The Mask (Chekhov)

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Anton Chekhov

The mask ( Russian Маска , Maska ) is a short story by the Russian writer Anton Chekhov , which appeared on October 27, 1884 in the Moscow humorous weekly newspaper Rasvletschenije .

content

In a provincial Russian town, a few gentlemen in the otherwise quiet reading room take no notice of the charitable masked ball that rages through the other rooms of the Municipal Public Club. A male mask, dressed as a coachman and with peacock feathers on his hat, disturbs the calm. The mask tears the newspaper out of the hand of the bank director Shestjakov and tears up the paper. The mask threatens the cashier of the orphanage Belebuchin with slaps in the neck if he continues reading. The bank director calls the vigilante present in the club. The latter wants to have the mask thrown out. The dispute escalates. Inquisitive people are lured from the dance hall into the reading room. The troublemaker tears the mask off his face. The cashier Belebuchin freezes and secretly slips away, because the unmasked scum brother is the manufacturer Yegor Nilych Pyatigorov, a millionaire and hereditary honorary citizen of the city. Belebuchin remains courageously in the club; Towards the end of the long evening, he submissively and successfully offers the drunk millionaire his escort home.

The bank director said in a good mood to the law enforcement officer that the case had been settled because Pyatigorov had said goodbye to him with a handshake. The law enforcement officer cannot contradict; calls the millionaire a vile scoundrel, but has to agree: “... he's a benefactor! There is nothing you can do!"

filming

  • 1938, Soviet Union , film studio Soviet Belarus : The Mask - a 25-minute short film by Sergei Sploschnow with Stepan Kajukow as Pyatigorov and Vitali Polizeimako as law enforcement officer.

Used edition

  • Gerhard Dick (Hrsg.), Wolf Düwel (Hrsg.): Anton Chekhov: Collected works in individual volumes : The mask. P. 235–241 in: Gerhard Dick (ed.): Anton Chekhov: From rain to eaves. Short stories. Translated from Russian by Ada Knipper and Gerhard Dick. With a foreword by Wolf Düwel. 630 pages. Rütten & Loening, Berlin 1964 (1st edition)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Russian Развлечение (журнал) - entertainment gazette
  2. ↑ Notes under The Mask (Russian) in FEB on p. 557
  3. ↑ Edition used, p. 241, 2nd Zvu
  4. ↑ Russian Маска (фильм, 1938)
  5. ↑ Russian Каюков, Степан Яковлевич
  6. ↑ Russian Полицеймако, Виталий Павлович
  7. ↑ Entry in WorldCat