Cherry Blossoms and Nostalgia: "The Cherry Orchard" by Anton Chekhov

                      Anton Chekhov, the playwrite

                         (obtained in Google image search)

“The Cherry Orchard” by Anton Chekhov is a very strange play that deals a lot with human psychology and paralysis. It is a meant to be a comedy and although there are several comic moments, the events of the play are not necessarily comical.

“The Cherry Orchid” follows the Ranyevskaya family and a menagerie of other characters all connected by this large mansion and a historic cherry orchard. The changing social environment in Russia, a five year trip to Paris, and a lack of current income have finally broken the failing fortune of Liubov Ranyevskaya. She cannot afford to pay the interest on this mansion, and so it and the cherry orchard are put up for auction.

A businessman Lopakhin, buys it, whose family ironically use to be labors for the Ranyevskaya family at this very mansion. He had reached success despite his humble origins and plans on destroying the orchard and carving up the land into vacation homes. An idea he pitches and offers to help that Ranyevskaya family do several times throughout the play, but no one listens to him.

The family loses their ancestral home and parts ways at the close of the play, and we do not know what happens to them after that. One of the lines that stands out in the play is at one point when Lopakhin, tries to give the family a reality check by telling them “You can’t ever go back to the past.”

Although each character in their own way would like to go back to the past, none seems to want to more than Liubov Ranyevskaya, who is the owner of the mansion.  The cherry orchard again and again throughout the play seems symbolize her childhood, which she misses greatly. She misses the old roles of Serfdom Russia. Or at the very least she probably wishes she could go back to before he son drowned. This would give her back her son as well as keep her from fleeing to Paris because she couldn’t deal with being in the place he died constantly, where she would further “waste” her money as she called it in Act 2.

Liubov would like to return to the past, to when this Mansion was her family’s and there was no questioning that, and because her choices have always been poor, she may even desire to return to her childhood, before she set on the path of losing her mansion and her fortune.

(Image obtained in Google Image Search of "The Cherry Orchard". This fits the symbolism of the cherry orchard for Liubov Ranyevskaya)

Gayev, her brother more than likely desires the same thing. He is in love with the memories and the nostalgia that this mansion brings. He was raised here and he seems to have no desire to leave this house.

The various servants that still live with the Ranyevskaya family are also saddened about losing their home, especially Firs, who has gone a bit crazy in his old age. He actually misses the past, where he was a serf for the family. He takes pride in the fact that he has stayed with his masters even after serfdom was outlawed by the Russian Czar.

Anya and Varya, Libov’s daughters would like to return to the past probably to be able to save their brother and to help their mother be happy. Varya, might try to find herself a different suitor, other than Lopahkin, who just plays around with the idea.

Anya interestingly, is the only member of the Ranyevskaya family who is eager to face this new mansion-less future. She is eager to go with Petya Trofimov, who she has fallen in love with back to his university so that he may finish his graduate degree.

Petya , Anya, Lopakhin, and Yasha, are the only members of the cast no paralyzed in some sense by losing this cherry orchard. Petya and Anya look forward to a future; we can only assume that has them together. Lopakin looks forward to further fortune and business ventures, and is thrilled to have possession of the cherry orchard. Yasha, the Ranyevskaya’s valet, gets to go back to Paris, which is what he wanted throughout the play. Their futures all seem to hold what they desire, and therefore are eager to leave.

But for the rest of the characters, whose futures are uncertain without the mansion, they are all timid and sadden at the close of the play.  Each of these characters long to return to the past, to a simpler time, where it seemed like, they would live forever in that Mansion overlooking the cherry orchard.

“The Cherry Orchard” has interesting themes of nostalgia throughout its pages. You begin to wonder what you would like to return to in your past. You want to return to a point when life was simpler, to a past lover, or to a family or friend that the future has drifted you from. Returning to the past is easy because it is certain, you know what happens, so you want to return because it is safe and you want to remember the feelings of the moments that have marked you life so strongly and made you who you are.

The difference between us and many of these characters however, is that we aren’t paralyzed by the past. We can move forward to the future, even if it is unsure.

(Obtained in Google Image Search of Cherry Blossoms)