Death(TM)s Effect on the Realities of Life in House of Bernarda Alba and The Cherry Orchard

International Baccalaureate Languages

Tripathy

0000101-287

Shrusti Tripathy

World Literature 2c

Word Count: 1, 294

IB Candidate Number: 0000101-287

25th February 2008

Death’s Effect on the Realities of Life

House of Bernarda Alba and The Cherry Orchard

Death can be interpreted in a two forms, a beginning of a new life or as the end the latter being the reaction by most loved ones. In House of Bernarda Alba and The Cherry Orchard, both Federico Garcia Lorca and Anton Chekhov illustrate the cycle of life and death and the effects it has on a family who mourn in different ways. Both plays begin and end with the death of a family member, Grisha and Firs in The Cherry Orchard and the Father and Adela in The House of Bernarda Alba. Therefore, the author’s purpose in including death in both plays, conveyed through a circular structure in the plot, the cycle of death in the plays and the death of minor characters is to illustrate the lack of change in the realities of life.

The structure defined by the author, in both cases of the mentioned plays, they are circular because each character is shown to be exactly where they began from at the end. Although circumstances regarding each situation has changed in both plays, the end result is the same. Ranyevskaya left Russia first, after losing their son and brother, Grisha, respectively in hopes of escaping their past which Anya says, “My brother…Mama couldn’t bear it. She escaped – fled without so much as a backward glance.” (Chekhov 8) However, after returning, her past did catch up with her when she lost her home at the end, saying “Well, I think we can finally be on our way.” (Chekhov 64), also causing her to flee Russia to Paris once again in the Cherry Orchard. Ranyevskaya’s flee to Paris whenever she was in trouble showed the life’s realities and that trying to escape from problems is never the solution. Similarly in House of Bernarda Alba, the women in the house began in mourning for their father and husband and ended in mourning for their youngest sister and daughter, Adela. It began with, “ During our eight years of mourning, no wind from the street will enter this house!” (Lorca 205) and ended with, “I want no weeping. We must look death in the face. Silence!” (Lorca 288) There is no change during the course of the story, emphasizing the repetitive routine in our mundane lives. Both Chekhov and Lorca comment on the lackluster with which humans are living life, without enjoying the short life we ‘enjoy’ on Earth instead mourning for the loss of others’. The playwrights also send a message regarding their beliefs about the death simply being a corner turned, where there is a new life waiting as Ranyevskaya’s final trip to Paris proves at the end.

This is a preview of the whole essay

In addition to the circular structure, the start and end is essentially the same in plotline and the reader can see how this would be a vicious cycle, imagine how the story of these characters’ families would continue. By the same plot, I mean that both stories begin and finish with a death, Grisha and Firs in the Cherry Orchard while the father and Adela in House of Bernarda Alba. One knows that death affects the living more than the one already departed, well, as far as we know and this can be seen in the opposing coping mechanisms of both families. Bernarda becomes more spiteful and tyrannical screaming at her daughters, “Give me the black one [fan], and learn to respect your father’s memory!” (Lorca 205) while Ranyevskaya drowns in self-pity, “in the river here…my little boy was drowned , and I went utterly away, went meaning never to return, never to see this river again…pitilessly, brutally” (Chekhov 28) These different mechanisms just go to show that death doesn’t affect the dead as much as the loved ones left alive with the memories. Bernarda’s response is to wear black, trap all the household members at home to coerce them to grieve their father, even though they all know they should be moving on with their lives while Ranyevskaya’s reaction is to leave everything and attempt to forget the river and her son. Although both mechanisms have negative aspects, it is interesting to note that Ranyevskaya is never said to be wearing black in mourning for her husband or son, in fact, in the plays, she’s actually wearing white. These differences fundamentally lead to the same conclusion that neither mother was in any state to run a household after their loved ones’ death, seeing as they were in denial as to what was happening right under their roof, Adela’s affair and the cherry orchard being auctioned off. Basically, by living in denial regarding the deaths, the heads of each household were trapped in a rut, thereby causing history to repeat itself.

Death, whether it is a loved one or someone you don’t know, is the same, although they affect us differently. In both plays, a minor character dies to which the main characters react differently. In House of Bernarda Alba, the woman with the illegitimate child was stoned to death, not while she was trying to protect her baby, her baby was already murdered by her before. Hearing the screams of the woman and the men’s shouts, Adela, who suspects her own pregnancy, feels the woman’s pain within herself, “Not to kill her…They should let her go! Don’t go out there. (Clutching her womb) No!).” (Lorca 261) Therefore, this is a case where the minor character’s death played an important part in foreshadowing events that may occur to the main character, since the stoned woman seems to parallel Adela’s possible future. However, there is a major difference in the two deaths in House of Bernarda Alba in the way they died, showing if there life was indeed purposeful or not. The woman died of stoning, but after she had murdered her child and tried to hide it while Adela hung herself to prevent the stoning since Pepe had ‘died’, showing she was a stronger woman who at least fought for her beliefs, even if she lost. Lorca’s message here is that sometimes, death is the only thing that connects people, people who have nothing else in common, are always united in death. It’s a universal affliction or gift. However, in The Cherry Orchard, the only minor character who dies is Firs, at the end, whose death is not even known to the rest of the family who left him there by accident, “They’ve gone. They’ve forgotten about me. Well, never mind.” (Chekhov 67) . Chekhov is trying to prove here that death in itself doesn’t cause pain, it’s the selfish love of the memory or helplessness wondering what they would do without their departed loved one.

Death is the single abstract thought that unites and divides human beings at the same time. In House of Bernarda Alba and The Cherry Orchard, Lorca and Chekhov emphasize death as a motif with multiple purposes such as showing the circular structure in the plot, emphasizing relationships through the cycle of life and death and the death of minor characters all go towards understanding the truth about life and it’s humdrum routine. In the plays, death has a cause and effect relationship with the plot, as one leads to another, however, they all end within the same frame, with almost no change. Death is one of the greatest mysteries of our time because the only people who know the answer are in no state to tell us, or we are in no state to listen.

References

Chekhov, Antón. The Cherry Orchard. Trans. Michael Frayn. London: Methuen Drama, 1990.

Lorca, Federico G. The House of Bernarda Alba. Trans. Michael Dewell, Caremen Zapata. Methuen, Ltd., 1998.