Symbolism In The Cherry Orchard By Anton Chekhov

The Cherry Orchard (Вишнëвый сад) is the last play written by Russian Playwright Anton Chekhov when he was already suffering from tuberculosis, in the years 1903-4. Premiered at the Moscow Art Theatre in January 1904, the play initially written as a comedy, was also portrayed as a tragedy. The play depicts a story of a Russian aristocratic woman, by the name of Mrs. Lyuba Ranevsky, who returns with her family to her estate, which includes a large and well known cherry orchard, just before it is sold to pay off her debts. As the play advances the orchard acts as the central plot device in the play. The orchard is the massive, over-shadowing presence at the play's center of gravity; For some, the cherry orchard symbolizes the past both good and bad, and in turn, the individual memories that each character associated with it; for others it represents Russia, and and for characters such as Lopakhin, it presents an opportunity to make money and become wealthy by dividing it into plots of land. In this essay I am going to discuss how the title ‘The Cherry Orchard’ acts as a symbol for the aspirations and dreams of the main characters, as symbol of the past, in particular of a lost paradise, and also as a symbol for the social, political and economic change in Russia at the end of the twentieth century.
The Cherry Orchard acts as a symbol of both the past and future aspirations for different characters in Chekhov’s play. Varying by both age and by class, for some characters the cherry orchard is a glorified symbol of what once was, and others of troubled and punishing times. the young tend to view the orchard in a negative light, for example Trofimov and Anya, who connect with the cherry orchard to that of repression and abuse towards th...

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...hard is not only symbolic to each of the characters in the play, but it also has a symbolic meaning towards Chekhov himself as it perhaps symbolizes Chekov’s own childhood. When Chekhov was still a student at the Taganrog gymnasium, his father was forced to close his store because of the loss of business in Taganrog largely due to the installment of a railroad through the nearby city of Rostov. (S.Baehr, 1999) Like with the loss of the Cherry Orchard and the home of Ranevsky and her family, this displacement showed him first hand how progress and historical change can alter lives. Chekhov was strongly troubled by the sale of his home, and just as he reflects this loss of residence in his literary works of Uncle Vania and Three Sisters, in his final play, The Cherry Orchard the title can be seen as very symbolic to Chekhov’s life as it symbolizes Chekhov’s own past.