S. Tretiakov. I Want a Baby!

Abstract

The review deals with the new edition of Khochu rebyonka! [I Want a Baby!]— a play by LEF’s most prominent playwright Sergey Tretiakov. It is for the first time that two versions of the play — before and aſter the cuts made by censors — are published. T. Hofmann and E. Ditschek carefully examine discrepancies between the two versions of the play and the film libretto it inspired, as well as archived records of the play’s discussions that involved Meyerhold, Terentiev, and other prominent figures of early Soviet theatre. It seems that the only disadvantage ofthe book is its poor adaptation for aRussian reader; explanatory notes oſten read as if copy-pasted from the German publication. Perhaps, the most exciting part of the book is Tretiakov’s explanations of his plot and transcripts of the play’s discussions at Repertkom (the Main Repertoire Committee). As a result, the book comprising two versions of the play, the author’s comments, opinions of Tretiakov’s contemporaries and comments of modern scholars emerges as a discussion of Tretiakov’s discussion play.