Volume 7, Number 2 · August 18, 1966
Poet of Hopelessness
By Helen Muchnic
Platonov
by Anton Chekhov, translated by David Magarshack
Hill & Wang, 195 pp., $1.75 (paper)
Chekhov and Other Essays
by Leon Shestov, with a new Introduction by Sidney Monas
Ann Arbor Paperbacks, 205 pp., $1.95
Chekhov and His Prose
by Thomas Winner
Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 263 pp., $5.00
Chekhov: A Biographical and Critical Study
by Ronald Hingley
Barnes & Noble, 262 pp., $1.50 (paper)
The four-act play, Platonov, was found among Chekhov's papers after his death in a heavily corrected manuscript of which the title page was missing. It was first published in the USSR as 'A Play Without a Title,' and was translated into English in 1964 by David Magarshack and broadcast on the BBC in a shortened version. (The present edition indicates in brackets the parts that were omitted in this production.) Written at the very beginning of Chekhov's career, when he was a student at the University of Moscow, twenty or twenty-one years old, it is a very long and awkward play, 'almost as long,' Mr. Magarshack remarks, 'as his last three plays put together,' We know from a letter of his brother Michael that Chekhov had hoped to have it staged, and that 'he even took it to the well-known actress M. N. Ermolova.' But Mr. Hingley is doubtless right is saying that 'Chekhov left it among his papers and probably forgot about it; its defects are so obvious that he would certainly have been horrified to know that it has been published posthumously.' Nevertheless, a great author's early attempts, however unsuccessful, are always interesting and usually, as in this case, by no means without intrinsic merit.
Review, 2184 words
To read the full text of this piece, please choose one of the following options:
|
If you are already a subscriber to the Review's electronic edition, please sign in: |
To subscribe to the electronic edition, please press the button below. |
To purchase access to this article for $3, please press the button below. |