Word: chekhovisms
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AFTER the hard but enjoyable labor of reading these little miracles, it seems a shame that the entire list can't be instantly awarded a place on the shelf next to the well thumbed offerings of de Maupassant, Chekhov, and Lawrence. Yet as Tyler cautions in her introductions, while a mediocre novel can fashion a place, a memory sheerly through fulsome persistance, even a very good short story is ephemeral. The Best American Short Stories is proud of its egalitarianism--unlike Prize Stories, it doesn't pick first, second, and third prizes. But this is faintly spurious democracy: we make...
...good physician must be able to inspire hope as well as be a man or woman of medicine. These abilities are best learned from a strong dose of the liberal arts. Anton Chekhov, a doctor who was also a master of the short story, once said, "Medicine is my lawful wife and literature my mistress. When I get tired of one, I spend the night with the other...
...many plays such an inversion would undoubtedly prove disastrous, but in this case it not only matches Chekhov's mood and theme, but carries the playwright's own actions one step further. Chekhov boils the play's plot down to a bare minimum; Rauch abandons the scenery as well. We are left with the bare essence: a group of men and women struggling vainly to communicate with each other and to cope with their loves, their art, and their lives...
...danger of using such an experimental setting--particularly in a play like Chekhov's--is that the form will overshadow the characters. In this production, however, the acting is uniformly so powerful that the characters rise above their setting, letting it serve only as a backdrop for their individual tensions. Peter Howard brilliantly captures Constantine's internal agitation; Claudia Silver is dazzling in her portrayal of his vain, cruel, but basically insecure mother; and Molly White plays the brooding and morose Masha with frightening conviction. Nina Bernstein as Nina Zarechny and Benajah Cobb as the old writer Trigorin are also...
Ironically, Chekhov's genius lies in his ability to communicate the inability to communicate. Rauch's production not only captures this haunting theme, but--by putting the audience on stage, and the stage in the audience--suggests that the loneliness and isolation of Chekhov's characters is all too real...