UNCLE VANYA
A monologue from the
play by Anton
Chekhov
|
NOTE: This monologue is reprinted
from The Moscow Arts Theatre Series of Plays. Ed. Oliver
M. Sayler. New York: Brentanos, 1922. |
|
|
ASTROFF: You can burn peat in your stoves and build
your barns of stone. Oh, I don't object, of course, to cutting
wood when you have to, but why destroy the forests? The woods
of Russia are trembling under the blows of the ax. Millions of
trees have perished. The homes of the wild animals and the birds
have been laid desolate; the rivers are shrinking, and many beautiful
landscapes are gone forever. And why? Because men are too lazy
and short-sighted to stoop and pick their fuel from the ground.
Am I not right? Who but a senseless barbarian could burn so much
beauty in his stove and destroy what he cannot create himself?
Man has reason and creative energy so that he may increase his
possessions. Until now, though, he has not created but destroyed.
The forests are disappearing, the rivers are drying up, the game
is being exterminated, the climate is spoiled and the earth becomes
poorer and uglier every day. I read irony in your eye; you do
not take seriously what I am saying; and -- and -- perhaps I
am talking nonsense. But when I cross peasant-forests which I
have saved from the ax, or hear the rustling of the young trees
which I have set out with my own hands, I feel as if I had had
some small share in improving the climate, and that if mankind
is happy a thousand years from now I shall have been partly responsible
in my small way for their happiness. When I plant a young birch
tree and see it budding and swaying in the wind, my heart swells
with pride and I -- however -- I must be off. Probably it is
all nonsense, anyhow. Goodbye.
MORE
MONOLOGUES BY ANTON CHEKHOV |
