A simple arrival-and-departure structure provides the framework for the action, the play beginning with the arrival of urbanite outsiders into the tightly-knit world of a small provincial estate. Professor Serebryakov and his young, beautiful wife, Yelena Andreyevna, have come to stay at the estate legally owned by Sonya, his daughter, who inherited the estate from her mother, his first wife. Together with her dead mother's brother, her uncle Vanya, Sonya has not only managed the estate, but undertaken much of the back-breaking labour that ensures its survival and the revenues that support Serebryakov's smart but parasitic academic life, plus Vanya's mother, Mariya, Telegin (“Waffles”) – an impoverished old friend of the f

This article in full comprises 3625 words but only the first 150 or so words are available to non-members.

All our articles have been written recently by experts in their field, more than 95% of them university professors. To read about membership, please click here.

Published 21 March 2003

Citation: Reid, John. "Diadia Vania [Uncle Vanya]". The Literary Encyclopedia. 21 March 2003.
[http://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=11678, accessed 9 February 2010.]