در نمایشنامه "دایی وانیا" پروفسور سربریاکف، دانشمندی متوسط و متظاهر که سال های سال با کار و زحمت شبانه روزی و طاقت فرسای دخترش سونیا و بردار همسر قبلی اش "دایی وانیا" که اداره ملکی را که از زن مرحومش به میراث برده برعهده دارند، زندگی راحت و بی دغدغه ای را می گذراند. پروفسور با دختر جوانی به نام یلنا، که مجذوب شهرت و ظاهر عالمانه او شده ازدواج کرده و بی قراری یلنا و خودخواهی سربریاکوف اداره ملک را مختل کرده و این اوضاع متشنج وقتی به اوج خود می رسد که سربریاکف، اعلام می کند می خواهد ملکش را بفروشد و در شهر زندگی کند.
زندگی یکنواخت وانیا و آستروف با ورود یلنا تغییر می کند و این دو شخصیت شیفته یلنا شده و فکر می کنند با حضور او می توانند از دایره روزمرگی رها شوند، اما یلنا همسر پروفسور است و پایبندی به اخلاق به او اجازه نمی دهد به دعوت وانیا و آستروف پاسخ گوید. زمانی که یلنا و پروفسور، محل را ترک می کنند؛ صدای دور شدن کالسکه است که به نوستالژی تلخ زندگی آنان تبدیل می شود.

ASTROFF. You can burn peat in your stoves and build your sheds of
stone. Oh, I don't object, of course, to cutting wood from
necessity, but why destroy the forests? The woods of Russia are
trembling under the blows of the axe. Millions of trees have
perished. The homes of the wild animals and birds have been
desolated; the rivers are shrinking, and many beautiful
landscapes are gone forever. And why? Because men are too lazy
and stupid to stoop down and pick up their fuel from the ground.
[To HELENA] Am I not right, Madame? Who but a stupid barbarian
could burn so much beauty in his stove and destroy that which he
cannot make? Man is endowed with reason and the power to create,
so that he may increase that which has been given him, but until
now he has not created, but demolished. The forests are
disappearing, the rivers are running dry, the game
is exterminated, the climate is spoiled, and the earth becomes
poorer and uglier every day. [To VOITSKI] I read irony in your
eye; you do not take what I am saying seriously, and--and--after
all, it may very well be nonsense. But when I pass
peasant-forests that I have preserved from the axe, or hear the
rustling of the young plantations set out with my own hands, I
feel as if I had had some small share in improving the climate,
and that if mankind is happy a thousand years from now I will
have been a little bit responsible for their happiness. When I
plant a little birch tree and then see it budding into young
green and swaying in the wind, my heart swells with pride and
I--[Sees the WORKMAN, who is bringing him a glass of vodka on a
tray] however--[He drinks] I must be off. Probably it is all
nonsense, anyway. Good-bye.