Chekhov as a symbol of the loss of meaning in human life. "Seagull" A

In the second third of the 18th century, a new “rhetorical agitation model” was formed for Russia: conditions arise under which the government communicates with society, assuming the presence of feedback.... This feedback became the performing arts. Sumarokov the playwright was one of the first to recognize himself as a professional theater figure who bears personal responsibility to art and the audience and is no longer just a conductor of the ideas of the “spectator on the throne.”

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Artemyeva L. S.

“Hamlet” microplot in the play by A.P. Chekhov's "The Seagull"

The article examines Shakespearean allusions and reminiscences that introduce “Hamlet’s” microplots into A. P. Chekhov’s play “The Seagull”. The “movement” of microplots actualizes certain genre dominants (tragedy, drama, comedy) and determines the development of the main conflict of the play.

Key words: Shakespeare, Chekhov, “The Seagull”, microplot, genre.

In domestic and foreign literary criticism, “The Seagull” is considered to be Chekhov’s most “Hamlet” play. Comparing “The Seagull” with “Hamlet”, researchers paid attention to the scenic originality of both plays, in which “the main event is continuously

is put down." “Sharp turns, interruptions in the state of the heroes” “The Seagulls”, which help reveal the main conflict of the play and convey its main tonality, according to scientists, also go back to the Shakespearean tradition. Tracing Shakespearean allusions and reminiscences in Chekhov’s play, B.I. Zingerman notes that all the heroes of “The Seagull” are “the heirs of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the first in world drama for whom the solution to the eternal damned questions about the meaning of life and the purpose of man has become more important than all other interests.” Noting this feature of Chekhov's play, the author of the idea emphasizes that this refers to such features of Shakespeare's hero as a tendency to rational thinking, reflection, and thoughtful slowness in decision-making. The same point of view is shared by J. G. Adler, considering the main - “Hamlet” - conflict of “The Seagull” in a social class manner. The researcher comes to the conclusion that Chekhov “retold Hamlet’s situation in realistic middle-class terms” (the translation hereinafter is ours. - L.A): Shakespeare’s tragedy “depicts a world in which the aristocratic tradition still works, in which the hero does not just die so his death means something, in which an aristocratic mistake can be corrected by an aristocratic act. "The Seagull" shows a world in which aristocratic traditions are dying,<...>shows the fatal impracticality of the aristocratic world, in which most people - and among them such non-aristocrats infected by aristocrats as Masha and Trigorin - have become small versions of Hamlet." Considering the “unheroic” nature of Chekhov’s characters in a more generalized manner, T.G. Winner sees Shakespearean references as a way of creating an ironic subtext that reflects the "tragedy of mediocrity".

Despite a significant amount of research into Chekhov's play, the question of its genre still remains open. Chekhov himself defined it as a comedy, but currently it is classified as a tragicomedy (“tragicomedy of heartfelt “inconsistencies”), a synthetic genre that combines elements of tragic and comic conflicts. The definition of the genre specificity of a play, from our point of view, can be given as a result of an analysis of its structural features, in particular, the structure of the plot. According to O.M. Freudenberg, “what the plot tells through its composition, what the hero of the plot tells about himself, is<...>worldview response to life." The character's worldview, which determines his role in the movement of the plot, is fixed, according to Freudenberg, in certain genre forms. Each microplot of “The Seagull” informs about the presence in the play of certain genre dominants, which in the course of the development of the action are developed or, conversely, suppressed. Z.S. drew attention to the important role of microplots in the play. Paperny, who pointed out that the entire plot of the play is made up of microplots in which the characters “not only express

they say, confess, argue, act - they offer each other different stories that express their understanding of life, their point of view, their “concept”. (Among the named microplots, a special role belongs to microplots in which “the heroes refer to the classics”). Shakespearean microplots of the play can be distinguished into a separate group, among which the most significant is “Hamlet’s”, associated with the image of Treplev.

Treplev is the most “Hamletian” figure in “The Seagull”: he “looks like Hamlet in his intelligence, his hyperactive imagination, which weighs him down, and his suicidal tendencies; he feels like a stranger in the space around him, suffers from the unrealization of his social position (Hamlet is the son of a king, Treplev is the son of a wealthy aristocrat), thirsts for revenge (Treplev challenges Trigorin to a duel).” The character traits of the characters listed by the researcher indicate the main similarities of the characters - their loneliness, alienation from the world around them; It is precisely this dominant motif in “The Seagull” that reveals the Hamletian subtext of Chekhov’s play. If Hamlet is initially given as a hero who knows the truth about the world, then Treplev is a hero seeking the truth; he contrasts himself with his mother and Trigorin, who in his mind are the embodiment of a world hostile to him: “She loves the theater, it seems to her that she serves humanity, sacred art, but in my opinion, modern theater is a routine, a prejudice.<...>New forms are needed. New forms are needed, and if they are not there, then nothing better is needed.” Thus, Treplev sees the possibility of realizing his ideal in the future, but not by restoring the lost harmony of the past, as the Danish prince says, but by criticizing the present, believing in the possibility of the triumph of new life principles. Art becomes a tool for transforming reality for the hero, since he is confident that it should “depict life not as it is, and not as it should be, but as it appears in dreams.”

The motif of contrasting past and future is developed in the following lines from scene 4 of Act III of Shakespeare’s tragedy, which can be considered as a kind of prologue to Treplev’s play:

Arkadina (reading from Hamlet): “My son! You turned your eyes inside my soul, and I saw it in such bloody, such deadly ulcers - there is no salvation!

Treplev (from Hamlet): “And why did you succumb to vice, looking for love in the abyss of crime?” .

As we remember, in Shakespeare, Hamlet invites his mother to look at the portrait of Claudius, a man who has become for the prince a symbol of the depravity of the present, and compare it with the portrait of the late king, personifying the era of nobility and triumph of civic duty (“Look here, upon this picture, and on this , / The counterfeit presentation of two brothers" III, 4 (“Look, here is a portrait, and here is another, / Skillful likenesses

two brothers" (translated by M. Lozinsky - L.A.)). Chekhov’s Arkadina seems to be declaring her readiness to listen to new forms of art, but in reality she is only playing another role, and remains indifferent to her son’s play: “He himself warned that it was a joke, and I treated his play as a joke.” . Researchers have more than once drawn attention to Hamlet’s character and the play-within-the-play itself: “Arkadina’s statement<...>that Treplev treats his play as a joke is reminiscent of The Murder of Gonzago, about which Hamlet<...>says: “No, no! They’re just joking, they’re being sarcastic for fun, nothing offensive.” In fact, both performances were given with serious intentions” (our translation - L.A.).

On the other hand, this unhappened dispute about art, which precedes the performance with a quote given in Polevoy’s translation, emphasizes the everyday plan of the play and turns out to be practically an accusation of the mother of betraying her husband’s memory and at the same time an assertion of Treplev’s superiority over Trigorin as a writer, as researchers have already written about. Apparently, one should agree with the statement that the image of Trigorin can be considered as a reminiscence of the image of Claudius, not only because the very situation of the “triangle” of Chekhov’s play goes back to Shakespeare’s tragedy, but also because Claudius “killed something, which Treplev idealized, like Hamlet idealized his father.” The “associations that arise in this scene: Treplev is Hamlet, Arkadina is the queen, Trigorin is the king who took the throne wrongly,” aggravate the motive of alienation in the image of Treplev, who, like Shakespeare’s Hamlet, betrayed by Gertrude and Ophelia, turns out to be betrayed not only by his mother, but also Nina, who left him for Trigorin. Thanks to Hamlet’s motifs, introduced by reminiscences and quotes, Treplev’s opposition to the world around him receives psychological motivation: through external collisions the hero’s internal conflict is realized. The main problem driving the action of the play turns out to be the eternal conflict of generations, the struggle between “youth, forever daring in art,” which “Chekhov saw in the form of a Shakespearean, Hamletian situation: next to the young rebel from the very beginning in the plan there are his opponents - usurpers who captured places in art, “rutiners” - a mother-actress with her lover." However, from the very beginning, the impossibility of Treplev’s victory in this struggle is obvious, which is emphasized by reminiscences of Shakespeare’s tragedy: in contrast to the successful production of Hamlet, Treplev’s experimental play fails, which, according to Winner, symbolizes “Treplev’s obvious powerlessness,” “his inability to cope with life."

The conflict between Chekhov's hero and the world develops in a different sequence than in Shakespeare, and this is the fundamental innovation of The Seagull. The plot of Hamlet consistently introduces us to the hero

first in a situation of despair, leading him to thoughts of suicide (I, 2), then, having learned the truth from the Phantom (I, 4), he enters into an external confrontation with the world, playing out the “mousetrap” scene as part of the plan (III, 2) , having become convinced of terrible suspicions, denounces his mother (III, 4) and thus moves towards the inevitable fulfillment of his duty. Chekhov's Treplev first argues with his mother, then experiences the failure of his play, and only then makes an unsuccessful suicide attempt. From the possibility of success, Chekhov's hero moves to unequivocal failure: he begins with confidence in his rightness and comes to disappointment, abandoned by everyone.

At the same time, the external development of the hero’s internal conflict in Chekhov’s play is repeated twice: the third act opens with a scene in which Arkadina changes her son’s bandage and which, according to most researchers, resembles the scene in the queen’s chambers from Shakespeare’s tragedy (III, 4), a quote from which was preceded Treplev's performance. Here Chekhov’s hero directly accuses his mother of having an affair with Trigorin, like Shakespeare’s Hamlet, accusing his mother of succumbing to vice, and again Treplev’s dispute with Arkadina also turns out to be a dispute about art:

Treplev: I don’t respect you. You want me to also consider him a genius, but, forgive me, I don’t know how to lie, his works sicken me.

Arkadina: This is envy. People who are not talented, but have pretensions, have no choice but to condemn real talents. Nothing to say, consolation!

Treplev (ironically): Real talents! (Angrily.) I’m more talented than all of you, for that matter! (Tears off the bandage from his head.) You, routinists, have seized primacy in art and consider legitimate and real only what you do yourself, and you oppress and stifle the rest! I don't recognize you! I don’t recognize either you or him! .

But this dispute ends in nothing, just like the first one. If Hamlet’s words about the “ulcers of her soul” are heard by the mother, then Treplev’s judgments are not perceived by those to whom they are addressed. Both scenes - Shakespeare's and Chekhov's - end with an image of an illusory reconciliation of the characters, but the nature of this reconciliation is different. If Hamlet “can afford to be tender” with his mother, “like an adult, confident in the rightness of his action” and able to forgive a weak woman, then Treplev is an adult child who, in a moment of weakness, “sits down and quietly cries,” feeling pity for yourself and only then to your mother). This conversation with his mother is followed by Treplev’s new insight, the realization that “the point is not in old or new forms, but in the fact that a person writes without thinking about any forms, writes because it flows freely from his soul.” . However, he fails to put this understanding into practice. Addressing Nina, he says: “I’m lonely, not warmed by anyone’s affection, I’m cold, like in a dungeon, and no matter what I write, it’s all dry, callous, gloomy,” he

again finds himself abandoned by his mother and abandoned by Nina. The futility of all his aspirations, attempts to realize himself in art, to create something real ends - this time successfully - in suicide.

Both times, during the development of the internal conflict, Chekhov's character moves from a somewhat strong and active position to a weak one that psychologically destroys him. He is defeated in an argument with Arkadina (he interrupts the play the first time and cries the second), despite his passion and openness, he does not become a great writer (his play does not find a response in anyone, and having become more or less famous, he also is not satisfied with himself and sees his shortcomings), unable to survive defeat (in love and art), he passes away. Reminiscences of “Hamlet” constantly emphasize the hero’s failure. The unconditional sincerity of the character’s beliefs is not realized; he is not able to embody them.

Reminiscences of Shakespeare's tragedy and a quotation from it introduce Hamlet's motives into the development of the action, each of which corresponds to a certain way of developing the conflict and, accordingly, a special type of behavior of the hero. However, in Chekhov's play they each time receive the opposite interpretation (despite the fact that their content - an argument with the mother, rejection of her lover, opposition to the world - remains the same), as if realized with the opposite sign. By repeating Hamlet's conflict twice in reverse order, Chekhov “forces” Treplev to experience an anti-tragedy, the only way out of which is death. Suicide at the end of the play turns out to be the only successful act of the hero, which actualizes the tragic mode, constantly recalled and at the same time constantly removed through Shakespearean references.

At the same time, Treplev’s “Hamlet” plot also includes other characters, each of whom implements the said microplot in his own way.

In the second act, commenting on Trigorin’s appearance in front of Nina, who is carried away by him, Treplev says: “Here comes true talent; steps like Hamlet, and also with a book. (Teases.) “Words, words, words...”.” On the one hand, this remark is ironic, since the image of Claudius “shines through” in Treplev’s words. The irony is enhanced by a quotation from the tragedy: Prince Polonius’s answer to the question of what he is reading indicates both the meaninglessness of the question itself (and at the same time all the “cunning” questions of Polonius), and the unimportance of everything that can be written. In Trigorin’s works, Treplev also sees only empty words devoid of meaning. On the other hand, this irony also turns against Treplev himself, since Nina is passionate about the writer just as she once was passionate about him. In addition, the scene Treplev refers to in his sarcastic remark precedes the scene of Hamlet's meeting with Ophelia, set up by Polonius and Claudius. Thus,

Chekhov's hero turns out to be betrayed as if twice: Nina leaves him for someone similar to himself, but only successful in the literary field. Moreover, the Hamlet reference that appears in this episode seems to correlate with the not entirely unambiguous character of Trigorin, despite the fact that, according to the son, the mother’s lover occupies the only possible position of “usurper” and “routineer” in art. Chekhov's Trigorin turns out to be capable of self-irony, and is not without a sober view of himself: “I never liked myself. I don't like myself as a writer. The worst thing is that I’m in a kind of daze and often don’t understand what I’m writing...<...>I talk about everything, I’m in a hurry, they push me from all sides, they get angry, I rush from side to side,<...>, I see that life and science are moving forward and forward, but I am falling behind and falling behind<...>and, in the end, I feel that I can only paint a landscape, and in everything else I am false and false to the core.” Trigorin, who cannot find his place, do what he really would like to do (spend his days on the shore of the lake and fish), does not create his own plot, but always turns out to be a character in the plot of “another,” as indicated by references to Shakespeare’s tragedy. Through the efforts of Arkadina, he is attached to her and, as a result, embodies the figure of Claudius in the eyes of Treplev, he is a hero like Hamlet in the eyes of Nina, who is in love with him, - while in fact, he, being a little this, a little that, turns out to be nothing, which is emphasized by that that he forgets all previous plots. To Shamraev’s remark that at his request a stuffed seagull was made, he replies: “I don’t remember”). Thus, Trigorin does not consciously commit a single action, but rather plays the role of a plot circumstance in the destinies of Nina, Treplev, and Arkadina. The change of tragic roles offered to him by other characters has the character of comic inconsistencies: Trigorin’s plot roles do not correspond to each other, they are replaced randomly and without the conscious participation of the hero himself.

Nina is also included in Treplev's Hamlet plot. Researchers point to a number of formal signs that establish similarities between Nina Zarechnaya and Ophelia: she “is also patronized beyond measure by her father<...>and also unsuccessfully"; “she falls in love with two men endowed with Hamlet-like traits”; “both girls are going crazy because of the actions of the men they love.” In relation to Treplev, Nina takes the position of Ophelia, who betrayed the prince by obeying her father’s advice; in relation to Trigorin, also associated with Hamlet within the Chekhov play, - Ophelia, betrayed by the prince who refused her love (“Hamlet: I did love you once. Ophelia: Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so. Hamlet: You should don't have believed me;<...>I loved you not. Ophelia: I was the more deceived" (III, 1) /"Hamlet: I loved you once. Ophelia: Yes, my prince, and I had the right to believe it. Hamlet: You believed me in vain;<...>I didn't love you. Ophelia: Tem

I was more deceived" (translated by M. Lozinsky - L.A.)). At the same time, the love conflict of the characters unexpectedly turns out to be motivated by the fact that Nina does not accept Treplev’s play, which destroys classical traditions: his drama lacks action, there is “only reading” in it, and “in the play,” according to the heroine, “there must certainly be love ... ". The theme of love is closely intertwined with the theme of art: it is the desire for traditional and successful art that draws her to Trigorin (“How I envy you, if only you knew!”). However, he does not live up to her hopes not only by the fact that he does not break off relations with Arkadina, but also - and this is more important for the heroine - by his attitude towards the theater: “He did not believe in the theater, he kept laughing at my dreams, and little by little I did too I stopped believing and lost heart..."

As researchers point out, there is a close connection between the reminiscence of Ophelia and the symbol of the seagull, forming the image of Nina. The symbol of the seagull includes the heroine in the plot of Trigorin’s unwritten story: “The plot for a short story: a young girl like you has lived on the shore of a lake since childhood; loves the lake like a seagull, and is happy and free like a seagull. But by chance a man came, saw it, and out of nothing to do, killed it, like this seagull.” It is noteworthy that the image of the destroyed seagull is taken from the story about himself proposed by Treplev: “I had the meanness to kill this seagull today.<...>Soon I will kill myself in the same way,” and was interpreted by his rival in a different way. All the “Hamlet” microplots we have examined indicate that not a single idea of ​​Treplev-“Hamlet”, not a single act of his is realized as intended. The plot of an accidentally ruined life from Treplev’s initially tragic plot is picked up by Trigorin and retells it as an ordinary story, which dramatically changes its pathos, giving the conflict an everyday character. It is noteworthy that Trigorin does not even remember him at the end of the play, because he creates unconsciously, on inspiration, which once again emphasizes the comical nature (precisely in the sense of non-conformity with a given model) of his figure.

The image of Nina unites all the plots that were not embodied by the other characters: Treplev, who strives for true art, and the naive Ophelia, and the murdered seagull (both in Treplev’s version and in Trigorin’s version), and her own (with an unsuccessful career, death of a child, feeling of guilt before Treplev). Therefore, the final clash of the heroine “with herself is dramatically contrasting”: it is as if all the possible conflicts of all the characters have merged in her. It is no coincidence that her last words are the beginning of the monologue of the world soul from Treplev’s play, which continued as follows: “. and I remember everything, everything, everything, and I relive every life in myself again.” Turning to Treplev’s play indicates a deep understanding

Nina’s understanding of everything that happened: she is the only character who realizes the unproductiveness and falsity of all the plots offered by the heroes to each other, and consciously strives to go beyond them (at the end of the play, in a conversation with Treplev, she constantly repeats: “I am a seagull... No, not that" ). However, she does not succeed: her speech is confused, remembering, she wanders between different subjects (Treplev, Trigorin, love, theater), unable to figure out which one is real. Nina's internal contradictions are never resolved, and her discrepancy with herself takes on a tragic sound.

Reminiscences and allusions to Shakespeare’s tragedy “Hamlet” include each character in “The Seagull” in various variations of the Hamlet plot: however, while maintaining its meaningful side, they embody it not as a tragedy, but as an anti-tragedy (Treplev), drama (Nina), comedy (Trigorin ). As part of the main “Hamlet” conflict, each character embodies several different microplots, reflecting their own worldview or the one attributed to them by other characters. Overlapping, the microplots either reinforce each other (the confrontation between Treplev and Trigorin, the “madness” of unfortunate Nina), or refute each other (the confrontation between Treplev and Arkadina, Trigorin’s “Hamletism”). Either actualizing or suppressing the tragic dominants of the proposed conflicts, microplots ensure their movement and development within the framework of the main plot of the play: guided by their personal truth, each hero tries to navigate life, but as the Shakespearean references embodied in these microplots show, none of them can do this succeeds.

Bibliography

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2. Kataev V.B. Chekhov's literary connections. - M.: Moscow State University Publishing House, 1989. - 261 p.

3. Paperny Z.S. “The Seagull” by A.P. Chekhov. - M.: Artist. lit., 1980. - 160 p.

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5. Freidenberg O.M. Poetics of plot and genre. - M.: Labyrinth, 1977. - 449 p.

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Analysis of the play by A.P. Chekhov's "The Seagull"

In 1895, A.P. Chekhov began working on “The Seagull”. This play is perhaps the most personal of all his works. This is his only major work directly devoted to the theme of art. The author talks about his secrets - about the difficult path of an artist, about the essence of artistic talent, about what human happiness is.

“The Seagull” is an elegant creation by Chekhov the playwright. It is truly simple and complex, like life itself, and its true theme is not immediately revealed to readers, just as it is not immediately possible to understand those complex situations, the contradictory tangles of circumstances that life bestows. The author seems to offer us a choice of different options for understanding the play.

The main thing in “The Seagull” is the theme of heroism. In art, the one who is capable of feat wins.

On the shore of a beautiful lake lived a lovely girl, Nina Zarechnaya. She dreamed of the stage, of fame. A young neighbor on the estate, Konstantin Treplev, an aspiring writer, was in love with her. And Nina reciprocated his feelings. He also dreamed: of fame and of “new forms” in art.

Treplev wrote a play - unusual, strange, in a decadent spirit, and staged it for family and friends in an original setting: from the stage in the park, a view of a real lake opens up.

Nina Zarechnaya plays the main role in this play.

Treplev's mother, Arkadina, a domineering, capricious woman, an actress spoiled by fame, openly ridicules her son's play. The proud Treplev orders the curtain to be drawn. The performance ended without ending. The play failed.

Arkadina brought with her her life partner, the famous writer Trigorin, and Nina fell in love with him with all passion. Her tender relationship with Treplev turned out to be just an easy dream of her youth.

Nina breaks up with her family, enters the stage, and leaves for Moscow, where Trigorin lives. He became interested in Nina, but his intimacy with Trigorin ends tragically for her. He stopped loving her and returned “to his former affections” - to Arkadina. Nina had a child from Trigorin. The child died.

The life of Konstantin Treplev is shattered. He attempted suicide after breaking up with Nina. However, he continues to write, his stories even began to be published in metropolitan magazines. But his life is joyless: he is unable to overcome his love for Nina.

Nina Zarechnaya became a provincial actress. After a long separation, she again visits her native places. Her meeting with Treplev takes place. He begins to hope for the resumption of their previous relationship. But she still loves Trigorin - she loves “even more than before.” The play ends with Treplev's suicide. His life was cut short, as was his performance.

Chekhov wrote about the play that it contains “a lot of talk about literature, little action, five pounds of love.” It may seem that unhappy love is the main theme of “The Seagull.” But this is just a “plot for a short story” by Trigorin, and not at all for a big play by Chekhov. This plot exists in “The Seagull” only as a possibility, refuted by the entire course of the action, as a hint that could come true, but does not come true.

Nina and Konstantin lived in a quiet world of tender feelings and dreams. But then they both met life as it really is. But in fact, life can be not only gentle, but also rough. "Life is rough!" - Nina says in the fourth act. And in real life everything can be much more difficult than it seems in young dreams.

Art seemed to Nina a radiant path to fame, a wonderful dream. But then she came into life. Immediately a terrible burden fell on her fragile shoulders. The person I loved “didn’t believe in the theater, he kept laughing at my dreams, and little by little I also stopped believing and lost heart,” Nina tells Treplev at their last meeting. - And here are the worries of love, jealousy, constant fear for the little one... I became petty, insignificant, played meaninglessly... I didn’t know what to do with my hands, I didn’t know how to stand on stage, I didn’t have control of my voice. You don't understand this state when you feel like you're playing terrible."

She, a dreamy girl, encountered drunken merchants and the unimaginable vulgarity of the then provincial theatrical world. She, feminine, graceful, managed to withstand the collision of dreams with life. At the cost of heavy sacrifices, Nina won the truth that “in our business - it doesn’t matter whether we play on stage or write - the main thing is not fame, not brilliance, not what I dreamed of, but the ability to endure. Know how to bear your cross and believe. I believe, and it doesn’t hurt me so much, and when I think about my calling, I’m not afraid of life.”

These are words obtained at the cost of youth, at the cost of all trials, at the cost of those sufferings that are known to an artist who hates what he does, who despises himself, his uncertain figure on the stage, his poor language in the story. Nina has faith, she has strength, she has will, she now has knowledge of life and has her own happiness.

So, through the darkness and heaviness of life, overcome by the heroine, the reader hears the leitmotif of “The Seagull” - the theme of flight, victory. Nina rejects the version that she is a ruined seagull, that her sufferings, her searches, achievements, her whole life are just “a plot for a short story.” Not the fall of a shot seagull, but the flight of a beautiful, gentle, free bird - this is the poetic theme of the play.

When Treplev met Nina, he clearly saw how Nina had outgrown him. He still lives in that world of immature beautiful feelings in which he once lived. In his art, he still “doesn’t know what to do with his hands, doesn’t have a voice.” The consciousness that he has not yet achieved anything penetrates him with cruel force. Treplev now understood the reason for this. “You have found your path,” he says to Nina, “you know where you are going, but I am still running around in the chaos of dreams and images, not knowing why and who needs it. I don’t believe and I don’t know what my calling is.” He cannot do anything with his talent, because he has no goal, no faith, no knowledge of life, no courage, no strength. Having talked so much about innovation, he himself falls into a routine. Innovation cannot exist on its own; it is possible only as a conclusion from a bold knowledge of life; it is possible only with the richness of the soul and mind.

You cannot escape vulgarity by escaping into illusions, into dreams far from life. This is a false flight, inevitably ending in a fall, a return to even greater vulgarity. Treplev’s abstract “beautiful” dreams led him to such an ugly violation of the laws of life, hostile to beauty, as suicide. You can't run from vulgarity, you can't hide from it. Nina clearly sees the vile ordinariness of life, knows that “life is rough,” but does not run from vulgarity and rudeness to false dreams. She embodies true art, and true art is knowledge of the whole truth of life and the pursuit of beauty in life itself, and not just in a dream.

“The Seagull” is closely connected with Chekhov’s thoughts about the essence of talent, about the worldview, about the “general idea.” In Trigorin and Arkadina, the author notes features characteristic of a whole category of writers and artists of the eighties and nineties, who were not inspired by great ideological goals, high pathos and therefore inevitably fall into the grip of routine, inertia, and everyday life. This does not mean that Chekhov gave in the image of Nina Zarechnaya a realistically complete history of the artist’s formation and growth. Nina Zarechnaya, while maintaining the authenticity of her living character, at the same time appears to be a poetic symbol. This is the very soul of art, conquering darkness, cold, always striving “forward and higher!”

I was very lucky that among the topics on Chekhov’s dramaturgy was the one included in the title of the essay. Not only because “The Seagull” is my favorite Chekhov play, but also because it is so precisely because of the comprehensive study of art and creativity that Chekhov carries out with brutal and surgical precision in his comedy. In fact, if I were asked what Chekhov’s other plays are about, I could, of course, highlight the theme of the moribund old life of the nobility and the vigorous but also cynical capitalism that is replacing it in The Cherry Orchard, the leaden abominations of Russian provincial life in "Uncle Vanya", "Three Sisters" and "Ivanov", while in each play one could fruitfully talk about superbly developed love lines, and about the problems that come to a person with age, and about much more. But “The Seagull” has it all. That is, like all other “comedies”, “scenes” and dramas, “The Seagull” is about life, like any real literature, but also about what is most important for a creative person, writing, like Chekhov himself, writing for theater and who created a new mask for the ancient muse of the theater Melpomene - about Art, about serving it and about how art is created - about creativity.
If they wrote about actors, their lives, their cursed and sacred craft back in ancient times, then the writers themselves started talking about the creator - the author of the text much later. The semi-mystical process of creativity began to be revealed to the reader only in the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. Gogol in “Portrait”, Oscar Wilde in “The Picture of Dorian Gray”, J. London in “Martin Eden”, Mikhail Bulgakov in “The Master and Margarita”, and in our time His Majesty the Author is becoming almost the most beloved hero of prose writers and playwrights.
Now it is difficult to understand whether Chekhov, with his “The Seagull,” gave impetus to this research boom, or whether just any writer at some point comes to the need to figure out how he writes, how his description and perception of reality relates to life itself, why he needs this himself and the people, what it brings to them, where he stands among other creators.
Almost all of these questions are posed and resolved in one way or another in the play "The Seagull". "The Seagull" is Chekhov's most theatrical play, because it stars writers Trigorin and Treplev and two actresses - Arkadina and Zarechnaya. In the best Shakespearean traditions, another scene is symbolically present on the stage; at the beginning of the play there is a beautiful, mysterious, promising scene with natural scenery, as if saying to both the audience and the participants in the big performance taking place in the estate: “It will still be. The play has just begun. Look!" and in the end - ominous, dilapidated, useless to anyone, which is too lazy to take apart or is simply scary. “Finita la comedia,” the participants in this “human comedy” could say, if according to Balzac. The curtain closes. Isn’t it the case in “Hamlet” that the traveling comedians reveal what people cannot say to each other openly and directly, but are forced to play life much more subtly than the actors do?

I would not be afraid to say that Art, Creativity and the attitude towards them are perhaps one of the most important characters in comedy, if not the main characters. It is with the touch of art, as well as love, that Chekhov trusts and rules his heroes. And it turns out right - neither art nor love forgives lies, false pretense, self-deception, and momentariness. Moreover, as always in this world, and in the world of Chekhov’s characters, in particular, it is not the scoundrel who is rewarded, but the conscientious one who is rewarded for being wrong. Arkadina lies both in art and in love, she is a craftsman, which in itself is commendable, but a craft without the spark of God, without self-denial, without the “intoxication” on the stage, to which Zarechnaya comes, is nothing, it is day labor, it is a lie. However, Arkadina triumphs in everything - both in the possession of tinsel success in life, and in forced love, and in the worship of the crowd. She is well-fed, youthful, “in tune”, self-satisfied, as only very narrow-minded people who are always right in everything can be, and what does she care about the art that she, in fact, serves? For her, this is just a tool with the help of which she ensures a comfortable existence for herself, indulges her vanity, and keeps with her someone she does not even love, no, a fashionable and interesting person. This is not a shrine. And Arkadina is not a priestess. Of course, we shouldn’t simplify her image; there are also interesting features in her that destroy the flat image, but we are talking about serving art, not about how she knows how to bandage wounds. If it were possible to expand Pushkin’s phrase about the incompatibility of genius and villainy, projecting it onto art and all its servants, among whom are geniuses, as Pushkin’s Mozart said - “you and me,” that is, not so many, and with the help of this criterion to check the servants of art depicted in the play, there would probably only be left Zarechnaya - pure, slightly exalted, strange, naive and so cruelly paid for all her sweet Turgenev qualities - paid with fate, faith, ideals, love, simple human life.
But the fact of the matter is that, apart from Arkadina, of the people associated with art in “The Seagull,” not a single one lives a simple human life, or can live. Art simply does not allow Chekhov’s heroes to do this, demanding sacrifices everywhere and continuously, in everything, everywhere and everywhere, contradicting Pushkin’s formulation “Until Apollo demands the poet to make a sacred sacrifice...”. Neither Treplev, nor Trigorin, nor Zarechnaya are able to live normally, because Apollo demands them to make a sacred sacrifice every second, for Trigorin this becomes almost a painful mania. He seems to confirm the old joke that the difference between writers and graphomaniacs is that the former get published, and the latter do not. Well, this difference between Trigorin and Treplev will disappear in just two years, between the third and fourth acts.
Well, who is the priest, restless, obsessed, tireless and merciless to himself, it is Trigorin. For him, according to the old Russian proverb, “hunting is worse than bondage”; If for Nina the biggest dream is creativity and fame, then for him it is fishing and life on the shore of an enchanted lake, far from the mad crowd. From the small evidence that is scattered throughout the pages of the play, one can judge that Trigorin is indeed talented. This neck of a bottle glinting on the bridge, and the shadow of a wheel in the moonlight, this amazing phrase about life that you can “come and take” - all this is written not so much worse than those Greats with whom Trigorin is constantly compared, tormenting and forcing him to doubt both in your gift and in the need to engage in creativity. However, for him creativity is not just bread, fun and fans, as for Arkadina, for him it is both a painful illness and an obsession, but also synonymous with life. He ruins Nina not because he is a villain, he just doesn’t live. He only writes. He is unable to understand the vitality of the allegory with the seagull, which became not an entertaining plot for a story, but a providence of what would happen to a living person, and to a woman who loved him with all the sincerity and strength of which she was generally capable. I can’t bring myself to blame Trigorin. He's not a scoundrel. He is a priest. He is blind and deaf to everything except his notebooks, he sees only images. He is Salieri, unable to realize that he is tearing music apart like a corpse. Taking landscapes into talented, even ingenious miniatures, he turns them into still lifes, natur mort - dead nature. Even understanding the civic tasks of his work, the responsibility for the word to the reader, the “educational function of art,” he does not feel within himself the ability to do anything in this field - this is not the right talent. But a poet in Russia is more than a poet.

Naive Nina! From her point of view, “whoever has experienced the pleasure of creativity, for him all other pleasures no longer exist.”

Director's analysis of the play, life and aesthetic position. The reason for the failure of the play, the artistic trend and material of the new play, devotion to art, the crisis situation in Russian art. The trend of modern cultural consciousness and dialectics.

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Department of Culture of the Belgorod Region

Belgorod State Institute of Culture and Arts

Faculty of Artistic Creativity

Department of Theater Creativity

Course work

in the disciplines of directing and acting

“Director's analysis of the play by A.P. Chekhov's "The Seagull"

Completed:

Student 31RTK group

Katasonova I.S.

Scientific adviser:

Senior Lecturer

Department of TT Brusensky V.A.

Belgorod - 2010

1. Director's analysis of the play

Justification for choice

“The Seagull” was written in Melikhovo. In this play, Chekhov for the first time so openly expressed his life and aesthetic position, showing people of art in it. This is a play about restless young artists and the smug, well-fed older generation guarding their conquered positions. This is a play about love (“Not enough action, five pounds of love,” Chekhov joked), about unrequited feelings, about mutual misunderstanding of people, the cruel disorder of personal destinies. Finally, this is a play about the painful search for the true meaning of life, a general idea, the purpose of existence, a certain worldview, without which life is “a complete mess, horror.”

The premiere of “The Seagull” took place on December 17, 1896 at the Alexandria Theater. From the very beginning of the action, it became clear that the play was perceived by the public in a completely different way than the author and directors had intended.

The day after the premiere, all morning St. Petersburg newspapers reported on the failure of the performance; reviewers noted the grandeur and scandalousness of the failure.

In the literature about Chekhov, there is a widespread assertion that the reasons for the failure of “The Seagull” primarily lay in the unsuccessful production of the Alexandria Theater: “Failure was inevitable, since the entire stable system of artistic means of this theater, corresponding to the stable, stereotyped forms of drama, was organically alien to the artistic tendency and the material of the new play.”

The production of “The Seagull” by the Moscow Art Theater (1898) introduced the art of Chekhov the playwright to the public. The performance was a great success. The flying seagull became the emblem of the Moscow Art Theater.

The play develops as a polyphonic, multi-voiced work, in which different motives are heard, different themes, plots, destinies, and characters intersect. All heroes coexist equally: there are no main or secondary destinies; first one or the other hero comes to the fore and then fades into the shadows. Obviously, therefore, it is impossible, and hardly necessary, to single out the main character of “The Seagull”. This question is not indisputable. There was a time when the heroine, undoubtedly, was Nina Zarechnaya; later Treplev became the hero. In some performances, the image of Masha comes forward, in some others, Arkadina and Trigorin outshine everyone.

The actress Arkadina is having an affair with the writer Trigorin, a bachelor at an advanced age. They understand things approximately equally and are each equally professional in their respective fields of art. Another pair of lovers is Arkadina's son Konstantin Treplev, who hopes to become a writer, and the daughter of a wealthy landowner Nina Zarechnaya, who dreams of becoming an actress. Then there are, as it were, falsely constructed pairs of lovers, the wife of the estate manager Shamraev, in love with a doctor, an old bachelor, Dorn, the Shamraevs’ daughter Masha, unrequitedly in love with Treplev. who, out of desperation, marries an unloved person. Even the former state councilor Sorin, a sick old man, admits that he sympathized with Nina Zarechnaya.

The sudden connection between Trigorin and Zarechnaya changed a lot in the lives of the characters in the play. The betrayal of a loved one, a faithful friend, stung Arkadina and brought unbearable pain to another person - Treplev, who sincerely loved Nina. He continued to love her when she went to Trigorin, and when she gave birth to a child from him, and when she was abandoned by him and became poor. But Zarechnaya managed to establish herself in life and, after a two-year break, reappeared in her native place. Treplev greeted her joyfully, believing that happiness was returning to him. But Nina was still in love with Trigorin, she was in awe of him, but she did not seek a meeting with him and soon suddenly left. Unable to bear the ordeal, Treplev shot himself.

Love, which engulfs almost all the characters, is the main action of “The Seagull”. But devotion to art is stronger than love. In Arkadina, both of these qualities - femininity and talent - merge into one. Trigorin is interesting precisely as a writer. In all other respects, he is a weak-willed creature and complete mediocrity. Out of habit, he trails after Arkadina, but leaves her when the opportunity arises to get along with the young Zarechnaya. You can explain such inconstancy of feelings to yourself by the fact that Trigorin is a writer and a new hobby - a kind of new page in life, which has a chance to become a new page in the book. This is partly true. We watch him write down in his notebook the thought that flashed through his mind about a “plot for a short story,” repeating exactly the life of Nina Zarechnaya: a young girl lives on the shore of a lake, she is happy and free, but by chance a man came, saw and had nothing to do ruined her. The scene in which Trigorin showed Zarechnaya the seagull killed by Treplev is symbolic. Treplev killed the bird - Trigorin kills Nina's soul.

Treplev is much younger than Trigorin, he belongs to a different generation and in his views on art acts as an antipode to Trigorin. and his mother. He himself believes that he is losing to Trigorin in everything: he has not succeeded as a person, his beloved is leaving him, his search for new forms was ridiculed as decadent. “I don’t believe and I don’t know what my calling is,” Treplev says to Nina, who, in his opinion, has found her path. These words immediately precede his suicide.

Thus, the truth remains with the average actress Arkadina, who lives with memories of her successes. Gregory also enjoys constant success. He is smug and on his last visit to Sorin’s estate he even brought a magazine with Treplev’s story. But. as Treplev noted, all this is for show: “He read his story, but didn’t even cut mine.” Trigorin condescendingly informs Treplev in front of everyone: “Your admirers send their regards to you... In St. Petersburg and Moscow they are generally interested in you. And everyone asks me about you.” Trigorin would like not to let go of the question of Treplev’s popularity; he would like to measure its measure himself: “They ask: what is he like, how old is he, brunette or blond. For some reason everyone thinks that you are no longer young.” This is how the ladies from Trigorin’s entourage are seen here; he tried to decolorize their questions even more. Trigorin literally erects a tombstone over a man whom he also robbed in his personal life.

Trigorin believes that Treplev’s unsuccessful writing is further confirmation that Treplev is unworthy of a different fate: “And no one knows your real name, since you publish under a pseudonym. You are as mysterious as the Iron Mask.” He does not suggest any other “mystery” in Treplev. If you listen more carefully to the characteristics of the heroes, to the definitions they give to each other, you can understand that Chekhov gives some preference to Treplev’s life position. Treplev's life is richer and more interesting than the sluggish, routine life that the other heroes lead, even the most spiritual ones - Arkadina and Trigorin.

It is quite obvious that all of Chekhov’s sympathies are on the side of the young, seeking generation, those who are just entering life. Although here too he sees different, non-merging paths. A young girl who grew up in an old noble estate on the lake, Nina Zarechnaya, and a dropout student in a shabby jacket, Konstantin Treplev, both strive to get into the wonderful world of art. They start together: the girl plays in a play written by a talented young man in love with her. The play is strange, abstract, it talks about the eternal conflict of spirit and matter. “We need new forms! - Treplev proclaims. “New forms are needed, and if they are not there, then nothing better is needed!”

A stage has been hastily put together in the evening garden. Perhaps a new work of art is being born here... But the play remains unfinished. Treplev’s mother, the famous actress Arkadina, demonstratively does not want to listen to “decadent nonsense.” The show has been cancelled. This reveals the incompatibility of two worlds, two views on life and positions in art.

“You, routinists, have seized primacy in art and consider only what you do yourself to be legitimate and real, and you oppress and stifle the rest! - Treplev rebels against his mother and successful writer Trigorin. - I don’t recognize you! I don’t recognize either you or him!”

In this conflict, a crisis situation emerges in Russian art and in life at the end of the 19th century, when “the old art went wrong, but the new one has not yet improved.” The old classical realism, in which the imitation of nature turned into an end in itself (“people eat, drink, love, walk, wear their jackets”), degenerated into nothing more than a clever technical craft. The art of the new, coming century is born in pain, and its path is not yet clear. “We must portray life not as it is, and not as it should be, but as it appears in dreams”—this Treplev program still sounds like a vague and pretentious declaration. With his talent, he pushed off from the old shore, but has not yet landed on the new one. And life without a definite worldview turns for the young seeker into a chain of continuous torment.

The loss of the “common idea - the living God of man” divides the people of the transitional era. Contacts are broken, everyone exists on their own, alone, incapable of understanding the other. That is why the feeling of love is so especially hopeless here: everyone loves, but everyone is unloved and everyone is unhappy.

The whole play is permeated with languor of spirit, anxieties of mutual misunderstanding, unrequited feelings, and general dissatisfaction. Even the most seemingly prosperous person - the famous writer Trigorin - secretly suffers from dissatisfaction with his fate, his profession, and in essence he is unhappy and lonely.

In a word, the feeling of the general unsettledness of life here is painful. Why, then, is the play called “The Seagull”?

And why, when reading it, is it captured and conquered by a special feeling of the poetry of its entire atmosphere? Most likely because Chekhov extracts poetry from the very disorder of life.

“The Seagull” is a motive for an eternal anxious flight, a stimulus for movement, a rush into the distance. The writer extracted not a banal “plot for a short story” from the story of a shot seagull, but an epically broad theme of bitter dissatisfaction with life, awakening languor, longing for a better future. Only through suffering does Nina Zarechnaya come to the idea that the main thing is not fame, not brilliance, not what she once dreamed of, but the ability to endure. “Know how to carry your cross and believe” - this hard-won call for courageous patience opens the tragic image of Chaika to an aerial perspective, a flight into the future, does not close it with historically outlined time and space, puts not an end, but an ellipsis in her fate.

I would not be afraid to say that Art, Creativity and the attitude towards them are perhaps one of the most important characters in comedy, if not the main characters at all. It is with the touch of art, as well as love, that Chekhov trusts and rules his heroes. And it turns out that everything is right - neither art nor love forgives lies, false pretense, self-deception, and momentariness. Moreover, as always in this world, and in the world of Chekhov’s characters, in particular, it is not the scoundrel who is rewarded, but the conscientious one who is rewarded for being wrong. Arkadina lies both in art and in love, she is a craftsman, which in itself is commendable, but a craft without the spark of God, without self-denial, without the “intoxication” on the stage, to which Zarechnaya comes, is nothing, it is day labor, it is a lie. However, Arkadina triumphs in everything - both in the possession of tinsel success in life, and in forced love, and in the worship of the crowd. She is well-fed, youthful, “in tune”, self-satisfied, as only very narrow-minded people who are always right in everything can be, and what does she care about the art that she, in fact, serves? For her, this is just a tool with the help of which she ensures a comfortable existence for herself, indulges her vanity, and keeps with her someone she does not even love, no, a fashionable and interesting person. This is not a shrine. And Arkadina is not a priestess. Of course, we shouldn’t simplify her image; there are also interesting features in her that destroy the flat image, but we are talking about serving art, not about how she knows how to bandage wounds. If it were possible to expand Pushkin’s phrase about the incompatibility of genius and villainy, projecting it onto art and all its servants, among whom are geniuses, as Pushkin’s Mozart said - “you and me,” that is, not so many, and with the help of this criterion to check the servants of art depicted in the play, probably only Zarechnaya would remain - pure, slightly exalted, strange, naive and so cruelly paid for all her sweet Turgenev qualities - paid with fate, faith, ideals, love, simple human life.

But the fact of the matter is that, apart from Arkadina, of the people associated with art in “The Seagull,” not a single one lives a simple human life, or can live. Art simply does not allow Chekhov’s heroes to do this, demanding sacrifices everywhere and continuously, in everything, everywhere and everywhere, contradicting Pushkin’s formulation “Until Apollo demands the poet to make a sacred sacrifice...”. Neither Treplev, nor Trigorin, nor Zarechnaya are able to live normally, because Apollo demands them to make a sacred sacrifice every second, for Trigorin this becomes almost a painful mania. He seems to confirm the old joke that the difference between writers and graphomaniacs is that the former get published, and the latter do not. Well, this difference between Trigorin and Treplev will disappear in just two years, between the third and fourth acts.

“The Seagull” differs sharply from Chekhov’s previous plays in its lyricism, symbolism and clearly defined clash of different concepts of art and concepts of life. There is a lot of love in “The Seagull”, i.e. it is shown how this powerful feeling filled all the heroes. The actress Arkadina is having an affair with the writer Trigorin, a bachelor at an advanced age. They understand things approximately equally and are each on the same level in their own sphere of art. Another pair of lovers is Arkadina's son Konstantin Treplev, who dreams of becoming a writer, and the daughter of a wealthy landowner Nina Zarechnaya, who dreams of becoming an actress. Then there are, as it were, falsely constructed pairs of lovers: the wife of the estate manager Shamraev is in love with Doctor Dorn, an old bachelor; The Shamaevs' daughter Masha, unrequitedly in love with Treplev, out of despair marries an unloved man. Even the former state councilor Sorin, a sick old man, admits that he sympathized with Nina Zarechnaya. Chekhov himself joked that in his “The Seagull” there are “five pounds of love.”

The love affairs in “The Seagull” develop sharply. Arkadina is stung by Trigorin Zarechnaya's sudden infatuation. And he seemed to her a faithful friend, “the last station of her life.” But, in general, she, being carried away herself, forgave him everything.

The connection between Trigorin and Zarechnaya brought unbearable pain to Treplev, who loved Nina. He continued to love her both when she went to Trigorin and gave birth to a child from him, and when she was abandoned by him and became poor. Without any outside help, Zarechnaya managed to establish herself in life. After a two-year break, Nina reappears in her native place, and she also comes to Sorin’s estate. Treplev greeted her joyfully, believing that happiness was returning to him. But she is still in love with Trigorin and is in awe of him. However, having learned that Trigorin is in the next room, she does not seek a meeting with him and suddenly leaves. Unable to bear the test, Treplev shoots himself.

Love, which engulfs almost all the characters, is the main action of “The Seagull”. But no less powerful is the devotion of her heroes to art. And this feeling, perhaps, turns out to be higher than love, it turns out to be the most powerful incentive for the actions of the main characters. In Arkadina, both of these qualities - femininity and talent - merge into one. Trigorin is undoubtedly interesting precisely as a writer. In literature he is a well-known person, they say about him that you can’t compare him only with Tolstoy and Zola, and many put him right after Turgenev. As a man, he is a weak-willed creature and a complete mediocrity. Out of habit, he trails after Arkadina, but immediately abandons her when he sees the young Zarechnaya. At the same time, he is a writer, a new hobby - a kind of new page in life, important for creativity. So he writes down in his notebook the thought that flashed through his mind about “a plot for a short story,” repeating exactly the life of Nina Zarechnaya: a young girl lives on the shore of a lake, she is happy and free, but “a man came by chance, saw it and “had nothing to do” ruined her. Trigorin pointed Zarechnaya to the seagull killed by Treplev. But Treplev killed the bird, Trigorin kills Nina’s soul.

Treplev is much younger than Trigorin, he belongs to a different generation and in his views on art he acts as an antipode to both Trigorin and his mother. He believes that “new forms are generally considered to be that Treplev is losing on all fronts: as a person he has not succeeded, his beloved is leaving him, his search for new forms was ridiculed as decadent.” “I don’t believe and I don’t know what my calling is,” he says to Nina, who, in his opinion, has found her path. These words immediately precede Treplev's suicide. It turns out, for better or for worse.

The work “The Seagull” by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, at first glance, is the most ordinary play, without any significant events or incidents. This play shows ordinary people's lives - a little love, a little intrigue and, of course, a lot of ordinary talk and a little action. It seems to me that the characterization given by Arkadina to Treplev’s play is an assessment of Chekhov’s entire work.

The action in the play unfolds sluggishly and coldly. No events - neither Medvedenko's love for Masha, nor Nina's unsettled personal life, nor the death of Konstantin Gavrilych - make an impression on the heroes. Huge pauses between actions slow down the flow of the play, making it smoother, without bright bursts. All these coldly perceived events indicate routine life with its regularity and routine.

Who in real life cares about feelings like love and events like suicide? The fate of several heroes did not work out, love faded, and Treplev shot himself - however, the end can hardly be called tragic, life goes on, everything flowed again along the old channel, someone just disappeared, but someone else will soon take his place.

Chekhov pointed out the vicious circle, dullness and routine of ordinary life. But perhaps this is only a superficial impression. Maybe life lies “in the hidden dramas and tragedies in every figure.” After all, the “seagull” herself, Nina Zarechnaya, although wounded by deceiving love, the death of a child, failures on stage, is not broken and believes that she will become a “great actress.” In Chekhov, the pitifully sentimental image proposed by Trigorin turns into a symbol of a difficult, even painful, but take-off.

The problem of “life purpose and purpose of a person” has always been of great importance in the life of not only a creative person, a person of art, but also in the life of an ordinary person. Anton Pavlovich Chekhov occupies an equally outstanding place in the world literary process both as a prose writer and as a playwright. But how He became a playwright earlier. At the age of eighteen, Chekhov began work on his first play, which was not published during the author’s lifetime. But Chekhov’s great work as a playwright began much later, eighteen years later, from “The Seagull,” which was completed in 1896. The author himself defined it as an unusual work, a work contrary to all the rules of drama. “The Seagull” is the most tragic comedy, the plot of which consists of a labyrinth of captures and passions, there is no way out of it, because there is no way out of a series of contradictory human feelings.

Love in the work is the sad facts of human relationships that do not develop: teacher Medvedenko loves Masha, Masha is passionately in love with Treplev, Treplev hopelessly pines for Nina, who, in turn, loves Trigorin. Events move past the heroes of the play. Of course, Treplev and Nina could make a wonderful couple and be happy. But she loves Trigorin, who, after a short affair with her, will return to Arkadina. All these illogical relationships create disharmony in the play, which turns from a unique comedy-tragedy into the most ordinary drama.

Teacher Medvedenko cannot talk about anything other than material wealth, because this is the problem of all teachers of that time: “I receive only twenty-three rubles a month, and they also deduct from me an emeritus, but still I do not wear mourning.”

Masha openly tells everyone that she is unhappy: “And I feel as if I was born a long time ago; I drag my life along with fiber, like an endless train. And often there is no desire to live.”

Consequently, from the first acts of the play it is clear that its atmosphere is dominated by general dissatisfaction with life. People are too absorbed in their own troubles, and therefore they do not hear each other. The atmosphere of the work is an atmosphere of complete psychological deafness.

Nina, after all her misfortunes, began to feel like a seagull that was shot by a man out of boredom. Like a seagull, she signed her letters when she despaired of life. But Nina is a strong person, a person who knows how to fight and dream: “I am already a real actress, I play with pleasure, with delight, I get drunk on stage and feel beautiful. And now, while I live here, I keep walking, I keep walking and I think, I think and I feel how my spiritual strength is growing every day.”

era

The cultural situation at the end of the 19th century was influenced by a number of factors, both social and cultural.

If we bear in mind the social relations that reigned in the country, then this was the time when, as one of the heroes of the drama “Dowry” says, “the triumph of the bourgeoisie” began. The transition to new forms of life is carried out quickly, even rapidly. “Another life” is coming. As M.V. correctly noted. Otradin, “this transition to a new life was sharply manifested in the development and approval of a different system of moral values, which was primarily of interest to writers.”

And among the factors of a cultural nature, the influence of L,N was especially significant and largely determining, for obvious reasons. Tolstoy and F.M. Dostoevsky.

The most important property of Dostoevsky's ideological world was complexity. He, like no one else in the 19th century, was able to reproduce with almost physical palpability the complexity of human spiritual life, the real complexity of existence, the insolubility of problems and the relativity of truth. In terms of the richness of its problematic content, Dostoevsky's work is unique.

Suppressed by the endless complexity of both reality itself and its understanding, the cultural consciousness of the era lost moral guidelines, and therefore spiritual health, often arriving at hopeless despair. The culture became destabilized and lost its vitality.

The tendency of the modern cultural consciousness of the 19th century is to master the dialectics of life as fully as possible, courageously and honestly accepting the most pressing questions and unresolved problems, not being satisfied with approximate answers, general considerations or slogans. All this is fully reflected in the works of F.M. Dostoevsky. But as noted by A.B. Esin, “another trend is no less relevant - the need of modern man to find stable guidelines in a complex and changing world, the desire to rely on something simple and clear, rooted in the long-term everyday practice of generations and absolutely not subject to doubt.”

These attempts to “take root”, to find support for a moral life, are reflected in Chekhov’s comedy “The Seagull”. “Never before have people so felt in their hearts the need to believe and so understood with their minds the impossibility of believing,” Mirezhkovsky asserted. “This insane unresolved dissonance, as well as unprecedented mental freedom, the courage of denial, lies the most characteristic feature of the mystical need of the 19th century. Our time must be defined by two opposing features - this is a time of the most extreme materialism and at the same time the most passionate ideal impulses of the spirit."

In Chekhov's play, only man and his soul, his conscience, his ideals, his understanding of life, his feelings are explored.

A person, according to I. Vishnevskaya’s definition, “is not supported by anything other than his own strength - neither religion, nor the church, nor fear of the devil, nor fear of sin, nor fear of punishment for the triumph of happy love.”

Hence the understanding of the meaning of the title of the play: “The Seagull” is a lonely, unhappy bird, doomed to constantly circle over the water screaming.

Because of this spiritual deficiency, all the troubles of the heroine, the seagull, arise.

It is believed that at the moment of destabilization of culture, the flourishing of “complexity” F.M. Dostoevsky's creativity A.P. Chekhov was a necessary counterbalance.

Human axiomatics, at first glance, are really simple and at the same time extremely natural. It lies not in the plane of religious or philosophical speculation, but in the sphere of practical morality: “My holy of holies is the human body, health, mind, talent, inspiration, love and absolute freedom, freedom from force and lies, in which the last two were not expressed.” .

The value system of Chekhov, the playwright, was born from the understanding of the fundamental properties of human needs in general - of any person and in all centuries. Chekhov said that beauty is not “outside,” but in life itself, that beauty is the seed of man.

Chekhov's problem is not in posing questions about what is good, but in how much the specific life of specific people corresponds to simple, original, immutable moral values.

Hierarchy of society. Disunity, which has permeated all the pores of human relations, and ineffectiveness, inflation of previous values, connecting principles are the most important factors under the influence of which in Chekhov’s world the formation of personality occurs or, on the contrary, deformation, depersonalization, vulgarization of a person.

The realistic principle - to portray a person “not as an angel, not as a villain” - was implemented by Chekhov in its extremely complete form. It is difficult to judge almost every character of his unambiguously and with certainty: whether he is sincere or not, truthful or deceitful, smart or stupid, strong or weak, good or evil. And we, readers, almost never know for sure what will prevail in the hero. The originality, confusion, mixedness, and different principles of Chekhov’s character does not come from strength, but, on the contrary, as L.A. denounces. Kolobaeva, “from weakness - from the confusion of life, from the weakness of the individual’s self-awareness.”

All this is explained historically, by the peculiarities of Russian social life of the 90s and 900s, with the extremely aggravated features of the transition of different forms of life and mentality.

The hero in Chekhov's world is often in captivity of other people's words and thoughts, other people's ideas imposed on him by his environment, the power of dominant social institutions, their traditions, regulations and conventions. Enslavement to all this is a serious evil from which a person suffers and from which he is able to free himself only through independent experience and its comprehension.

Chekhov considers the most important source of what is “wrong” in a person to be his confusion with one-sided ideas about life, narrow goals, stereotypes of mechanically acquired beliefs, assessments and rules of behavior, blind faith in the usual outdated authorities - the enslavement of the individual by all kinds of ideological and moral “ghosts”, in the creation and overcoming which the artist saw as the first and necessary condition for human liberation. “What is important is not forgotten words, not idealism, but the consciousness of your own purity, that is, the complete freedom of your soul from all forgotten and not forgotten words, idealisms and other things. You need to believe in God, and if there is no faith, then do not take its place with hype , but to search, search, search alone, alone with your conscience...” - wrote Chekhov in a letter to V.S. Mirolyubov December 17, 1901.

Chekhov deeply feels the burden of all sorts of illusions that distort personality in his contemporary society, but he never proceeds from their inevitability, and never reconciles himself with them, exploring them in his work, especially in plays.

The ability to develop, change, and internal movement of Chekhov's heroes, as well as other classics of Russian realistic literature, is a sign and criterion of vitality, spiritual health and beauty of an individual.

Beauty, according to Chekhov, is often used by its owners not for its natural “divine” purpose. This is what illuminates life, even for a moment, gives an impulse of light and what, even without being present in this world, invisibly develops within its boundaries. Chekhov's beauty is the idea of ​​​​the highest harmony, the basis, the essence of divine-human existence.

In the writer’s understanding, happiness, firstly, is the entire process of life, if it brings a person satisfaction, the consciousness of its correctness. Secondly, happiness is man-made and largely depends on the conditions of the person himself. Thirdly, happiness depends on the circumstances in which a person is placed. Many of these circumstances are not meant for one person.

The first step towards the formation of personality in Chekhov’s heroes, according to the observation of L.A. Kolobaeva, “is accomplished through the spiritual work of self-denial, when a person, freeing himself from self-deception, from illusions about his own account, rises to the ability to blame himself for his failures in life not on others, but on himself.”

Chekhov's search for truth, God, soul, and the meaning of life was carried out by exploring not the sublime manifestations of the human spirit, but moral weakness, fall, and powerlessness of the individual.

All Russian writers went through a test of faith, feeling their work as the fulfillment of a duty bequeathed by God.

The intense search for the meaning of life becomes the main content of the existence of Chekhov's heroes. “It seems to me,” says the heroine of “Three Sisters,” Masha, “a person must be a believer or must seek faith, otherwise his life is empty, empty... To live and not know why the cranes fly, why children are born, why the stars are in the sky ... Either you know what you live for, or it’s all nonsense, damn it.”

The requirements of the writer’s moral and aesthetic code is faith in a person who is allowed to live independently, make independent choices: “Life is given once and you want to live it cheerfully, meaningfully, beautifully. You want to play a prominent, independent, noble role, you want to make history...” ( A.P. Chekhov).

play tendency dialectic

The ideological and thematic concept of the work

Topic: “about the insecurity of a creator’s life and the cruel world of art and creativity”

The theme of "The Seagull" is such precisely because of the comprehensive study of art and creativity that Chekhov harshly and surgically carries out in his comedy. In fact, if I were asked what Chekhov’s other plays are about, I could, of course, highlight the theme of the moribund old life of the nobility and the vigorous but also cynical capitalism that is replacing it in The Cherry Orchard, the leaden abominations of Russian provincial life in "Uncle Vanya", "Three Sisters" and "Ivanov", while in each play one could fruitfully talk about superbly developed love lines, and about the problems that come to a person with age, and about much more. But “The Seagull” has it all. That is, like all other “comedies”, “scenes” and dramas, “The Seagull” is about life, like any real literature, but also about what is most important for a creative person, writing, like Chekhov himself, writing for theater and created a new mask for the ancient muse of the theater Melpomene - about Art, about serving it and about how art is created - about creativity.

If they wrote about actors, their lives, their cursed and sacred craft back in ancient times, then the writers themselves started talking about the creator - the author of the text much later. The semi-mystical process of creativity began to be revealed to the reader only in the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. Gogol in “Portrait”, Oscar Wilde in “The Picture of Dorian Gray”, J. London in “Martin Eden”, Mikhail Bulgakov in “The Master and Margarita”, and in our time His Majesty the Author is becoming almost the most beloved hero of prose writers and playwrights.

Now it is difficult to understand whether Chekhov, with his “The Seagull,” gave impetus to this research boom, or whether just any writer at some point comes to the need to figure out how he writes, how his description and perception of reality relates to life itself, why he needs this himself and the people, what it brings to them, where he stands among other creators.

Almost all of these questions are posed and resolved in one way or another in the play "The Seagull". "The Seagull" is Chekhov's most theatrical play, because it stars writers Trigorin and Treplev and two actresses - Arkadina and Zarechnaya. In the best Shakespearean traditions, another scene is symbolically present on the stage; at the beginning of the play there is a beautiful, mysterious, promising scene with natural scenery, as if saying to both the audience and the participants in the big performance taking place in the estate: “It will still be. The play has just begun. Look!" and in the end - ominous, dilapidated, useless to anyone, which is too lazy to take apart or is simply scary. “Finita la comedia,” the participants in this “human comedy” could say, if according to Balzac.

Idea: “Vocation is like a path without which people rush around in the chaos of dreams and images”

Art (for the characters in “The Seagull” this is mainly literature and theater) constitutes a huge layer of the heroes’ ideals, it is their profession and hobby. “Without faith, a person does not know his calling”

All the characters in the analyzed play are united by one common quality: everyone experiences their fate alone, and no one can help a friend. All the characters are, to one degree or another, dissatisfied with life, focused on themselves, on their personal experiences and aspirations.

The drama “The Seagull” is thoroughly imbued with an atmosphere of trouble. There are no happy people in it. An atmosphere of loneliness haunts each of the heroes. And against the background of this atmosphere, the seagull symbol, which takes on different meanings, lives differently in the souls of the young heroes of the play - Treplev and Nina.

For Treplev, the seagull is also a symbol, but a symbol of what did not come true. And although for him, a famous writer, the search for the meaning of life never ended, he, like Nina, can be attributed to one camp, Trigorin and Arkadin to another. If Treplev says at the last moment in despair: “I’m still running around in the chaos of dreams and images, not knowing why and who needs it.”

Fable

The young writer Treplev “left the third year of university due to circumstances beyond the editor’s control” and lived on his uncle’s estate. His mother, a famous actress, stayed at this estate with Trigorin. Treplev writes a play in which his beloved Nina Zarechnaya plays the main role. The performance failed and Treplev lost the meaning of life. Soon her mother leaves, Nina falls in love with Trigorin, who breaks up with Arkadina, and they live together for two years. Nina loses her child and breaks up with Trigorin, who returns to Arkadina. Chetez returns to his father’s estate for two years and comes to Treplev. At this time, Treplev’s mother arrives at Sorin’s estate along with Trigorin. After a conversation with Nina, who once again abandons him, he shoots himself.

The plot and compositional basis of the work

Composition and architectonics of the work

1. Exposition: Pre-premiere bustle at Sorin's estate. From the words: “So before you start, send me to say...”

1) conversation between Masha and Medvedenko.

2) conversation between Sorin and Treplev.

3) preparation for the performance.

4) Nina’s arrival.

5) Treplev’s declaration of love for Nina.

To the words: “There is little action in your play, only reading…”

2. Plot: The beginning of the performance

From the words: “It’s getting damp. Come back, put on your galoshes..."

1) Arrival of spectators.

2) Treplev’s altercation with his mother.

3) Opening speech by Treplev.

4) Nina’s play at the Treplev Theater.

5) Quarrel between Arkadina and Treplev.

To the words: “Guilty! I lost sight of the fact that only a few can write plays and act on stage...”

3. Development of action: The everyday life of unusual people.

From the words: “This is fair, but let’s not talk about plays or atoms. Such a nice evening..."

1) Nina’s sympathy for Trigorin.

2) Quarrel between Arkadina and Shamraev.

3) Nina’s gift to Trigorin.

4) Departure of Arkadina and Trigorin.

5) Trigorin's betrayal.

6) Sorin's fainting.

7) Return of Arkadina and Trigorin.

To the words: “As you know. Petrusha, have dinner!....."

4. Climax: Nina’s arrival to Treplev.

From the words: “I talked so much about new forms...”

1) Treplev’s thoughts on new forms.

2) The appearance of Nina.

3) Treplev’s confession to Nina of his old feelings.

4) Nina’s refusal.

5) Nina's departure.

Until the words: “It’s not good if someone meets her in the garden and then tells her mother...”

5. Denouement: Treplev's suicide.

From the words: “Red wine and beer for Boris Alekseevich...”

1) Fun at Sorin's estate.

2) Suicide of Konstantin Gavrilovich.

Until the words: “the fact is that Konstantin Gavrilovich shot himself...”

Event structure:

Initial: pre-premiere preparation of the performance.

The main thing: the performance was a failure. First suicide attempt.

Central: arrival of Zarechnaya to Treplev.

Final: Treplev's suicide.

The main thing: the premiere of the play.

Conflict

Main conflict:

Between life circumstances and emotional impulses. The collision of the characters' aspirations with life gives rise to the tragic conflict of the play.

Side conflict:

Between a person’s purpose in this life and the lack of opportunity to realize his purpose.

Conflict between:

By whom:

Treplev-Arkadina

Treplev - Trigorin

Treplev-Medvedenko

Zarechnaya-Arkadina

Zarechnaya -Masha

Dorn-Shamraev

Arkadina-Shamraev

How:

Creative impulses - their vulnerability in a cruel world.

The desire to establish yourself as an artist - the lack of understanding of others.

Young creativity and its cruel denial.

Analysis of the proposed circumstances:

Originalproposed circumstances: The young student Treplev “graduated from the third year of university,” which radically changed his life. After a quarrel with his mother, he comes to the estate of his uncle, Pyotr Nikolaevich Sorin, where he remains to live. He has no means of living, but he has a talent, which he later realizes in writing his play.

Presentersproposedcircumstances: all the characters in this play are in one way or another connected with the upcoming premiere at Sorin’s estate. This event bears on itself the entire effective series of the play. For Treplev, his future fate was practically decided, since he was afraid that he would not be perceived as a serious author. Being a man with a vulnerable soul and a sensitive heart, he tried to show those around him, and most importantly his mother, that he was worth something and that his passion for theater was not a passing activity, but his life’s work. He dreamed of theater and hoped with his creativity to bring something new to it that would amaze the viewer.

Basicproposedcircumstances: The young aspiring writer Treplev wrote an original play, but no one took his work seriously, and the most offensive thing for his young pride was that Arkadina simply laughed at him. The main role in this play was played by Nina Zarechnaya, whom Treplev loved dearly, but she did not take it as something serious. For her it was just sympathy. Nina dreamed of the stage, wanted to become a great actress, and for her the premiere of this play was her debut on stage. At the premiere of the play, Arkadina simply mocked what she saw, which really hurt Konstantin, who could not stand his mother’s criticism and interrupted the performance. After this they had a big quarrel. From that moment on, Treplev withdrew into himself and began to be in constant search of self-affirmation as a creator worthy of attention and respect for his work. He began to publish, but his works did not please him; he was waiting for a different path. Trying to find his place in life and his calling, he makes two unsuccessful suicide attempts. After which he finally retreats into himself.

Genre: comedy in 4 acts.

Scheme-questionnaire about images

Three views on character

The grain of the play

The grain of the play is a high mountain, the top of which not everyone can climb. The whole way to the top is all obstacles and obstacles on the path of the creator. The strong in spirit reach the end of the road, and the rest, unable to withstand all the tests, cease to exist as great artists, as outstanding personalities. You will not be alone at this peak, so you should not make sudden movements so as not to push someone off his path, his calling. Essentially this is a figurative picture of our life. The pain caused by such movements, even if done carelessly, can lead to the death, moral or physical, of a person close to you.

Plot

His nephew, the aspiring writer Konstantin, settled in Sorin’s estate, whose mother, the famous actress, came to stay with them. Konstantin is writing a play. A theater was prepared in the garden of this estate, where the premiere of the play was to take place. The main role in this play is played by Nina Zarechnaya, a young girl, the daughter of a rich landowner, whom Kostya dearly loved. Nina arrives and, left alone with her, Treplev confesses his love to her, but she does not reciprocate his feelings. Kostya’s mother perceived her son’s play as something decadent and they had a quarrel, and Treplev raised the curtain and interrupted the performance. After that he became somehow strange and aloof. Nina developed a liking for Trigorin. After a quarrel with Shamraev, Arkadina decides to leave. Nina gives Trigorin a medallion as a farewell gift and confesses her feelings. They agree to meet in Moscow. Life has become boring and ordinary. The works of the young writer Treplev began to be published in magazines, but this did not please him at all. After the second suicide attempt, Arkadina is sent a telegram about Sorin’s poor health. Arkadina and Trigorin, who has returned to her, come to the estate again. Konstantin learns about Nina’s arrival in the village and waited with trepidation for their meeting, went to her house, but did not dare to enter, stood under her windows. A holiday was prepared for Arkadina's arrival at the estate, but Konstantin did not want to have fun with everyone else. He stayed in his office, and that night he finally waited to meet Nina, who sneaked in to him secretly so that no one would notice her. They shared their troubles with each other and Treplev asked her to take him with her, but Zarechnaya refused and left him. When he was left alone, he realized that his life was ruined, that he did not know what he was living for, did not know his calling and shot himself. Hearing a shot from the office, Dorn discovers him.

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Comedy in four acts

Characters

The action takes place in Sorin's estate. Two years pass between the third and fourth acts.

Act one

Part of the park on the Sorina estate. The wide alley leading from the spectators into the depths of the park towards the lake is blocked by a stage hastily put together for a home performance, so that the lake is not visible at all. There are bushes to the left and right of the stage. Several chairs, a table.

The sun has just set. On the stage behind the lowered curtain, Yakov and other workers; Coughing and knocking are heard. Masha and Medvedenko are walking on the left, returning from a walk.

Sorin and Treplev enter from the right.

Arkadina enters arm in arm with Sorin, Trigorin, Shamraev, Medvedenko and Masha.

Treplev comes out from behind the stage.

The curtain rises; overlooks the lake; the moon above the horizon, its reflection in the water; Nina Zarechnaya sits on a large stone, all in white.

Swamp lights are shown.