The Storm

The author of "The Storm," Alexander Ostrovsky (born in Moscow 1823, died 1886), is acknowledged to be the greatest of the Russian dramatists. He has been called "a specialist in the natural history of the Russian merchant," and his birth, upbringing, family connections and vocations gave him exceptional facilities for penetrating into the life of that class which he was the first to put into Russian literature. His best period was from 1850 to 1860, but all his work received prompt and universal recognition from his countrymen. In 1859 Dobroliubov's famous article, "The Realm of Darkness," appeared, analysing the contents of all Ostrovsky's dramas, and on the publication of "The Storm" in 1860, it was followed by another article from the same critic, "A Ray of Light in the Realm of Darkness." These articles were practically a brief for the case of the Liberals, or party of Progress, against the official and Slavophil party. Ostrovsky's dramas in general are marked by intense sombreness, biting humour and merciless realism. "The Storm" is the most poetical of his works, but all his leading plays still hold the stage.

"The Storm" will repay a minute examination by all who recognise that in England to-day we have a stage without art, truth to life, or national significance. There is not a superfluous line in the play: all is drama, natural, simple, deep. There is no falsity, no forced situations, no sensational effects, none of the shallow or flashy caricatures of daily life that our heterogeneous public demands. All the reproach that lives for us in the word theatrical is worlds removed from "The Storm." The people who like 'farcical comedy' and social melodrama, and 'musical sketches' will find "The Storm" deep, forbidding and gloomy. The critic will find it an abiding analysis of a people's temperament. The reader will find it literature.

E. G. November, 1898.

THE STORM

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

SAVIL PROKOFIEVITCH DIKOY, a merchant, and personage of importance in the town.

BORIS GRIGORIEVITCH, his nephew, a young man of good education.

MARFA IGNATIEVNA KABANOVA, a rich merchant's widow.

TIHON IVANITCH KABANOV, her son.

KATERINA, his wife.

VARVARA, sister of Tihon.

KULIGIN, a man of artisan class, a self-taught watchmaker, engaged in trying to discover the secret of perpetual motion.

VANIA KUDRIASH, a young man, clerk to Dikoy.

SHAPKIN, an artisan.

FEKLUSHA, a pilgrim woman.

GLASHA, a maid servant in the Kabanovs' house.

AN OLD LADY of seventy, half mad, with TWO FOOTMEN.

TOWNSPEOPLE of both sexes.

The action takes place in the town of Kalinov, on the banks of the Volga, in summertime. There is an interval of ten days between the 3rd and 4th acts. All the characters except Boris are dressed in old Russian national dress.

ACT I

SCENE I

A public garden on the steep bank of the Volga; beyond the Volga, a view of the country. On the stage two benches and a few bushes.

KULIGIN (sitting on a bench, looking towards the river).

KUDRIASH and SHAPKIN (walking up and down).

KULIGIN (singing). "Amidst the level dales, upon a sloping hillside,"… (ceases singing) Wonderful, one really must say it's wonderful! Kudriash! Do you know, I've looked upon the Volga every day these fifty years and I can never get tired of looking upon it.

KUDRIASH.

How's that?

KULIGIN.

It's a marvellous view! Lovely! It sets my heart rejoicing.

KUDRIASH.

It's not bad.

KULIGIN. It's exquisite! And you say "not bad"! You are tired of it, or you don't feel the beauty there is in nature.

KUDRIASH. Come, there's no use talking to you! You're a genuine antique, we all know, a chemical genius.

KULIGIN.

Mechanical, a self-taught mechanician.

KUDRIASH.

It's all one.

[Silence.

KULIGIN (pointing away).

Look, Kudriash, who's that waving his arms about over there?

KUDRIASH.

There? Oh, that's Dikoy pitching into his nephew.

KULIGIN.

A queer place to do it!

KUDRIASH. All places are alike to him. He's not afraid of any one! Boris Grigoritch is in his clutches now, so he is always bullying him.

SHAPKIN. Yes, you wouldn't find another bully like our worthy Saviol Prokofitch in a hurry! He pulls a man up for nothing at all.

KUDRIASH.

He is a stiff customer.

SHAPKIN.

Old Dame Kabanova's a good hand at that too!