Three Sisters Essay, Research Paper
The two men in this play that are radically different are Chebutykin and Andrey. These men are different because their set of mind. Chebutykin is the old doctor that has given up on life because he deems it useless and nothing matters. Andrey is the young husband who thinks too highly of himself and is too self-centered to change his ways. Both ultimately ruin themselves because they are too focused on their way of thinking to realize how they actually fit into the world.
The old doctor, Chebutykin, is a man that knows he is going to leave the world soon and is giving up. He tells us that he lives only for the girls and would have died if it weren t for their existence. Right from the start of the play he doubts the importance of things. We are introduced to his philosophy in his second line when he says, For hair falling out… two ounces of naphthalene in half a bottle of alcohol to be dissolved and used daily…Let’s make a note of it! No, I don’t want it It doesn’t matter. At the point when he is drunk, he takes this philosophy to a higher level and believes that his life and others are pointless. Chebutykin seems to be an intelligent and pleasant man because of the way he treats other people and talks but now he has withdrawn from this and taken to alcohol. He feels like he is shallow yet he is included. Everyone thinks he knows a lot still and is useful but the fact is that he is not. Chebutykin suffers great pain when a woman dies because they think that he is a doctor. He also suffers when the people around him talk about history and literature and include him while he knows absolutely nothing.
Andrey is a coward who does not care about anyone else but himself. He knows that his wife has gone out and had a child with another man but has not said anything. Perhaps this is because that man is his superior and he could lose his rank if he says anything. Perhaps no one will call him your honor anymore and he is afraid of this because, in his mind, it is a position that sets him off in a higher class. So he keeps his resentment inside him and acts as if he knows nothing. He allows his sisters to be pushed around by his wife and does say a word in their defense. Instead he backs up his wife and even lectures them on how he loves her so much. Among other things, he has a gambling problem. He has lost most of his money and has mortgaged the house without telling his sisters. He took this very underhandedly without a thought about his sisters. He cares nothing about others, as he was brought up on the belief that he was, as he said, young, happy, and clever, his thoughts were exquisite, and his past were lighted up by hope. These are, of course, false beliefs. He lives in his own self-centered ways on delusions.
The way Chebutykin and Andrey think of themselves and the way others think of them are radically different. Chebutykin thinks of himself as a useless old man who is at the end of the line. Others, however, are fond of him and includes him as if he knew everything. On the other hand, Andrey thinks of himself as a well-respected man who has a good future. Yet we know Andrey as an egotistical coward who cares nothing of his own family.
Both Chebutykin and Andrey view the world around them differently too. Chebutykin sees no hope for the future and has given up on it. He feels what he has at the moment is what is important to him the most. Andrey sees the present as a dull, drab, uninteresting, lazy, indifferent, useless, and unhappy world as he describes it. In reality, the description he gives rather fits him better than the world. Whereas Chebutykin has given up, Andrey wants a new beginning and looks towards to the future.
Chebutykin and Andrey are two radically different characters. Chebutykin, the better one, so to say, has given up on life and lives for the present. Andrey, the deluded one, sees a bright future for him ahead but in truth its not there. The two are both trouble stricken because of the way they think of themselves rather than how other react to them. To sum it up, they are products of their own minds and not the world around them as they believe.