Complete Works of Anton Chekhov

TO K. S. STANISLAVSKY.

YALTA,

October 30, 1903.

… Many thanks for your letter and telegram. Letters are very precious to me now — in the first place, because I am utterly alone here; and in the second, because I sent the play three weeks ago and only got your letter yesterday, and if it were not for my wife, I should know nothing at all and might imagine any mortal thing. When I was writing Lopahin, I thought of it as a part for you. If for any reason you don’t care for it, take the part of Gaev. Lopahin is a merchant, of course, but he is a very decent person in every sense. He must behave with perfect decorum, like an educated man, with no petty ways or tricks of any sort, and it seemed to me this part, the central one of the play, would come out brilliantly in your hands…. In choosing an actor for the part you must remember that Varya, a serious and religious girl, is in love with Lopahin; she wouldn’t be in love with a mere money-grubber….