TREPLIEFF.All this began when my play failed so dismally.Awoman never can forgive failure.I have burnt the manuscript to the last page.Oh, if you could only fathom my unhappiness! Your estrangement is to me terrible, incredible; it is as if I had suddenly waked to find this lake dried up and sunk into the earth.You say you are too simple to understand me; but, oh, what is there to understand? You disliked my play, you have no faith in my powers, you already think of me as commonplace and worthless, as many are.[Stamping his foot] How well I can understand your feelings! And that understanding is to me like a dagger in the brain.May it be accursed, together with my stupidity, which sucks my life-blood like a snake! [He sees TRIGORIN, who approaches reading a book] There comes real genius, striding along like another Hamlet, and with a book, too.
[Mockingly] "Words, words, words." You feel the warmth of that sun already, you smile, your eyes melt and glow liquid in its rays.I shall not disturb you.[He goes out.]
TRIGORIN.[Making notes in his book] Takes snuff and drinks vodka; always wears black dresses; is loved by a schoolteacher--NINA.How do you do?
TRIGORIN.How are you, Miss Nina? Owing to an unforeseen development of circumstances, it seems that we are leaving here today.You and I shall probably never see each other again, and Iam sorry for it.I seldom meet a young and pretty girl now; I can hardly remember how it feels to be nineteen, and the young girls in my books are seldom living characters.I should like to change places with you, if but for an hour, to look out at the world through your eyes, and so find out what sort of a little person you are.
NINA.And I should like to change places with you.
TRIGORIN.Why?
NINA.To find out how a famous genius feels.What is it like to be famous? What sensations does it give you?
TRIGORIN.What sensations? I don't believe it gives any.
[Thoughtfully] Either you exaggerate my fame, or else, if it exists, all I can say is that one simply doesn't feel fame in any way.
NINA.But when you read about yourself in the papers?
TRIGORIN.If the critics praise me, I am happy; if they condemn me, I am out of sorts for the next two days.
NINA.This is a wonderful world.If you only knew how I envy you!
Men are born to different destinies.Some dully drag a weary, useless life behind them, lost in the crowd, unhappy, while to one out of a million, as to you, for instance, comes a bright destiny full of interest and meaning.You are lucky.
TRIGORIN.I, lucky? [He shrugs his shoulders] H-m-- I hear you talking about fame, and happiness, and bright destinies, and those fine words of yours mean as much to me--forgive my saying so--as sweetmeats do, which I never eat.You are very young, and very kind.
NINA.Your life is beautiful.
TRIGORIN.I see nothing especially lovely about it.[He looks at his watch] Excuse me, I must go at once, and begin writing again.
I am in a hurry.[He laughs] You have stepped on my pet corn, as they say, and I am getting excited, and a little cross.Let us discuss this bright and beautiful life of mine, though.[After a few moments' thought] Violent obsessions sometimes lay hold of a man: he may, for instance, think day and night of nothing but the moon.I have such a moon.Day and night I am held in the grip of one besetting thought, to write, write, write! Hardly have Ifinished one book than something urges me to write another, and then a third, and then a fourth--I write ceaselessly.I am, as it were, on a treadmill.I hurry for ever from one story to another, and can't help myself.Do you see anything bright and beautiful in that? Oh, it is a wild life! Even now, thrilled as I am by talking to you, I do not forget for an instant that an unfinished story is awaiting me.My eye falls on that cloud there, which has the shape of a grand piano; I instantly make a mental note that Imust remember to mention in my story a cloud floating by that looked like a grand piano.I smell heliotrope; I mutter to myself: a sickly smell, the colour worn by widows; I must remember that in writing my next description of a summer evening.
