him.)
JULIE (to her brother): Go to the professor! It’s awkward!
ZHELTOUKHIN (to her): Damn him! [Goes out.
DYADIN: Yulia Stepanovna, allow me to thank you from the bottom of my soul. (Kissing her hand.)
JULIE: Don’t mention it, Ilya Ilyich! You’ve eaten so little… (The company get up and thank her.) Don’t mention it! You’ve all eaten so little!
FYODOR: What are we going to do now? Let’s now go to the croquet lawn and settle our bet … and then?
JULIE: And then we shall have dinner.
FYODOR: And then?
KHROUSCHOV: And then you all come to me. In the evening we’ll arrange a fishing party on the lake.
FYODOR: Splendid!
DYADIN: That is fascinating!
SONYA: Well, it is settled then. It means we are going now to the croquet lawn to settle our bet… Then Julie will give us an early dinner, and about seven we’ll drive over to the Wood I mean to M. Khrouschov. Splendid! Come, Julie, let’s get the balls.
(Goes with JULIE into the house.)
FYODOR: Vassili, carry the wine to the lawn! We will drink the health of the conquerors. Now, pater, come and let’s have a noble game.
ORLOVSKY: Wait awhile, my own, I must sit with the professor for a few minutes, for it’s a bit awkward. One must keep up appearances. You play my ball for a while, I’ll come presently… . (Goes into the house.)
DYADIN: I am going to listen to the most learned Alexander Vladimirovich. In anticipation of the high delight, which
VOYNITSKY: You’re a bore, Waffle! Go away!
DYADIN: I am going. (Goes into the house.)
FYODOR (walking into the garden, singing): “Thou wilt be the queen of the universe, thou my dearest.” …
[Goes out.
KHROUSCHOV: I’ll leave quietly. (To VOYNITSKY) George Petrovich, I earnestly ask you, let us never talk either of forests, or of medicine. I don’t know why, but when you start discussing these matters, I have a feeling all day afterwards as if I had eaten my dinner out of rusty pots. Allow me!
[Goes out.
SCENE VIII
ELENA ANDREYEVNA AND VOYNITSKY
VOYNITSKY: The narrow-minded fellow! Everyone is permitted to say stupid things, but I dislike it when it is done with pathos.
ELENA ANDREYEVNA: You have again behaved impossibly, George! Why need you have argued with Marie Vassilievna and Alexander, and spoken about perpetuum mobile? How petty it is!
VOYNITSKY: But if I hate him?
ELENA ANDREYEVNA: There’s nothing to hate Alexander for; he’s like all the rest… .
(SONYA and JULIE pass into the garden with croquet balls and mallets.)
VOYNITSKY: If you could see the expression on your face, your movements! … You’re too lazy to live! Oh, what laziness!
ELENA ANDREYEVNA: Oh, lazy, boring! (After a pause.) Everyone scoffs at my husband before my eyes, without minding my presence. Everyone looks at me with compassion: “Poor woman, she has an old husband! “All, even very kind people, would like me to leave Alexander.… That sympathy, all those compassionate glances and sighs of pity come simply to this. As the Wood Demon has just said, all of you nonsensically destroy forests, and soon none will be left on the earth. Just as nonsensically do you all destroy man, and soon, thanks to you, there will remain on earth neither faithfulness, nor purity, nor the capacity for self-sacrifice. Why can’t you look unconcernedly at a faithful wife, if she’s not yours? The Wood Demon is right. There’s lurking in all of you a demon of destruction. You spare neither forests, nor birds, nor women, nor one another.
VOYNITSKY: I don’t love this philosophy!
ELENA ANDREYEVNA: Tell that Fyodor that his impudence bores me. It’s loathsome in the end. To look into my eyes and to speak aloud in the presence of all about his love for a married woman — how wonderfully witty!
VOICES IN THE GARDEN: Bravo! Bravo!
ELENA ANDREYEVNA: But how nice the Wood Demon is! He often comes to us, but I’m shy and have never talked to him, as I should have liked to; I did not make a friend of him. He may think that I am ill-natured or proud. George, probably you and I are such good friends because we both are dull and boring people! Bores! Don’t look at me like that, I don’t like it.
VOYNITSKY: But how else can I look at you, if I love you? You are my happiness, my life, my youth! … I know that the chances of your returning my love are nil, but I want nothing more, only allow me to look at you, to hear your voice… .
SCENE IX
THE SAME AND SEREBRYAKOV
SEREBRYAKOV (at the window): Elena dear, where are you?
ELENA ANDREYEVNA: I’m here.
SEREBRYAKOV: Come and sit with us awhile, dear… .
(Disappears, ELENA ANDREYEVNA goes into the house.)
VOYNITSKY (following her): Allow me to speak of my love, don’t drive me away, and this alone will be my greatest happiness.
CURTAIN
ACT II
The dining-room of the SEREBRYAKOVS’ house. A sideboard, a dinner table in the middle of the room. Time: after one o’clock at night. From the garden comes the sound of the night watchman’s knocks.
SCENE I
SEREBRYAKOV (sitting in a chair in front of the window and dozing) and ELENA ANDREYEVNA (sitting near by and also dozing)
SEREBRYAKOV (awaking): Who’s there! Is it you, Sonya?
HLENA ANDREYEVNA: It’s me… .
SEREBRYAKOV: You, Lena dear? … The pain is excruciating!
ELENA ANDREYEVNA: Your rug is on the floor… .
(Wrapping it round his legs.) I’ll shut the window, Alexander.
SEREBRYAKOV: No, don’t, I’m hot. … I had just fallen into a doze and dreamed that my left leg did not belong to me. … I awoke with excruciating pain. No, it’s not gout. I think it is rheumatism. What’s the time now?
ELENA ANDREYEVNA I TWENTY PAST ONE, (A PAUSE.)
SEREBRYAKOV: Have a look in the morning, in the library, for Batyushkov. I believe we’ve got his books.
ELENA ANDREYEVNA WHAT?
SEREBRYAKOV: Have a look for Batyushkov. I remember we had his works. But why am I breathing with such difficulty?
ELENA ANDREYEVNA: You’re tired. It’s