Delphi Complete Works of Anton Chekhov

SCENE XIV.

ANNA PETROVNA AND GLAGOLYEV I.

GLAGOLYEV i. How tedious! These people are saying the same things I heard years ago 5 they think the thoughts I thought in my childhood... Everything is old, nothing new... I’ll have a chat with her, then I’ll leave this place.

ANNA PETROVNA. What are you mumbling about, %Porfiry Semeonitch? Please tell me!

GLAGOLYEV i. You here? (Goes to her.) I’m cursing myself for being superfluous here. . . .

ANNA PETROVNA. Not because you’re not like us?

. . . Well, people become reconciled to roaches, and you must become reconciled to our folk here! Sit down, please, and we’ll have a chat!

GLAGOLYEV i. I was looking for you, Anna Petrovna!

I must have a talk with you about something. . . .

ANNA PETROVNA. By all means . . .

GLAGOLYEV i. The fact is ... I would like to learn the answer to my . . . letter. . . .

ANNA PETROVNA. H’m . . . What do you want from me, Porfiry Semeonitch?

GLAGOLYEV 1. D’you know, I renounce . . . any rights as a husband... I’m not out for rights! I want a friend, a clever housewife. ... I have a paradise, but there are no angels in it.

ANNA PETROVNA. I often put the question to myself, what could I do in paradise? I’m a human being, and not an angel!

GLAGOLYEV i. Can you tell what you’re going to do in paradise any more than you can tell what you’re going to do tomorrow? A good person will find work to do anywhere, whether on earth or in heaven...

ANNA PETROVNA. All this is very lovely, but would my existence with you be worth what I should receive for it? Excuse me, Porfiry Semeonitch, but your proposition seems rather a strange one to me... Why should you marry? Why should you want a friend in a skirt? It’s none of my business, of course! But as it’s gone this far, I may as well finish. If I were as old as you, and had as much money, sense and truth as you have, I should not seek anything on this earth, except the common good . . . that is to say, I should seek nothing except the gratification of my love toward my neighbour... GLAGOLYEV I. I am unable to fight for the common good of men... One needs to have ability and a strong will for that, and God did not grant them to me. I was born only to love great deeds and to achieve a heap of petty ones, good for nothing . . . only to love! Come to me!

ANNA PETROVNA. NO. Don’t speak any more of this. And don’t attach any grave significance to my re-

fusal... Vanity, my friend! If we possessed all that we loved, there would be no room for all our possessions... That means, those who refuse are not always stupid or unfriendly. (Laughs.) There’s some philosophy for you for dessert! What’s all that din about? Do you hear it? Most likely it’s Platonov raising a racket... What a character! (Enter Grekova and Triletzky.)