Ten Corrections*
(Dialectical Pairs)
Ten Corrections*
(Dialectical Pairs)
Speculation
But young people err so often and so grievously in this: that they (in whose nture it lies to have no patience) fling themselves at each other, when love takes possession of them, scatter themselves, just as they are, in all their untidiness, disorder, confusion…. And then what? What is life to do to this heap of half-battered existence which they call their communion and which they would gladly call their happiness, if it were possible, and their future? Thus each loses himself for the sake of the other and loses the other and many others that wanted still to come. And loses the expanses and the possibilities, exchanges the approach and flight of gentle, divining things for an unfruitful perplexity out of which nothing can come any more, nothing save a little disgust, disillusionment and poverty, and rescue in one of the many conventions that have been put up in great number like public refuges along this most dangerous road.
[Irren die jungen Menschen so oft und so schwer: dass sie (in deren Wesen es liegt, keine Geduld zu haben) sich einander hinwerfen, wenn die Liebe uber sie kommt, sich ausstreuen, so wie sie sind in all ihrer Unaufgeraumtheit, Unordnung, Wirrnis… Was aber soll denn sein? Was soll das Leben an diesem Haufen von Halbzerschlagenem tun, den sie ihre gemeinsamkeit heissen und den sie gerne ihr Gluck nennen mochten, ginge es an, und ihre Zukunft? Da verliert jeder sich um des anderen willen und veriert den anderen und viele andere, die noch kommen wollten. Und verliert die weiten und Moglichkeiten, tauscht das Nahen und Fliehen leiser, ahnungsvoller Dinge gegen eine unfruchtbare Ratlosigkeit, aus der nichts mehr kommen kann; nichts als ein wenig Ekel, Enttauschung und Armut und die Rettung in eine der vielen Konventionen, die wie allgemeine Schutzhutten an diesem gefahrlichsten Wege in grosse Zahl angebracht sind.]
The beauty of expression is so persuasive one is tempted to pass over the repellent content. But suppose this were said baldly: You are too young to love. You don’t know how. You will make a mess of it. Leave love to your elders and betters, those who are wise enough to know what use to make of it. Left to your own devices, you will either throw yourself away, or, worst case, get trapped in a bourgeois marriage, in which you will be forever loveless, deprived even of the liasons you might otherwise have enjoyed (viele andere, die noch kommen wollten). All the joyous, eloquent and passionate young lovers of Shakespeare rise up and cry shame!
It is inbuilt in mankind to suppose there are forces controlling his destiny beyond those he can manage for himself.This is self- evident in his obvious helplessness in the face of nature and the aggression of human instincts. Nature devastates and man devastates. What protection is there? The gods, not man, are responsible for events, and given that events are unpredictable and most often take a harsh toll, the gods apparently are not friendly to men. So they must be propitated. And how? With human blood. Why? Because life is the most precious attribute of a man, and what ought one give to the god but what is most precious?
Thus, in its earliest stages, human sacrifice is the rule.(1) It is endemic in the area where the Jewish people originate. The struggle against it can be traced as a “red thread” throughout the Old Testament, where it preempts much of the narrative. (2) The outcome of this struggle is prefigured in Genesis, when Isaac is replaced on the altar by a stag, sent by God as a substitute for Abraham’s son. There are many stories in the Old Testament, but there is but one overriding message: Love thy God. This God is One and to be feared and obeyed. How is His will known? Through the prophets, the first of whom, Moses, institutes His Commandments. Here then, the burden of the good life is put on man himself, not on unpredictable deities. God is only partly responsible for human vicissitudes. To thrive, man must cooperate, he must obey the Law. There is nothing in the Commandments that indicates how this God is to be worshiped, except with all one’s heart, mind, and strength. There is nothing in them that outlaws human sacrifice. But having established Jahweh as One, he is in natural competition with the multiplicity of gods in the surrounding area. And the hallmark of these gods is that they require human blood.) The zeal of the prophets is constantly directed against backsliding, against the bloodthirsty hunger of Baal and the worshipers who feed him their sons and daughters, against the temptation of the Hebrews to go over to them; the struggle is both religious and political. It will persist until Jerusalem is established and the Temple is built and the Ark is housed. The Hebrews, by the time they have built the Temple, have largely replaced human sacrifice with animal sacrifice. Blood is spilled, blood is required, but it is not the blood of beating human hearts. It has been replaced by the blood of birds and beasts.
The bridge that connects these opposing views is the shift in the meaning of sacrifice. The New Testament continues the story in an unprecedented way. In place of animal sacrifice, comes the one-time sacrifice of a man who symbolically incorporates all other types of sacrifice into himself, because, contrary even to his deepest wish, it is a sacrifice that is voluntary. Thus, the idea of sacrifice is transposed to the will of the individual man. It issues from the freedom to choose. When Jesus drives the money changers out of the Temple, he is not just driving out commerce. This act anticipates a rejection of the very notion that a bird or animal’s blood can count as an acceptable offering to God. Henceforth it will be reconfigured in bread and wine, offered as a sacrifice in the Mass. What nourishes man nourishes God.
In John, Jesus commands his disciples to love each other as he has loved them. This is the lead-in to the famous ssaying: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” The place taken by Love in the New Testament as opposed to Law in the Old is summarized in this saying, and with it, the idea of love, not propitiation or appeasement, as the basis for sacrifice. It culminates in Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross.(3)
From this sacrifice derives a rationale for suffering conspicuously absent in antiquity. To the Greeks, suffering was unavoidable and pointless, a condition of the universe. A great draft of cosmic indifference whistles through Greek tragedy. In the Old Testament personal suffering is figured in Job, a story which humbles the imagination. Job accepts his lot unconditionally as God’s will, and with acceptance propsperity redoubles. With the Resurrection, something new is introduced: Jesus-become-Christ valorizes suffering by making it into an example. This view is in wide currency today, especially as a consolation for pain. But one remembers the woman who, when offered Jesus as a consolatory example, replies: “Yes, but Jesus suffered for three hours. I have suffered a lifetime.” It is convenient, perhaps plausible, but remains as empty as the words of Job’s comforters, unless joined to some personal persuasion that there is a good to be found in pain. What is purpose-driven is acceptable. If one can indeed find a purpose, or invent a purpose, even after the fact, the ordeal is more easily withstood.
And now we come to Chekhov, and the remarkable way he suggests suffering, shorn of a basis in religious thought, is sacrificial in and of itself. Unlike any playwright in the English-speaking canon, Chekhov writes characters whose restlessness seeks a meaning to life, to their trials and vexations, their suffering and pain. Hamlet and MacBeth despair. But they do not comfort themselves with ideology. (4) In “The Seagull,” art substitutes for religion. In “Uncle Vanya,” Sonia, still within the tradition of faith, voices a belief in the afterlife, nay, the Millenium, which feels more like a fervent wish than a conviction. But in the next play, “The Three Sisters,” all reference to Christianity is displaced by what one might call a type of humanism, except one thinks humanism must be better tailored to the actual needs of living men and women. People suffer in the present so the future will be happy for others.
OLGA
Our suffering will be changed to joy for those who come after us.
And in “The Cherry Orchard”:
TROFIMOV
The moon is rising. Happiness is nearing. I can see it.. and if we miss it… does it really matter? It will arrive for others.
But Vershinin in “The Three Sisters” takes this idea a step further:
VERSHININ
In two or three hundred years… a new and happy life will begin… it is our lives and our effort and yes! our suffering that is helping to bring it about, and, if you like, our only happiness.
Future happiness is dependent on present suffering. So that suffering not only has a rationale, it is necessary. It is not even one’s children or grandchildren who are being spoken of here. It is a wolloping abstraction that has overwhelmed the concrete.
The most remarkable feature of this kind of thinking is that it prefigures the ideology of the October Revolution, Thus, the notorious phrase “You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs” to justify famine, mass murder, and eventually, the police state. Its cruelty and absurdity, its anti-humanistic thrust which turns the whole project upside down – the omelette was illusory – is epitomized in the tragic resonance of Mandelstam’s lines:
For the thundering glory of future generations,/for the sake of a tall race of men/ I have forfeited my seat at the feast of my fathers,/ I have laid down my honor and my good cheer.
Here I would like to append a footnote from personal experience. It is my belief that suffering is made salutary – that is, builds a bridge to others rather than isolates from them – only when it has been deprived of any meaning one is likely to ascribe to it – when it is made naked, is denuded of all props.(5) I have in mind not so much physical pain as the Chekhovian variety: mental anquish, or despair; and to this end, in an attempt to make sense of past events, once wrote the paragraph which follows:
All this time, I had borne with the pressures of disintegration, vaguely expecting that one day I would simply die, as if from internal combustion. I would not have to kill myself. It would happen for me. Past and future were equally closed off. I could not anticipate. I could not remember. I, who had once been thought promising, at twenty-five had come on terminal failure; and so shame was added to the witch’s broth of despair and runaway guilt. I knew that I had long since overstepped the boundary of normal human unhappiness with the onslaught of new geographies in consciousness; but I did not give this new territory a name. The point at which it occurred to me that something else might be at play – that the borderline of sanity had been crossed – was when, one afternoon in late February, vibrations in my palms announced that I was in the grip of a religious hallucination.
Napoleon and Christ are the polar cliches of the asylum, the one an exemplar of absolute power, the other of absolute helplessness. The lunatic who thinks he is Napoleon removes himself from suffering through the illusion of control. The lunatic who thinks he is Christ identifies with suffering to such a degree that he incorporates it into himself in order to justify it. He makes of himself the Exemplary Victim. The lure of meaning is more compelling than suffering itself when suffering without meaning is pushed to its limits. The false meaning of the Exemplary Victim is a solution to the search for meaning that is otherwise fruitless.
I understood in that moment that suffering has no meaning. Meaning is imposed on it. This was the endpoint of my journey down. I could go no lower.(5)
And indeed, isn’t it precisely here that the Christian role model kicks in? For it is undeniable that in two of the Gospels, the words: “My God my God, why has Thou forsaken me” – are ascribed to the man on the cross? And what can these words mean but that to him, his suffering is denuded of meaning? has none?
I continue in the conviction that it is not until the individual recognizes and ackhowledges that suffering is meaningless, that some remedy in the psyche is affected, that it is incorporated into experience in a way that does not lead to apathy, cynacism, pessimism, or nihilism. With these in the forefront, nothing can be advanced, nothing redeemed. In the Biblical story, this acknowledgment is followed by resurrection. (6)
FOOTNOTES
1. It is interesting to note, in this respect, that the Greeks, and subsequently the Romans, seem to have avoided the stage of human sacrifice. The Illiad and Aenead are full of the blood of beasts – In both epics great hecatombs of cattle are offered in celebration and supplication to the denizens of Olympus; who themselves are viewed not as inimical to man, but so capricious in their quarrels and jealousies and vainglory, that they are almost indistinquishable from those they rule – the Greek religious imagination, like its art, is deeply humanistic.
There is an exception in the story of Iphegineia, the daughter of Agamemnon. An oracle requires her to be sacrificed to Artemis in order to stir up the winds and set sail for Troy. As in the Biblical story of Abraham and Isaac, she is rescued on the altar, when replaced by a stag (deer). Artemis, like God, does not want human blood.
2. It is difficult to know what to make of the story of Japtheth’sdaughter, who, like Jairus’ daughter in the New, is nameless. (Judges ll:29) It might be called an “inadvertant” sacrifice. Jeptheth is a general who makes a bargain with God: Give me success in battle and I will give you (as a “burnt offering”)_ the first creature to exit my house on my return. He conquers the Ammonites, and when his daughter, rejoicing with dance and music, comes to meet him, he is obligated to keep his word. The story, in its irony, has a Greek flavor. Interpreters don’t know what to make of it. Two are punished: Japtheth, who loses his beloved only child, and with her, the hope of posterity; and the daughter, whose life is forfeit. What is the meaning? That the sins of the fathers are visited on the children? But what is the sin? Overconfidence? Rashness? Bargain-making with God? A bargain implies a transaction between equals, and this would, in fact, be blasphemous. Some interpretations argue that her life is spared, as, although willing enough to comply with her father’s rash vow, she asks for two months’ grace “to bewail her virginity”: the punishment brought on her father, who cannot hope to perpetuate his line, and if spared, on herself, being cut off from marriage and children, a Hebrew woman’s best hope; a request that is granted, after which, Japtheth “did with her according to the vow he had vowed” – serves her up to the fire, one would think: but the curious sentence is added “and she knew no man.” The result was the institution of a sort of four-day holiday on which the “daughters of Israel” remember this other daughter and lament – what? her death? Perpetual virginity?
3. What a paradox that it was precisely when the Gospels were made accessible through translation, and, one would have thought, Jesus’s rejection of violence could not be gainsaid, the wars of religion started to gather steam. The wine – content – was turned sour by the bottle – doctrine.
4. For a fuller elaboration of this theme in Chekhov’s plays, see my introduction to Uncle Vanya and Other Plays, Bantam Press, 1994.
5. Of course, one can never be sure. Life is still being lived, with possibilities of other bottoms, other intelligence.
PROLOGUE
RALPH, a raven with an umbrella, is pushing his way through the swirling snow and moaning wind toward a house in the distance. The dark is scattered with pinpoints of light from festively lit windows.
RALPH: IF ONLY
(He gives a hair-raising croak at the end of the song. A big gust of wind catches his umbrella and blows him offstage)
ACT I
Scene i: Wizard’s laboratory. Books, bottles, alembics, testubes, glasses, globes, coils, etc. A fire beneath a tripod flickers against the hearth. There is a large cuckoo clock on the wall. IRRWITZER, a wizard, is at his desk writing. From somewhere distant the sound of off-key scales, gradually fading into silence.
(Animal cutouts or puppets are silhouetted; singing as if from far away)
All right. Don’t answer it.
(desperate, to self, looking around for a place to hide)
It’s too early. I still have time!
(Banging gets louder)
IRRWITZER
(still dashing about) NASTY SNOOPING GREEDY THING I’VE TROUBLES ENOUGH NOW SHE’S ON HER WAY |
RALPH
(warming himself at the fire) CHILLS,ARTHRITIS,CRIPPLED WING I’VE TROUBLES ENOUGH NO WAY DOES IT PAY |
RALPH
(he picks up a piece of paper dropped from Irrwitzer’s bundle: to self, in awe) Kitty, look! Look at this!
RALPH
This is you
There is no doubt
The bulging eyes
Protruding tongue
FROM a gibbet’s ARM
TRUSSED and hung
MAURIZIO
It’s NOT true
It can’t be me
RALPH
The scruffy tail
MAURIZIO
How rude you are!
RALPH
underneath your chin
The same white star
There’s truth in the doodles
HATCHED BY the brain
They tell oodles and oodles
makE SEcRET THOUGHTS plain
A DRAWING wears no
disguise
it never lies
ONE PICTURE IS worth a thousand words!
MAURIZIO
IS IT TRUE?
Can this be me?
Am I deceived?
CAN he HAVE LIED?
RALPH
Pictures as clear as this
CAN’T BE DENIED
MAURIZIO
HE WAS always SO GOOD
TO ME
HE FED MY FAVORITe FOOD
TO ME TUNA MELTS
SARDINES AND SMELTS
utterly scrumptious delicious tidbits
OH Oh OH IT’S VERY HARD
TO SWALLOW!
THE SHAMELES CAD!
The hypocriTE! SO MANY PROMISES ALL HOLLOW!
BUT I HAVE TO ADMIT
IT’S TRUE
THIS PICTURE DOESN’T FIT
IT’S TRUE
Oh OH OH IT’S VERY HARD
TO SWALLOW! MY HIGH HOPES DASHED
MY DREAMS ALL SMASHED SO MANY PROMISES ALL HOLLOW!
RALPH
GIBBET-ED!
MAURIZIO
HE WANTS ME DEAD
IT’S NOT JUST SUSPICIOUS
IT’S PROOF POSITIVE
|
||
RALPH
THERE’S TRUTH IN THE DOODLES
HATCHED BY THE BRAIN
THEY TELL OODLES AND ODDLES MAKE SECRET THOUGHTS PLAIN A DRAWING NEVER LIES IT WEARS NO DISGUISE ONE PICTURE IS WORTH A
THOUSAND WORDS
|
MAURIZIO
HOW COULD HE
HOW COULD HE
FEED ME SUCH LIES
WEAR A DISGUISE BUT
ONE PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS
|
|
I DON’T WANT TO DIE
IT’S MUCH TOO SOON
OH, WORTHY SIR
GRANT ME THIS BOON ANOTHER TWENTY YEARS
TO BREATHE THE AIR
ANOTHER TEN YEARS THAT’S ALL THAT’S ALL JUST ANOTHER WEEK
TIME TO PREPARE
I’M TOO YOUNG TO DIE
IT’S MUCH TOO SOON
NO-O-O-O |
I DON’T WANT TO DIE
IT’S MUCH TOO SOON
OH, WORTHY SIR
GRANT ME THIS BOON
ANOTHER TWENTY YEARS
IT ISN’T FAIR
ANOTHER SUMMER
ANOTHER FALL
IT ISN’T FAIR JUST ONE MORE DAY JUST ANOTHER SUN I’M TOO YOUNG TO DIE
IT’S MUCH TOO SOON
NO-O-O-O-O |
I DON’T DEAL IN FEELINGS
THERE’S NO REPEAL
A CONTRACT’S
A CONTRACT
I DON’T MEAN T0 HAGGLE
IT’S IN THE BAG
A CONTRACT’S
A CONTRACT
HERE’S WHERE YOU SIGNED
ON THE DOTTED
LINE
I ADVISE YOU TO MAKE OUT
YOUR LAST WILLS AND TESTAMENTS
AT MIDNIGHT I’LL RETURN
IF YOU’RE STILL IN ARREARSTHE ONE THING CERTAIN IS
CURTAINS!
|
Scene v: RALPH and MAURIZIO
(RALPH and MAURIZIO climb out of the barrel and stagger around as if they were drunk)
I feel terrible.
Ralph……..I … I …. I owe you an apology.
Scene ii: The backward tilted bell tower of the cathedral. RALPH and MAURIZIO are laboriously making their way upward through wind and snow. MAURIZIO is in front.
Scene iii: The Laboratory. GRUELLA and IRRWITZER have been working steadily. They are staring into an enormous transparent punch bowl; it glows a violet color.
Scene viii. The laboratory. The wizard and witch are staring into the cauldron.
Der Satnarcholugenialkohollische Wunschpunsch
PROLOGUE
PRESTANOVSKY
So that’s my platform, folks: Elect Prestanovsky and get yourself a president for the people. Just remember those two letters: PP: President for the People. For every one of the people: old young middle-aged: JOBS! and with jobs what do you get? FOOD on the table; CLOTHES on your back! a ROOF over your head! And with a roof 0ver your head, what do you get? A BED to lie down in! And without a bed to lie down in, what do you get? SWEET DREAMS? You better believe it!
ASTROLOGERS
ACT III
Talk show studio. At an elevated level to the left and right are large frames, simulating TV screens. In a living room set at stage level sits VENUS with the ANCHORWOMAN and ANCHORMAN. Technicians fuss around briefly adjusting microphone on VENUS) ANCHORWOMAN waves them off frantically before turning to face front with artificial smile.)
1. FACTORY CAFETERIA. THE FACTORY WHISTLE BLOWS. IT IS LUNCHTIME
EMMA and her friend, CLARA, walk on with their lunchboxes. They sit down and take out their sandwiches.
CLARA: Chicken with mustard.
EMMA: Meatloaf with catsup.
CLARA: Do you want to trade?
EMMA: No. But I’ll have some of your lemonade.
(Holds out her cup, Else pours. Enter CONSUELA and
LUISA, also with their lunchboxes. They join CLARA
and EMMA.)
LUISA: Do you think the strike will come off?
CLARA: It all depends.
EMMA: Depends on what?
CONSUELA: On Manolo, of course.
LUISA: He’s with us. I know.
EMMA: How do you know?
LUISA: From Maria who got it…
CLARA: …from the mouth of the horse.
LUISA: Loewenthal thinks it’s a bluff.
CONSUELA: Loewenthal sucks.
CLARA: Loewenthal doesn’t pay his workers enough.
CONSUELA: He keeps a gun in his desk.
CLARA: A pistol. I know.
LUISA: In the front left drawer.
EMMA: How do you know?
CONSUELA: From Maria who got it …
CLARA: … from Manolo who got it …
LUISA … from the mouth of the horse!
EMMA: I hate violence.
CLARA: It makes no sense.
LUISA: If they call in scabs….
EMMA: Let’s talk about something else.
CLARA: What’s at the movies?
CONSUELA: (looking in her paper) Sailing to Zanzibar.
LUISA: (over her shoulder) “A turbulent drama of passion and betrayal.”
EMMA: Thank you, I’ll pass.
CLARA: Who is the star?
LUISA: Zabeta Tomas.
CONSUELA: Maria looks like Zabeta Tomas.
CLARA: Manolo is sweet on Maria.
CONSUELA: She comes in late –
LUISA: She isn’t to blame.
CONSUELA: Misses a day –
LUISA: It’s all the same.
CONSUELA: I wish I looked like Maria!
EMMA: Consuela. For shame!
LUISA: Her looks are great.
CONSUELA: She’s beautiful.
LUISA: It must be heaven. That’s what heaven is.
CLARA: Heaven is sleeping late.
EMMA: In heaven there is justice.
(They look at her oddly)
TRIO: Emma does not sing.
LUISA & CONSUELA
If I could be anything else and still me
I’d be beautiful beautiful beautiful
that’s what I’d be
A gull on the wing is a heavenly thing
a beautiful girl is more heavenly still
A peacock in spring is a heavenly thing
but beautiful eyes
[beautiful hair
beautiful skin]
are more heavenly still
CLARA
The looking-glass eye is a readymade lie
LUISA & CONSUELA
The looking-glass eye is a karmic charm
CLARA
The looking-glass eye is marred by a stye
LUISA & CONSUELA
The cold of the glass by breath is made warm
CLARA
The looking-glass eye will wink you to death
LUISA & CONSUELA
The glass is made glad by beauty’s sweet breath
The gold in the sun is a heavenly thing
the gold in a ring is more heavenly still
If I could have one –
CLARA
Husbands! We will!
We just have to wait until we are older
LUISA & CONSUELA
I’d trade the looking-glass eye for the eye of the beholder.
(The factory whistle blows. They pack up their lunchboxes.)
LUISA: Until Sunday at three?
CONSUELA: We’ll meet in the park.
CLARA: But we haven’t decided what movie to see.
CONSUELA: Tomorrow we have a half day at work.
LUISA: Then we’ll decide.
CONSUELA: All right.
CLARA: All right.
CONSUELA: See you inside.
(LUISA and CONSUELA leave.)
2. EMMA and CLARA
CLARA: Emma, you’re so quiet. Aren’t you feeling all right?
EMMA: I’m fine.
CLARA: Are we going to join the gym tonight?
EMMA: Yes. I’ll meet you there at eight.
CLARA: They have strict rules of hygiene.
EMMA: What do you mean?
CLARA: There’s a physical exam.
EMMA: I know. It’s disgusting.
CLARA: But if you’re a swimmer…
EMMA: I am.
CLARA: And you want to use the pool –
EMMA: I love to swim. I used to swim every summer
in the river near our house in –
CLARA: Where?
EMMA: Never mind.
CLARA: You know Emma, with a little more care …
EMMA: Yes?
CLARA: Some lipstick, for example…
EMMA: Yes?
CLARA: Some shadow, some eyebrow pencil …..
EMMA: Yes?
CLARA: You’d outshine us all.
EMMA: (leaving) Boys don’t interest me.
CLARA: (calling after) But you’re almost eighteen.
EMMA: (almost off) I’ll grow into it I guess. …(afterthought) You know what though …
CLARA: What?
EMMA: Bring me your makeup. I’ll give it a shot.
CLARA: You mean it?
EMMA: Why not?
CLARA: Good. What do you want?
EMMA: I don’t know. Lipstick. Liner. Bring it all.
CLARA: All right….. You let something fall.
EMMA: (she turns) What?
CLARA: (picking it up) You dropped a letter … it’s from Brazil.
EMMA; (lunging for the letter) Give me that!
CLARA: (holding it back) What makes you so rude?
EMMA: I don’t know. Let’s not fight.
CLARA: You’re in a strange mood.
EMMA: Sorry. You’re right.
CLARA; (handing it back to her) I didn’t know you had friends in Brazil.
EMMA: I don’t. It’s nothing. A misaddressed bill.
(Freeze on CLARA. Flashback: EMMA opens the letter for the
first time, and reads it. VOICE over)
Dear Ms. Zunz: I am writing to inform you that Emanuel Maier, who was a boarder of mine, was found dead last Wednesday of an overdose of Veronal. He had been released from prison only recently and was not in a positive frame of mind. I found your name and address on an envelope among his few posssessions which I am forwarding to you under separate cover. Sincerely …
EMMA: (dropping the letter) Emanuel Meier…. Manuel Zunz.
Father Father
What have you done?
Where have you gone?
Why have you left your daughter alone?
(SHE picks up the letter and puts it in her pocket. Then she
opens the box and goes through its contents. Takes out a
watch. Winds it.)
Time has stopped ticking
Time has stopped ticking the way it did then
Time has stopped ticking at twenty past ten
The river’s stopped flowing
The river’s stopped flowing the way it did then
the river’s stopped flowing like ink from a pen
Who will nail down the lid to the coffin
What can make the lid of the coffin stay shut
like a shutter banging in the wind
like a gate swinging on its hinge
the lid on the coffin will not stay put
(SHE sets the watch aside; takes out a photograph):
Mem’ries go drifting
Mem’ries go drifting like clouds through the blue
Mem’ries go drifting of me and of you
Who can bring back one day of the summer
What can make me carefree the way I was then
like a leaf floating on the stream
like a wish buried in a dream
the long light of summer slips out of ken
(Further flashback #l):
MOTHER’S VOICE
Emma, where are you?
Oh, there you are.
Stand with your father
in front of the car.
A little big closer.
There. Give a big smile.
Hold it! Terrific!
Now don’t go too far.
I’ll pack up the picnic.
We still have awhile.
FATHER’S VOICE
The long days of summer [run on and] blend into one.
The long days of summer are never done.
MOTHER
Go get your father! It’s time to come in.
Go get your father! The food’s getting cold.
FATHER
Go get your mother! We’ll go for a spin.
BOTH
Happy Birthday, Emma. You are twelve years old.
EMMA
The long days of summer [run on and] blend into one
The long days of summer are very soon done.
EMMA: Look, Father: I found a four-leaf clover!
FATHER: That’s good for one wish.
EMMA: I wish – I wish summer would never end.
FATHER: That’s impossible. But it will come back again.
EMMA: Will it? Sometimes I get frightened.
FATHER: Whatever for?
EMMA: I don’t know. I love you so much, Father. Perhaps it is wrong, and I’ll be punished for it.
FATHER: Punished for loving? What nonsense.
ARIA: EMMA: A Catalogue of Lovely Things
There’s no where I would rather be
when you are with me, Father.
There’s nothing that can bother me
when you are with me, Father.
[When you are with me, Father
the world is right and good.
When you are with me Father,
should turns into is, and is is always should.]
When you are with me, Father
The world is full of good and lovely things:
bells that ring, folk who speak,
birds that sing, boards that squeak,
water running silent in a creek
The world is full of good and lovely things:
trees that grow, light that spills
worms that glow, food that fills
thunderstorms, pampa grass, the distant hills
candlesticks [and] postage stamps
rocking chairs [and] table lamps
dragonflies [and] finger paints
bicycles [and] pillar saints
FATHER: Pillar saints?
EMMA: Yes, pillar saints.
FATHER: What do you know about pillar saints?
EMMA: They’re in the Encyclopaedia. Another good and lovely thing –
Who can count the good and lovely things:
Earth below, sky above
minds that know, hearts that love
Endless things I’ll never tire of
When you are with me, Father.
(Return to first flashback: EMMA in her room with the box
of her father’s effects. SHE puts aside the photograph.
Takes out a Bible. Opens to a marker. Reads):
Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips and from a
deceitful tongue.
(Further flashback #2):
MOTHER: There was another poisonous letter this morning.
FATHER: Tear it up.
MOTHER: Did you see the headlines?
FATHER: Embezzlement scheme exposed at Tarbuch textile mills.
MOTHER: How can I face the neighbors? The shame…..
FATHER: Emma, I have to talk to you.
EMMA: I know. Something’s wrong.
FATHER: How do you know?
EMMA: The whispering. Your face. That letter that came.
FATHER: I’ve lost my position; it won’t be long
before I lose my freedom as well.
EMMA: Why, Father? What for?
FATHER: For a crime
I did not commit.
For another man’s wrong,
I will sit in a cell.
EMMA: What crime?
FATHER: Stealing.
EMMA: What man?
FATHER: You must give me your word never to tell.
By all that is sacred, swear.
EMMA: By all that is sacred, I swear.
Who is it, father? Who is the guilty man?
FATHER: The manager: Loewenthal. Aaron Lowenthal.
EMMA: How can they say it is you?
FATHER: I’m the cashier.
I had the temptation.
What could be easier?
I was there.
EMMA: But you’re innocent.
Why don’t you tell the police?
FATHER: He is a very clever man, Emma.
He is far more clever than I.
I have no proof, and he knows it.
And he has managed the thing
so the evidence points to me.
EMMA: It’s wrong! Wrong!
If they take you away, I’ll die.
FATHER: Don’t say that. You’re strong.
You’ll manage without me. You’ll see.
ARIA: FATHER
The cup of sorrow is passed among us
by a hand that is unseen
And then one day it stops, it is carried to
your lips
And you must drink it down,
drink it to the last bitter drop
no matter who you are:
a humble cashier or a mighty king or queen
An unseen hand has passed me sorrow’s cup
Now I must drink the portion I am served
I must drink it down,
drink it to the last bitter drop
deserved or undeserved:
This is how things are
for each of us, great and small:
This is how things are.
Be patient, child:
Patience carries far EMMA
Child, do not sorrow Grief in my marrow
Wait until tomorrow Grief in my bone
This too will pass I am alone
This night will never pass
VOICES: Are you Manuel Zunz?
FATHER: Yes.
VOICES: You are under arrest.
EMMA: No. Don’t! Don’t take him yet.
VOICES: Sorry, miss.
EMMA: Father, I won’t forget.
Father, I’ll never forget.
(Further flashback #3: Hammer strokes are heard as the house
is boarded up. Mother and daughter stand looking on.)
Elegy for Lost Childhood
Enchanted skies
enchanted grass
enchanted world beneath the glass
of memory
enchanted world – gone, alas!
enchanted world – gone, alas!
Goodbye house. Goodbye Eden. Goodbye Golden Age.
(Spoken through music)
EMMA: What will become of us, Mother?
MOTHER: We must throw ourselves on God’s mercy.
EMMA: And if God should have none?
MOTHER: Then we must trust to his Justice.
(Fade out, return to First Flashback: EMMA is still
holding the Bible)
EMMA: God has no mercy. Let me be the instrument of his Justice.
[ variations on this couplet:
My body is my shield my body is my sword
I will destroy him in the name of the lord.]
(End of flashbacks. Return to factory.)
CLARA: Emma, are you coming?
EMMA: Don’t wait for me. I have to make a phonecall.
(CLARA leaves.)
3. EMMA alone.
EMMA: Hello? Mr. Loewenthal?
LOEWENTHAL: Yes, who is this?
EMMA: Emma Zunz, sir.
LOEWENTHAL: Emma Zunz….
EMMA: Yes, sir. I’m in the dye works.
LOEWENTHAL: It’s a name I seem to recall.
What do you want?
EMMA: I want to speak to you…
LOEWENTHAL: Yes.
EMMA: In private, sir.
LOEWENTHAL: Can’t you speak to the manager?
EMMA: No. It’s for the owner’s ears alone…
Something you need to know, only….
LOEWENTHAL: What is it about?
EMMA: I don’t want to take any risks, you understand …
If the other girls were to find out..
You see, it’s in regard to the strike .
LOEWENTHAL: Oh….. Come to my office
this evening after work.
EMMA: Tomorrow would be better, sir.
I could come in the evening, around eight.
LOEWENTHAL: All right, tomorrow then. And don’t be late.
EMMA: Yes, sir. I’ll see you then.
(SHE hangs up and repeats)
Yes sir. I’ll see you then.
(SHE takes out the letter, sings.)
Father, father,
before the earth has turned again
turned once again
around the sun
I will complete
what I’ve begun
Father, father,
before the earth has turned again
turned once again
around the sun
It shall be done
It shall be done
(SHE tears up the letter and throws it in the trash. Blackout.)
4.The next day at noon. The Factory gate. Whistle is heard. EMMA is leaving work with CLARA, LUISA, and CONSUELA.
LUISA: Tomorrow at three then.
CLARA: “Sailing to Zanzibar.”
CONSUELA: Unless Emma changes her mind….
How about it, Emma. Will you?
EMMA: No.
CONSUELA: How stubborn you are.
EMMA: I’ll take a raincheck.
LUISA & CONSUELA: All right. Let’s go.
So long, girls.
EMMA & CLARA: So long.
CLARA: Here’s my makeup kit.
EMMA: Good. You remembered.
CLARA: I still can’t get over it. I mean that you said yes.
EMMA: Sometimes, I’m too inflexible. I know.
CLARA: Like with the movie just now.
EMMA: Romance is so heavy. I prefer something light.
CLARA: You’re probably right. See you tomorrow, Emma.
EMMA: Goodbye, Clara.
4. EMMA alone.
(She goes over to a kiosk.)
A copy of La Prensa, please.
(She pays for it, opens to shipping news.)
Pier four. Pier four. The Nordstarjam.
Leaving tonight.
Leaving tonight for Norway’s fjords
and Sweeden’s frozen coast
By you I will steer
By you I will steer, my guiding polar light.
She crosses to a cafe, disappearing inside. The flat turns reveal-ing on the other side
5. A bar: Three sailors sit drinking. The jukebox is just coming to the end of a popular tango.
RED: Friggen tango. I’m sick of ’em.
(sings)
I done a bad thing in Mandelay
and the devil knows, but the cops don’t care
I broke a gal’s heart and she’s crying all day
And I’m never gonna go back there
Oh, lock up m’bones in Davy Jones and throw away the key
and that’ll be the end of me
and that’ll be the end of me
I done a bad thing in Zanzibar
and the devil knows, but the cops don’t care
I trashed the whole bar, and I wrecked my pal’s car
and I’m never gonna go back there
Oh, lock up m’bones in Davy Jones and throw away the key
and that’ll be the end of me
and that’ll be the end of me
Oh, lock up m’bones in Davy Jones and throw away the key
and that’ll be the end of me
and that’ll be the end of me
BJORN: What’s your ship, friend?
RED: The Brisbane.
BJORN: Australia, right?
RED: Right, mate.
I done a bad thing in Mazatlan
and the devil knows, but the cops don’t care
I popped a few pills and cut up a man
and I’m never gonna go back there
Lock up m’bones in Davy Jones, and throw away the key
That’ll be the end of me
C’mon. Sing with me: That’ll be the end of me.
They sing together:
That’ll be the end of me
That’ll be the end of me.
BJORN: I’m on the Nordstarjam, out of Malmo. So’s m’pal here.
RED: Red’s my name.
BJORN: Bjorn. This is Sven. (mighty clap on the back: in Swedish*)
This is Red. He’s on the Brisbane. (to RED). He can’t speak the lingo.
SVEN: (in Swedish or Finnish, which ever sings better)
Ask him if he’s ever sailed to Borneo.
BJORN: You ever sailed to Borneo?
RED: Sure.
SVEN: (in Swedish) Ask him if there are cannibals in Borneo.
BJORN: Are there cannibals in Borneo?
RED: You bet your friggin’ ass.
SVEN: (in Swedish, followed by uproarious laughter:) Ask him if he
got eaten while he was there.
EMMA walks in. She is heavily made up. She goes to the jukebox and puts in a coin. The same popular tango starts up.
BJORN: Look what just walked in.
RED: Too skinny.
BJORN: (in Swedish) Red here thinks she’s too skinny.
SVEN: (in Swedish): A cunt’s a cunt.
BJORN: She looks good to me: (goes over) How about a dance, sweetheart.
(EMMA shakes her head. She doesn’t know how to dance.)
A drink then? May I buy you a drink?
(They go to the bar. She stands next to SVEN.)
What’ll it be? Whiskey? Gin?
EMMA: What are you drinking?
BJORN: Half and half.
EMMA: (staring at SVEN) I… What is your ship?
BJORN: The Nordstarjam. That’s my mate, Sven. He only speaks Swedish.
SVEN
(To EMMA, in Swedish) C’mon, girlie. Let’s go.
(EMMA nods. He grabs her arm and hustles her out.)
RED
It looks like you just got the shaft.
BJORN: (shrugs) The sea is full of fish.
Lights dim. The flat revolves to the outside again.
6. PANTOMIME In the shadows SVEN backs EMMA into a doorway and brutally yanks up her skirt. Black out.
7. Lights up. EMMA is alone. There is money in her hand. She looks at it with disgust and drops it. She walks over to a fountain and wets her handkerchief to wipe off her makeup.
The dirt still clings
the dirt still clings
to the roots of my hair
between my legs
beneath my nails
my body broken
like a bowl
who did this thing
[who did] this vile atrocious thing
forgiveness fails
nothing can make me clean
nothing can make me whole
As she leaves she doubles up:
It’s killing me
It’s killing me
there’s a purpose still
there’s a purpose still
to fulfill.
Blackout.
8. The Factory: LOEWENTHAL is standing at the window of his office, looking out. He looks at his watch.
LOEWENTHAL: Eight o’clock. Where is that confounded girl?
(He walks around the office nervously. Straightens a calendar on the wall.)
A year has gone since Minna died.
(Walks back to the window.)
Minna, my dear, I mourn your passing.
I mourn your passing
but even now I am not alone;
remembering you,
I remember always
I remember always
the textile mill I own.
The mill is with me, it fills me to brimming
at the hour of dusk, when I miss you most, my Minna.
How lovely you were the day we married
the day we married;
your dowery was more lovely still
remembering it,
I remember always
I remember always
you helped me to the mill.
The mill is with me, it fills me to brimming
at the hour of dusk, when I miss you most, my Minna.
(The dog starts barking in the courtyard. He calls down.)
It’s alright. He can’t get off the chain. Come right up.
(He drags a chair in front of the desk. Dusts off his cuffs.
Sits down facing the door. EMMA walks through the door.
She looks exactly as she did before the episode in the bar.)
LOEWENTHAL: Miss Zunz is it? Please sit down.
EMMA: Are you sure we’re alone, sir?
LOEWENTHAL: Yes, yes. Quite alone.
EMMA: If it got out I would die….
LOEWENTHAL: You can rely on me.
EMMA: No one would speak to me again.
LOEWENTHAL: Come come. What, is it girl?
EMMA: Well, you know…. about the strike…
LOEWENTHAL: Yes, yes, the strike.
EMMA: This isn’t easy… The foreman, Monolo….
LOEWENTHAL: Yes yes Monolo …
EMMA: Could you get me a glass of water?
LOWENTHAL: A glass of water?
EMMA: It would help calm my nerves. Please.
LOEWENTHAL: (humoring her) All right. Just a minute.
(He gets up and disappears behind a screen: The sound of running
water. She goes to his side of the desk, opens the top left drawer
and pulls out the revolver. He returns with the water glaas.
He stops dead in his tracks as she confronts him with the gun.)
LOEWENTHAL: What are you doing?
(as he advances, she shoots. He staggers and falls.
The glass falls and shatters)
LOEWANTHAL: You bitch! You bitch out of hell!
EMMA: That’s for my father. That’s for six years locked in a cell.
(He reaches out, she shoots again)
And that’s for me.
LOWENTHAL: Fry! Fry in hell, you bitch!
EMMA: The shame!
LOEWENTHAL: Zunz! Emanuel Zunz!
ENNA: The dishonor!
LOWENTHAL: Now I remember the name!
EMMA: Die! Die for it!
(She shoots a third time: he is quiet. The dogs starts barking.
She disarranges the divan, unbottons his jacket, takes out his glasses,
puts them on the filing cabinet.)
(spoken)
Operator? Get me the police…. Police? Yes. My name is Emma Zunz. I am a worker at the Tarbuch and Loewenthal Textile Mills. Mr. Loewenthal had me come to his office tonight on the pretext of the strike. He violated me and I killed him… yes. Please come at once.
Blackout.
9. Lights up. Police, reporters, etc. crowding through the door. The cameras flash. EMMA sings in triumph and outrage, pointing at the corpse:
EMMA:
The dirt still clings
the dirt still clings
to the roots of my hair
beneath my nails
between my legs
my body is broken
like a bowl
he did this thing
[he did] this vile atrocious thing
forgivenesss fails
nothing can make me clean
nothing can make me whole
black is his guilt
black is the guilt on his soul
CURTAIN
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