Anton Chekhov

Even toned down, the comic characters are reduced to a series of tics and hardly seem to exist on the same plane as the primary characters. Kosykh is nothing more than his obsession with cards; Zinaida becomes the epitome of her stinginess, 'Madame Gooseberry-Jam'. Gradually, Chekhov learned how to make farcical elements more revelatory of his plays' inner meanings. On the other hand, Shabelsky's off-again-on-again courtship of the widow sardonically comments on Ivanov's own conscience- stricken interest in Sasha. Here the comedy has the Shakespearean function of a reflective subplot, with the result that 'two weddings are spoilt'.

Within the conventional framework, however, a Chekhovian sense of atmospherics is beginning to emerge. He knew well the resonance that derived from a properly-chosen setting, and structured the play to alter­nate private and public life. We first see Ivanov solus, seated in a natural surrounding against the background of his house; he is outside it, because it represents to him a suffocating prison to be escaped. But the primal image of isolated Ivanov is shattered by Borkin with his gun.

As if to exacerbate the incursions into his privacy, Ivanov flees to a more peopled spot, the party at the Lebedevs. But there the guests are already yawning at the very boredom he hoped to avoid. Act Two begins in a crowd of persons, some so anonymous as to be designated only as First Guest, Second Guest, etc.; this chorus makes common knowledge deeds performed in private. Even before Ivanov and Shabelsky appear, their lives are trotted forth as gossip and conjecture; Ivanov's innermost motives are distorted, and his most intimate action here, the embrace of Sasha, is intruded upon by the worst possible witness, his wife.

Act Three returns to Ivanov's study, which ought to be his sanctum, but is, as the stage direction makes clear, a jumble, a visual metaphor for the disorder of his existence. His papers, presumably the products of his brain, lie cheek by jowl with food and drink, brought in by others, who expatiate on gastronomy. Coming as it does after Anna's melodramatic discovery, this interlude strikes the note of triviality, and neutralises what might otherwise be overly theatrical. It is Chekhov's way of cooling overheated actions by pairing them with the banal. Ivanov himself seems aware of this, for he resents the impinging of his workaday fellows on his moping. Their commentary reduces his soul-searching to cheap and obvious motives.

'It's like living in Australia!' says Kosykh, unwittingly evoking this provincial barbarity where vast expanses stretch between estates, and yet privacy is impossible. The last act sanctions a medley of public and private worlds as the wedding party prepares for blessing before going to church. The event could not be more gregarious, despite the personal nature of the conjugal bond, and the charac­ters have difficulty finding a quiet corner in which to unburden their minds. Ivanov's entrance is regarded as tactless invasion, a bridegroom seeing the bride before the ceremony; and his self-destruction is enacted before a crowd of horrified onlookers.

Suicide as a public act chimes in with Ivanov's continual self-dramatisation. He and his uncle Shabelsky put a literary construction on life. The Count tends to compare persons to characters in Gogol, life to events in French plays and novels. Ivanov points the comparisons inward: 'I'm dying of shame that I'm a healthy, strong man, and not turning into Hamlet or Manfred or a superfluous man'. Dr Lvov labels Ivanov a Tartuffe, Moliere's classic hypocrite. Most frequent is the Lazarus image, the dead man who might yet be called from the tomb if Sasha acts the Saviour. During the wedding preparations, Ivanov is told not to be a Chatsky, Griboyedeov's comic hero who regarded his society with scorn and was taken by it to be a madman. Ivanov's problem often seems to be an embarrassment of role models, none of which adequately expresses his complexity. Despite the conspectus of opinion that runs from Sasha's hero-worship to the malign slanders of the party-guests, Ivanov's character does not get beyond his own verbose self-scrutiny. 'How can a man see into another man's soul?' he asks Lvov. Chekhov did his best to present the evidence fairly, but he had yet to achieve the proper form.

⁴The Wood Demon'

In 1888, even before he had finished work on Ivanov, Chekhov suggested to Suvorin that they collaborate on a comedy. They drew up a list of characters, episodes and a distribution of assignments. Suvorin soon dropped out, and Chekhov reworked the play into The Wood Demon in Spring 1889.