Notice that the scene was not prepared for, that it merely happened that it occurred at the end of the penultimate act may be set down to the author's intent. The third act contains a good deal of action, which is rather disjointed and 'jerky' the important part is the end, where Nina evidently becomes Trigorin's mistress.

If the reader is at all familiar with the ways of the dramatist, or of the authors of novels or short stories, he will at least suspect a definite application of such a speech and await the foreshadowed result. But a man comes along by chance, and sees her and ruins her, like this seagull, just to amuse himself.' This is a good example of foreshadowing. She loves the lake like a seagull, and is happy and free like a seagull. Interest is sustained and future events foreshadowed in Trigorin's words to Nina, regarding a subject for a possible story: 'A girl - like yourself, say - lives from her childhood on the shores of a lake. In the middle of the second act, the plot is resumed - if the slender series of more or less connected incidents may be so termed - in the scene between Treplef and Nina, and further carried on in that between Trigorin and Nina. I am in love with Constantine.' Here is the thread of interest which is necessary - even in the plays of the radical Russian - to bridge the gap between the first and second acts. Toward the end of the act Masha says to Dorn, '.Help me, or I shall commit some folly, I shall make havoc with my life. Nothing happens until Nina appears in Treplef's play but be it remembered, this plaz is merely an incident about which Chekhov's own characters may converse. The entire opening of the play is as casual as life itself. There is more talk, which is broken off by the entrance of further characters. Soon after, another pair arrives, Sorin and Treplef.

We also learn a good deal of the character of the two speakers. The play opens with a conversation between Masha and Medvedenko it is evident that a dramatic production is at hand.

Since this is so, we shall see that the dramatist does not bother to construct a plot which will interest or divert his audience. It has been well said that in this author's plays what is said is more important than what is done. Keep well in mind that the dialogue in Chekhov's plays is of the utmost importance. This analysis of The Seagull was originally published in The Continental Drama of Today.

The seagull anton chekhov