How we cite our quotes: (Act.Line)
Quote #7
YELENA ANDREYEVNA: [...] As Astrov said just now: all of you are mindlessly destroying the forests and soon there'll be nothing left on earth. In the same way you mindlessly destroy a man, and soon thanks to you the earth will have neither loyalty, nor purity, nor the capacity for self-sacrifice. (1.348-52)
Yelena uses the forest as a metaphor for a person, who can be cut down so much that he or she can never grow back. She thinks that Vanya is too cruel, and that he will destroy the Professor with his hatred until there will be no redeeming qualities left in the way the two treat each other.
Quote #8
VOYNITSKY: The rain will pass now and all nature will be refreshed and give a gentle sigh. I alone will not be refreshed by the storm. [...] My feelings are going to waste, like a ray of sunshine falling into a chasm, and I myself am going to waste. (2.128-37)
You're invited to Uncle Vanya's pity party, starting right now. Vanya compares his state of mind to the environment surrounding him. While nature is refreshed by the rain, he is inconsolable because Yelena won't return his love. Finally, he uses a simile to compare his feelings to light that is just swallowed up, never reaching the plants that need it because of the depths of the chasm. That's his love, going to waste on the fickle Yelena.
Quote #9
SONYA: The hay is all cut, it rains every day, everything is rotting—and you're occupied with mirages. (2.260-61)
Sonya is the only one who seems to have any sort of practical relationship with the natural world. She's a country girl, in the end, and knows that no one will be eating if the growing and harvesting doesn't all go right. The rain isn't some cutesy refreshing shower for her; it's the enemy that won't let her hay dry out.