The Old World Landowners

Landowner from ancient times (Russian Старосветские помещики ) is a story by the Russian writer Nikolai Gogol. She appeared in 1835 as part of the anthology Poltava.

Content

Athanasius Ivanovich Towstogub and Pulcherija Ivanovna are an old couple from the " last century ", they are very fond of each other and take care of each other. They are childless, living alone in a distant village, referred to in Little Russia " villages from ancient times ." They are hospitable, aside from the occasional visitors who come into the house, her life is peaceful and undisturbed. They take care of their household, fill in all inventories of the house again and again, but do not realize that they are robbed of their estate manager and the lackeys. Since they have no kids, her whole affection and tenderness turns to the others. You read every wish from our eyes. The old love the good food they like to share with their guests. Day after day goes by in an unusually quiet and peaceful harmony of two loving hearts.

But one day the favorite cat woman disappears in the forest. After three days of relentless searching Pulcherija Ivanovna finds again the cat in the vegetable garden. She feeds the feral and emaciated cat no longer be petted, jumps out the window and disappears forever. Since that day the old woman is thoughtful and has thoughts of death. The only thing she cares, her husband, to whom she would look after her death no more. She asks her housekeeper to care for her husband and threatens her with the punishment of God, if they do not listen to her mistress. Her husband tries in vain to distract them from these black thoughts. As Pulcherija Ivanovna dies, it is bad for her husband. After the funeral, he returned to the empty house and breaks into tears.

Five years have passed, the house expires, the servant result of drunkenness, Athanasius Ivanovich becomes weaker and weaker, he neglected. His sorrow has not diminished over time, everything around him reminds him of the deceased. As he goes through the garden one day, he hears himself suddenly called by name, and he believes that his deceased wife calls him up. His last will, he expressed shortly before his death, he wanted to be buried next to his wife. His house forfeited, the household will be divided among the people of the village. His tenure falls to a distant relative who leaves him to himself.

Reception

A play based on the story of Gogol was developed for the New Stage of the Moscow Art Theatre AP Chekhov and directed by the Lithuanian director Pyotr Fomenko Mindaugas Karbauskis.

Text output

• A landowner from ancient times in Nikolai Gogol: stories. Übers and hrsg.von Eberhard Reissner. Stuttgart: Reclam ISBN 978-3-15-020248-7