Three sisters characteristics of sisters. Anton Chekhov - three sisters

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov.

The action takes place in the provincial town, in the house of the Prozorovs.

Irina, the youngest of the three Prozorov sisters, turns twenty years old. “It’s sunny and fun outside,” and a table is being set in the hall to await guests—officers of the artillery battery stationed in the city and its new commander, Lieutenant Colonel Vershinin. Everyone is full of joyful expectations and hopes. Irina: “I don’t know why my soul is so light!... It’s like I’m on sails, there’s a wide blue sky above me and big white birds are flying around.” The Prozorovs are scheduled to move to Moscow in the fall. The sisters have no doubt that their brother Andrei will go to university and eventually become a professor. Kulygin, a gymnasium teacher, the husband of one of the sisters, Masha, is grateful. Chebutykin, a military doctor who once madly loved the Prozorovs’ late mother, succumbs to the general joyful mood. “My white bird,” he kisses Irina touchingly. Lieutenant Baron Tuzenbach speaks with enthusiasm about the future: “The time has come […] a healthy, strong storm is being prepared, which […] will blow away laziness, indifference, prejudice towards work, rotten boredom from our society.” Vershinin is equally optimistic. With his appearance, Masha’s “merechlyundia” goes away. The atmosphere of relaxed cheerfulness is not disturbed by the appearance of Natasha, although she herself is terribly embarrassed by large society. Andrei proposes to her: “Oh youth, wonderful, wonderful youth! […] I feel so good, my soul is full of love, delight... My dear, good, pure, be my wife!”

But already in the second act, major notes are replaced by minor ones. Andrey can't find a place for himself because of boredom. He, who dreamed of a professorship in Moscow, is not at all attracted by the position of secretary of the zemstvo government, and in the city he feels “alien and lonely.” Masha is finally disappointed in her husband, who once seemed to her “terribly learned, smart and important,” and among his fellow teachers she simply suffers. Irina is not satisfied with her work at the telegraph office: “What I so wanted, what I dreamed about, is not in it. Work without poetry, without thoughts...” Olga returns from the gymnasium, tired and with a headache. Not in the spirit of Vershinin. He still continues to assure that “everything on earth must change little by little,” but he immediately adds: “And how I would like to prove to you that there is no happiness, there should not be and there will not be for us... We must only work and work..." In Chebutykin's puns, with which he amuses those around him, hidden pain breaks through: "No matter how you philosophize, loneliness is a terrible thing..."

Natasha, who is gradually taking control of the whole house, sends out the guests who were waiting for the mummers. "Philistine!" - Masha says to Irina in her hearts.

Three years have passed. If the first act took place at noon, and it was “sunny and cheerful” outside, then the stage directions for the third act “warn” about completely different - gloomy, sad - events: “Behind the stage they sound the alarm bell on the occasion of a fire that started a long time ago. Through the open door you can see a window, red from the glow.” The Prozorovs' house is full of people fleeing the fire.

Irina sobs: “Where? Where did it all go? […] and life is leaving and will never return, we will never, never go to Moscow... I’m in despair, I’m in despair!” Masha thinks in alarm: “Somehow we will live our lives, what will become of us?” Andrei cries: “When I got married, I thought that we would be happy... everyone is happy... But my God...” Tuzenbach, perhaps even more disappointed: “How happy I imagined then (three years ago. - V.B.) life! Where is she?" While on a drinking binge, Chebutykin: “My head is empty, my soul is cold. Maybe I’m not a person, but I’m only pretending that I have arms and legs... and a head; Maybe I don’t exist at all, but it only seems to me that I walk, eat, sleep. (Crying.)" And the more persistently Kulagin repeats: “I am satisfied, I am satisfied, I am satisfied,” the more obvious it becomes how broken and unhappy everyone is.

And finally, the last action. Autumn is approaching. Masha, walking along the alley, looks up: “And migratory birds are already flying…” The artillery brigade leaves the city: it is transferred to another place, either to Poland, or to Chita. The officers come to say goodbye to the Prozorovs. Fedotik, taking a photograph as a souvenir, notes: “...there will be peace and quiet in the city.” Tuzenbach adds: “And the boredom is terrible.” Andrey speaks out even more categorically: “The city will be empty. It’s as if they’ll cover him with a cap.”

Masha breaks up with Vershinin, whom she fell in love with so passionately: “Unsuccessful life... I don’t need anything now...” Olga, having become the head of the gymnasium, understands: “That means she won’t be in Moscow.” Irina decided - “if I’m not destined to be in Moscow, then so be it” - to accept the proposal of Tuzenbach, who retired: “The baron and I are getting married tomorrow, tomorrow we’re leaving for the brick factory, and the day after tomorrow I’m already at school, a new one begins life. […] And suddenly, as if wings grew on my soul, I became cheerful, it became a lot easier and again I wanted to work, work...” Chebutykin in emotion: “Fly, my dears, fly with God!”

He blesses Andrei in his own way for the “flight”: “You know, put on your hat, pick up a stick and go away... leave and go, go without looking back. And the further you go, the better.”

But even the most modest hopes of the characters in the play are not destined to come true. Solyony, in love with Irina, provokes a quarrel with the baron and kills him in a duel. Broken Andrey does not have enough strength to follow Chebutykin’s advice and pick up the “staff”: “Why do we, having barely begun to live, become boring, gray, uninteresting, lazy, indifferent, useless, unhappy?...”

The battery leaves the city. A military march sounds. Olga: “The music plays so cheerfully, cheerfully, and you want to live! […] and, it seems, a little more, and we will find out why we live, why we suffer... If only we knew! (The music plays quieter and quieter.) If only I had known, if only I had known!” (A curtain.)

The heroes of the play are not free migratory birds, they are imprisoned in a strong social “cage”, and the personal destinies of everyone caught in it are subject to the laws by which the entire country, which is experiencing general trouble, lives. Not "who", but "what?" dominates a person. This main culprit of misfortunes and failures in the play has several names - “vulgarity”, “baseness”, “sinful life”... The face of this “vulgarity” looks especially visible and unsightly in Andrei’s thoughts: “Our city has existed for two hundred years, there are a hundred thousands of inhabitants, and not a single one who would not be like the others... […] They only eat, drink, sleep, then die... others will be born, and they also eat, drink, sleep and, in order not to become dull from boredom, diversify their lives with disgusting gossip, vodka, cards, litigation..."

Material provided by the internet portal briefly.ru, compiled by V. A. Bogdanov.

The action takes place in the provincial town, in the house of the Prozorovs.

Irina, the youngest of the three Prozorov sisters, turns twenty years old. “It’s sunny and fun outside,” and a table is being set in the hall to await guests—officers of the artillery battery stationed in the city and its new commander, Lieutenant Colonel Vershinin. Everyone is full of joyful expectations and hopes. Irina: “I don’t know why my soul is so light... It’s like I’m on sails, there’s a wide blue sky above me and big white birds are flying around.” The Prozorovs are scheduled to move to Moscow in the fall. The sisters have no doubt that their brother Andrei will go to university and eventually become a professor. Kulygin, a gymnasium teacher, the husband of one of the sisters, Masha, is grateful. Chebutykin, a military doctor who once madly loved the Prozorovs’ late mother, succumbs to the general joyful mood. “My white bird,” he kisses Irina touchingly. Lieutenant Baron Tuzenbach speaks with enthusiasm about the future: “The time has come to prepare a healthy, strong storm that will blow away laziness, indifference, prejudice towards work, and rotten boredom from our society.” Vershinin is equally optimistic. With his appearance, Masha’s “merechlyundia” goes away. The atmosphere of relaxed cheerfulness is not disturbed by the appearance of Natasha, although she herself is terribly embarrassed by large society. Andrei proposes to her: “Oh youth, wonderful, wonderful youth! I feel so good, my soul is full of love, delight... My dear, good, pure, be my wife!”

But already in the second act, major notes are replaced by minor ones. Andrey can't find a place for himself because of boredom. He, who dreamed of a professorship in Moscow, is not at all attracted by the position of secretary of the zemstvo government, and in the city he feels “alien and lonely.” Masha is completely disappointed in her husband, who once seemed to her “terribly learned, smart and important,” and among his fellow teachers she simply suffers. Irina is not satisfied with her work at the telegraph office: “What I wanted so much, what I dreamed about, is not in it. Work without poetry, without thoughts...” Olga returns from the gymnasium tired and with a headache. Not in the spirit of Vershinin. He still continues to assure that “everything on earth must change little by little,” but immediately adds: “And how I would like to prove to you that there is no happiness, there should not be and will not be for us... We must only work and to work...” In Chebutykin’s puns, with which he amuses those around him, hidden pain breaks through: “No matter how you philosophize, loneliness is a terrible thing...”

Natasha, who is gradually taking control of the whole house, sends out the guests who were waiting for the mummers. “Philistine!” – Masha says to Irina in her hearts.

Three years have passed. If the first act took place at noon, and it was “sunny and cheerful” outside, then the stage directions for the third act “warn” about completely different – gloomy, sad – events: “Behind the stage they sound the alarm bell on the occasion of a fire that started a long time ago. Through the open door you can see a window, red from the glow.” The Prozorovs' house is full of people fleeing the fire.

Irina sobs: “Where? Where did it all go? but life is leaving and will never return, we will never, never go to Moscow... I’m in despair, I’m in despair!” Masha thinks in alarm: “Somehow we will live our lives, what will become of us?” Andrei cries: “When I got married, I thought that we would be happy... everyone is happy... But my God...” Tuzenbach, perhaps even more disappointed: “How happy I imagined then (three years ago. - V.B.) life! Where is she?" While on a drinking binge, Chebutykin: “My head is empty, my soul is cold. Maybe I’m not a person, but I’m only pretending that I have arms and legs... and a head; Maybe I don’t exist at all, but it only seems to me that I walk, eat, sleep. (Cries.).” And the more persistently Kulygin repeats: “I am satisfied, I am satisfied, I am satisfied,” the more obvious it becomes how broken and unhappy everyone is.

And finally, the last action. Autumn is approaching. Masha, walking along the alley, looks up: “And migratory birds are already flying…” The artillery brigade leaves the city: it is transferred to another place, either to Poland, or to Chita. The officers come to say goodbye to the Prozorovs. Fedotik, taking a photo as a souvenir, notes: “...there will be peace and quiet in the city.” Tuzenbach adds: “And terrible boredom.” Andrey speaks out even more categorically: “The city will be empty. It’s as if they’ll cover him with a cap.”

Masha breaks up with Vershinin, whom she fell in love with so passionately: “Unsuccessful life... I don’t need anything now...” Olga, having become the head of the gymnasium, understands: “That means she won’t be in Moscow.” Irina decided - “if I’m not destined to be in Moscow, then so be it” - to accept the offer of Tuzenbach, who retired: “The baron and I are getting married tomorrow, tomorrow we’re leaving for the brick factory, and the day after tomorrow I’m already at school, a new one begins life. And suddenly, as if wings had grown on my soul, I became cheerful, it became much easier and again I wanted to work, to work...” Chebutykin in emotion: “Fly, my dears, fly with God!”

He blesses Andrei in his own way for the “flight”: “You know, put on your hat, pick up a stick and go away... leave and go, go without looking back. And the further you go, the better.”

The battery leaves the city. A military march sounds. Olga: “The music plays so cheerfully, cheerfully, and you want to live! and, it seems, a little more, and we will find out why we live, why we suffer... If only we knew! (The music plays quieter and quieter.) If only I had known, if only I had known!” (A curtain.)

The heroes of the play are not free migratory birds, they are imprisoned in a strong social “cage”, and the personal destinies of everyone caught in it are subject to the laws by which the entire country, which is experiencing general trouble, lives. Not "who", but "what?" dominates a person. This main culprit of misfortunes and failures in the play has several names - “vulgarity”, “baseness”, “sinful life”... The face of this “vulgarity” looks especially visible and unsightly in Andrei’s thoughts: “Our city has existed for two hundred years, there are a hundred thousands of inhabitants, and not a single one who would not be like the others... They only eat, drink, sleep, then die... others will be born, and they also eat, drink, sleep and, in order not to become dull from boredom, they diversify their lives with nasty gossip, vodka , cards, litigation..."

Option 2

Part 1

At the Prozorovs' house they are preparing to celebrate the 20th birthday of Irina, the youngest of three sisters. Officers from the artillery battery and their commander, Lieutenant Colonel Vershinin, should come to visit. Everyone except sister Masha is in a good mood.

In the fall, the Prozorovs are going to move to Moscow, where Andrei, the girls’ brother, is supposed to go to university. They predict that he will become a professor in the future.

Kulygin, Masha’s husband, a gymnasium teacher, is pleased. Chebutykin, a military doctor who used to be madly in love with the Prozorovs’ late mother, rejoices. Lieutenant Baron Tuzenbach talks about a bright future. Vershinin supports him. With the appearance of the lieutenant colonel, Masha’s “merechlyundia” goes away.

Natasha appears. The girl is embarrassed by large society. And Andrei invites her to become his wife.

Part 2

Andrey can't find a place for himself out of boredom. He dreamed of a professorship, but was forced to work as a secretary of the zemstvo government. He doesn't like it in the city, he feels lonely and alien.

Masha is disappointed in her husband; she suffers from communication with his fellow teachers. Irina is also not happy about her position at the telegraph office, because she did not dream of such thoughtless work. Olga returns from the gymnasium tired and with a headache.

Vershinin is not in a good mood, but still continues to assure that soon everything on earth should change. True, he now adds that happiness does not exist, and the main task of people is to work.

Chebutykin tries to amuse those around him with various puns, but the pain caused by loneliness breaks through in them.

Natasha, having become Andrei's wife, gradually takes over the entire house. The Prozorov sisters consider her a bourgeois.

Part 3

3 years have passed. There is a fire in the city. People fleeing from him gathered in the Prozorovs' house.

Irina sobs in despair that her life is being wasted and she will never go to Moscow. Masha is also worried about her life and the future. Andrei is disappointed in his own marriage, he says that when he got married, he thought they would be happy, but it didn’t turn out that way.

Tuzenbach is even more upset, because 3 years ago he imagined a very happy life, but everything remained only dreams.

Chebutykin goes on a drinking binge. He thinks about loneliness, about human essence, and cries.

Only Kulygin stubbornly insists that he is happy with everything. Against this background, it becomes more and more obvious how unhappy and broken everyone is.

Part 4

Autumn is approaching. The artillery brigade leaves the city - it is transferred to another place. The officers come to say goodbye to the Prozorovs. Taking photos for memory, everyone talks about how quiet, calm and boring it will be here now.

Masha says goodbye to Vershinin, with whom she is passionately in love. She considers her life a failure and says that she doesn't need anything else. Olga becomes the head of the gymnasium and realizes that she will never get to Moscow.

Irina also says goodbye to her dreams of the capital and decides to become Tuzenbach’s wife. The girl is preparing for the start of a new life, and Chebutykin is very happy for her. In addition, the old man advises Andrei to leave the city at least somewhere: “Go without looking back. And the further you go, the better.”

But the heroes' hopes are not destined to come true. Solyony, who is in love with Irina, kills Tuzenbach in a duel. The girl decides to leave the city and work. And Andrei simply does not have enough strength to act as Chebutykin advised.

The battery leaves the city. A military march is playing. Olga says that the music plays very cheerfully and cheerfully, it makes you want to live, “and, it seems, a little more, and we will find out why we live, why we suffer... If only we knew!”

Essay on literature on the topic: Summary of the Three Chekhov Sisters

Other writings:

The action takes place in the provincial town, in the house of the Prozorovs. Irina, the youngest of the three Prozorov sisters, turns twenty years old. “It’s sunny and fun outside,” and a table is being set in the hall, waiting for guests - officers of the artillery battery stationed in the city and its new commander, lieutenant colonel Read More ......
A.P. Chekhov's drama “Three Sisters” today ranks among the most popular theatrical works. This is the only play whose genre is indisputable for the author and the audience. Over the years, this work not only has not lost its ideological meaning, but has also expanded its semantic boundaries. Read More......
A.P. Chekhov's drama “Three Sisters,” written in 1900, is a work of innovative Chekhov dramaturgy, built according to different dramatic canons than the classical plays of the 19th century. The classical unity of place, time and action is a thing of the past; there is no conflict of drama in its Read More......
One of the main problems of A.P. Chekhov’s play “Three Sisters” is the problem of unfulfilled dreams. The leitmotif of the work is the desire of the Prozorov sisters to return to their homeland - Moscow. They talk about this throughout the play, make plans and actively discuss Read More......
Vershinin Characteristics of a literary hero VERSHININ is the central character of A.P. Chekhov’s drama “Three Sisters” (1900). Lieutenant Colonel V., the battery commander, is the same Russian man who, in his own words, “was tormented with his wife... tormented with the house...”, “suffers and only complains.” Coming Read More......
Brothers and sisters Pekashinsky peasant Stepan Andreyanovich Stavrov cut down a house on the slope of a mountain, in the cool twilight of a huge larch tree. Not a house - a two-story mansion with a small side hut to boot. There was a war going on. Old people, children and women remained in Pekashin. Without Read More......
Seagull The action takes place in the estate of Pyotr Nikolaevich Sorin. His sister, Irina Nikolaevna Arkadina, is an actress, visiting his estate with her son, Konstantin Gavrilovich Treplev, and Boris Alekseevich Trigorin, a fiction writer, quite famous, although he is not yet forty. About Read More......
Sisters of the Cross Pyotr Alekseevich Marakulin infected his colleagues with fun and carefreeness. He himself was narrow-chested, with a stringy mustache, about thirty years old, but he felt almost twelve years old. Marakulin was famous for his handwriting, he wrote out reports letter by letter: he scribbled evenly, as if he were tracing with beads, and Read More......

Summary of Three Chekhov Sisters

The source of conflict in the play is the motive of the loneliness of a modern person in his family, among the people he loves and who love him. But this is not physical loneliness, when no one is around in the literal sense. This is the absence of a kindred spirit who would understand all the moods of the soul, to whom hopes and dreams would be close.

In Chekhov's play, all the characters - the Prozorov sisters, their brother Andrei, their friends at home - are separated and lonely, despite the fact that they love each other. These heroes are helpless: they cannot understand either themselves or those around them.

Of course, the problems of family and love occupy an important place in the play; all the characters act around them. But still, the main question for everyone remains: “How to live?” In the first act, Irina’s joyful words are heard: “When I woke up today, got up and washed my face, it suddenly began to seem to me that everything in this world was clear to me, and I know how to live.” But the naivety of these words becomes clear in the next action: “...But it turned out to be all nonsense, nonsense!”
Masha is also disappointed, but only in love. It seemed to her that she had found exactly what she needed, the right person. She says about her husband: “He seemed to me then terribly learned, smart and important. But now it’s not the same, unfortunately.” Masha says about Vershinin: “At first he seemed strange to me, then I felt sorry for him, ... then I fell in love.” And at the end of the play she says: “Unsuccessful life... I don’t need anything now...”.

Andrei’s thoughts are similar to these words: “When I got married, I thought we would be happy, everyone would be happy... But my God... (cries).” Olga also has her own dreams, which also turn out to be unfulfilled.

Confusion, disappointment, awareness of deception unites all the main characters of the play. Their scattered exclamations merge into one: “how time passes,” “what if we could start life again,” “how life deceives!”, “life flashed by like lightning.” The sisters' desire “To Moscow!” To Moscow!" and its impracticability become in the play a symbol of disappointed hopes.

The main characters of "Three Sisters" are unhappy, but the meaning of the play is not limited to depicting the unhappy life of unhappy people. By the way, this is exactly what contemporary critics accused Chekhov of. The author allows you to see and penetrate deeply into the reasons for the misfortunes of his heroes. The uniqueness of the conflict in this play lies in the fact that, pitting different heroes or groups of heroes against each other, the author insists that they are all connected, albeit covertly.

Here, many heroes are both themselves unhappy and the cause of the misfortune of others. Therefore, Natasha, Soleny, Chebutykin, Kulagin are not opposed to the other heroes. Each of them has their own idea of happiness, their own life program. And each of them tries to convey their “truth” to the others.

But to others this “truth” seems either funny, or stupid, or strange. And he encounters ridicule, or rudeness, or indifference from those around him. Tuzenbach tells Olga: “You’re talking such nonsense, I’m tired of listening to you,” in response to her revelation about how happy she would be not to work and to get married. And when Masha tells Olga about her love, Olga will call it nonsense. Tuzenbach, who dreams of working and finding reciprocity with Irina, constantly encounters her coldness. Irina responds even colder to Solyony’s declaration of love for her.

And the rest of the heroes have the same misunderstanding of each other. Each is absorbed in his own view of things, unable to understand the other’s point of view. In response to his changes or frankness, he is met only with ridicule or rudeness.

Here the author talks about the imaginary nature of forms sacred to man: about the family, about children, about the intelligentsia’s faith in work, in suffering for the sake of future generations. The conversations of the characters in the play about the future, about the meaning of life, about the need to believe in a happy future are in contrast with the absurdity of their real situation, with their everyday behavior.

It is here that the author shows the manifestation of the irony of life. But by the end of the play it becomes clear that all disputes, dreams, hopes are a necessary part of the lives of these people. In spite of everything, they “damn want to live,” “they have to live,” “and they want to live!” And while the heroes have this desire to live, the desire to believe and try to look into the future is just as natural for them.

This is precisely where the uniqueness of the conflict in the play lies. All complex, universal, seemingly insoluble conflicts between the characters at the end of the play come down to a simple desire - “Live!” This positive attitude towards the future is especially valuable in the play.
Baron Tuzenbach, a Russified German, born in St. Petersburg, “cold and idle,” is the happiest man in the play. He acutely feels the “borderline”, “turning point” of the present time and with his whole being is directed towards the approaching “hulk”, “a healthy, strong storm”, which “will blow away laziness, indifference, prejudice towards work, rotten boredom from our society.”
Tusenbach’s ardent conviction in the need for work, consistent, obligatory work for every person (“In some twenty-five to thirty years, every person will work. Everyone!”) is reflected in his “German” healthy love for “order”, for the reasonable the structure of life, his belief in meaningful, creative work that transforms society and man. Here we find closeness to the image of Stolz (“Oblomov” by I.A. Goncharov).
Tuzenbach is devoid of skepticism and is not inclined to look at the current state of life as hopeless. He believes that in the future “life will remain the same, life is difficult, full of secrets and happy.” He is highly endowed with the “gift of insight into life,” the gift of love for life, the gift of being happy even in an unrequited feeling for Irina. Her “longing for work” is clear and close to him. And he never tires of supporting Irina’s spiritual strength with his cheerful belief in life.
Tuzenbach not only dreams of a “new life”, but also prepares for it: he resigns, chooses a job as an engineer at a brick factory and plans to go there after marrying Irina: “I’ll take you away tomorrow, we’ll work, we’ll be rich, dreams yours will come to life. You will be happy." But an absurd, ordinary, “always on” skirmish with Solyony led to a duel. T.’s farewell to Irina is absolutely devoid of “pre-duel fever” (cf. “Duel” by Chekhov, “Duel” by Kuprin). On the contrary, the usually soft, always conciliatory T. displays courage and enormous “concentration of calm and pain” (P.A. Markov). As if seeing the beauty of the surrounding nature for the first time, feeling the living trembling of autumn leaves, Tuzenbach utters the words that became the result of his life’s faith: “What beautiful trees and, in essence, what a beautiful life should be around them!”

SOLYONY is the central character of A. P. Chekhov’s drama “Three Sisters” (1900). Staff Captain S., by type of character and mental structure, belongs to those people who are usually called difficult. In his appearance, behavior, in going against general dialogue, remarks, some kind of “ritual” spraying of hands and chest with perfume - there is some kind of “composition”, conspicuous “inauthenticity”; out of shyness, he created for himself the image of a “terribly scary person,” a brethren, and is now forced to constantly confirm and support it. Critics noted his similarity with Dostoevsky’s “underground” heroes (for example, Ganya Ivolgin in “The Idiot”), and analyzed his “philistine Byronism ", a cheap imitation of Lermontov. "Case C." - this is a case of “an idea that fell into the street,” that is, into the head of a poorly educated, uncultured person, and led to a distortion of his personality. “He is too little educated and too little a poet to imitate Lermontov” (Vl. I. Ne-Mirovich-Danchenko). S. is burdened by his bitterness, and probably he wants to break out of the circle of loneliness in which he has imprisoned himself. After all, alone with someone, with the same Tuzenbach, he is “both smart and affectionate.” S. hopes that Irina will help him break this circle: “You can see the truth... Only you alone can understand me.” But his love - as oppressive and heavy as he himself - scares Irina, and she coldly asks not to speak her about love. S. swore “to all the saints” that he would “kill his rival,” and did it. Indeed, some kind of “tarara boombia”: a wonderful man was killed, the hopes of a sweet, intelligent woman were dashed, and now S. will be counted no longer three, but four duels.
According to Chekhov, “It was terribly difficult to write Three Sisters.” After all, there are three heroines, each should be like their own model, and all three are the general’s daughters.” Educated, young, graceful, beautiful women are “not three units, but three-thirds of three,” one soul that has taken “three forms” (I.F. Annensky). In the “trinity” of heroines there is a masterly difficulty in constructing a play.
The time of action - the life of the sisters - is shown by Chekhov in breaks: in “scraps”, “passages”, “accidents”. Spring afternoon of the first act; winter twilight of the second; a summer night, illuminated by the reflections of a fire raging in the city; and again the day, but already autumn, farewell - in the fourth act. From these fragments, scraps of destinies, an internal, continuous in the “undercurrent” of the play, “the cantilena of the life of Chekhov’s heroines” (I.N. Solovyova) arises.
The sisters are given a keen sense of the fluidity of life, passing by and/or imaginary, lived “in rough drafts.” Apart from the will and desire of the sisters, it turns out “wrong”: “Everything is not done our way” (Olga); “This life is damned, unbearable,” “unsuccessful life” (Masha); “Life is leaving and will never return”, “You are leaving a real wonderful life, you are going further and further into some kind of abyss” (Irina). The sisters perceive the flow of life as a “huge inert river” Nemirovich-Danchenko), carrying faces, dreams, thoughts, and feelings into oblivion, into the past disappearing from memory: “So they won’t remember us either. They will forget."

The scene of action is the house of the Prozorov sisters, a space of life ennobled by them, full of love, tenderness, spiritual closeness, hopes, melancholy and nervous anxiety. The house appears in the play as a space of culture, the life of the spirit, as an oasis of humanity and “mass of light” among “spiritual darkness” (cf. the Turbins’ house in “The White Guard” by M.A. Bulgakov). This space is fragile, permeable and defenseless under the pressure of the provincial vulgarity triumphant in the person of Natasha.
The development of action in the play is associated with the gradual impoverishment of the living joy of life among the Prozorov sisters, with a growing feeling of the annoying incompleteness of existence and with a growing thirst for understanding the meaning of the life they live - meaning, without which happiness is impossible for them. Chekhov's thought about the human right to happiness, about the need for happiness in human life permeates the depiction of the life of the Prozorov sisters.
Olga, the eldest of the sisters who serves as a teacher at the gymnasium, lives with a constant feeling of weariness from life: “I feel like drops of strength and youth are leaving me every day.” She is the spiritual backbone of the house. On the night of the fire, a “tormenting night” when O. seems to have “aged ten years”, she takes upon herself the nervous breakdowns, confessions, revelations and explanations of her sisters and brother.

She hears, feels, perceives not only what they say, but also the unspoken inner pain - she supports, consoles, forgives. And in the advice to Irina to “marry the baron,” her unspoken thought about marriage breaks through: “After all, people don’t get married for love, but only to fulfill their duty.” And in the last act, when the regiment leaves the city and the sisters are left alone, she, with words of encouragement and consolation, seems to push aside the darkness of the thickening spiritual emptiness: “The music plays so cheerfully, so joyfully, and, it seems, a little more, and we will find out why we we live, why do we suffer...” In spite of the triumphant, visual, spreading vulgarity (lisping Natasha, Andrei hunched over the stroller, the always happy Kulygin, “tara-pa bumbia” Chebutykin, who has long “didn’t care”) O.’s voice sounds a yearning appeal: “If I would know if I knew..."
Masha is the most silent of the sisters. At the age of 18, she married a high school teacher, who seemed to her “terribly learned, smart and important.” For her mistake (her husband turned out to be “the kindest, but not the smartest”) M. pays with the feeling of emptiness of life that haunts her. She carries the drama within herself, maintaining her “isolation” and “separateness.” Living in high nervous tension, M. increasingly succumbs to “merlechlundia,” but does not “sour,” but only “gets angry.” M.’s love for Vershinin, expressed with courageous openness and passionate tenderness, made up for the painful incompleteness of existence for her, forced her to seek the meaning of life, faith: “It seems to me that a person must be a believer or must seek faith, otherwise his life is empty, empty...”. M.'s lawless affair with a married man, the father of two girls, ends tragically. The regiment is transferred from the city, and Vershinin leaves forever. M.'s sobs are a premonition that life will again become “empty”: meaningless and joyless. Overcoming the feeling of spiritual loneliness that gripped her, M. forces herself to believe in the need to continue life. Already life itself becomes for her a duty towards herself: “We will be left alone to start our life again.” Her words “We must live, we must live” sound in unison with the Olgins’ “If only I knew, if only I knew...”.

Irina is the youngest of the sisters. She bathes in waves of love and admiration. “Just in sails,” she is carried by hope: “To finish everything here and to Moscow!” Her thirst for life is fueled by the dream of love, of expressing her personality in work. After three years, Irina works at the telegraph office, tired of a stultifying, joyless existence: “Work without poetry, without thoughts is not at all what I dreamed of.” No love. And Moscow is “dreamed of every night” and forgotten, “like a window or a ceiling in Italian.”
In the last act, I. - matured, serious - decides to “start living”: “marry the baron”, be a “faithful, submissive wife”, work at a brick factory as a teacher. When Tuzenbach’s stupid, absurd death in a duel ends these hopes, I. no longer sobs, but “cries quietly”: “I knew, I knew...” and echoes the sisters: “We must live.”
Having lost their home and loved ones, parted with illusions and hopes, the Prozorov sisters come to the idea of the need to continue life as a fulfillment of their moral duty to it. The meaning of their life shines through all the losses - through spiritual resilience and opposition to everyday vulgarity.
VERSHININ is the central character of A.P. Chekhov’s drama “Three Sisters” (1900). Lieutenant Colonel V., the battery commander, is the same Russian man who, in his own words, “was tormented with his wife... tormented with the house...”, “endures and only complains.” Coming to visit the Prozorov sisters, V. finds himself in his native space - warmth, culture, innate noble delicacy. He admires their “wonderful apartment” and admits that in his life he always lacked just such an apartment - “with flowers, with a lot of light...”. Living his life “in rough drafts,” V. regrets that “his youth has passed,” leaving him with the ability to endure the hardships of life and the habit of “philosophizing” with or without reason. His main idea about life, which he never tires of repeating, is the idea that “in two to three hundred years, life on earth will be unimaginably beautiful, amazing” and a person should “anticipate it, wait, dream, prepare for it.” V. looks at “present life” as if from this distant future - like through inverted binoculars. He is convinced that real happiness is unthinkable and impossible. And he doesn’t really believe in Tuzenbach’s ability to be happy even now: “There is no happiness, there should not be and there will not be for us.”

From complaints, confidential conversations, disputes and “philosophizing”, it is unknown how and why Masha’s beautiful, lofty love came through and illuminated his life with happiness. V. still claims that his youth has passed, he is still stubborn and returns to thoughts about what will happen “in two or three hundred years.” But he is already seized by a new, special mood: “I want to live like hell...” On the night of the fire - a “painful” night of nervous breakdowns, mental fatigue - Masha and V.’s declaration of love sounds beautiful and powerful: “All ages are submissive to love...” This love shook V.’s convinced philosophical pessimism. Before separation forever, he “philosophizes” for the last time: “Life is hard. It seems to many of us dull and hopeless, but still, we must admit, it is becoming clearer and easier ... "

The Moscow Art Theater commissioned this play from Chekhov. The first production took place on January 31, 1901. Since then, it has not left the domestic and foreign theater stages for more than a century.

According to literary scholars and biographers of the writer, the idea for the play was born back in 1898-1899. This conclusion was made on the basis that Chekhov actively used notes from his notebooks when writing the play.

The youngest of the sisters, whose name is Irina, turns 20. On this occasion, celebrations are planned, the table is set and guests are awaited. The officers of the artillery battery stationed in the city should visit the Prozorovs. Its new commander, Vershinin, will also come.

Everyone is in joyful anticipation of the upcoming evening. Irina herself admits that her soul is so light, as if she is rushing on sails.

This coming fall the entire Prozorov family plans to move to Moscow. Their brother Andrey intends to go to university and plans to become a professor in the future.

The gymnasium teacher Kulygin, who is the husband of Masha, one of the sisters, is also in a pleasant mood. Military doctor Chebutykin, who once passionately loved the Prozorovs’ late mother, also comes to the holiday in an elevated mood. Now he treats Irina tenderly and touchingly.

Major notes in the four-act play by A.P. Chekhov are present in almost all the characters. For example, Lieutenant Tuzenbach. He looks to the future with enthusiasm, arguing that the time has come when our society must get rid of indifference and laziness, as well as the destructive neglect of work.

Vershinin also has optimism. Only Natasha is embarrassed by the large number of guests. Andrey proposes to her.

Minor mood

In the second act of Chekhov's play "Three Sisters" everyone is attacked by despondency and sadness. Andrey is languishing with boredom. He dreamed of a professorship in Moscow, but instead was forced to settle for an insignificant secretarial position at the zemstvo government. In his hometown, he feels lonely, alien and unwanted.

Masha is experiencing difficulties in her family life. She is completely disappointed in her husband. Once she sincerely considered him important, learned and smart, but now she suffers in his company and among his fellow gymnasium teachers.

The younger sister Irina understands that she can no longer bear to work at the telegraph office. Everything she dreamed of was never realized. Olga comes home from the gymnasium with a headache and exhausted. Vershinin, who is also out of sorts, continues to assure that everything will soon change, but at the same time unexpectedly adds that happiness does not exist, but only work and labor.

Chebutykin tries to cheer up those gathered, but no one is happy about his puns, and hidden pain shows through in them.

At the end of the evening, Natasha begins to actively tidy up the whole house, simultaneously sending the guests away.

Three years later

The next action takes place three years later. Already in the stage directions to it, the author clarifies that the surroundings are gloomy and sad. At the very beginning of the third act of Chekhov's play "Three Sisters" the alarm bell is sounded behind the stage. Everyone is informed about the fire that has started. Through the window you can see a strong fire burning in the distance. In the house of the Prozorov family there are many people trying to escape the fire.

Irina gets hysterical. She laments that her whole life has passed and will not return, and we will never leave for Moscow. Their move, planned earlier, never took place.

Maria is also worried about her fate. She realizes that she does not understand how she will live her life.

Andrey begins to cry. He says he hoped everyone would be happy when he got married, but things turned out differently.

Baron Tuzenbach is also deeply disappointed. He didn't have a happy life either. Chebutykin went on a drinking binge.

The denouement of the play

The last action of the play "Three Sisters", the plot of which is outlined in this article, takes place against the backdrop of the approaching autumn.

Masha looks sadly at the migratory birds flying past. The artillerymen leave the city and are transferred to a new duty station. True, it is still unknown where - to Chita or Poland. The officers come to say goodbye to the Prozorovs. They take photographs as a souvenir, and at parting they note that now there will be peace and quiet here. Baron Tuzenbach adds that it is also terrible boredom. The city is emptying.

“Three Sisters” is a play that tells how Masha breaks up with Vershinin, whom she previously loved so passionately. She admits that her life has been unsuccessful.

The fates of the sisters

By this time Olga received the position of head of the gymnasium. After this, she also realizes that she will no longer leave for Moscow, a high position in the province strongly binds her.

Irina decided so and accepted the offer from Tuzenbach, who was retiring. They are going to get married and start a family life together. Irina herself is at least a little inspired by this news, admits that she feels as if she has grown wings. Chebutykin is sincerely touched by them.

However, the hopes of most of the characters in the play are not destined to come true. Another character Solyony, in love with Irina, having learned about the upcoming wedding with Tuzenbach, provokes him into a conflict. In a duel he kills the baron.

Finale of "Three Sisters"

"Three Sisters" is a play in the finale of which the artillery battery leaves the city. They leave under a military march. In fact, one thing worries all the characters in the play "Three Sisters". The characters are not free people, like migratory birds that they observe for themselves.

All characters are imprisoned in strong social cages. Their destinies are subject to the laws by which the country itself lives, which at that time was experiencing general troubles.

Artistic features of the performance

Having familiarized yourself with the summary of “Three Sisters”, you can separately dwell on the artistic features of this work.

Many critics of that time considered the lack of a plot to be a drawback of the play. At least in the generally accepted understanding of this term. Thus, the popular playwright Pyotr Gnedich in one of his letters cites an ironic statement by Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy. The great Russian writer notes that when a drunk doctor lies on the sofa, and it’s raining outside the window, then this is outright boredom, and not a play, as Chekhov believes, and not a mood, as Stanislavsky would say. And there is no dramatic action in such a scene.

Director Nemirovich-Danchenko admitted that he found the plot in “Three Sisters” only shortly before the premiere of the play. What was new was the absence of events, as well as the fact that Anton Chekhov saw social drama and tragedy in the most ordinary things. This was an innovative technique in Russian drama, which had not been used by anyone before. The play "Three Sisters" became very popular abroad. The play was translated into German, French and Czech during the author's lifetime. Translated by A. Scholz, it was first shown on the Berlin stage in 1901.

Characters

Prozorov Andrey Sergeevich.

Natalya Ivanovna, his fiancee, then his wife.

Olga

Masha his sisters.

Irina

Kulygin Fedor Ilyich, gymnasium teacher, Masha’s husband.

Vershinin Alexander Ignatievich, lieutenant colonel, battery commander.

Tuzenbakh Nikolay Lvovich, baron, lieutenant.

Soleny Vasily Vasilievich, staff captain.

Chebutykin Ivan Romanovich, military doctor.

Fedotik Alexey Petrovich, second lieutenant.

Rode Vladimir Karlovich, second lieutenant.

Ferapont, watchman from the zemstvo council, old man.

Anfisa, nanny, old woman 80 years old.

The action takes place in a provincial town.

Act one

In the Prozorovs' house. Living room with columns, behind which a large hall is visible. Noon; It's sunny and fun outside. The breakfast table is set in the hall. Olga in the blue uniform of a female gymnasium teacher, constantly correcting student notebooks, standing as she walks; Masha in a black dress, with a hat on her knees, sitting and reading a book; Irina in a white dress stands thoughtfully.

Olga. My father died exactly a year ago, exactly on this day, the fifth of May, on your name day, Irina. It was very cold and it was snowing then. It seemed to me that I would not survive, you lay in a faint, as if dead. But now a year has passed, and we remember this easily, you are already in a white dress, your face is shining...

The clock strikes twelve.

And then the clock also struck.

Pause.

I remember when they were carrying my father, music was playing and there was shooting in the cemetery. He was a general, commanded a brigade, yet few people came. However, it was raining then. Heavy rain and snow.

Irina. Why remember!

Behind the columns, in the hall near the table, the baron is shown Tuzenbakh, Chebutykin And Salty.

Olga. It’s warm today, you can keep the windows wide open, and the birches haven’t yet blossomed. My father received a brigade and left Moscow with us eleven years ago, and, I remember very well, at the beginning of May, at this time, everything in Moscow was already in bloom, warm, everything was flooded with sun. Eleven years have passed, but I remember everything there as if we left yesterday. My God! This morning I woke up, saw a lot of light, saw spring, and joy stirred in my soul, I passionately wanted to go home.

Chebutykin. Hell no!

Tuzenbach. Of course it's nonsense.

Masha, thinking about a book, quietly whistles a song.

Olga. Don't whistle, Masha. How can you do this!

Pause.

Because I’m at the gymnasium every day and then give lessons until the evening, I constantly have a headache and thoughts like I’m already old. And in fact, during these four years, while I have been serving in the gymnasium, I feel how strength and youth are leaving me drop by drop every day. And one dream only grows and gets stronger...

Irina. To go to Moscow. Sell the house, end it all here and go to Moscow...

Olga. Yes! More likely to Moscow.

Chebutykin and Tuzenbach laugh.

Irina. The brother will probably be a professor, he still won't live here. Only here is a stop for poor Masha.

Olga. Masha will come to Moscow for the whole summer, every year.

Masha quietly whistles a song.

Irina. God willing, everything will work out. (Looking out the window.) Nice weather today. I don’t know why my soul is so light! This morning I remembered that I was the birthday girl, and suddenly I felt joy, and remembered my childhood, when my mother was still alive! And what wonderful thoughts excited me, what thoughts!

Olga. Today you are all shining, you seem incredibly beautiful. And Masha is beautiful too. Andrei would be good, but he has gained a lot of weight, it doesn’t suit him. And I’ve gotten older, I’ve lost a lot of weight, which must be because I’m angry with the girls at the gymnasium. Today I’m free, I’m at home, and I don’t have a headache, I feel younger than yesterday. I’m twenty-eight years old, only... Everything is fine, everything is from God, but it seems to me that if I got married and sat at home all day, it would be better.

Pause.

I would love my husband.

Tuzenbach (To Solyony). You talk such nonsense, I'm tired of listening to you. (Entering the living room.) I forgot to say. Today our new battery commander Vershinin will visit you. (Sits down at the piano.)

Olga. Well! I am very happy.

Irina. He is old?

Tuzenbach. There is nothing. At most, about forty, forty-five years. (Plays quietly.) Apparently a nice guy. Not stupid, that's for sure. He just talks a lot.

Irina. Interesting person?

Tuzenbach. Yes, wow, just my wife, mother-in-law and two girls. Moreover, he is married for the second time. He makes visits and everywhere says that he has a wife and two girls. And he will say it here. The wife is kind of crazy, with a long girlish braid, says only pompous things, philosophizes and often attempts suicide, obviously to annoy her husband. I would have left this one a long time ago, but he tolerates it and only complains.

Salty (entering the living room with Chebutykin from the hall). With one hand I lift only one and a half pounds, and with two, five, even six pounds. From this I conclude that two people are stronger than one, not twice, but three times, even more...

Chebutykin (reads a newspaper while walking). For hair loss... two spools of naphthalene in half a bottle of alcohol... dissolve and use daily... (Writes it down in a book.) Let's write it down! (To Solyony.) So, I tell you, the cork is stuck into the bottle, and a glass tube passes through it... Then you take a pinch of the simplest, most ordinary alum...

Irina. Ivan Romanych, dear Ivan Romanych!

Chebutykin. What, my girl, my joy?

Irina. Tell me why am I so happy today? It’s as if I’m on sails, there’s a wide blue sky above me and big white birds are flying around. Why is this? From what?

Chebutykin (kissing both her hands, tenderly). My white bird...

Irina. When I woke up today, got up and washed my face, it suddenly began to seem to me that everything in this world was clear to me and I knew how to live. Dear Ivan Romanych, I know everything. A person must work, work hard, no matter who he is, and in this alone lies the meaning and purpose of his life, his happiness, his delight. How good it is to be a worker who gets up early and breaks stones on the street, or a shepherd, or a teacher who teaches children, or a driver on the railway... My God, not like a man, it’s better to be an ox, it’s better to be a simple horse, if only work than a young woman who gets up at twelve o'clock in the afternoon, then drinks coffee in bed, then takes two hours to get dressed... oh, how terrible it is! In hot weather, sometimes I get so thirsty that I want to work. And if I don’t get up early and work, then deny me your friendship, Ivan Romanych.