Customer Reviews

Plays: Ivanov; The Seagull; Uncle Vanya; Three Sisters; The CherryOrchard (Penguin Classics)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
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1 star:		(0)

 

 

Dr. Anton Chekhov (1860-1904) was a medical doctor, short story writer and author of great plays. Chekhov is one of the Russian immortals of the nineteenth century along with Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenev, Lermentov, Tosltoy and Doestoevsky.
Chekhov was a playwright in a time when melodramas and the well made plays of the Victorian era were the norm. Chekhov's plays, however read like modern works as this doctor of the human heart probes emotions of everyday men and women dealing with such major issues as: bordedom; the passage of time; love and work. Chekhov is one of this reviewer's favorite literary artists!
The Revised Penguin Edition of five of his plays includes such gems as:
Ivanov: a bored middle aged man who has grown weary of life.
The Seagull-A story of a famous actress; the man who jilted her and a young girl who becomes an actress in Moscow .
Uncle Vanya-He is a man without past or future. he has been exploited by the rich old man whose estate he has managed well for many years. Vanya is incapable of murder, love or suicide. Sonya is the daughter of the old man. She is plain but has a loving heart. Dr. Astrov is a jaded doctor who is also interested in conservation. These are the characters in the play which endure through work. The old professor and his hedonistic wife leave the estate for the city. They are exploiters. The wife named Yelena has physical beauty but inside she is lazy, indolent and self-centered.
Three Sisters-A troika of sisters who are living in a sleepy town of 100,000 longing for the excitement of their home in Moscow. They realize they will never have their dreams fulfilled. They are admirable in that they know life is best lived with busy service in the cause of the community around them. Love affairs go nowhere in this excellent play.
The Cherry Orchard-The sale of a cherry orchard is symbolic of Russia's transition from a rural to an industrial economy.
Chekhov's plays are slices of life with little plot development. They are neither tragic or comedic but give us a close up version of life as it is lived each day. Chekhov deals with problems and possibilities endemic to the human heart. Many of Chekhov's characters feel a strong sense of frustration and the quiet desperation of mundane living. Though Chekhov is more concerned with the human condition his plays are, nevertheless, a careful anatomy of the Russian soul and society in the waning years of Czarist rule.
Anyone who claims to be civilized should be familiar with Chekhov whose works are a gift of love to the family of humanity.

Plays in general have a tendency to be overly-dramatic. Thus the name "drama". Chekhov definitely used this drama aspect to enhance his plays. He succeeded with some, making them dramatic, awe-inspiring, and amazing. Others? Less so.

I enjoyed reading all of these plays, and I won't deny that. Some, however, are harder to read and to understand than others. It's especially difficult to remember what character is which in each play, especially since in Ivanov, all the names are long and complex. While good plays themselves, I constantly had to flip back to the character list just to remember who that is, a problem rarely found in other plays, such as Ibsen's works.

The plays themselves are good. Each one has its own charm and interest. They're a pleasant read, but a difficult one. It's not something you can just breeze through. Reading these plays needs time and effort, which may be too much for some. If you're looking for any old Chekhov, settle for his stories, like "Ward number six", or even his short little stories (which are great for quick, disjointed reads). If you're looking for plays (not Shakespeare, that is), go for Ibsen. If you think you can handle this, take it on, but be warned that this is not an easy read.

I had to read this for a class that I had. I know it is representative of Russian literature, but it's very bleak and depressing. None of the plays have a really happy ending, but they do have good endings. My least favorite of the plays was Three Sisters, and my favorite was Cherry Orchard. Three Sisters, in my opinion is about the most bleak, unsatisfying, and depressing play about life and love I have ever read. Cherry Orchard is, in my opinion well thought out, bad things happen in this play, but there are reasons for these occurances, and it also has the most satisfying ending of all the plays in this book. Seagull, Uncle Vanya, and Ivanov aren't really bad, but aren't spectacular. If you want to read a light-hearted and easy going play, don't read this. They were interesting enough for me to give this four stars, they aren't bad for the most part, but aren't spectacular either.