Anton Chekhov’s play Three Sisters is one of his most interesting works for analysis. This play contains several philosophical thoughts that appeal to not all the readers. However, those who succeed in understanding the story and following the train of the characters’ thoughts find this play amusing because it contains several funny moments and even jokes on the part of the characters. These are ridiculous plot points, rather than mere jokes because any of them relates to a certain plot aspect of the play. Any joke reflects the character’s attitude towards life, the traits of his/her personality, his/her relations with other characters, and the like aspects. There are four most remarkable ridiculous plot points in the story; they can be observed in the relationships between Masha and Kulygin, the situation when Irina philosophizes on the sense of life, the character of Irina in general, and Vershinin’s attitude towards Russian people and their families.
The first ridiculous plot point in the play is presented by Masha and Kulygin’s relationships. Love and affection in their relations are not mutual because Kulygin desperately loves Masha, while she seems to be tired of his attention and care and even irritated by them. There are several moments when she openly shows this, but Kulygin does not seem to notice this, which makes their relations simply ridiculous. This may be exemplified by the scene when Kulygin heaps her with compliments and Masha replies to him rather impolitely: “My sweet Masha; my beautiful Masha […] my good, wonderful wife … I love you. MASHA. (Angrily) Amo, amas, amat, animus, amatis, amant!” (Chekhov, p. 50). This is the conjugation of the Latin verb “amare” which stands for English “to love”; by this, she shows how insignificant Kulygin’s words and his love are for her. The whole ridiculousness of their relations is further emphasized by Masha’s infidelity after which Kulygin accepts her back and does not even reproach her for being unfaithful.
Secondly, a ridiculous situation takes place when Kulygin comes to Irina’s party organized on her name day. Kulygin presents Irina with a book that he has written about the history of the school he was working for, but it turns out that he had already presented her with such a book on Easter. On hearing this, Kulygin says, “In that case, give it back, or better still … give it to the Colonel here. Take it, Colonel; read it when you’re bored sometime” (Chekhov, p. 18). This reflects the essence of Kulygin’s personality: not only is he absent-minded, but he lacks self-respect because he does not consider his book worth reading until one is bored. What is the most striking, he is never embarrassed by such ridiculous situations as this one?
Thirdly, the character of Irina as such may be regarded as one of the ridiculous points of the plot. Irina is 20 and, throughout the play, she ardently expresses a desire to be perceived as an adult, rather than a child. At this, however, she acts like a child in most cases. The brightest example of this is when Fedotik brings her a set of colored pencils and a penknife from Moscow for which she says as if offended, “You treat me like a little child; I’m an adult. (Takes the pencils and penknife, joyfully.) Oh, they’re beautiful!” (Chekhov, p. 32). Even despite her philosophical thinking (for instance, that it is not worth being a human when you are a woman who has to spend two hours in the morning for dressing), she is still regarded as a child because she is the youngest daughter. Nevertheless, such situations as with pencils or with the spinning top (also presented to her by Fedotik) make her philosophizing and character in general somewhat ridiculous.
And the last ridiculous plot point is Vershinin’s ideas expressed about Russian families. In his conversation with Masha, Vershinin states that Russian men are too often dissatisfied with their families; he asks, “Why is he sick of his children and sick of his wife, and why are his wife and children sick of him?” (Chekhov, p. 27). The ridiculousness of this idea of his consists in himself answering his question a few minutes later. The matter is that Vershinin is married, but he is in love with Masha; telling about constant problems and fights with his wife and his children, he complains, “I suppose I have a bad conscience about giving them such a stepmother” (Chekhov 28). This serves as a reply to his question, pointing why several couples in Russia are so unhappy – they simply do not love each other for they married not for love, but children or for money.
In conclusion, there are several ridiculous plot points in Chekhov’s Three Sisters. Four of them discussed above show how deep the meaning of the play is. It leaves the readers in thoughts and may even change their attitude towards life because some of the ideas that its characters express are worth thinking over.