The Duel (Chekhov)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Anton Chekhov

The duel , also duel , a duel , a duel ( Russian Дуэль ), is a story by the Russian writer Anton Chekhov , which was published in October / November 1891 in the St. Petersburg newspaper Novoje wremja .

Korfiz Holms translation Ein Zweikampf was published by Albert Langen in Munich in 1897 . Other translations: 1892 into Danish ( En Duel ), 1894 into Serbo-Croatian ( Двобој ), 1896 into Hungarian ( A párbaj ), 1897 into Czech ( Souboj ), 1902 into French ( Un duel ), 1904 into Spanish ( Duelo ), 1948 into Lithuanian ( Dvikova ), 1950 into Italian ( Duello ), 1966 into Swedish ( duels ) and 1973 into Korean ( 決 鬪 ).

overview

This story does not stop at verbal ideological disputes between two opponents that get out of hand over time. The “tough, strong, despotic” Social Darwinist Nikolai Wassiljewitsch von Koren challenges the 28-year-old Petersburg state servant Ivan Andrejitsch Lajewskij, a studied philosopher , to a duel. The contest of honor takes place in a Caucasian coastal town on the Black Sea one morning at five o'clock. The night before the exchange of fire, Layevsky reconsiders his botched life in anticipation of death. Nadezhda Fyodorovna, a married woman, had piloted the unscrupulous bachelor Layevsky to the south of Russia. Later, by the time Layevsky was fed up with this woman, her husband died. Lajewskij had intercepted the written death report from the Russian north and withheld Nadezhda. From his friend, the military doctor Dr. Alexander Dawidowitsch Samoilenko, a Russian nobleman and state councilor, had borrowed money to flee Nadezhda to Petersburg. Now the challenge of the principle rider von Koren had intervened. Lajewskij survived the duel with a rather harmless graze on the neck. The scratch becomes the occasion for the inner reversal of the slightly injured person: He marries the widow Nadezhda and strives for a new beginning with her.

action

It looks as if Layevsky is trying to flee not only from Nadezhda, but also from his creditors . He has no money and two thousand rubles in debt. Von Koren despises Lajeskij deeply. Lajewski fears the zoologist: “I am an empty, void, decrepit person! The air that I breathe, this wine, love, in a word, I have bought my whole life to this day at the price of lies, laziness and faint-heartedness. To this day I have betrayed others and myself, I have suffered from it, and my sufferings have been cheap and bad. I shyly bow my back to Koren's hatred because at times I hate and despise myself. "

Nadeschda's good friend Marja Konstantinovna and of course von Koren think that Nadezhda is a terrible sinner. Von Koren believes that Nadezhda should be forcibly returned to her husband. And if the man doesn't want to know anything more from her, then take her to the workhouse or the reformatory .

Samoilenko already owes seven thousand rubles because he helped the needy with borrowed money. Now he is pumping a hundred rubles from Koren. Von Koren actually only wants to lend him the money if it isn't for his adversary Layevsky. Although the rubles are for Layevsky, Koren still gives them.

Lajewskij has an epileptic seizure in company. Von Koren registered the disease with malice. The troubled Lajewskij is also jealous of two local rivals. Lajewskij is particularly overly sensitive to money matters. He falls out with Samoilenko over the money he needs so badly for his escape. Von Koren, who is friends with the “donor”, ​​interferes at the height of the verbal argument and challenges the good-for-nothing to a duel. To make matters worse, Lajewskij is led in the distress by one of his rivals to Nadezhda's foraging with the other rival. Regardless of this, the duel preparations are relentless. Seconds - all officers and a doctor are ready. In the morning - as I said - at five o'clock on the beach it turns out that none of the gentlemen seconds knows the current duel regulations exactly. Still, the shooting continues. Lajewskij as an offended one has the first shot and shoots deliberately in the air. Von Koren wants to kill, but is fortunately distracted while aiming.

Adaptations

Spoken theater

filming

reception

Contemporaries
  • The Russian critic Alexander Skabitschewski dealt with the text in several ways in 1892. For example, he doesn't like to believe that Lajewskij and Nadeschda - two weak characters of the first degree - can make the new beginning that has finally been announced.
  • June 7, 1898, Thomas Mann reads the “brilliant translation” with interest.
  • January 18, 1910. Schnitzler admires the text.
Recent comments
  • 1958, Maugham uses the quote "... soon a star peeked out and blinked shyly with its only eye" on two often observable characteristics: Chekhov's sparing use of emotional passages and the tendency to shorten the text to the point of mutilation.
  • January 1, 1980, Verena Auffermann , Deutschlandfunk : How should one live?

German-language editions

  • The duel. Translated from the Russian by Ada Knipper and Gerhard Dick. in: Anton Pavlovič Čechov: The narrative work in ten volumes. Part: Little Novels: A Boring Story . The duel. 245 pages, Diogenes, Zurich 1976, ISBN 978-3-257-20267-0

Secondary literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Russian entry at fantlab.ru
  2. ↑ Russian references to translations
  3. ↑ VIAF entries for 18 translations
  4. ↑ in the text "Sociologist and Zoologist"
  5. ^ Volksbühne ( memento from November 17, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Das Duell
  6. ↑ Russian Плохой хороший человек
  7. ↑ Russian Даль, Олег Иванович
  8. ↑ Russian Максакова, Людмила Васильевна
  9. ↑ eng. The duel
  10. ↑ eng. Dover Kosashvili
  11. ↑ eng. Fiona Glascott
  12. ↑ Russian Скабичевский, Александр Михайлович
  13. ↑ Russian remarks at chehov.niv.ru on Das Duell , 5th paragraph vu
  14. ↑ Thomas Mann quoted in Urban, p. 205, 2. Zvo
  15. ↑ Schnitzler quoted in Urban, p. 207
  16. ↑ Maugham cites Chekhov , Chapter 18 , Paragraph 3
  17. ↑ Maugham cited in Urban, p. 193, 7th Zvu