Here is an old book jot from July 2021:

I just finished reading Uncle Vanya by Anton Chekhov (1898), translated by Peter Carson. It is a four-act play and considered one of Chekhov’s major plays.

Chekhov has long been one of my favorite authors, and I’ve read many of his short stories over the years. However, I avoided his plays for a long time. I think I liked his short stories so much I thought I’d be disappointed by his plays, because they couldn’t possibly be as good. But I’ve more recently read several of them and learned the error of my ways. They are excellent.

Uncle Vanya features a small cast of characters, most of whom are flawed but quite sympathetic. The various meditations on life offered by the characters are poignant and frequently something to which I felt I could relate. Like much of what Chekhov wrote, there is a simple grace and humanity in the play, as well as a sense of the vague and unresolved nature of life.

“One has to be a mindless barbarian to burn such beauty in a stove, to destroy what we cannot create.”