After the The­atre opens with Nadya Zelenin step­ping into the cold night air, her thoughts still lost in the echoes of the opera she had just seen. The emo­tions stirred by “Yevge­ny Onye­gin” set­tle into her like a dream she doesn’t want to wake from. The world feels rich­er, more mean­ing­ful, every shad­ow more poet­ic. Her mind latch­es onto Tatyana’s sor­row, and she feels a thrill in imag­in­ing her­self as a girl fat­ed to suf­fer for love. This imag­ined melan­choly draws her clos­er to the idea of being noble and trag­ic, which in her young heart feels desir­able. Upon return­ing home, she lights a lamp, finds paper, and begins a let­ter not to any­one real, but to the emo­tions she doesn’t yet ful­ly under­stand. The let­ter becomes an out­pour­ing of longing—crafted with delib­er­ate sor­row, drawn from bor­rowed sen­ti­ment, yet felt with the sin­cer­i­ty of youth.

Nadya address­es the let­ter with pas­sion, imag­in­ing it meant for either Gorny or Gruzdev, young men who have shown her some atten­tion. Though she doesn’t tru­ly love either of them, she finds pow­er in writ­ing as if she does. This per­for­mance allows her to indulge in feel­ings she wants to feel—devotion, despair, beau­ty found in heart­break. She writes about sor­row as if it’s some­thing noble to wear, some­thing that could define her in the most grace­ful way. Her dec­la­ra­tion of becom­ing a nun or end­ing her life isn’t root­ed in real suf­fer­ing but in the grandeur of imag­ined tragedy. The let­ter reflects not what she expe­ri­ences, but what she yearns to believe about her­self and the world. It’s a tes­ta­ment to the way youth some­times prac­tices feel­ing deeply before under­stand­ing what depth real­ly means.

Moments lat­er, the mood changes entire­ly. The let­ter that once made her weep now brings a smile, then laugh­ter. Her sor­row evap­o­rates not through heal­ing, but through bore­dom with the role she was play­ing. She places the let­ter aside, sud­den­ly uncon­vinced by her own words. The sad­ness was nev­er anchored in reality—it was a cos­tume she wore and now removes. Nadya walks to her mir­ror and smiles at her reflec­tion, aware that she is still the hero­ine of her own imag­ined sto­ry, just in a dif­fer­ent chap­ter. This emo­tion­al swing is not uncom­mon in ado­les­cence, where emo­tions feel truer when dra­mat­ic, but van­ish quick­ly when no longer fed by imag­i­na­tion.

Her shift­ing feel­ings high­light a core part of grow­ing up—the ten­den­cy to mim­ic what we think we should feel rather than explor­ing what’s tru­ly in our hearts. Nadya’s joy by the end is not caused by love returned, nor sor­row over­come. It’s sim­ply a release from the weight of a fan­ta­sy that no longer sat­is­fies. Her laugh­ter is both light and reveal­ing. She doesn’t need to be in love to write of despair; she only needs to believe she’s play­ing the part well. But what she writes might some­day become real. This moment, then, becomes a rehearsal for a more seri­ous future. One day, per­haps, she will write not for art, but because she can­not hold back real emo­tion.

“After the The­atre” cap­tures the inno­cence and volatil­i­ty of a young mind dis­cov­er­ing the joy and pow­er of emo­tion through lit­er­a­ture and imag­i­na­tion. Nadya is not fool­ish, only untest­ed. Her love of opera and romance reflects a sin­cere desire to under­stand her­self and her place in the emo­tion­al world. She sees in tragedy a kind of beau­ty, a way to mat­ter more deeply. Chekhov does not mock her for this. Instead, he paints her with gen­tle clarity—as some­one who is learn­ing that feel­ing some­thing, even for pre­tend, can still leave a mark. Through Nadya, we are remind­ed that every­one must first act out love before tru­ly under­stand­ing what it means to live it.