page 428 / After: an upstart! — A crude dullard! (NT)
page 429 / After: like a side of bacon! — There won’t be a wet patch left on her! (NT)
page 431 / After: a shame, a disgrace! — I feel myself now in such a nasty situation you can’t imagine! (NT, Cens., Lith., P, AB)
NOTES
1 Nikolay Nikolaevich Solovtsov (Fyodorov, 1857–1902), a schoolmate of Chekhov’s in Taganrog, who became an actor at the Alexandra Theatre in St. Petersburg 1882 to 1883, and was actor and director at Korsh’s Theatre in Moscow from 1887 to 1889. He staged Chekhov’s play The Wood Goblin at Abramova’s Theatre in 1889–1890.
2 An ironic name, from smirny (peaceful, serene).
3 The Gentry Land Bank, established by the government in the 1880s to offer financial assistance to impecunious landowners.
4 In Western Russia, many rural inns were run by Jews, and a standard anti-Semitic joke was that they were flea-infested clip joints. A “kike tavern” was a figure of speech for “chaos, bedlam.”
5 Joke names: Gruzdyov, from gruzd, a kind of mushroom; Kuritsyn, from kuritsa, hen; Mazutov, from mazut, fuel oil.
6 A refreshing drink of low alcohol content, made from fermented black bread and malt, much preferred to beer by the peasantry. Lopakhin orders it in Act One of The Cherry Orchard.
7 See Uncle Vanya, note 59.
8 Mispronunciation of French, je vous prie, “I beg you.”
9 Dark eyes, flashing eyes, the first words of “Ochi chyornye,” a well-known Russian folksong.
10 Russian literature knows several Tamaras: a famous queen of Georgia (1184–1213); a Georgian Lorelei or wandering spirit in Lermontov’s poem “Tamara”; and the Georgian maiden who flees to a nunnery to avoid the Demon’s love, in Anton Rubinstein’s opera from Lermontov, The Demon (1871).
11 Chekhov uses the phallic image ogloblya v chuzhoy kuzov, a long shaft in someone else’s wagon.
THE PROPOSAL
“A vulgarish and boringish vaudevillette, but suitable for the provinces” was how Chekhov disparaged The Proposal, even as he asked friends to intercede with the censors on its behalf. Inspired by the success of The Bear, he was anxious to get his next farce on the boards. It had its first production at the theater at the Imperial residence at Tsarskoe Selo on August 9, 1889, with a cast of Pavel Svobodin (who had created Shabelsky) as Lomov, Mariya Ilinskaya as Nataliya, and the popular fat comedian Varlamov as Chubukov. It was greeted with unbroken laughter, not least from Tsar Alexander III, who congratulated the actors. The Proposal shared The Bear’s fate as a favorite curtain-raiser and benefit play in the provinces for years.
The Proposal is the first of Chekhov’s farces to employ the device of thwarted expectation of what the title announces. Just as the characters in The Wedding and The Celebration fail to pull off the intended ceremonies, so the offer of marriage in this play is continually postponed and eventually eliminated. Botched proposals are a Chekhovian speciality. The cross-purposes of the “imaginary invalid” Lomov, incongruously decked out in tails and gloves, and Nataliya, in her apron, mount to a boisterous, breathless pitch. Chekhov understood how to accelerate the basic misapprehensions into a barrage of insults, and, after building to a climax, how to reinvigorate the action by introducing a fresh contretemps (which he may have learned from Turgenev’s one-act Luncheon with the Marshal of Nobility). Later, the final interview of Tusenbach and Irina in Three Sisters and Lopakhin’s failure to propose to Varya in The Cherry Orchard will show Chekhov modulating the tone to one of shattered hopes and mutually conflicting illusions.
THE PROPOSAL
Прe‰ложeниe
A Joke in One Act
CHARACTERS
STEPAN STEPANOVICH CHUBUKOV,1 a landowner
NATALIYA STEPANOVNA, his daughter, 25
IVAN VASILYEVICH LOMOV,2 Chubukov’s neighbor, a healthy, well-fed, but very hypochrondriacal landowner
The action takes place on Chubukov’s estate.
A parlor in Chubukov’s house.
I
CHUBUKOV and LOMOV (enters wearing a tailcoat and white gloves).
CHUBUKOV (going to meet him). Darling boy, look who it is! Ivan Vasilye-vich! Absolutely delighted! (Shakes his hand.) This is what I call a pleasant surprise, laddy . . . How are you?
LOMOV. Well, thank you kindly. And how are you getting on?
CHUBUKOV. We plug along in a modest sort of way, my cherub, all the better for your asking and so on. Have a seat, please do . . . The thing of it is, it’s wrong to neglect your neighbors, laddy. Darling boy, why are you in formal dress? A tailcoat, gloves, and so on. You headed anywhere in particular, my trusty friend?
LOMOV. No, I’m only calling on you, respected Stepan Stepanych.
CHUBUKOV. Then why the tailcoat, the elegance!
LOMOV. Well, you see, here’s what it’s about. (Takes him by the arm.) I have come, respected Stepan Stepanych, to trouble you with a certain question. More than once now I have had the honor of calling on your assistance, and you have always, in a manner of speaking . . . but, excuse me, I’m getting excited. I’ll take a sip of water, respected Stepan Stepanych. (Drinks water.)
CHUBUKOV (aside). He’s here to ask for money! He won’t get it! (To him.) What’s the matter, my beauty?
LOMOV. Well, you see, Respect Stepanych . . . sorry, Stepan Respectych . . . I mean, I’m awfully excited, as you may have noticed . . . In short, you’re the only one who can assist me, although, of course, I don’t deserve it in any way and . . . and I don’t have the right to count on your support . . .
CHUBUKOV. Ah, stop beating around the bush, laddy! Spit it out! Well?
LOMOV. Right away . . . this very minute. The fact is, I have come here to ask for the hand of your daughter Nataliya Stepanovna.
CHUBUKOV (overjoyed). Darling boy! Ivan Vasilyevich! Say that again — did I hear it right?
LOMOV. I have the honor to ask . . .
CHUBUKOV (interrupting). My darling boy . . . I am delighted and so on . . . The thing of it is and so forth. (Embraces and kisses him.) I’ve wanted this for a long time. It’s always been my wish. (Sheds a tear.) And I’ve always been fond of you, my cherub, like my own son. God grant you both wisdom and love and so on, and I’ve really wanted . . . Why am I standing around like a lunkhead? I’m dazed with delight, quite dazed! Oof, with all my heart . . . I’ll go and call Natasha and that sort of thing.
LOMOV (deeply moved). Respected Stepan Stepanych, what do you think, can I count on her consent?
CHUBUKOV. The thing of it is, a good-looking fellow like you and . . . how can she not consent! She loves you like a cat loves catnip, I’ll wager, and so on . . . Be right back! (Exits.)