The cherry orchard, Tchekhov

THE CHERRY ORCHARD

1. RUSSIAN HISTORY

In order to understand the concept and process behind The Cherry Orchard, it is important to understand what type of shift Russia underwent in the 19th century.

The 3rd of March 1861, the Tsar Alexander II abolished the system that tied the muzhik (peasants) to the landowners. It was then called serfdom. It consisted in the total authority for the landowner to control the life and work of peasant serfs who lived on the land. Their bond was identified, in regards of the law, as a property one: the serfs were accessories of immovable property, due to their attachment to the land (movable and immovable property right / accessory and principal right). Unlike the concept of slavery, for instance in the United States, serfs were not technically tied to the master but to the land itself. Slaves were disposable property of their masters, serfs were an accessory right derived from a principal right: the property of the land. But eventually, no distinction could be made because serfs were not allowed to move from the land without the consent of the landowner.

Russian Tsar established the concept of serfdom in order to ensure the dvoriane (nobility of landowners) loyalty. By according them such “luxury”, the Tsar was making sure none of them would rise up against him and his authority. Serfdom persisted in Russia even after the abolishment of slavery in the western countries. Slavophil even claimed: “Holy Russia was unique and had nothing to envy to the corrupted nation of the west”. While Western Europe was going through commercial and industrial age, USSR was still not undergoing any transition. Russian intellectuals started using serfdom as an explanation, an excuse for all of Russia weaknesses, such as food shortage, industrial backwardness, weakness in wars…etc. For instance, 1857 was a terrible year for USSR: the country underwent a terrible humiliation in the Crimean war. It was impossible for Russian army, composed of serfs who were forced to fight, to equal the strength of an army composed of volunteers, ready to die for their countries (French and British armies for instance). After that humiliation, Tsar Alexander II became convinced that a military and domestic reforms were necessary, leading the country to undergo its major shift: the emancipation proposal. But such event has to be tempered. Indeed, to understand some characters from the Cherry Orchard, the analysis of this Emancipation Manifesto is crucial: first of all, the proposal was drafted by the dvoriane themselves. The principal aspect of the Manifesto was that the farmer serfs were granted some lands from the landowners. But the latest chose which part they were giving, and the newly free peasants had to pay for it. A new type of bond was created: instead of being tied to a land, the peasants were now tied to the landowners through the debts they contracted in order to pay for their lands. As we can see, this emancipation did not lead to complete freedom for the peasants, nor equality between the muzhik and the dvoriane. This bittersweet taste left by the Manifesto justifies the atmosphere in the Cherry Orchard. This very slow transition was not just experienced by the characters in the play but by Chekhov himself.

1. THE INFLUENCE OF CHEKHOV’S OWN LIFE

Chekhov was born a year before the emancipation of the serfs, on January 17th, 1960. Unlike what we may think, he was born in a free peasants family thanks to his grandfather who bought their freedom in 1947. Nonetheless, his family was neither wealthy nor successful. His father was a grocery store owner, but his business failed in 1876 and the family had to move to Moscow. This theme of one’s incompetence to manage his affairs is omnipresent in the Cherry Orchard and will have a very strong influence on the building of the characters. Freedom was not a synonym of success in Chekhov’s family, and he soon became the head of the family, replacing his father in such position, after entering the medical school of Moscow University. Chekhov, like on of his character from the Cherry Orchard that we will talk about later, struggled to emancipate from this slave mentality, despite the free status of his family. Being the second free generation, we could expect an evolution in the mentality of the people, but such historical baggage is transmitted through the family and does not simply disappear after 1861 (year of the Emancipation Manifesto).

One of the main reasons is the extremely disappointing outcome of the Manifesto. As underlined before, it only created a new dominator/dominated relationship between the muzhik end the dvoriane.

1. CHEKHOV’S CONCEPT OF CHARACTERS

Chekhov’s characters are “all human beings trying to cope with the difficulties of their lives in ways we quickly recognize since they are our ways”. All of his character’s stories evolve around the concept of change; all of the characters are forced to find a new course of life.

They all look at the situation differently. None of them seem to be able to move on. They whether look nostalgically in the past or fail to learn from it. But in order to build the story on those characters, Chekhov created a silent character, one that everybody connects with: the Cherry Orchard itself. It is considered in a lot of different ways (positively or negatively), but always ends up representing a reminiscence of the past, of what Russia used to be, of what life used to be, and for some characters, a reminiscence of a dark period that should never be reminded.  

...