Twenty years after their romantic and ultimately tragic encounter described in Alexander Pushkin’s great narrative poem EugeneOnegin, Onegin and Tatyana encounter each other at a spa in Odessa, and as they try to make sense of the events that pushed them apart years ago, we see them reliving these events and gradually are able to piece together the puzzle of their tragic love story. Onegin, a handsome and cynical young man, has inherited a rich uncle’s country estate, and is living there, burnt out and bored, until he is befriended by a young, idealistic poet named Lensky, who innocently brings his new friend to meet the Widow Larin and her two beautiful daughters: the fun-loving Olga, who Lensky loves, and her darker and stranger sister Tatyana, who reads books and looks at the moon. Tatyana falls hopelessly in love with Onegin, writes him a letter offering herself to him, and Onegin, rather to his own surprise, decides not to take advantage of her innocence. But later, at a ball celebrating Tatyana’s Name Day, Onegin dances one mazurka after another with Lensky’s love Olga, precipitating a duel and a tragic death. Later, Oneginencounters the married Tatyana in St Petersburg, married to a wealthy Prince, and finds himself hopelessly in love with her. Complex, moving and at times also surprisingly funny, this retelling of the greatest Russian poem is part of Nigro’s ongoing Russian cycle of plays.