The chorister
The Choristin ( Russian Хористка , Choristka) is a short story by the Russian writer Anton Chekhov , which appeared on July 5, 1886 in the weekly Oskolki .
When Tolstoy looked through Anton Chekhov's narrative work - consisting of almost 500 titles - in 1903, he highlighted fifteen texts from them with the title “highest quality”. One of the outstanding titles was Die Choristin .
Vladimir Czumikov's translation into German was published in 1901 by Diederichs in Leipzig . Other translations: 1901 into Hungarian ( A kóristanő ), 1902 into Slovak ( Speváčka ), 1904 into Polish ( Chorzystka ), 1920 into English ( The Chorus Girl ) and into Norwegian ( Korpiken ).
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In this crook story , the choir singer Pascha - here called the chorus - is relieved of her jewelry by her "admirer" Nikolai Petrovich Kolpakow and his alleged wife.
Shortly before the young, beautiful stranger enters Pasha's apartment, Kolpakov hastily hides in the next room. The elegantly dressed stranger pretends to be Kolpakov's wife and tells Pasha that she has known about the affair for a long time and has observed everything. Pasha asserts that Kolpakov was not on the scene. But one thing is true - he comes often and always uninvited. The stranger still needs nine hundred rubles today . Kolpakov embezzled the money. Banishment threatens. In that case, the “wife” and their children would starve to death. Pasha doesn't have the money.
Then Pasha would just have to surrender all the jewelry that Kolpakov gave her. Kolpakov has given nothing Pasha, but she gives her gold bracelet, the ruby ring, the diamond brooch, the coral necklace, gold watch, a cigarette case, bracelets and rings and bracelets out.
After the stranger has gone with the booty, Kolpakov steps out of the next room and insults Pasha because his decent, proud wife had to humiliate herself.
Adaptations
Opera
- 1996 Pasha . Chamber opera in one act (working title Corps de Ballet ) by Oliver Gruhn, libretto by Claus H. Henneberg based on Die Choristin .
TV movie
- 1998, Russia , VID-TV and Chekhov Art Theater Moscow : Chekhov and Company , Season 4 (Russian) by Sinowi Roisman, Dmitri Brusnikin and Alexander Feklistow with Yevgenija Dobrowolskaja as Pascha, Alexei Scharkow as Kolpakow and Marina Brusnikina as his "wife".
German-language editions
Used edition
- The chorister . In: Gerhard Dick, Wolf Düwel (eds.): Anton Chekhov: The Swedish match . Short stories and early narratives. German by Wolf Düwel. Rütten & Loening, Berlin 1965, pp. 156-162.
Web links
- The text
- Wikisource: Хористка (Чехов) - Sources and full texts (Russian)
- online in the Komarow library (Russian)
- online in FEB (Russian)
- online at litmir.co (Russian)
- Tales of Chekhov: The Chorus Girl in Project Gutenberg ( currently not available to users from Germany ) (English)
- Chekhov Bibliography, Entry Stories No. 405 (Russian)
