A drama on the hunt

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Anton Chekhov

A drama on the hunt , also The Drama on the Hunt ( Russian Драма на охоте , Drama na ochote), is a detective novel by the Russian writer Anton Chekhov , which was written in 1884 and continued in the Moscow magazine Novosti dnja in 1884/1885 ( headlines ) appeared. Chekhov first signed with Antoscha Chechonte and then with A. Chechonte .

Internal narration

In his manuscript “A Drama on the Hunt. From the notes of an examining magistrate, “the narrator Kamyshev pretends to be Sergei Petrovich Zinoviev. The examining magistrate had met his old friend and drinking brother, the wealthy Count Alexej Karnejew, while he was studying law at the university. The latter's liver is destroyed from drinking. At the Count's splendid country estate Karnejewka, the two friends have a drink after the other. After one of the orgies, the gentlemen can row across the lake on the estate. The drunk examining magistrate hits a rowing peasant with a head wound with the oar blade. The examining magistrate knows well that he is "spoiled to the core". When the very well-paid Zinoviev wanted to pay half the fee that committed entertainers claim for one of these feasts, the host count brusquely refused the request. The examining magistrate throws the banknotes into the fire. The Pole Kajetan Kasimirowitsch Przechocki, a friend of the house unknown to Zinoviev, deletes the securities and takes them for himself. The examining magistrate later becomes an eyewitness when poor man Kajetan transfers the bundle of money at the post office.

There in the country by the lake the examining magistrate meets Olga Nikolajewna, the daughter of the mentally ill forester Skworzow. The 50-year-old aristocratic Pyotr Jegorytsch Urbenin - the count's estate manager, a widower with two children Sascha and Grischa - is also in love with Olenka, as the beautiful Olga is called.

The 30-year-old district doctor Dr. Pawel Ivanovich Vosnesensky, known as the friendly Kiebitz by Zinoviev, is unhappy in love with Nadeshda Nikolaevna Kalinina, the daughter of the justice of the peace. The examining magistrate was immediately lucky with the young lady. Nadeshda falls in love with him. Soon the Kalinin family thought the handsome young Zinoviev was Nadeshda's groom. When Zinoviev accidentally learns that the justice of the peace sees him as the daughter's bridegroom, he withdraws from the Kalinin family forever. Nadeshda doesn't get over that.

The inexperienced young Olenka wants to marry the wealthy but much older Urbenin. She wants to use his money to treat her father's madness . The examining magistrate does not take the reason for the marriage from her. He wants to give her the money she needs. In vain labor of love. At the pompous wedding - the landed gentry is invited - Zinoviev takes on the role of bride and groom . When Olenka flees to the Count's park after the obligatory kiss at the party and does not appear, the examining magistrate saves the situation by successfully looking for her solo. However, the two stay away from the noble wedding party for a long time. The simple reason: Both recognize that they are meant for each other. However, their embrace is watched by Kajetan. Zinoviev to the newly married Olenka: “... I am determined, dearest. You become my wife."

Later at the wedding party, Nadezhda raised the courage in private to the question: "May I hope?" The examining magistrate refuses to answer.

The count is interested in Olenka and Nadezhda. When the justice of the peace notices that he is interested in his daughter, he is pleased. Perhaps he will have a count as a son-in-law. Nadeshda no longer wants anything from her loyal admirer Dr. Vosnesensky know. The rejected lapwing is now angry with the examining magistrate. The count can tell his friend, the examining magistrate, that Olenka is making progress and confesses that he only wants to seduce her; so never get married. Stepmother Olenka is nasty to her two children by marriage. In front of the count and his friend Zinoviev, Olenka claims that her husband beat her. The count then dismisses his administrator. After six years of service, he moves into town with his two children, drinks his belongings and goes hungry.

The examining magistrate regards Olenka as his lover and is considering killing her and the count when he is sent home by Karnejew that night because he is disrupting their tête-à-tête. The examining magistrate doesn't know what to think of them. The count vacillates between dislike and affection. When the hunt is on, Olenka tells people that the count wants to throw them out.

Nadeshda has news for the coroner. She wants to marry the count. Sosja, the count's wife, appears at the side of her brother Kajetan Przechocki. The Justice of the Peace, Kalinin, passes out. The lapwing appears in the middle of the night with bad news at the examining magistrate. Nadeshda had attempted suicide. With her marriage she wanted revenge on Zinoviev. Zinoviev must marry Nadezhda. The die-hard bachelor doesn't want to.

Zinoviev receives a letter from the Count that Olenka - fatally injured during the hunt - is dying. When he arrived in Karnejewka, the examining magistrate learned from the count that he had been married in Petersburg when he was drunk. And Olenka's own blunt dagger was stabbed in the hip while hunting in the forest. You lost too much blood. The count considers Urbenin to be the perpetrator and also fears for his own life. Shortly before her death, the examining magistrate questions the dying woman. Olenka does not reveal the name of her murderer and dies. There is no robbery. The examining magistrate suspects that Olenka has withheld the name of her murderer from him because she wanted to protect him from harsh punishment. Accordingly, the father, the husband or the count could be the perpetrators. Since the father and the count have an alibi, Urbenin is arrested, charged and convicted. Zinoviev had already handed the murder case over to a colleague and had to say goodbye before the trial. Zinoviev cites his bad reputation as the count's drinking companion and irregularities in the detention of prisoners on remand as reasons for his release. Zinoviev is summoned to witness the murder trial. He gets away with it.

The Count's estate falls into the hands of his wife and Przechockis. The count becomes impoverished and lives at Zinoviev's expense.

Frame narration

In April 1880, the candidate of the right Ivan Petrovich Kamyshev, examining magistrate a. D., residing in Moscow's Tverskaya , gave a newspaper editor his manuscript for publication. It is about events that took place in the Russian provinces around 1872. The editor requests three months to review the manuscript.

When Kamyshev went to the editorial office again in the summer of 1880, the excited editor spoke to his conscience. It was not Urbenin - sentenced to 15 years of forced labor in Siberia - who murdered the beautiful young Olenka, but Kamyshev himself. The latter admits the act. Olenka had stood in the Kamyshev forest; she had never loved anyone other than him. But when she added: "If I hadn't married Urbenin, I could now become the wife of a count", Kamyshev could not have got over that and took action.

shape

When Kamyshev, around forty years old, enters the editorial office in the frame story, he is described by the editor as “tall, broad-shouldered and compact”, as a man who “could bend a horseshoe between his fists without much effort”. All of this fits in with the opening at the end of the novel: The perpetrator must have been a muscle man. The editor uses numerous footnotes - especially in the last quarter of the internal narrative - to point out how the investigating judge successfully dismissed all suspicions.

Right at the beginning of the internal narrative, the examining magistrate begins with his glances into the future, which continue throughout the text: Olenka will be “the heroine” of his “extremely troubled novel”. One of his writing concerns is to “let the picture” of his “beloved heroine arise”. Just before Olenka becomes Mrs. Urbenina, the examining magistrate's fun is over. He writes: “From the next chapter on, the face of my hitherto peaceful muse will reflect anger and sadness instead of calm serenity. The prologue is over, the drama begins. "

While he was writing the exam, the examining magistrate looked back sadly at his mistakes and atrocities. Example: He had refused to answer Nadeshda's honest question during Olenka's wedding party.

When Count Olenka wins for himself, the examining magistrate writes: "... nobody ... would have believed that the boyish attempt at conquest would drive some of the people involved into moral decline, death and even crime." so that the administrator Urbenin, whose wife Olenka and himself means, the reader cannot guess at the early stage with the best will in the world. Sometimes it depends on the word. The reader, who is searching for the meaning of questionable expressions, can hardly guess what it means when the Count interspersed his speech that he could not marry at all. The solution comes towards the end of the novel: Count Karneev is already married.

The examining magistrate, who ultimately turns out to be the murderer, targets every potential suspect in order to distract himself: "The one-eyed Kusma, who unexpectedly came to the fore, caused utter confusion in the almost completed novel." ironically pointed to a structure of thought which - as it turns out - differs considerably from the truth in the main point of the murder investigation in favor of the author Kamyshev.

Adaptations

filming

radio play

German-language editions

Used edition

  • A drama on the hunt. Detective novel. Translated by Hartmut Herboth. 259 pages. Verlag Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 1987 (1st edition), ISBN 3-360-00074-9

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Russian Новости дня
  2. Russian Антоша Чехонте
  3. Russian А. Чехонте
  4. Russian pseudonyms
  5. Russian Ниренбург, Борис Эдуардович
  6. Russian Мой ласковый и нежный зверь
  7. Russian Лотяну, Эмиль Владимирович
  8. Entry in the IMDb
  9. Audio play entry at hoerdat

Remarks

  1. Urbenin denies or puts this into perspective later. (Edition used, p. 215, 9. Zvo)
  2. ↑ To be more precise, the examining magistrate covered up the incomplete testimony through skillful conversation. When Olenka says: "Yes, and you, you ... killed ...", the examining magistrate replies: "The snipe, that's right." (Edition used, p. 204, 8th Zvu)
  3. Kamyshev also killed the one-eyed servant Kusma so that he could not testify against him. (Edition used, p. 255, 5th Zvu)