Carregado
ENCENATION
LUÍS ARAÚJO
INTERPRETATION
NUNO CARDOSO
The Swan Song/ Лебединая песна (1897)
Translated by
António Pescada
Staging
Luís Araújo
Scenic device
Nuno Carinhas
Light design
Wilma Moutinho
Sound design
Luís Araújo
Hugo Ferraz
The play The Swan Song was written from a short story called “Calcas”, published on November 10, 1886. In a letter to M.V. Kisséliova, Chekhov announced on January 17, 1887 that it was a play to be performed in fifteen or twenty minutes, and that he had written it in an hour and five minutes.
The first version, published in January 1887, was very short, but knowing that it would be performed, Chekhov tried to revise and lengthen it later that year.
The premiere took place in Moscow at the Korch Theater, with V. Davydov, a very famous actor at the time, in the lead role. It was such a success that the Maly Theater also wanted to produce it and Chekhov, returning to the manuscript, submitted a third version to the reading committee, which was accepted (but ultimately not performed).
In 1889, the magazine The Artist published it with illustrations by Léonid Pasternak, somewhat unfaithful in detail, but which pleased Chekhov so much that he modified the text to match the image.
The definitive version appeared in 1897 in the compilation entitled Plays, with some significant changes: Svetlovídov is 68 and not 58; the 45th and not the 35th anniversary of his career is celebrated; Chekhov added the monologue of Tchatski, the hero of Aleksandr Griboiédov’s The Misfortune of Having a Spirit, thus inscribing the play in the history of Russian theater and taking up a theme that was already present in Platónov. –