Word: platonov
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THAT WORTHLESS FELLOW PLATONOV- Anton Chekhov; translated by John Gournos-Button...
Anton Chekhov, prince of Russian short-story writers, prince of Russian playwrights, wrote one play that has waited until now to be translated into English. Without the lucid depths, the sparkling shallows, of his masterpiece The Cherry Orchard, That Worthless Fellow Platonov obviously wells up from the same source. No one but a Russian, no Russian but warmhearted, skeptical Anton Chekhov, could have written...
...village. Anna Petrovna, a General's widow, who is frightfully in debt to Jew moneylenders and ought to be saving every kopek, is giving a party, with all the fixings -Chinese lanterns in the garden, music, fireworks, plenty of drink. All the neighbors are there, among them Schoolteacher Platonov, intelligent, charming, young, popular: the perfect lady-killer, but with too much Hamlet in his makeup. His wife adores him; they have a little son. Other women adore him too: his hostess, the General's widow, her daughter-in-law, Sofya, just married. Platonov is fond of his wife...
Everyone gets at least slightly drunk. Platonov's wife goes home early. That worthless fellow is in great form: he has drunk a good deal, and it all goes to his heart. He makes love to his hostess, to the newly married Sofya, goes a little too far with Grekova, whom he humiliates by kissing soundly and then throwing on a table. When he gets home in the small hours, his adoring wife is waiting up for him, but he will not go to bed; he sits outside and indulges in remorse for his disgraceful conduct. Anna Petrovna comes...