Word: lermontov
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Lermontov himself comes into direct conflict with the Czar and must choose whether to run off or to stay for a fixed duel which will make it obvious that he is being killed by the Czar, thus following in Pushkin's footsteps...
Shea concentrates on and sometimes interprets certain elements in the lives of Pushkin and Lermontov that stress their roles as political actors and as outsiders to the system. Pushkin was the descendent of a Negro slave to the Czar and was dark himself, a fact not commonly known. In this play, he is portrayed by a black actor, mainly to stress his sense of difference and his antipathy toward the Czar. In Lermontov's life, too, the political acts are highlighted: his eulogy to Pushkin at Pushkin's funeral (based on the real Lermontov's poem), dangerous because Pushkin...
...admires the Don Juan theme because its hero is a man who "did not take things as they are." Pushkin's most famous poem, Eugene Onegin, is a treatment of that subject, and it is partly on this poem and partly on Byron's Don Juan that Lermontov bases the story that is the second part of the play...
...show actions that are important psychologically, Shea points out. Rather, the film sequences show major events in the lives of the characters that they then have to deal with. Pushkin watches the bloody raid on the Decembrist Revolutionists by forces of the Czar on film, and Lermontov watches the death of Pushkin on film. Later, the Czar sees part of Lermontov's novel, which he terms "self-indulgent," on the screen...
...rare occurrence among Harvard productions. A play this new, never produced before, is just as rare here. The thinking for it began last summer, the writing began in New York, and was finished here during February and March. Shea has had teaching jobs in both places. He read Lermontov's book long ago. And why this particular choice for the subject of his play? "It's good story." Shea already has another play planned, the story of Anton Mesmer. In it, the spiritualist will appear as Jesus in another play-within-the-play...