[IV-9]

[Chekhov]

IRINA: Everyone has to put ten kopeks in the pot. Put mine in for me, doctor.

DORN: Certainly.

(They start playing lotto.)

MASHA: Is everybody in? I'll start . . . twenty-two!

IRINA: Here.

MASHA: Three!

DORN: Got it.

MASHA: Did you put three down? Eight. Eighty-one. Ten.

ILYA: You're going too fast.

IRINA: They loved me in Kharkov! My head's still spinning from all the adoration.

MASHA: Thirty-four.

(A melancholy waltz is heard in the distance.)

IRINA: The students gave me an ovation and showered me with flowers. And look what they gave me . . . (she takes off a brooch and tosses it onto the table.)

ILYA: Very nice!

MASHA: Fifty!

DORN: You said fifty?

IRINA: I was dressed to the teeth. Whatever else you say about me, my taste is exquisite.

POLINA: Konstantin is playing that song again. He's so unhappy.

ILYA: The critics in the paper have been going after him again.

MASHA: Seventy-seven!

IRINA: He shouldn't worry about critics.

TRIGORIN: He's had no luck. And he can't find his style. There's something strange and vague about his style - sometimes he seems delirious. His characters never come to life.

MASHA: Eleven!

IRINA: (glancing at Sorin) Petrusha, are you bored? He's asleep.

DORN: That he is.

MASHA: Seven! Ninety!

TRIGORIN: If I lived here by the lake, do you think I'd get much writing done? I'd forget my passion for literature and do nothing but fish.

MASHA: Twenty-eight!

TRIGORIN: Catching perch all day - I'd be in heaven.

DORN: Well, I like Konstantin's writing. There's something special about it. He thinks in images and his stories are quite vivid, they move me a good deal. The pity is, he has no clear purpose. He creates an impression but nothing more. Irina, are you glad your son is a writer?

IRINA: To be honest, I haven't read a word he's written. There's never any time.

MASHA: Twenty-six!

(Treplev enters and goes to his desk.)

[continue]