The Complete Plays

AN INVOLUNTARY TRAGEDIANC

Chekhov had promised the comic actor Konstantin Varlamov an acting vehicle and turned to his story One of Many (1887) about a paterfamilias who must spend his time shunting back and forth between the dacha where his loved ones are summering and the town, where he carries out their innumerable commissions. For the sake of the stage, Chekhov altered the list of errands, deleting from the items to be purchased “a child’s coffin” and expunging racy remarks that could pass in print but would never get past the dramatic censor. Varlamov did not in fact appear in the play, so the first actor to create the harried family man was the far less famous M. I. Bibikov, at an amateur perfomance at the Petersburg German Club on October 1, 1889. Basically, Tragedian is a straightforward comic monologue, with the officious friend acting as “feed” or straight man.

The allusion to Molière in the original title—A Tragedian in Spite of Himself—alerts one to the extreme contradictions of the protagonist. Molière dealt in paradoxical natures: the imaginary invalid, the learned ladies, the bourgeois aristocrat, or the misanthrope, originally subtitled “the grouch in love” (l’atrabilaire amoureux). Described as “the father of a family,” Tolkachov is a characteristic hero of a Chekhov farce, being a man on the edge of a nervous breakdown. He begins the play by calling for a pistol to commit suicide and ends it by quoting Othello, demanding the blood of his interlocutor. Between these two extremes, the banal situation he describes comes less from the world of tragedy than from that of existential absurdity His multifarious errands compel him to live in a muddle of inanimate objects. “For instance, do you put the heavy brass mortar and pestle in with the glass lampshade or the carbolic acid with the tea? How do you pack the bottles of beer with the bicycle?” This surrealistic mélange, followed by a hyperbolic comparison of married life to the Israelites’ labor in the Egyptian brickyards or the Spanish Inquisition, creates an impression of an ordinary middle-class existence as Bosch’s hell. Although firmly in the Gogol tradition, Chekhov is here halfway to Jarry and Ionesco.

AN INVOLUNTARY TRAGEDIAN (FROM THE LIFE OF VACATIONERS)

Tрa„иk пoнe‚oлe

(Иэ ‰aчнoй жизни)

A Joke in One Act

CHARACTERS¹

IVAN IVANOVICH TOLKACHOV, the father of a family

ALEKSEY ALEKSEEVICH MURASHKIN, his friend

The action takes place in Petersburg, in Murashkins apartment.

Murashkins study. Well-upholstered furniture—MURASHKIN is sitting at a writing desk. Enter TOLKACHOV, holding a glass globe for a lamp, a toy bicycle, three hatboxes, a large bundle of clothing, a shopping bag filled with bottled beer, and lots of little parcels. He has a dazed look in his eyes and drops on to the sofa in exhaustion.

MURASHKIN. Good afternoon, Ivan Ivanych! Delighted to see you! What have you been up to?

TOLKACHOV (breathing hard). My good friend, dear heart . . . I’ve come to you with a request . . . Please . . . lend me a revolver until tomorrow. Be a friend!

MURASHKIN. What’ll you do with a revolver?

TOLKACHOV. I need it . . . Ugh, good grief! . . . Let me have some water . . . Quick, water! . . . I need it . . . Tonight I have to drive through a dark forest, so you see, I . . . in case of emergency. Lend it to me, do me a favor!

MURASHKIN. Uh-oh, you’re lying, Ivan Ivanych! What the deuce do you mean dark forest? More likely, you’re up to something? I can see by your face that you’re up to no good! What’s the matter with you? Do you feel ill?

TOLKACHOV. Hold on, let me catch my breath . . . Oof, good grief! I’m dog tired. There’s this feeling running all through my body and my brain-pan that I’ve been made into shish kebab. I can’t stand another minute of it. Be a friend, don’t ask questions, don’t go into details . . . lend me a revolver! For pity’s sake!

MURASHKIN. That’s enough of that! Ivan Ivanych, why so down in the mouth? You’re the father of a family, a senior civil servant! You should be ashamed!

TOLKACHOV. What kind of father of a family? I’m a martyr! I’m a beast of burden, a peon, a slave, a contemptible worm, who goes on hoping against hope and puts off taking his own life! I’m a doormat, a numbskull, an idiot! Why do I go on living? What’s it for? (Leaps up.) Go on, tell me, what am I living for? What’s the point of this neverending series of moral and physical torments? I can understand being a martyr to an idea, sure! but to be a martyr to who the hell knows what, lady’s petticoats and lampshades, no! — thank you kindly! No, no, no! I’ve had enough! Enough!

MURASHKIN. Stop shouting, the neighbors will hear!

TOLKACHOV. Let the neighbors hear, I don’t care! If you don’t lend me a revolver, somebody else will, I’m no longer among the living! It’s a done

deal!

MURASHKIN. Take it easy, you tore off my button. Try to be calm and collected. I still don’t understand what’s so bad about your life?

TOLKACHOV. What’s bad? You ask: what’s bad? Just let me tell you! Just let me! I’ll spill my guts to you and maybe it’ll take a load off my chest. Let’s sit down. Now, listen to this . . . Ugh, good grief, I’m winded! . . . Let’s take as an example this very day, today. Shall we? As you know, from ten to four I have to make a noise at the office. Overheated, stale air, flies, and the most utter, my dear pal, chaos. My secretary’s away on leave, Khrapov’s² gone off to get married, the office small fry are obsessed with summer rentals, love affairs, and amateur theatricals. They’re all so drowsy, worn out, haggard, you can’t get a word of sense out of them . . . The secretary’s duties are being performed out by a creature who’s deaf in the left ear and in love; the general public is bonkers, hustling and bustling in and out, losing their tempers, making threats,— it’s such bedlam you want to shout “Help.” A total zoo, all hell broke loose. And the work itself is diabolical: the same old same old, the same old same old, inquiries, reports, inquiries, reports,—as monotonous as the tide ebbing and flowing. You understand, it’s simply enough to make your eyes pop out of your skull. Let me have some water . . . You leave the daily grind broken, worn to a frazzle, you should be eating dinner and falling into bed, but no! — remember you’ve rented a place in the country, which means you’re a slave, a piece of crap, a loofah, an icicle, and it’s your job to run around, like a headless chicken, filling orders. The folks at our country place have a sweet little habit: if a vacationer goes to town, then, every vacationing twerp, not to mention his wife, has the power and right to foist a heap of errands on him. The wife demands that I stop by the dressmaker’s and bawl her out because she made the bodice too loose but the shoulders too narrow; Sonichka has a pair of shoes to be exchanged, my wife’s sister wants twenty kopeks’ worth of crimson silk for a pattern and seven feet of ribbon . . . Wait a minute, I can read it to you. (Pulls a list out of his pocket and reads it.) Globe for lamp; one pound ham sausage; five kopeks’ worth of cloves and cinnamon; castor oil for Misha; ten pounds granulated sugar; get from home the brass mortar and pestle for the sugar; carbolic acid, insect powder, ten kopeks’ worth of face powder; twenty bottles of beer; smelling-salts and a corset for Mme. Chanceau, size eighty-two . . . oof! and get from home Misha’s fall overcoat and galoshes. That’s the order of my wife and family. Now for the errands for my beloved friends and neighbors, may they rot in hell. The Vlasins are throwing a nameday party for their Volodya tomorrow, I’ve got to buy him a bicycle; Lieutenant-Colonel Vikhrin’s³ wife is in an interesting condition, so I’m obliged to drop in on the midwife every day and ask her to pay a call. And so on, and so on. There are five lists in my pockets and my handkerchief is all in knots. So, old pal, in the interval between work and the train you run around town like a dog with its tongue hanging out, — on the run, on the run, and cursing your life. From the department store to the pharmacy, from the pharmacy to the dressmaker, from the dressmaker to the butcher, and then back to the pharmacy. One place you trip over yourself, another place you lose your money, in a third place you forget to pay and they chase you down making a scene, in the fourth place you step on a lady’s train . . . phooey! All this heavy exercise drives you frantic and makes you such a wreck that all night long your bones ache and you dream of crocodiles. Well, sir, your errands are run, everything’s bought, now how are you supposed to pack up this whole kit and kaboodle? For instance, do you put the heavy brass mortar and pestle in with the glass lampshade or the carbolic acid with the tea? How do you pack the bottles of beer with the bicycle? It’s slaving in the brick yards of Egypt, a brain teaser, a riddle! No matter how much you wrack your brains and try to be clever, you always end up smashing and spilling something, and at the station and on the train you’ll be standing, your arms spreadeagled, your legs bowed, holding a package under your chin, covered with shopping, cardboard boxes and the rest of the crap. Then the train pulls out, passengers start to dump your things all over the place: your stuff is occupying other people’s seats. They yell, they call the conductor, they threaten to have you thrown off, and what can I do? I stand there and bug out my eyes, like a whipped mule. Now for the next installment. I get back to my cottage. There you should have a nice drink for all these righteous labors, a bite to eat and a bit of a snooze — am I right?—but it is not to be. My darling wifie has seen to that for quite some time. You’ve hardly had a spoonful of soup, when she pounces wham! on yours truly and it’s—wouldn’t you like to go out to an amateur theatrical or a dance social? You can’t say no. You’re a husband and the word “husband” translated into vacation language means a dumb pack-animal, which you can travel on and load with as heavy a burden as you like, with no fear of interference from the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. So you go and gape at Scandal in a Respectable Family or some other stupid farce,⁴ you applaud on your wife’s command while you’re drooping, drooping, drooping, and expect every minute you’ll have a stroke right on the spot. At the social you watch the dancers and collect partners for the wife, and if there aren’t enough partners, then you yourself have got to dance the quadrille. You’re dancing with Miss Two-Left-Feet, smiling like an idiot, and thinking all the while, “How long, O Lord?” You get home after midnight from the theater or the dance, and you’re no longer a man, you’re a bag of bones, ready for the scrap heap. But now at last you’ve reached the finish line: you strip off your things and get into bed. It’s wonderful, you close your eyes and doze off . . . It’s all so lovely, so poetic: it’s nice and warm, don’t you know, and the kids aren’t screaming in the next room, and the wife isn’t there, and your conscience is clear—what more could you ask for. You’re about to fall asleep — and suddenly . . . suddenly you hear: bzzzz! . . . Mosquitoes! (Leaps up.) Mosquitoes, damn, blast and anathematize them, mosquitoes! (Shakes his fists.) Mosquitoes! It’s the Plagues of Egypt,⁵ the Spanish Inquisition! Bzzz! It buzzes so pathetically, so mournfully, you’d think they’re begging your pardon, but once the bastards take a bite out of you, you’re up scratching for an hour. So you smoke, and you squash them, and you put your head under the covers — no escape! At the bitter end you spit in disgust and surrender to be torn to pieces: dig in, damn you! You barely have time to get used to the mosquitoes when there’s a new plague of Egypt: in the living room your wife begins to practice her ballads with her tenors. They sleep all day, and at night they rehearse amateur concerts. Oh, my God! A tenor is a torment far worse than mosquitoes. (Sings.) “Say not that her youth was wasted . . .” “Once again I stand bewitched before thee . . .”⁶ Oh, the ba-a-stards! They’ve destroyed me, body and soul! To drown them out just a bit, I’ve got this trick: I tap my finger on my forehead next to my ear. So I’m tapping away till around four in the morning, when they finally take their leave. Ugh, let me have some more water, pal . . . I’m done in . . . Well, sir, you’ve had no sleep, you get up at six and it’s— forward march to the station to catch the train. You run, for fear you’ll miss it, through the mud, fog, cold, brr! Then you get to town, and the whole merry-go-round starts over again. That’s how it goes, pal. My life, I assure you, stinks, I wouldn’t wish a life like this on my worst enemy. Can you imagine, it’s undermined my health! Shortness of breath, heartburn, shattered nerves, indigestion, spots before my eyes . . . Believe you me, I’ve turned into a mental case . . . (Looks around.) This is just between us . . . I plan to consult an eminent specialist in psychosis.⁷ A hell of a mood comes over you at times, pal. So in those moments of aggravation and craziness, when the mosquitoes bite or the tenors sing, suddenly your eyesight blurs, suddenly you jump up, run around the house like a maniac, shouting: “I crave blood! Blood!”⁸ In fact, at times like those you do want to stick a knife in somebody or bash his head in with a chair. That’s what summer rentals can do to you! And nobody’s sorry for you, nobody sympathizes, it’s as if that’s the way it’s supposed to be. People even laugh. But you understand, I’m a living creature, I want to go on living! This isn’t a farce, it’s a tragedy! Listen, if you won’t let me have a revolver, then at least show some sympathy!

MURASHKIN. I do sympathize.

TOLKACHOV. I can see the way you sympathize . . . Good-bye. I’m off to get some sardines and salami . . . there’s still the tooth powder, and then to the station.

MURASHKIN. Where’s the cottage you’re renting?

TOLKACHOV. On Dead Man’s Creek.

MURASHKIN (delighted). Really? Listen, do you know a woman who’s renting there, Olga Pavlovna Finberg?

TOLKACHOV. I do. In fact she’s a friend of ours.

MURASHKIN. Is that so? Well, what a coincidence! It’s so convenient, it would be so kind of you . . .

TOLKACHOV. What are you getting at?

MURASHKIN. Dear old pal, could you run me a little errand? Be a friend! Now, promise me that you’ll do it?

TOLKACHOV. What is it?

MURASHKIN. A friend in need is a friend indeed! For my sake, my dear man. First of all, convey my regards to Olga Pavlovna and tell her that I’m alive and well, and kiss her hand. Second, bring her a little something. She asked me to buy her a portable sewing machine, and there’s no one to deliver it to her . . . Bring it, dear boy! And, while you’re at it, bring along this canary in a cage . . . only very carefully, otherwise the door will break off . . . Why are you looking at me like that?

TOLKACHOV. A sewing machine . . . a canary in a cage . . . Tweety birds and dicky birds . . .

MURASHKIN. Ivan Ivanovich, what’s wrong with you? Why are you turning so red?

TOLKACHOV (stamping his feet). Hand over the sewing machine! Where’s the cage? Now you pile yourself on top! Devour a man! Tear him to pieces! Finish him off! (Clenching his fists.) I must have blood! Blood! Blood!

MURASHKIN. You’ve gone out of your mind!

TOLKACHOV (bearing down on him). I must have blood! Blood!

MURASHKIN (terrified). He’s gone out of his mind! (Shouts.) Petrushka! Mariya! Where are you? Somebody, help!

TOLKACHOV (chasing him around the room). I must have blood! Blood!

Curtain

VARIANT TO

An Involuntary Tragedian

The variant comes from the censor’s copy (C), Bazarov’s published edition (B), and the lithographed script (L).

page 558 / After: buy him a bicycle; — The Kuritsyns’ baby died, and I have to get a child’s coffin. (C, B, L)

NOTES

1 Suggestive comic names: Murashkin from murashka, ant, and Tolkachov from tolkach, go-getter.

2 Comic name from khrap, snore.

3 Comic name from vikhr, whirlwind.

4 In the original, Motnya, a farce by K. A. Tarnovsky. Scandal in a Respectable Family was also a farce, this one by N. I. Kulikov. Chekhov had seen both as a schoolboy in Taganrog.

5 The Ten Plagues that God visited upon the Egyptians to compel them to release the Hebrews from slavery and let them go (Exodus 7–10).

6 “Say not that her youth,” a ballad based on a poem by N. A. Nekrasov (“A heavy cross fell to her lot,” 1855) and set to music by many composers. “Once again,” the opening of a “gypsy” ballad from a lyric by V. I. Krasov. Chekhov cites them frequently in his plays.

7 In the original, Cechott and Merzheevsky. O. A. Chechott (b. 1842) and I. P. Merzheevsky (1838–1908) were well-known St. Petersburg psychiatrists.

8 From Shakespeare’s Othello (Act III, scene 3): “Blood, O Iago, blood!”