The Cherry Orchard, a classic of modern theater by Anton Chekhov, depicts the coming of age in a Russian society that is beginning to see a class mean rise to free the serfs. The characters of Firs (Gayef's servant) and Lopakhin (a rising middle-class businessman and landowner) react differently to this change in lifestyle. Lopakhin takes his release and rises to a higher level, while Firs is unable to know what to do with himself after so many years as a serf and, therefore, remains a slave; however, both men still remain aware of their inferior status amid these changing times. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Lopakhin takes the horrific poverty of his parents' peasant background and uses it as motivation to move up a notch into the developing middle class: “Well, that was soon over. I offered nine thousand more than the mortgage, and I got it; and now the cherry orchard is mine! . . . If only my father and grandfather could come out of their graves and see this whole affair, how their Yermolai, their scourged and ignorant Yermolai, who ran barefoot in winter, how this same Yermolai bought a property that did not its equal for beauty all over the world! I bought the property where my father and grandfather were slaves, where they were not even allowed to enter the kitchen” (Chekhov 38). He makes his money by making wise and cunning business decisions that resemble his idea of ​​selling cherry orchard plots for villas. Lopakhin is a person who sees a problem and envisions a way to solve it because he is a forward thinker. He even becomes something of a financial advisor to his former mistress, Madame Ranevsky, when he repeatedly tells her and Gayef to sell plots of the orchard and set up villas for the rising middle class can settle there: “You know that your cherry orchard is disappearing. to sell to pay the mortgage… if only you would break up the cherry orchard and the land along the river into building plots and rent them out for villas… Everything would be ripped away. In two words, I congratulate you; you are saved” (Chekhov 8). Unfortunately, unlike Lopakhin, she and Gayef are too proud and ignorant to heed this advice. They let their feelings about their childhood home interfere with the best financial decision for them: “Cut down the cherry orchard!” . . . If there is one thing that is interesting, even remarkable, in the whole province, it is our cherry orchard” (Chekhov 9). Lopakhin, unlike Firs and many other former slaves, is able to rise from the ashes to produce a better life for himself and his family; and even purchased the property on which he and his predecessors were slaves. Liberation leads Lopakhin differently because Lopakhin takes advantage of his opportunities and is able to see beyond current struggles and failures and into the future. He then creates a plan that will enable his future to be bright and successful by thinking carefully and making sometimes difficult, but ultimately responsible decisions to implement his plan. Fir trees, on the other hand, wither under slavery and diminish even more under freedom. . Firs has spent so many years being told what to do that he cannot think for himself and is unable to see into the future; he is paralyzed by the past and his old habits. He continues to take care of an already adult Gayef because that's what he's always done. Firs does not live.