The Seagull

but⁠ ⁠… as soon as it is published I can’t endure it, and I see that it is all wrong, a mistake, that it ought not to have been written at all, and I feel vexed and sick about it⁠ ⁠… laughing. And the public reads it and says: “Yes, charming, clever. Charming, but very inferior to Tolstoy,” or, “It’s a fine thing, but Turgenev’s Fathers and Children is finer.” And it will be the same to my dying day, only charming and clever, charming and clever⁠—and nothing more. And when I die my friends, passing by my tomb, will say, “Here lies Trigorin. He was a good writer, but inferior to Turgenev.” Nina Forgive me, but I refuse to understand you. You are simply spoiled by success. Trigorin What success? I have never liked myself; I dislike my own work. The worst of it is that I am in a sort of delirium, and often don’t understand what I am writing. I love this water here, the trees, the sky. I feel nature, it arouses in me a passionate, irresistible desire to write. But I am not simply a landscape painter; I am also a citizen. I love my native country, my people; I feel that if I am a writer I am in duty bound to write of the people, of their sufferings, of their future, to talk about science and the rights of man and so on, and so on, and I write about everything. I am hurried and flustered, and on all sides they whip me up and are angry with me; I dash about from side to side like a fox beset by hounds. I see life and culture continually getting farther and farther away while I fall farther and farther behind like a peasant too late for the train; and what it comes to is that I feel I can only describe scenes and in everything else I am false to the marrow of my bones. Nina You are overworked and have not the leisure nor the desire to appreciate your own significance. You may be dissatisfied with yourself, but for others you are great and splendid! If I were a writer like you, I should give up my whole life to the common herd, but I should know that there could be no greater happiness for them than to rise to my level, and they would harness themselves to my chariot. Trigorin My chariot, what next! Am I an Agamemnon, or what? Both smile. Nina For such happiness as being a writer or an artist I would be ready to endure poverty, disappointment, the dislike of those around me; I would live in a garret and eat nothing but rye bread, I would suffer from being dissatisfied with myself, from recognising my own imperfections, but I should ask in return for fame⁠ ⁠… real, resounding fame.⁠ ⁠… Covers her face with her hands. It makes me dizzy.⁠ ⁠… Ough! The voice of Madame Arkadin from the house. Madame Arkadin Boris Alexeyevitch! Trigorin They are calling for me. I suppose it’s to pack. But I don’t want to leave here. Looks round at the lake. Just look how glorious it is! It’s splendid! Nina Do you see the house and garden on the other side of the lake? Trigorin Yes. Nina That house was my dear mother’s. I was born there. I have spent all my life beside this lake and I know every little islet on it. Trigorin It’s very delightful here! Seeing the seagull. And what’s this? Nina A seagull. Konstantin Gavrilitch shot it. Trigorin A beautiful bird. Really, I don’t want to go away. Try and persuade Irina Nikolayevna to stay makes a note in his book. Nina What are you writing? Trigorin Oh, I am only making a note. A subject struck me putting away the notebook. A subject for a short story: a young girl, such as you, has lived all her life beside a lake; she loves the lake like a seagull, and is as free and happy as a seagull. But a man comes by chance, sees her, and having nothing better to do, destroys her like that seagull here a pause. Madame Arkadin appears at the window. Madame Arkadin Boris Alexeyevitch, where are you? Trigorin I am coming goes and looks back at Nina. To Madame Arkadin at the window. What is it? Madame Arkadin We are staying. Trigorin goes into the house. Nina Advances to the footlights; after a few moments’ meditation. It’s a dream! Curtain.

Act III

The dining-room in Sorin’s house. Doors on right and on left. A sideboard. A medicine cupboard. A table in the middle of the room. A portmanteau and hatboxes; signs of preparation for departure. Trigorin is having lunch; Masha stands by the table.

Masha	I tell all this to you as a writer. You may make use of it. I am telling you the truth: if he had hurt himself seriously I would not have gone on living another minute. But I have pluck enough all the same. I just made up my mind that I would tear this love out of my heart, tear it out by the roots.
Trigorin	How are you going to do that?
Masha	I am going to be married. To Medvedenko.
Trigorin	That’s the schoolmaster?
Masha	Yes.
Trigorin	I don’t understand what’s the object of it.
Masha	To love without hope, to spend whole years waiting for something.⁠ ⁠… But when I marry, there will be no time left for love, new cares will smother all the old feelings. And, anyway, it will be a change, you know. Shall we have another?
Trigorin	Won’t that be too much?
Masha	Oh, come! Fills two glasses. Don’t look at me like that! Women drink much oftener than you imagine. Only a small proportion drink openly as I do, the majority drink in secret. Yes. And it’s always vodka or brandy. Clinks glasses. My best wishes! You are a good-hearted man; I