Uncle Vanya

epub:type="z3998:persona">Marina with a candle. Sonya You ought to be in bed, nurse darling! It’s late. Marina The samovar has not been cleared. One can’t very well go to bed. Serebryakov Everyone is kept up, everyone is worn out. I am the only one enjoying myself. Marina Going up to Serebryakov tenderly. Well, master dear, is the pain so bad? I have a grumbling pain in my legs too, such a pain tucks the rug in. You’ve had this trouble for years. Vera Petrovna, Sonetchka’s mother, used to be up night after night with you, wearing herself out. How fond she was of you! A pause. The old are like little children, they like someone to be sorry for them; but no one feels for the old kisses Serebryakov on the shoulder. Come to bed, dear⁠ ⁠… come, my honey.⁠ ⁠… I’ll give you some lime-flower tea and warm your legs⁠ ⁠… and say a prayer for you.⁠ ⁠… Serebryakov Moved. Let us go, Marina. Marina I have such a grumbling pain in my legs myself, such a pain together with Sonya leads him off. Vera Petrovna used to be crying, and breaking her heart over you.⁠ ⁠… You were only a mite then, Sonetchka, and had no sense.⁠ ⁠… Come along, come along, sir⁠ ⁠… Serebryakov, Sonya and Marina go out. Yelena I am quite worn out with him. I can hardly stand on my feet. Voynitsky You with him, and I with myself. This is the third night I have had no sleep. Yelena It’s dreadful in this house. Your mother hates everything except her pamphlets and the Professor; the Professor is irritated, he does not trust me, and is afraid of you; Sonya is angry with her father, angry with me and has not spoken to me for a fortnight; you hate my husband and show open contempt for your mother; I am overwrought and have been nearly crying twenty times today.⁠ ⁠… It’s dreadful in this house. Voynitsky Let us drop this moralising. Yelena You are a well-educated and intelligent man, Ivan Petrovitch, and I should have thought you ought to understand that the world is not being destroyed through fire or robbery, but through hatred, enmity and all this petty wrangling.⁠ ⁠… It ought to be your work to reconcile everyone, and not to grumble. Voynitsky Reconcile me to myself first! My precious⁠ ⁠… bends down and kisses her hand. Yelena Don’t! Draws away her hand. Go away! Voynitsky The rain will be over directly and everything in nature will be refreshed and sigh with relief. But the storm has brought no relief to me. Day and night the thought that my life has been hopelessly wasted weighs on me like a nightmare. I have no past, it has been stupidly wasted on trifles, and the present is awful in its senselessness. Here you have my life and my love! What use to make of them? What am I to do with them? My passion is wasted in vain like a ray of sunshine that has fallen into a pit, and I am utterly lost, too. Yelena When you talk to me about your love, I feel stupid and don’t know what to say. Forgive me, there is nothing I can say to you is about to go out. Good night. Voynitsky Barring her way. And if you knew how wretched I am at the thought that by my side, in this same house, another life is being wasted, too⁠—yours! What are you waiting for? What cursed theory holds you back? Understand, do understand⁠ ⁠… Yelena Looks at him intently. Ivan Petrovitch, you are drunk! Voynitsky I may be, I may be⁠ ⁠… Yelena Where is the doctor? Voynitsky He is in there⁠ ⁠… he is staying the night with me. It may be, it may be⁠ ⁠… anything may be! Yelena You have been drinking again today. What’s that for? Voynitsky There’s a semblance of life in it, anyway.⁠ ⁠… Don’t prevent me, Hélène! Yelena You never used to drink, and you did not talk so much.⁠ ⁠… Go to bed! You bore me. Voynitsky Kisses her hand. My precious⁠ ⁠… marvellous one! Yelena With vexation. Don’t. This is really hateful goes out. Voynitsky Alone. She is gone a pause. Ten years ago I used to meet her at my sister’s. Then she was seventeen and I was thirty-seven. Why didn’t I fall in love with her then and make her an offer? It might easily have happened then! And now she would have been my wife.⁠ ⁠… Yes.⁠ ⁠… Now we should both have been awakened by the storm; she would have been frightened by the thunder, I should have held her in my arms and whispered, “Don’t be frightened, I am here.” Oh, wonderful thoughts, what happiness; it makes me laugh with delight⁠—but, my God, my thoughts are in a tangle. Why am I old? Why doesn’t she understand me? Her fine phrases, her lazy morality, her nonsensical lazy theories about the ruin of the world⁠—all that is absolutely hateful to me a pause. Oh, how I have been cheated! I adored that Professor, that pitiful gouty invalid, and worked for him like an ox. Sonya and I squeezed every farthing out of the estate; we haggled over linseed oil, peas, curds, like greedy peasants; we grudged ourselves every morsel to save up halfpence and farthings and send him thousands of roubles. I was proud of him and his learning; he was my life, the breath of my being. All his writings and utterances seemed to me inspired by genius.⁠ ⁠… My God, and now! Here he is retired, and now one can see the sum total of his life. He leaves not one page of work behind him, he is utterly unknown, he is nothing⁠—a soap bubble! And I have been cheated.⁠ ⁠… I see it⁠—stupidly cheated.⁠ ⁠… Enter Astrov in his coat, but without waistcoat or tie; he is a little drunk; he is followed by Telyegin with the guitar. Astrov Play something! Telyegin Everyone is asleep! Astrov Play! Telyegin begins playing softly. Astrov To