointed and often digressive dialogue allowed him to write in a musical and allusive rather than mechanical and melodramatic way. Gilman sees in Chekhov a precursor of Samuel Beckett, although Chekhov's objectivity and emotional restraint kept his plays more balanced and less despairing than Beckett's. The case Gilman makes for his subject's formal radicalism and literary stature is convincing as well as free from academic cant. Though he has a tendency to ramble, Gilman's encyclopedic knowledge of all things Chekhovian makes for interesting digressions, and this work should be eagerly received not only by admirers of Chekhov but by serious devotees of the theater.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Gilman (Yale Sch. of Drama) has written an eloquent tribute to Chekhov (1860-1904), both the man and the artist. After an introductory chapter of personal reflections about Chekhov, Gilman devotes a chapter to each of the major plays?Ivanov (1887), Uncle Vanya (1897), Three Sisters (1901), and The Cherry Orchard (1904)?placing them in the context of Chekhov's life as a doctor and devoted husband and brother, as well as in the larger milieu of late 19th-century Russian theater. Chekhov died tragically young?at age 44?of tuberculosis. Gilman astutely recognizes that, for Chekhov, a healthy body was inextricably linked to a healthy and creative mind, which may account for his refusal to diagnose his own illness until the very end. Chekhov's delicate touch and intuitive sense of character put him ahead of his time. In fact, his plays were sometimes criticized by contemporaries as being too much alike. Gilman's infectious enthusiasm for his subject makes this a definite improvement over much of the Chekhov scholarship. Highly recommended.?Diane Gardner Premo, SILS, SUNY at Buffalo
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Yale University Press (February 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0300064616
• ISBN-13: 978-0300064612
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.4 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,393,718 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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