a breath of fresh air, of youth, freedom, disruption, in what Stanislavsky called the “hothouse” life of the old country estate. But he is an unwitting and unwilling Eros. His importance lies less in his own character than in the effect he has on the others. The result of his sudden intrusion is a comedy of the unexpected at every turn and in every tone, a constant balancing of absurdity and true feeling, concealment and confession. The play keeps the lightness and quickness of the older French comedies, their repartee and their soliloquies, but transformed by a realism that was new to the stage. Maintaining that balance was the “complex psychological task” Turgenev set himself as a dramatist.
—Richard Pevear
CHARACTERS
ARKÁDY SERGÉICH ISLÁEV (Arkásha), a wealthy landowner, thirty-six
NATÁLYA PETRÓVNA (Natásha), his wife, twenty-nine
KÓLYA, their son, ten
VÉRA ALEXÁNDROVNA (Vérochka), their ward, seventeen
ÁNNA SEMYÓNOVNA ISLÁEVA, Islaev’s mother, fifty-eight
LIZAVÉTA BOGDÁNOVNA (Líza), her companion, thirty-seven
ADÁM IVÁNOVICH SCHÁAF, a German tutor, forty-five
MIKHÁIL ALEXÁNDROVICH RAKÍTIN (Michel), a friend of the house, thirty
ALEXÉI NIKOLÁEVICH BELYÁEV, a student, Kolya’s Russian teacher, twenty-one
AFANÁSY IVÁNOVICH BOLSHINTSÓV, a neighbor, forty-eight
IGNÁTY ILYÍCH SHPIGÉLSKY, a doctor, forty
MATVÉI, a servant, forty
KÁTYA, a maid, twenty
The action takes place on Islaev’s estate in the early 1840s. A day passes between Acts One and Two, Two and Three, and Four and Five.
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