The cherry orchard

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Data
Title: The cherry orchard
Original title: Вишнёвый сад
Genus: tragicomedy
Original language: Russian
Author: Anton Chekhov
Publishing year: 1903
Premiere: January 30, 1904
Place of premiere: Moscow Art Theater
Place and time of the action: on a Russian estate around 1900
people
  • Lyubov Andreevna Ranevskaya , landowner
  • Anja , her daughter, 17 years old
  • Varya , her foster daughter, 24 years old
  • Leonid Andrejewitsch Gajew , brother of Ranjewskaja
  • Yermolaj Alexejewitsch Lopachin , businessman
  • Pyotr Sergeyevich Trofimov , student
  • Boris Borissowitsch Simeonow-Pishchik , landowner
  • Charlotta Ivanovna , governess
  • Semyon Panteleevich Jepichodow , clerk
  • Dunjasha , maid
  • Firs , Lakai, an old man of 87 years
  • Jascha , a young lackey
  • A tramp
  • The station master

The cherry orchard ( Russian Вишнёвый сад / Wischnjowy sad ; scientific transliteration Višnëvyj sad ) is a tragic, socially critical comedy in four acts by Anton Chekhov . It was composed in 1903 and premiered in Moscow on Chekhov's 44th birthday on January 30th (according to the old calendar on January 17th) 1904 . It was the last play by the writer, who died of tuberculosis six months after its premiere .

The plot

The play takes place around 1900 on a Russian country estate with a manor house, which is surrounded by a beautiful cherry orchard. Anja , the daughter of the landowner Ranjewskaja , brings her mother back from Paris because the property is heavily in debt and has to be auctioned. The mother fled to France with her lover five years ago after her young son drowned in the nearby river. Ranevskaya's brother, Gajew , was incapable of dealing with money and enjoyed life. Ranevskaya also spends her money in Paris.

The former serf of the family, the merchant Lopachin , who has made a fortune, could be saved . He suggests building dachas (holiday homes) on the property and renting them out to summer guests. The prerequisite for this would be the cutting down of the beautiful, but useless cherry orchard, which is currently in full bloom. Another solution would be if Varya, the landowner's foster daughter , married Lopachin, but her dream does not come true. On the other hand, a love develops between the former tutor of the drowned son, the eternal student Trofimov , and Anja, the daughter of the landlady.

The landlady moves back to Paris, everyone leaves the house, only the old servant Firs , who symbolizes the old days before the abolition of serfdom, is accidentally locked in and remains motionless.

“Act One: The cherry orchard may have to be sold. Act two: the cherry orchard will be sold. Third act: the cherry orchard is sold. Fourth act: the cherry orchard has been sold. The rest: life. "( Jean-Louis Barrault )

interpretation

The historian Orlando Figes judges the play with a view to the worldview of its author: Chekhov himself was liberal and - as a doctor and scientist - convinced that technical progress and social changes would have a positive effect on people. His intention in the cherry orchard was therefore to satirically dismantle the myth of the good old days : For example, Madame Ranjewskaja keeps long, sentimental eulogies full of clichés about her happy childhood on the estate, which she left years ago to live in Amusing Paris. When the property is sold, she forgets her superficial nostalgia very quickly and leaves. Your brother Gajew is an irresponsible spendthrift. The landowner Simeonow-Pishchik praises the roots of the nobility in the country and, since it is heavily indebted, sells it to English mining engineers at the first opportunity. Trofimov is an eternal student and raves about a renewal of society. The servant Firs, who is the only one who still believes in the inner bond between master and servants, is simply left behind by the Ranjewskis. Chekhov, on the other hand, designed the figure of Lopachin as a positive counter-image of the sincere merchant who rose from a humble background through his own diligence. It can be assumed that Chekhov's own father, a former serf and later a wealthy merchant, served as a model for Lopachin. And yet: Even the economically capable Lopachin does not bring his private life into order. He does not manage to make the long-awaited marriage proposal to Varya, whom he admires.

The cherry orchard, which no longer yields a harvest, symbolizes the Russian nobility, which no longer provides any benefit to Russian society. It only has a decorative function, it symbolizes beauty. In the end it will be cut down.

Productions

Scenography for a performance at the Moscow Artists Theater, 1904

The world premiere took place in 1896 at the St. Petersburg Academy Theater and fell through completely with the audience. In 1904 the play had a second “premiere” under the direction of Konstantin Stanislawski at the Moscow Artists' Theater . During the rehearsals, Chekhov rewrote the second act. This version turned out to be a success with the public. Olga Knipper played the role of Madame Ranevskaya both in this premiere performance and in the 300th performance of the play in 1943.

The first German translation of Der Kirschgarten was published in 1912, the German premiere took place in December 1917 in Munich under the direction of Lion Feuchtwanger . In 1919 a production by the Volksbühne Berlin followed . According to his translator Peter Urban , Chekhov has long been considered unplayable in Germany and attributes this to poor translations that did not capture the accuracy and laconicity of Chekhov's language. It was not until the 1960s and 1970s that directors such as Ingmar Bergman and Giorgio Strehler , who staged the play at the Piccolo Teatro in 1974 , made Chekhov popular. Then interest grew in Germany too.

In England, the play was first played in 1925 at the Oxford Playhouse, directed by JB Fagan, and in 1934 there was a production in English at Sadler's Wells Theater . Directed by Tyrone Guthrie .

German productions (selection)

Reception in opera, fiction and film

expenditure

German-language editions
  • Anton Chekhov: The cherry orchard. Tragic comedy in four acts , Georg Müller , Munich 1912 (after the establishment of the Moscow Artistic Theater, translated and introduced by Siegfried Aschkinasy and Lion Feuchtwanger ), DNB 580816079 .
  • Wolf Düwel : Anton Chekhov, Dramas, "The Cherry Orchard" (= Anton Pavlovič Čechov: Collected Works in Individual Volumes ), Rütten & Loening, Berlin (East) 1964 (translated by Gudrun Düwel), DNB 450760898 .
  • Anton P. Čechov: Der Kirschgarten , Insel-Taschenbuchverlag, Frankfurt am Main a. a. 1991 (translated and edited by Thomas Brasch ), ISBN 3-458-33041-0 .
  • Anton Chekhov: Der Kirschgarten , Reclam, Stuttgart 1984 (translated by Hans Walter Poll 1984), ISBN 3-15-007690-0 .
  • Anton Chekhov: The cherry orchard . dtv, Munich 2009 (translated from Russian by Vera Bischitzky , with an afterword by Andreas Ebbinghaus, a glossary and a time table). ISBN 978-3-423-13835-2
  • Anton Chekhov: The Cherry Orchard: Comedy in 4 acts . Woodcuts by Werner Hofmann , Diogenes, Zurich 1964 (transferred and with an afterword by Sigismund von Radecki ). DNB 450760901 .
  • Anton Čechov: The Cherry Orchard , comedy in four acts. Translated and edited by Peter Urban (= Diogenes-Taschenbuch, Volume 20083: detebe-Klassiker), Diogenes, Zurich 1999, ISBN 3-257-20083-8 (first edition of this translation 1973, as Diogenes Taschenbuch, ISBN 3-257-20083- 8 ).
Russian-language editions
  • Anton Čechov: Вишнёвый сад / Visnëvyj sad . Edited by Wolfgang Schriek. Reclam, Stuttgart 2011. ( Reclam's Universal Library , Volume 19797, Foreign Language Texts : Russian ). ISBN 978-3-15-019797-4
  • Alexander Lehrman (Ed.): Anton Čechov's Višnevyj sad, a critical edition of the original Russian text with an introduction, a new translation and supplementary materials . Sagner, Munich 2009. ( Slavic articles . 467). ISBN 978-3-86688-057-3

literature

  • Herta Schmid: Structuralist drama theory: semantic analysis of Čechow's “Ivanov” and “Der Kirschgarten” . Scriptor, Kronberg (Taunus) 1973. (Scripts. 3.) ISBN 3-589-00032-5 (At the same time dissertation University of Konstanz, Philosophical Faculty 1972, under the title: The structure of meaning of drama as a sign of the genre .)

Web links

Commons : Der Kirschgarten  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Вишнёвый сад  - Sources and full texts (Russian)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Orlando Figes: Natasha's Dance. A cultural history of Russia . Picador, New York 2002 ISBN 0-312-42195-8 pp. 208ff.
  2. ↑ Summary from Der Kirschgarten getabstract.com, accessed on March 9, 2020
  3. ↑ Peter Urban on the modernity of Chekhov's Augsburger Allgemeine, accessed on March 7, 2020
  4. ↑ Frieder Reininghaus: The cherry garden becomes the kitsch garden , Deutschlandfunk.de, accessed on March 7, 2020