FIRST SCENE
(In the Luxembourg Gardens, at the group of Adam and Eve. The wind
is shaking the trees and stirring up dead leaves, straws, and
pieces of paper from the ground.)
(MAURICE and HENRIETTE are seated on a bench.)
HENRIETTE. So you don't want to die?
MAURICE. No, I am afraid. I imagine that I am going to be very
cold down there in the grave, with only a sheet to cover me and a
few shavings to lie on. And besides that, it seems to me as if
there were still some task waiting for me, but I cannot make out
what it is.
HENRIETTE. But I can guess what it is.
MAURICE. Tell me.
HENRIETTE. It is revenge. You, like me, must have suspected Jeanne
and Emile of sending the detectives after me yesterday. Such a
revenge on a rival none but a woman could devise.
MAURICE. Exactly what I was thinking. But let me tell you that my
suspicions go even further. It seems as if my sufferings during
these last few days had sharpened my wits. Can you explain, for
instance, why the waiter from the Auberge des Adrets and the head
waiter from the Pavilion were not called to testify at the
hearing?
HENRIETTE. I never thought of it before. But now I know why. They
had nothing to tell, because they had not been listening.
MAURICE. But how could the Commissaire then know what we had been
saying?
HENRIETTE. He didn't know, but he figured it out. He was guessing,
and he guessed right. Perhaps he had had to deal with some similar
case before.
MAURICE. Or else he concluded from our looks what we had been
saying. There are those who can read other people's thoughts--
Adolphe being the dupe, it seemed quite natural that we should
have called him an ass. It's the rule, I understand, although it's
varied at times by the use of "idiot" instead. But ass was nearer
at hand in this case, as we had been talking of carriages and
triumphal chariots. It is quite simple to figure out a fourth
fact, when you have three known ones to start from.
HENRIETTE. Just think that we have let ourselves be taken in so
completely.
MAURICE. That's the result of thinking too well of one's fellow
beings. This is all you get out of it. But do you know, _I_
suspect somebody else back of the Commissaire, who, by-the-bye,
must be a full-fledged scoundrel.
HENRIETTE. You mean the Abbé, who was taking the part of a private
detective.
MAURICE. That's what I mean. That man has to receive all kinds of
confessions. And note you: Adolphe himself told us he had been at
the Church of St. Germain that morning. What was he doing there?
He was blabbing, of course, and bewailing his fate. And then the
priest put the questions together for the Commissaire.
HENRIETTE. Tell me something: do you trust Adolphe?
MAURICE. I trust no human being any longer.
HENRIETTE. Not even Adolphe?
MAURICE. Him least of all. How could I trust an enemy--a man from
whom I have taken away his mistress?
HENRIETTE. Well, as you were the first one to speak of this, I'll
give you some data about our friend. You heard he had returned
that medal from London. Do you know his reason for doing so?
MAURICE. No.
HENRIETTE. He thinks himself unworthy of it, and he has taken a
penitential vow never to receive any kind of distinction.
MAURICE. Can that he possible? But what has he done?
HENRIETTE. He has committed a crime of the kind that is not
punishable under the law. That's what he gave me to understand
indirectly.
MAURICE. He, too! He, the best one of all, the model man, who
never speaks a hard word of anybody and who forgives everything.
HENRIETTE. Well, there you can see that we are no worse than
others. And yet we are being hounded day and night as if devils
were after us.
MAURICE. He, also! Then mankind has not been slandered--But if he
has been capable of _one_ crime, then you may expect anything of
him. Perhaps it was he who sent the police after you yesterday.
Coming to think of it now, it was he who sneaked away from us when
he saw that we were in the papers, and he lied when he insisted
that those fellows were not detectives. But, of course, you may
expect anything from a deceived lover.
HENRIETTE. Could he be as mean as that? No, it is impossible,
impossible!
MAURICE. Why so? If he is a scoundrel?--What were you two talking
of yesterday, before I came?
HENRIETTE. He had nothing but good to say of you.
MAURICE. That's a lie!
HENRIETTE. [Controlling herself and changing her tone] Listen.
There is one person on whom you have cast no suspicion whatever--
for what reason, I don't know. Have you thought of Madame
Catherine's wavering attitude in this matter? Didn't she say
finally that she believed you capable of anything?
MAURICE. Yes, she did, and that shows what kind of person she is.
To think evil of other people without reason, you must be a
villain yourself.
(HENRIETTE looks hard at him. Pause.)
HENRIETTE. To think evil of others, you must be a villain
yourself.
MAURICE. What do you mean?
HENRIETTE. What I said.
MAURICE. Do you mean that I--?
HENRIETTE. Yes, that's what I mean now! Look here! Did you meet
anybody but Marion when you called there yesterday morning?
MAURICE. Why do you ask?
HENRIETTE. Guess!
MAURICE. Well, as you seem to know--I met Jeanne, too.
HENRIETTE. Why did you lie to me?
MAURICE. I wanted to spare you.
HENRIETTE. And now you want me to believe in one who has been
lying to me? No, my boy, now I believe you guilty of that murder.
MAURICE. Wait a moment! We have now reached the place for which my
thoughts have been heading all the time, though I resisted as long
as possible. It's queer that what lies next to one is seen last of
all, and what one doesn't _want_ to believe cannot be believed--Tell
me something: where did you go yesterday morning, after we parted
in the Bois?
HENRIETTE. [Alarmed] Why?
MAURICE. You went either to Adolphe--which you couldn't do, as he
was attending a lesson--or you went to--Marion!
HENRIETTE. Now I am convinced that you are the murderer.
MAURICE. And I, that you are the murderess! You alone had an
interest in getting the child out of the way--to get rid of the
rock on the road, as you so aptly put it.
HENRIETTE. It was you who said that.
MAURICE. And the one who had an interest in it must have committed
the crime.
HENRIETTE. Now, Maurice, we have been running around and around in
this tread-mill, scourging each other. Let us quit before we get
to the point of sheer madness.
MAURICE. You have reached that point already.
HENRIETTE. Don't you think it's time for us to part, before we
drive each other insane?
MAURICE. Yes, I think so.
HENRIETTE. [Rising] Good-bye then!
(Two men in civilian clothes become visible in the background.)
HENRIETTE. [Turns and comes back to MAURICE] There they are again!
MAURICE. The dark angels that want to drive us out of the garden.
HENRIETTE. And force us back upon each other as if we were chained
together.
MAURICE. Or as if we were condemned to lifelong marriage. Are we
really to marry? To settle down in the same place? To be able to
close the door behind us and perhaps get peace at last?
HENRIETTE. And shut ourselves up in order to torture each other to
death; get behind locks and bolts, with a ghost for marriage
portion; you torturing me with the memory of Adolphe, and I
getting back at you with Jeanne--and Marion.
MAURICE. Never mention the name of Marion again! Don't you know
that she was to be buried today--at this very moment perhaps?
HENRIETTE. And you are not there? What does that mean?
MAURICE. It means that both Jeanne and the police have warned me
against the rage of the people.
HENRIETTE. A coward, too?
MAURICE. All the vices! How could you ever have cared for me?
HENRIETTE. Because two days ago you were another person, well
worthy of being loved--
MAURICE. And now sunk to such a depth!
HENRIETTE. It isn't that. But you are beginning to flaunt bad
qualities which are not your own.
MAURICE. But yours?
HENRIETTE. Perhaps, for when you appear a little worse I feel
myself at once a little better.
MAURICE. It's like passing on a disease to save one's self-
respect.
HENRIETTE. And how vulgar you have become, too!
MAURICE. Yes, I notice it myself, and I hardly recognise myself
since that night in the cell. They put in one person and let out
another through that gate which separates us from the rest of
society. And now I feel myself the enemy of all mankind: I should
like to set fire to the earth and dry up the oceans, for nothing
less than a universal conflagration can wipe out my dishonour.
HENRIETTE. I had a letter from my mother today. She is the widow
of a major in the army, well educated, with old-fashioned ideas of
honour and that kind of thing. Do you want to read the letter? No,
you don't!--Do you know that I am an outcast? My respectable
acquaintances will have nothing to do with me, and if I show
myself on the streets alone the police will take me. Do you
realise now that we have to get married?
MAURICE. We despise each other, and yet we have to marry: that is
hell pure and simple! But, Henriette, before we unite our
destinies you must tell me your secret, so that we may be on more
equal terms.
HENRIETTE. All right, I'll tell you. I had a friend who got into
trouble--you understand. I wanted to help her, as her whole future
was at stake--and she died!
MAURICE. That was reckless, but one might almost call it noble,
too.
HENRIETTE. You say so now, but the next time you lose your temper
you will accuse me of it.
MAURICE. No, I won't. But I cannot deny that it has shaken my
faith in you and that it makes me afraid of you. Tell me, is her
lover still alive, and does he know to what extent you were
responsible?
HENRIETTE. He was as guilty as I.
MAURICE. And if his conscience should begin to trouble him--such
things do happen--and if he should feel inclined to confess: then
you would be lost.
HENRIETTE. I know it, and it is this constant dread which has made
me rush from one dissipation to another--so that I should never
have time to wake up to full consciousness.
MAURICE. And now you want me to take my marriage portion out of
your dread. That's asking a little too much.
HENRIETTE. But when I shared the shame of Maurice the murderer--
MAURICE. Oh, let's come to an end with it!
HENRIETTE. No, the end is not yet, and I'll not let go my hold
until I have put you where you belong. For you can't go around
thinking yourself better than I am.
MAURICE. So you want to fight me then? All right, as you please!
HENRIETTE. A fight on life and death!
(The rolling of drums is heard in the distance.)
MAURICE. The garden is to be closed. "Cursed is the ground for thy
sake; thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee."
HENRIETTE. "And the Lord God said unto the woman--"
A GUARD. [In uniform, speaking very politely] Sorry, but the
garden has to be closed.
(Curtain.)
SECOND SCENE
(The Crêmerie. MME. CATHERINE is sitting at the counter making
entries into an account book. ADOLPHE and HENRIETTE are seated at
a table.)
ADOLPHE. [Calmly and kindly] But if I give you my final assurance
that I didn't run away, but that, on the contrary, I thought you
had played me false, this ought to convince you.
HENRIETTE. But why did you fool us by saying that those fellows
were not policemen?
ADOLPHE. I didn't think myself that they were, and then I wanted
to reassure you.
HENRIETTE. When you say it, I believe you. But then you must also
believe me, if I reveal my innermost thoughts to you.
ADOLPHE. Go on.
HENRIETTE. But you mustn't come back with your usual talk of
fancies and delusions.
ADOLPHE. You seem to have reason to fear that I may.
HENRIETTE. I fear nothing, but I know you and your scepticism--
Well, and then you mustn't tell this to anybody--promise me!
ADOLPHE. I promise.
HENRIETTE. Now think of it, although I must say it's something
terrible: I have partial evidence that Maurice is guilty, or at
least, I have reasonable suspicions--
ADOLPHE. You don't mean it!
HENRIETTE. Listen, and judge for yourself. When Maurice left me in
the Bois, he said he was going to see Marion alone, as the mother
was out. And now I have discovered afterward that he did meet the
mother. So that he has been lying to me.
ADOLPHE. That's possible, and his motive for doing so may have
been the best, but how can anybody conclude from it that he is
guilty of a murder?
HENRIETTE. Can't you see that?--Don't you understand?
ADOLPHE. Not at all.
HENRIETTE. Because you don't want to!--Then there is nothing left
for me but to report him, and we'll see whether he can prove an
alibi.
ADOLPHE. Henriette, let me tell you the grim truth. You, like he,
have reached the border line of--insanity. The demons of distrust
have got hold of you, and each of you is using his own sense of
partial guilt to wound the other with. Let me see if I can make a
straight guess: he has also come to suspect you of killing his
child?
HENRIETTE. Yes, he's mad enough to do so.
ADOLPHE. You call his suspicions mad, but not your own.
HENRIETTE. You have first to prove the contrary, or that I suspect
him unjustly.
ADOLPHE. Yes, that's easy. A new autopsy has proved that Marion
died of a well-known disease, the queer name of which I cannot
recall just now.
HENRIETTE. Is it true?
ADOLPHE. The official report is printed in today's paper.
HENRIETTE. I don't take any stock in it. They can make up that
kind of thing.
ADOLPHE. Beware, Henriette--or you may, without knowing it, pass
across that border line. Beware especially of throwing out
accusations that may put you into prison. Beware! [He places his
hand on her head] You hate Maurice?
HENRIETTE. Beyond all bounds!
ADOLPHE. When love turns into hatred, it means that it was tainted
from the start.
HENRIETTE. [In a quieter mood] What am I to do? Tell me, you who
are the only one that understands me.
ADOLPHE. But you don't want any sermons.
HENRIETTE. Have you nothing else to offer me?
ADOLPHE. Nothing else. But they have helped me.
HENRIETTE. Preach away then!
ADOLPHE. Try to turn your hatred against yourself. Put the knife
to the evil spot in yourself, for it is there that _your_ trouble
roots.
HENRIETTE. Explain yourself.
ADOLPHE. Part from Maurice first of all, so that you cannot nurse
your qualms of conscience together. Break off your career as an
artist, for the only thing that led you into it was a craving for
freedom and fun--as they call it. And you have seen now how much
fun there is in it. Then go home to your mother.
HENRIETTE. Never!
ADOLPHE. Some other place then.
HENRIETTE. I suppose you know, Adolphe, that I have guessed your
secret and why you wouldn't accept the prize?
ADOLPHE. Oh, I assumed that you would understand a half-told
story.
HENRIETTE. Well--what did you do to get peace?
ADOLPHE. What I have suggested: I became conscious of my guilt,
repented, decided to turn over a new leaf, and arranged my life
like that of a penitent.
HENRIETTE. How can you repent when, like me, you have no
conscience? Is repentance an act of grace bestowed on you as faith
is?
ADOLPHE. Everything is a grace, but it isn't granted unless you
seek it--Seek!
(HENRIETTE remains silent.)
ADOLPHE. But don't wait beyond the allotted time, or you may
harden yourself until you tumble down into the irretrievable.
HENRIETTE. [After a pause] Is conscience fear of punishment?
ADOLPHE. No, it is the horror inspired in our better selves by the
misdeeds of our lower selves.
HENRIETTE. Then I must have a conscience also?
ADOLPHE. Of course you have, but--
HENRIETTE, Tell me, Adolphe, are you what they call religious?
ADOLPHE. Not the least bit.
HENRIETTE. It's all so queer--What is religion?
ADOLPHE. Frankly speaking, I don't know! And I don't think anybody
else can tell you. Sometimes it appears to me like a punishment,
for nobody becomes religious without having a bad conscience.
HENRIETTE. Yes, it is a punishment. Now I know what to do.
Good-bye, Adolphe!
ADOLPHE. You'll go away from here?
HENRIETTE. Yes, I am going--to where you said. Good-bye my friend!
Good-bye, Madame Catherine!
MME. CATHERINE. Have you to go in such a hurry?
HENRIETTE. Yes.
ADOLPHE. Do you want me to go with you?
HENRIETTE. No, it wouldn't do. I am going alone, alone as I came
here, one day in Spring, thinking that I belonged where I don't
belong, and believing there was something called freedom, which
does not exist. Good-bye! [Goes out.]
MME. CATHERINE. I hope that lady never comes back, and I wish she
had never come here at all!
ADOLPHE. Who knows but that she may have had some mission to fill
here? And at any rate she deserves pity, endless pity.
MME. CATHERINE. I don't, deny it, for all of us deserve that.
ADOLPHE. And she has even done less wrong than the rest of us.
MME. CATHERINE. That's possible, but not probable.
ADOLPHE. You are always so severe, Madame Catherine. Tell me: have
you never done anything wrong?
MME. CATHERINE. [Startled] Of course, as I am a sinful human creature.
But if you have been on thin ice and fallen in, you have a right to
tell others to keep away. And you may do so without being held severe
or uncharitable. Didn't I say to Monsieur Maurice the moment that lady
entered here: Look out! Keep away! And he didn't, and so he fell in. Just
like a naughty, self-willed child. And when a man acts like that he has
to have a spanking, like any disobedient youngster.
ADOLPHE. Well, hasn't he had his spanking?
MME. CATHERINE. Yes, but it does not seem to have been enough, as
he is still going around complaining.
ADOLPHE. That's a very popular interpretation of the whole
intricate question.
MME. CATHERINE. Oh, pish! You do nothing but philosophise about
your vices, and while you are still at it the police come along
and solve the riddle. Now please leave me alone with my accounts!
ADOLPHE. There's Maurice now.
MME. CATHERINE. Yes, God bless him!
MAURICE. [Enters, his face very flushed, and takes a seat near
ADOLPHE] Good evening.
(MME. CATHERINE nods and goes on figuring.)
ADOLPHE. Well, how's everything with you?
MAURICE. Oh, beginning to clear up.
ADOLPHE. [Hands him a newspaper, which MAURICE does not take] So
you have read the paper?
MAURICE. No, I don't read the papers any longer. There's nothing
but infamies in them.
ADOLPHE. But you had better read it first--
MAURICE. No, I won't! It's nothing but lies--But listen: I have
found a new clue. Can you guess who committed that murder?
ADOLPHE. Nobody, nobody!
MAURICE. Do you know where Henriette was during that quarter hour
when the child was left alone?--She was _there_! And it is she who
has done it!
ADOLPHE. You are crazy, man.
MAURICE. Not I, but Henriette, is crazy. She suspects me and has
threatened to report me.
ADOLPHE. Henriette was here a while ago, and she used the self-
same words as you. Both of you are crazy, for it has been proved
by a second autopsy that the child died from a well-known disease,
the name of which I have forgotten.
MAURICE. It isn't true!
ADOLPHE. That's what she said also. But the official report is
printed in the paper.
MAURICE. A report? Then they have made it up!
ADOLPHE. And that's also what she said. The two of you are
suffering from the same mental trouble. But with her I got far
enough to make her realise her own condition.
MAURICE. Where did she go?
ADOLPHE. She went far away from here to begin a new life.
MAURICE. Hm, hm!--Did you go to the funeral?
ADOLPHE. I did.
MAURICE. Well?
ADOLPHE. Well, Jeanne seemed resigned and didn't have a hard word
to say about you.
MAURICE. She is a good woman.
ADOLPHE. Why did you desert her then?
MAURICE. Because I _was_ crazy--blown up with pride especially--and
then we had been drinking champagne--
ADOLPHE. Can you understand now why Jeanne wept when you drank
champagne?
MAURICE. Yes, I understand now--And for that reason I have already
written to her and asked her to forgive me--Do you think she will
forgive me?
ADOLPHE. I think so, for it's not like her to hate anybody.
MAURICE. Do you think she will forgive me completely, so that she
will come back to me?
ADOLPHE. Well, I don't know about _that_. You have shown yourself so
poor in keeping faith that it is doubtful whether she will trust
her fate to you any longer.
MAURICE. But I can feel that her fondness for me has not ceased,
and I know she will come back to me.
ADOLPHE. How can you know that? How can you believe it? Didn't you
even suspect her and that decent brother of hers of having sent
the police after Henriette out of revenge?
MAURICE. But I don't believe it any longer--that is to say, I
guess that fellow Emile is a pretty slick customer.
MME. CATHERINE. Now look here! What are you saying of Monsieur
Emile? Of course, he is nothing but a workman, but if everybody
kept as straight as he--There is no flaw in him, but a lot of
sense and tact.
EMILE. [Enters] Monsieur Gérard?
MAURICE. That's me.
EMILE. Pardon me, but I have something to say to you in private.
MAURICE. Go right on. We are all friends here.
(The ABBÉ enters and sits down.)
EMILE. [With a glance at the ABBÉ] Perhaps after--
MAURICE. Never mind. The Abbé is also a friend, although he and I
differ.
EMILE. You know who I am, Monsieur Gérard? My sister has asked me
to give you this package as an answer to your letter.
(MAURICE takes the package and opens it.)
EMILE. And now I have only to add, seeing as I am in a way my
sister's guardian, that, on her behalf as well as my own, I
acknowledge you free of all obligations, now when the natural tie
between you does not exist any longer.
MAURICE. But you must have a grudge against me?
EMILE. Must I? I can't see why. On the other hand, I should like
to have a declaration from you, here in the presence of your
friends, that you don't think either me or my sister capable of
such a meanness as to send the police after Mademoiselle
Henriette.
MAURICE. I wish to take back what I said, and I offer you my
apology, if you will accept it.
EMILE. It is accepted. And I wish all of you a good evening. [Goes
out.]
EVERYBODY. Good evening!
MAURICE. The tie and the gloves which Jeanne gave me for the
opening night of my play, and which I let Henrietta throw into the
fireplace. Who can have picked them up? Everything is dug up;
everything comes back!--And when she gave them to me in the
cemetery, she said she wanted me to look fine and handsome, so
that other people would like me also--And she herself stayed at
home--This hurt her too deeply, and well it might. I have no right
to keep company with decent human beings. Oh, have I done this?
Scoffed at a gift coming from a good heart; scorned a sacrifice
offered to my own welfare. This was what I threw away in order to
get--a laurel that is lying on the rubbish heap, and a bust that
would have belonged in the pillory--Abbé, now I come over to you.
ABBÉ. Welcome!
MAURICE. Give me the word that I need.
ABBÉ. Do you expect me to contradict your self-accusations and
inform you that you have done nothing wrong?
MAURICE. Speak the right word!
ABBÉ. With your leave, I'll say then that I have found your
behaviour just as abominable as you have found it yourself.
MAURICE. What can I do, what can I do, to get out of this?
ABBÉ. You know as well as I do.
MAURICE. No, I know only that I am lost, that my life is spoiled,
my career cut off, my reputation in this world ruined forever.
ABBÉ. And so you are looking for a new existence in some better
world, which you are now beginning to believe in?
MAURICE. Yes, that's it.
ABBÉ. You have been living in the flesh and you want now to live
in the spirit. Are you then so sure that this world has no more
attractions for you?
MAURICE. None whatever! Honour is a phantom; gold, nothing but dry
leaves; women, mere intoxicants. Let me hide myself behind your
consecrated walls and forget this horrible dream that has filled
two days and lasted two eternities.
ABBÉ. All right! But this is not the place to go into the matter
more closely. Let us make an appointment for this evening at nine
o'clock in the Church of St. Germain. For I am going to preach to
the inmates of St. Lazare, and that may be your first step along
the hard road of penitence.
MAURICE. Penitence?
ABBÉ. Well, didn't you wish--
MAURICE. Yes, yes!
ABBÉ. Then we have vigils between midnight and two o'clock.
MAURICE. That will be splendid!
ABBÉ. Give me your hand that you will not look back.
MAURICE. [Rising, holds out his hand] Here is my hand, and my will
goes with it.
SERVANT GIRL. [Enters from the kitchen] A telephone call for
Monsieur Maurice.
MAURICE. From whom?
SERVANT GIRL. From the theatre.
(MAURICE tries to get away, but the ABBÉ holds on to his hand.)
ABBÉ. [To the SERVANT GIRL] Find out what it is.
SERVANT GIRL. They want to know if Monsieur Maurice is going to
attend the performance tonight.
ABBÉ. [To MAURICE, who is trying to get away] No, I won't let you
go.
MAURICE. What performance is that?
ADOLPHE. Why don't you read the paper?
MME. CATHERINE and the ABBÉ. He hasn't read the paper?
MAURICE. It's all lies and slander. [To the SERVANT GIRL] Tell
them that I am engaged for this evening: I am going to church.
(The SERVANT GIRL goes out into the kitchen.)
ADOLPHE. As you don't want to read the paper, I shall have to tell
you that your play has been put on again, now when you are
exonerated. And your literary friends have planned a demonstration
for this evening in recognition of your indisputable talent.
MAURICE. It isn't true.
EVERYBODY. It is true.
MAURICE. [After a pause] I have not deserved it!
ABBÉ. Good!
ADOLPHE. And furthermore, Maurice--
MAURICE. [Hiding his face in his hands] Furthermore!
MME. CATHERINE. One hundred thousand francs! Do you see now that
they come back to you? And the villa outside the city. Everything
is coming back except Mademoiselle Henriette.
ABBÉ. [Smiling] You ought to take this matter a little more
seriously, Madame Catherine.
MME. CATHERINE. Oh, I cannot--I just can't keep serious any
longer!
[She breaks into open laughter, which she vainly tries to smother
with her handkerchief.]
ADOLPHE. Say, Maurice, the play begins at eight.
ABBÉ. But the church services are at nine.
ADOLPHE. Maurice!
MME. CATHERINE. Let us hear what the end is going to be, Monsieur
Maurice.
(MAURICE drops his head on the table, in his arms.)
ADOLPHE. Loose him, Abbé!
ABBÉ. No, it is not for me to loose or bind. He must do that
himself.
MAURICE. [Rising] Well, I go with the Abbé.
ABBÉ. No, my young friend. I have nothing to give you but a
scolding, which you can give yourself. And you owe a duty to
yourself and to your good name. That you have got through with
this as quickly as you have is to me a sign that you have suffered
your punishment as intensely as if it had lasted an eternity. And
when Providence absolves you there is nothing for me to add.
MAURICE. But why did the punishment have to be so hard when I was
innocent?
ABBÉ. Hard? Only two days! And you were not innocent. For we have
to stand responsible for our thoughts and words and desires also.
And in your thought you became a murderer when your evil self
wished the life out of your child.
MAURICE. You are right. But my decision is made. To-night I will
meet you at the church in order to have a reckoning with myself--
but to-morrow evening I go to the theatre.
MME. CATHERINE. A good solution, Monsieur Maurice.
ADOLPHE. Yes, that is the solution. Whew!
ABBÉ. Yes, so it is!
(Curtain.)
MISS JULIA
INTRODUCTION
The volume containing the translation of "There Are Crimes and
Crimes" had barely reached the public when word came across the
ocean that August Strindberg had ended his long fight with life.
His family had long suspected some serious organic trouble. Early
in the year, when lie had just recovered from an illness of
temporary character, their worst fears became confirmed. An
examination disclosed a case of cancer in the stomach, and the
disease progressed so rapidly that soon all hope of recovery was
out of the question. On May 14, 1912, Strindberg died.
With his death peace came in more senses than one. All the fear and
hatred which he had incurred by what was best as well as worst in
him seemed to be laid at rest with his own worn-out body. The love
and the admiration which he had son in far greater measure were
granted unchecked expression. His burial, otherwise as simple as he
himself had prescribed, was a truly national event. At the grave of
the arch-rebel appeared a royal prince as official representative
of the reigning house, the entire cabinet, and numerous members of
the Riksdag. Thousands of men and women representing the best of
Sweden's intellectual and artistic life went to the cemetery,
though the hour of the funeral was eight o'clock in the morning. It
was an event in which the masses and the classes shared a common
sorrow, the standards of student organizations mingling with the
banners of labour unions. And not only the capital, but the whole
country, observed the day as one of mourning.
A thought frequently recurring in the comment passed on Strindberg's
death by the European press was that, in some mysterious manner,
he, more than any other writer, appeared to be the incarnation of
the past century, with its nervous striving after truth, its fear
of being duped, and its fretting dread that evolution and progress
might prove antagonistic terms. And at that simple grave in
Stockholm more than one bareheaded spectator must have heard the
gravel rattle on the coffin-lid with a feeling that not only a
great individual, but a whole human period--great in spite of all
its weaknesses--was being laid away for ever.
Among more than half a hundred plays produced by Strindberg during
his lifetime, none has won such widespread attention as "Miss
Julia," both on account of its masterful construction and its
gripping theme. Whether liking or disliking it, critics have
repeatedly compared it with Ibsen's "Ghosts," and not always to the
advantage of the latter work. It represents, first of all, its
author's most determined and most daring endeavour to win the
modern stage for Naturalism. If he failed in this effort, it must
be recalled to his honour that he was among the first to proclaim
his own failure and to advocate the seeking of new paths. When the
work was still hot from his hands, however, he believed in it with
all the fervour of which his spirit was capable, and to bring home
its lesson the more forcibly, he added a preface, a sort of
dramatic creed, explaining just what he had tried to do, and why.
This preface, which has become hardly less famous than the play
itself, is here, as I believe, for the first time rendered into
English. The acuteness and exhaustiveness of its analysis serves
not only to make it a psychological document of rare value, but
also to save me much of the comment which without it might be
deemed needful.
Years later, while engaged in conducting a theatre for the exclusive
performance of his own plays at Stockholm, Strindberg formulated a
new dramatic creed--that of his mystical period, in which he was
wont to sign himself "the author of 'Gustavus Vasa,' 'The Dream
Play,' 'The Last Knight,' etc." It took the form of a pamphlet
entitled "A Memorandum to the Members of the Intimate Theatre from
the Stage Director" (Stockholm, 1908). There he gave the following
data concerning "Miss Julia," and the movement which that play
helped to start:
"In the '80's the new time began to extend its demands for reform
to the stage also. Zola declared war against the French comedy,
with its Brussels carpets, its patent-leather shoes and
patent-leather themes, and its dialogue reminding one of the
questions and answers of the Catechism. In 1887 Antoine opened his
Théâtre Libre at Paris, and 'Thérèse Raquin,' although nothing but
an adapted novel, became the dominant model. It was the powerful
theme and the concentrated form that showed innovation, although
the unity of time was not yet observed, and curtain falls were
retained. It was then I wrote my dramas: 'Miss Julia,' 'The
Father,' and 'Creditors.'
"'Miss Julia,' which was equipped with a now well-known preface,
was staged by Antoine, but not until 1892 or 1893, having previously
been played by the Students' Association of the Copenhagen
University in 1888 or 1889. In the spring of 1893 'Creditors' was
put on at the Théâtre L'OEuvre, in Paris, and in the fall of the
same year 'The Father' was given at the same theatre, with Philippe
Garnier in the title part.
"But as early as 1889 the Freie Bühne had been started at Berlin,
and before 1893 all three of my dramas had been performed. 'Miss
Julia' was preceded by a lecture given by Paul Schlenther, now
director of the Hofburg Theater at Vienna. The principal parts were
played by Rosa Bertens, Emanuel Reicher, Rittner and Jarno. And
Sigismund Lautenburg, director of the Residenz Theater, gave more
than one hundred performances of 'Creditors.'
"Then followed a period of comparative silence, and the drama sank
back into the old ruts, until, with the beginning of the new
century, Reinhardt opened his Kleines Theater. There I was played
from the start, being represented by the long one-act drama 'The
Link,' as well as by 'Miss Julia' (with Eysoldt in the title part),
and 'There Are Crimes and Crimes.'"
He went on to tell how one European city after another had got its
"Little," or "Free," or "Intimate" theatre. And had he known of it,
he might have added that the promising venture started by Mr.
Winthrop Ames at New York comes as near as any one of its earlier
rivals in the faithful embodiment of those theories which, with
Promethean rashness, he had flung at the head of a startled world in
1888. For the usual thing has happened: what a quarter-century ago
seemed almost ludicrous in its radicalism belongs to-day to the
established traditions of every progressive stage.
Had Strindberg been content with his position of 1888, many honours
now withheld might have fallen to his share. But like Ibsen, he was
first and last--and to the very last!--an innovator, a leader of
human thought and human endeavour. And so it happened that when the
rest thought to have overtaken him, he had already hurried on to a
more advanced position, heedless of the scorn poured on him by
those to whom "consistency" is the foremost of all human virtues.
Three years before his death we find him writing as follows in
another pamphlet "An Open Letter to the Intimate Theatre,"
Stockholm, 1909--of the position once assumed so proudly and so
confidently by himself:
"As the Intimate Theatre counts its inception from the successful
performance of 'Miss Julia' in 1900, it was quite natural that the
young director (August Falck) should feel the influence of the
Preface, which recommended a search for actuality. But that was
twenty years ago, and although I do not feel the need of attacking
myself in this connection, I cannot but regard all that pottering
with stage properties as useless."
It has been customary in this country to speak of the play now
presented to the public as "Countess Julie." The noble title is, of
course, picturesque, but incorrect and unwarranted. It is, I fear,
another outcome of that tendency to exploit the most sensational
elements in Strindberg's art which has caused somebody to translate
the name of his first great novel as "The Scarlet Room,"--instead
of simply "The Red Room,"--thus hoping to connect it in the reader's
mind with the scarlet woman of the Bible.
In Sweden, a countess is the wife or widow of a count. His daughter
is no more a countess than is the daughter of an English earl. Her
title is that of "Fröken," which corresponds exactly to the German
"Fräulein" and the English "Miss." Once it was reserved for the
young women of the nobility. By an agitation which shook all Sweden
with mingled fury and mirth, it became extended to all unmarried
women.
The French form of _Miss Julia's_ Christian name is, on the other
hand, in keeping with the author's intention, aiming at an
expression of the foreign sympathies and manners which began to
characterize the Swedish nobility in the eighteenth century, and
which continued to assert themselves almost to the end of the
nineteenth. But in English that form would not have the same
significance, and nothing in the play makes its use imperative. The
valet, on the other hand, would most appropriately be named _Jean_
both in England and here, and for that reason I have retained this
form of his name.
Almost every one translating from the Scandinavian languages
insists on creating a difficulty out of the fact that the three
northern nations--like the Germans and the French--still use the
second person singular of the personal pronoun to indicate a closer
degree of familiarity. But to translate the Swedish "du" with the
English "thou" is as erroneous as it is awkward. Tytler laid down
his "Principles of Translation" in 1791--and a majority of
translators are still unaware of their existence. Yet it ought to
seem self-evident to every thinking mind that idiomatic
equivalence, not verbal identity, must form the basis of a good and
faithful translation. When an English mother uses "you" to her
child, she establishes thereby the only rational equivalent for the
"du" used under similar circumstances by her Swedish sister.
Nobody familiar with the English language as it actually springs
from the lips of living men and women can doubt that it offers ways
of expressing varying shades of intimacy no less effective than any
found in the Swedish tongue. Let me give an illustration from the
play immediately under discussion. Returning to the stage after the
ballet scene, _Jean_ says to _Miss Julia_: "I love you--can you
doubt it?" And her reply, literally, is: "You?--Say thou!" I have
merely made him say: "Can you doubt it, Miss Julia?" and her
answer: "Miss?--Call me Julia!" As that is just what would happen
under similar circumstances among English-speaking people, I
contend that not a whit of the author's meaning or spirit has been
lost in this translation.
If ever a play was written for the stage, it is this one. And on
the stage there is nothing to take the place of the notes and
introductory explanations that so frequently encumber the printed
volume. On the stage all explanations must lie within the play
itself, and so they should in the book also, I believe. The
translator is either an artist or a man unfit for his work. As an
artist he must have a courage that cannot even be cowed by his
reverence for the work of a great creative genius. If, mistakenly,
he revere the letter of that work instead of its spirit, then he
will reduce his own task to mere literary carpentry, and from his
pen will spring not a living form, like the one he has been set to
transplant, but only a death mask!
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
Like almost all other art, that of the stage has long seemed to me
a sort of _Biblia Pauperum_, or a Bible in pictures for those who
cannot read what is written or printed. And in the same way the
playwright has seemed to me a lay preacher spreading the thoughts
of his time in a form so popular that the middle classes, from
which theatrical audiences are mainly drawn, can know what is being
talked about without troubling their brains too much. For this
reason the theatre has always served as a grammar-school to young
people, women, and those who have acquired a little knowledge, all
of whom retain the capacity for deceiving themselves and being
deceived--which means again that they are susceptible to illusions
produced by the suggestions of the author. And for the same reason
I have had a feeling that, in our time, when the rudimentary,
incomplete thought processes operating through our fancy seem to be
developing into reflection, research, and analysis, the theatre
might stand on the verge of being abandoned as a decaying form, for
the enjoyment of which we lack the requisite conditions. The
prolonged theatrical crisis now prevailing throughout Europe speaks
in favour of such a supposition, as well as the fact that, in the
civilised countries producing the greatest thinkers of the age,
namely, England and Germany, the drama is as dead as are most of
the other fine arts.
In some other countries it has, however, been thought possible to
create a new drama by filling the old forms with the contents of a
new time. But, for one thing, there has not been time for the new
thoughts to become so popularized that the public might grasp the
questions raised; secondly, minds have been so inflamed by party
conflicts that pure and disinterested enjoyment has been excluded
from places where one's innermost feelings are violated and the
tyranny of an applauding or hissing majority is exercised with the
openness for which the theatre gives a chance; and, finally, there
has been no new form devised for the new contents, and the new wine
has burst the old bottles.
In the following drama I have not tried to do anything new--for
that cannot be done--but I have tried to modernize the form in
accordance with the demands which I thought the new men of a new
time might be likely to make on this art. And with such a purpose
in view, I have chosen, or surrendered myself to, a theme that
might well be said to lie outside the partisan strife of the day:
for the problem of social ascendancy or decline, of higher or
lower, of better or worse, of men or women, is, has been, and will
be of lasting interest. In selecting this theme from real life, as
it was related to me a number of years ago, when the incident
impressed me very deeply, I found it suited to a tragedy, because
it can only make us sad to see a fortunately placed individual
perish, and this must be the case in still higher degree when we
see an entire family die out. But perhaps a time will arrive when
we have become so developed, so enlightened, that we can remain
indifferent before the spectacle of life, which now seems so
brutal, so cynical, so heartless; when we have closed up those
lower, unreliable instruments of thought which we call feelings,
and which have been rendered not only superfluous but harmful by
the final growth of our reflective organs.
The fact that the heroine arouses our pity depends only on our
weakness in not being able to resist the sense of fear that the
same fate could befall ourselves. And yet it is possible that a
very sensitive spectator might fail to find satisfaction in this
kind of pity, while the man believing in the future might demand
some positive suggestion for the abolition of evil, or, in other
words, some kind of programme. But, first of all, there is no
absolute evil. That one family perishes is the fortune of another
family, which thereby gets a chance to rise. And the alternation of
ascent and descent constitutes one of life's main charms, as
fortune is solely determined by comparison. And to the man with a
programme, who wants to remedy the sad circumstance that the hawk
eats the dove, and the flea eats the hawk, I have this question to
put: why should it be remedied? Life is not so mathematically
idiotic that it lets only the big eat the small, but it happens
just as often that the bee kills the lion, or drives it to madness
at least.
That my tragedy makes a sad impression on many is their own fault.
When we grow strong as were the men of the first French revolution,
then we shall receive an unconditionally good and joyful impression
from seeing the national forests rid of rotting and superannuated
trees that have stood too long in the way of others with equal
right to a period of free growth--an impression good in the same
way as that received from the death of one incurably diseased.
Not long ago they reproached my tragedy "The Father" with being too
sad--just as if they wanted merry tragedies. Everybody is clamouring
arrogantly for "the joy of life," and all theatrical managers are
giving orders for farces, as if the joy of life consisted in being
silly and picturing all human beings as so many sufferers from St.
Vitus' dance or idiocy. I find the joy of life in its violent and
cruel struggles, and my pleasure lies in knowing something and
learning something. And for this reason I have selected an unusual
but instructive case--an exception, in a word--but a great
exception, proving the rule, which, of course, will provoke all
lovers of the commonplace. And what also will offend simple brains
is that my action cannot be traced back to a single motive, that
the view-point is not always the same. An event in real life--and
this discovery is quite recent--springs generally from a whole
series of more or less deep-lying motives, but of these the
spectator chooses as a rule the one his reason can master most
easily, or else the one reflecting most favourably on his power of
reasoning. A suicide is committed. Bad business, says the merchant.
Unrequited love, say the ladies. Sickness, says the sick man.
Crushed hopes, says the shipwrecked. But now it may be that the
motive lay in all or none of these directions. It is possible that
the one who is dead may have hid the main motive by pushing forward
another meant to place his memory in a better light.
In explanation of _Miss Julia's_ sad fate I have suggested many
factors: her mother's fundamental instincts; her father's mistaken
upbringing of the girl; her own nature, and the suggestive influence
of her fiancé on a weak and degenerate brain; furthermore, and more
directly: the festive mood of the Midsummer Eve; the absence of her
father; her physical condition; her preoccupation with the animals;
the excitation of the dance; the dusk of the night; the strongly
aphrodisiacal influence of the flowers; and lastly the chance
forcing the two of them together in a secluded room, to which must
be added the aggressiveness of the excited man.
Thus I have neither been one-sidedly physiological nor one-sidedly
psychological in my procedure. Nor have I merely delivered a moral
preachment. This multiplicity of motives I regard as praiseworthy
because it is in keeping with the views of our own time. And if
others have done the same thing before me, I may boast of not being
the sole inventor of my paradoxes--as all discoveries are named.
In regard to the character-drawing I may say that I have tried to
make my figures rather "characterless," and I have done so for
reasons I shall now state.
In the course of the ages the word character has assumed many
meanings. Originally it signified probably the dominant ground-note
in the complex mass of the self, and as such it was confused with
temperament. Afterward it became the middle-class term for an
automaton, so that an individual whose nature had come to a stand
still, or who had adapted himself to a certain part in life--who
had ceased to grow, in a word--was named a character; while one
remaining in a state of development--a skilful navigator on life's
river, who did not sail with close-tied sheets, but knew when to
fall off before the wind and when to luff again--was called lacking
in character. And he was called so in a depreciatory sense, of
course, because he was so hard to catch, to classify, and to keep
track of. This middle-class notion about the immobility of the soul
was transplanted to the stage, where the middle-class element has
always held sway. There a character became synonymous with a
gentleman fixed and finished once for all--one who invariably
appeared drunk, jolly, sad. And for the purpose of characterisation
nothing more was needed than some physical deformity like a
clubfoot, a wooden leg, a red nose; or the person concerned was
made to repeat some phrase like "That's capital!" or "Barkis is
willin'," or something of that kind. This manner of regarding human
beings as homogeneous is preserved even by the great Molière.
_Harpagon_ is nothing but miserly, although _Harpagon_ might as
well have been at once miserly and a financial genius, a fine
father, and a public-spirited citizen. What is worse yet, his
"defect" is of distinct advantage to his son-in-law and daughter,
who are his heirs, and for that reason should not find fault with
him, even if they have to wait a little for their wedding. I do not
believe, therefore, in simple characters on the stage. And the
summary judgments of the author upon men--this one stupid, and that
one brutal, this one jealous, and that one stingy--should be
challenged by the naturalists, who know the fertility of the
soul-complex, and who realise that "vice" has a reverse very much
resembling virtue.
Because they are modern characters, living in a period of transition
more hysterically hurried than its immediate predecessor at least,
I have made my figures vacillating, out of joint, torn between the
old and the new. And I do not think it unlikely that, through
newspaper reading and overheard conversations, modern ideas may
have leaked down to the strata where domestic servants belong.
My souls (or characters) are conglomerates, made up of past and
present stages of civilisation, scraps of humanity, torn-off pieces
of Sunday clothing turned into rags--all patched together as is the
human soul itself. And I have furthermore offered a touch of
evolutionary history by letting the weaker repeat words stolen from
the stronger, and by letting different souls accept "ideas"--or
suggestions, as they are called--from each other.
_Miss Julia_ is a modern character, not because the man-hating
half-woman may not have existed in all ages, but because now, after
her discovery, she has stepped to the front and begun to make a
noise. The half-woman is a type coming more and more into
prominence, selling herself nowadays for power, decorations,
distinctions, diplomas, as formerly for money, and the type
indicates degeneration. It is not a good type, for it does not
last, but unfortunately it has the power of reproducing itself and
its misery through one more generation. And degenerate men seem
instinctively to make their selection from this kind of women, so
that they multiply and produce indeterminate sexes to whom life is
a torture. Fortunately, however, they perish in the end, either
from discord with real life, or from the irresistible revolt of
their suppressed instincts, or from foiled hopes of possessing the
man. The type is tragical, offering us the spectacle of a desperate
struggle against nature. It is also tragical as a Romantic
inheritance dispersed by the prevailing Naturalism, which wants
nothing but happiness: and for happiness strong and sound races are
required.
But _Miss Julia_ is also a remnant of the old military nobility
which is now giving way to the new nobility of nerves and brain.
She is a victim of the discord which a mother's "crime" produces in
a family, and also a victim of the day's delusions, of the
circumstances, of her defective constitution--all of which may be
held equivalent to the old-fashioned fate or universal law. The
naturalist has wiped out the idea of guilt, but he cannot wipe out
the results of an action--punishment, prison, or fear--and for the
simple reason that they remain without regard to his verdict. For
fellow-beings that have been wronged are not so good-natured as
those on the outside, who have not been wronged at all, can be
without cost to themselves.
Even if, for reasons over which he could have no control, the
father should forego his vengeance, the daughter would take
vengeance upon herself, just as she does in the play, and she would
be moved to it by that innate or acquired sense of honour which the
upper classes inherit--whence? From the days of barbarism, from the
original home of the Aryans, from the chivalry of the Middle Ages?
It is beautiful, but it has become disadvantageous to the
preservation of the race. It is this, the nobleman's _harakiri_--or
the law of the inner conscience compelling the Japanese to cut open
his own abdomen at the insult of another--which survives, though
somewhat modified, in the duel, also a privilege of the nobility.
For this reason the valet, _Jean_, continues to live, but _Miss
Julia_ cannot live on without honour. In so far as he lacks this
life—endangering superstition about honour, the serf takes
precedence of the earl, and in all of us Aryans there is something
of the nobleman, or of Don Quixote, which makes us sympathise with
the man who takes his own life because he has committed a
dishonourable deed and thus lost his honour. And we are noblemen to
the extent of suffering from seeing the earth littered with the
living corpse of one who was once great--yes, even if the one thus
fallen should rise again and make restitution by honourable deeds.
_Jean_, the valet, is of the kind that builds new stock--one in
whom the differentiation is clearly noticeable. He was a cotter's
child, and he has trained himself up to the point where the future
gentleman has become visible. He has found it easy to learn, having
finely developed senses (smell, taste, vision) and an instinct for
beauty besides. He has already risen in the world, and is strong
enough not to be sensitive about using other people's services. He
has already become a stranger to his equals, despising them as so
many outlived stages, but also fearing and fleeing them because
they know his secrets, pry into his plans, watch his rise with
envy, and look forward to his fall with pleasure. From this
relationship springs his dual, indeterminate character, oscillating
between love of distinction and hatred of those who have already
achieved it. He says himself that he is an aristocrat, and has
learned the secrets of good company. He is polished on the outside
and coarse within. He knows already how to wear the frock-coat with
ease, but the cleanliness of his body cannot be guaranteed.
He feels respect for the young lady, but he is afraid of _Christine_,
who has his dangerous secrets in her keeping. His emotional
callousness is sufficient to prevent the night's happenings from
exercising a disturbing influence on his plans for the future.
Having at once the slave's brutality and the master's lack of
squeamishness, he can see blood without fainting, and he can also
bend his back under a mishap until able to throw it off. For this
reason he will emerge unharmed from the battle, and will probably
end his days as the owner of a hotel. And if he does not become a
Roumanian count, his son will probably go to a university, and may
even become a county attorney.
Otherwise, he furnishes us with rather significant information as
to the way in which the lower classes look at life from beneath—-
that is, when he speaks the truth, which is not often, as he
prefers what seems favourable to himself to what is true. When
_Miss Julia_ suggests that the lower classes must feel the pressure
from above very heavily, _Jean_ agrees with her, of course, because
he wants to gain her sympathy. But he corrects himself at once, the
moment he realises the advantage of standing apart from the herd.
And _Jean_ stands above _Miss Julia_ not only because his fate is in
ascendancy, but because he is a man. Sexually he is the aristocrat
because of his male strength, his more finely developed senses, and
his capacity for taking the initiative. His inferiority depends
mainly on the temporary social environment in which he has to live,
and which he probably can shed together with the valet's livery.
The mind of the slave speaks through his reverence for the count
(as shown in the incident with the boots) and through his religious
superstition. But he reveres the count principally as a possessor
of that higher position toward which he himself is striving. And
this reverence remains even when he has won the daughter of the
house, and seen that the beautiful shell covered nothing but
emptiness.
I don't believe that any love relation in a "higher" sense can
spring up between two souls of such different quality. And for this
reason I let _Miss Julia_ imagine her love to be protective or
commiserative in its origin. And I let _Jean_ suppose that, under
different social conditions, he might feel something like real love
for her. I believe love to be like the hyacinth, which has to
strike roots in darkness _before_ it can bring forth a vigorous
flower. In this case it shoots up quickly, bringing forth blossom
and seed at once, and for that reason the plant withers so soon.
_Christine_, finally, is a female slave, full of servility and
sluggishness acquired in front of the kitchen fire, and stuffed
full of morality and religion that are meant to serve her at once
as cloak and scapegoat. Her church-going has for its purpose to
bring her quick and easy riddance of all responsibility for her
domestic thieveries and to equip her with a new stock of
guiltlessness. Otherwise she is a subordinate figure, and therefore
purposely sketched in the same manner as the minister and the
doctor in "The Father," whom I designed as ordinary human beings,
like the common run of country ministers and country doctors. And
if these accessory characters have seemed mere abstractions to some
people, it depends on the fact that ordinary men are to a certain
extent impersonal in the exercise of their callings. This means
that they are without individuality, showing only one side of
themselves while at work. And as long as the spectator does not
feel the need of seeing them from other sides, my abstract
presentation of them remains on the whole correct.
In regard to the dialogue, I want to point out that I have departed
somewhat from prevailing traditions by not turning my figures into
catechists who make stupid questions in order to call forth witty
answers. I have avoided the symmetrical and mathematical
construction of the French dialogue, and have instead permitted the
minds to work irregularly as they do in reality, where, during
conversation, the cogs of one mind seem more or less haphazardly to
engage those of another one, and where no topic is fully exhausted.
Naturally enough, therefore, the dialogue strays a good deal as, in
the opening scenes, it acquires a material that later on is worked
over, picked up again, repeated, expounded, and built up like the
theme in a musical composition.
The plot is pregnant enough, and as, at bottom, it is concerned
only with two persons, I have concentrated my attention on these,
introducing only one subordinate figure, the cook, and keeping the
unfortunate spirit of the father hovering above and beyond the
action. I have done this because I believe I have noticed that the
psychological processes are what interest the people of our own day
more than anything else. Our souls, so eager for knowledge, cannot
rest satisfied with seeing what happens, but must also learn how it
comes to happen! What we want to see are just the wires, the
machinery. We want to investigate the box with the false bottom,
touch the magic ring in order to find the suture, and look into the
cards to discover how they are marked.
In this I have taken for models the monographic novels of the
brothers de Goncourt, which have appealed more to me than any other
modern literature.
Turning to the technical side of the composition, I have tried to
abolish the division into acts. And I have done so because I have
come to fear that our decreasing capacity for illusion might be
unfavourably affected by intermissions during which the spectator
would have time to reflect and to get away from the suggestive
influence of the author-hypnotist. My play will probably last an
hour and a half, and as it is possible to listen that length of
time, or longer, to a lecture, a sermon, or a debate, I have
imagined that a theatrical performance could not become fatiguing
in the same time. As early as 1872, in one of my first dramatic
experiments, "The Outlaw," I tried the same concentrated form, but
with scant success. The play was written in five acts and wholly
completed when I became aware of the restless, scattered effect it
produced. Then I burned it, and out of the ashes rose a single,
well-built act, covering fifty printed pages, and taking hour for
its performance. Thus the form of the present play is not new, but
it seems to be my own, and changing aesthetical conventions may
possibly make it timely.
My hope is still for a public educated to the point where it can
sit through a whole-evening performance in a single act. But that
point cannot be reached without a great deal of experimentation. In
the meantime I have resorted to three art forms that are to provide
resting-places for the public and the actors, without letting the
public escape from the illusion induced. All these forms are
subsidiary to the drama. They are the monologue, the pantomime, and
the dance, all of them belonging originally to the tragedy of
classical antiquity. For the monologue has sprung from the monody,
and the chorus has developed into the ballet.
Our realists have excommunicated the monologue as improbable, but
if I can lay a proper basis for it, I can also make it seem
probable, and then I can use it to good advantage. It is probable,
for instance, that a speaker may walk back and forth in his room
practising his speech aloud; it is probable that an actor may read
through his part aloud, that a servant-girl may talk to her cat,
that a mother may prattle to her child, that an old spinster may
chatter to her parrot, that a person may talk in his sleep. And in
order that the actor for once may have a chance to work independently,
and to be free for a moment from the author's pointer, it is better
that the monologues be not written out, but just indicated. As it
matters comparatively little what is said to the parrot or the cat,
or in one's sleep--because it cannot influence the action--it is
possible that a gifted actor, carried away by the situation and the
mood of the occasion, may improvise such matters better than they
could be written by the author, who cannot figure out in advance
how much may be said, and how long the talk may last, without
waking the public out of their illusions.
It is well known that, on certain stages, the Italian theatre has
returned to improvisation and thereby produced creative actors—
who, however, must follow the author's suggestions--and this may be
counted a step forward, or even the beginning of a new art form
that might well be called _productive_.
Where, on the other hand, the monologue would seem unreal, I have
used the pantomime, and there I have left still greater scope for
the actor's imagination--and for his desire to gain independent
honours. But in order that the public may not be tried beyond
endurance, I have permitted the music--which is amply warranted by
the Midsummer Eve's dance--to exercise its illusory power while the
dumb show lasts. And I ask the musical director to make careful
selection of the music used for this purpose, so that incompatible
moods are not induced by reminiscences from the last musical comedy
or topical song, or by folk-tunes of too markedly ethnographical
distinction.
The mere introduction of a scene with a lot of "people" could not
have taken the place of the dance, for such scenes are poorly acted
and tempt a number of grinning idiots into displaying their own
smartness, whereby the illusion is disturbed. As the common people
do not improvise their gibes, but use ready-made phrases in which
stick some double meaning, I have not composed their lampooning
song, but have appropriated a little known folk-dance which I
personally noted down in a district near Stockholm. The words don't
quite hit the point, but hint vaguely at it, and this is
intentional, for the cunning (i. e., weakness) of the slave keeps
him from any direct attack. There must, then, be no chattering
clowns in a serious action, and no coarse flouting at a situation
that puts the lid on the coffin of a whole family.
As far as the scenery is concerned, I have borrowed from
impressionistic painting its asymmetry, its quality of abruptness,
and have thereby in my opinion strengthened the illusion. Because
the whole room and all its contents are not shown, there is a
chance to guess at things--that is, our imagination is stirred into
complementing our vision. I have made a further gain in getting rid
of those tiresome exits by means of doors, especially as stage
doors are made of canvas and swing back and forth at the lightest
touch. They are not even capable of expressing the anger of an
irate _pater familias_ who, on leaving his home after a poor
dinner, slams the door behind him "so that it shakes the whole
house." (On the stage the house sways.) I have also contented
myself with a single setting, and for the double purpose of making
the figures become parts of their surroundings, and of breaking
with the tendency toward luxurious scenery. But having only a
single setting, one may demand to have it real. Yet nothing is more
difficult than to get a room that looks something like a room,
although the painter can easily enough produce waterfalls and
flaming volcanoes. Let it go at canvas for the walls, but we might
be done with the painting of shelves and kitchen utensils on the
canvas. We have so much else on the stage that is conventional, and
in which we are asked to believe, that we might at least be spared
the too great effort of believing in painted pans and kettles.
I have placed the rear wall and the table diagonally across the
stage in order to make the actors show full face and half profile
to the audience when they sit opposite each other at the table. In
the opera "Aïda" I noticed an oblique background, which led the eye
out into unseen prospects. And it did not appear to be the result
of any reaction against the fatiguing right angle.
Another novelty well needed would be the abolition of the foot-lights.
The light from below is said to have for its purpose to make the
faces of the actors look fatter. But I cannot help asking: why must
all actors be fat in the face? Does not this light from below tend
to wipe out the subtler lineaments in the lower part of the face,
and especially around the jaws? Does it not give a false appearance
to the nose and cast shadows upward over the eyes? If this be not
so, another thing is certain: namely, that the eyes of the actors
suffer from the light, so that the effective play of their glances
is precluded. Coming from below, the light strikes the retina in
places generally protected (except in sailors, who have to see the
sun reflected in the water), and for this reason one observes
hardly anything but a vulgar rolling of the eyes, either sideways
or upwards, toward the galleries, so that nothing but the white of
the eye shows. Perhaps the same cause may account for the tedious
blinking of which especially the actresses are guilty. And when
anybody on the stage wants to use his eyes to speak with, no other
way is left him but the poor one of staring straight at the public,
with whom he or she then gets into direct communication outside of
the frame provided by the setting. This vicious habit has, rightly
or wrongly, been named "to meet friends." Would it not be possible
by means of strong side-lights (obtained by the employment of
reflectors, for instance) to add to the resources already possessed
by the actor? Could not his mimicry be still further strengthened
by use of the greatest asset possessed by the face: the play of the
eyes?
Of course, I have no illusions about getting the actors to play
_for_ the public and not _at_ it, although such a change would be
highly desirable. I dare not even dream of beholding the actor's
back throughout an important scene, but I wish with all my heart
that crucial scenes might not be played in the centre of the
proscenium, like duets meant to bring forth applause. Instead, I
should like to have them laid in the place indicated by the
situation. Thus I ask for no revolutions, but only for a few minor
modifications. To make a real room of the stage, with the fourth
wall missing, and a part of the furniture placed back toward the
audience, would probably produce a disturbing effect at present.
In wishing to speak of the facial make-up, I have no hope that the
ladies will listen to me, as they would rather look beautiful than
lifelike. But the actor might consider whether it be to his
advantage to paint his face so that it shows some abstract type
which covers it like a mask. Suppose that a man puts a markedly
choleric line between the eyes, and imagine further that some
remark demands a smile of this face fixed in a state of continuous
wrath. What a horrible grimace will be the result? And how can the
wrathful old man produce a frown on his false forehead, which is
smooth as a billiard ball?
In modern psychological dramas, where the subtlest movements of the
soul are to be reflected on the face rather than by gestures and
noise, it would probably be well to experiment with strong side-light
on a small stage, and with unpainted faces, or at least with a
minimum of make-up.
If, in additon, we might escape the visible orchestra, with its
disturbing lamps and its faces turned toward the public; if we
could have the seats on the main floor (the orchestra or the pit)
raised so that the eyes of the spectators would be above the knees
of the actors; if we could get rid of the boxes with their
tittering parties of diners; if we could also have the auditorium
completely darkened during the performance; and if, first and last,
we could have a small stage and a small house: then a new dramatic
art might rise, and the theatre might at least become an
institution for the entertainment of people with culture. While
waiting for this kind of theatre, I suppose we shall have to write
for the "ice-box," and thus prepare the repertory that is to come.
I have made an attempt. If it prove a failure, there is plenty of
time to try over again.
MISS JULIA
A NATURALISTIC TRAGEDY
1888
PERSONS
MISS JULIA, aged twenty-five
JEAN, a valet, aged thirty
CHRISTINE, a cook, aged thirty-five
The action takes place on Midsummer Eve, in the kitchen of the
count's country house.
MISS JULIA
SCENE
(A large kitchen: the ceiling and the side walls are hidden by
draperies and hangings. The rear wall runs diagonally across the
stage, from the left side and away from the spectators. On this
wall, to the left, there are two shelves full of utensils made of
copper, iron, and tin. The shelves are trimmed with scalloped
paper.)
(A little to the right may be seen three fourths of the big arched
doorway leading to the outside. It has double glass doors, through
which are seen a fountain with a cupid, lilac shrubs in bloom, and
the tops of some Lombardy poplars.)
(On the left side of the stage is seen the corner of a big cook
stove built of glazed bricks; also a part of the smoke-hood above
it.)
(From the right protrudes one end of the servants' dining-table
of white pine, with a few chairs about it.)
(The stove is dressed with bundled branches of birch. Twigs of
juniper are scattered on the floor.)
(On the table end stands a big Japanese spice pot full of lilac
blossoms.)
(An icebox, a kitchen-table, and a wash-stand.)
(Above the door hangs a big old-fashioned bell on a steel spring,
and the mouthpiece of a speaking-tube appears at the left of the
door.)
(CHRISTINE is standing by the stove, frying something in a pan. She
has on a dress of light-coloured cotton, which she has covered up
with a big kitchen apron.)
(JEAN enters, dressed in livery and carrying a pair of big, spurred
riding boots, which he places on the floor in such manner that they
remain visible to the spectators.)
JEAN. To-night Miss Julia is crazy again; absolutely crazy.
CHRISTINE. So you're back again?
JEAN. I took the count to the station, and when I came back by the
barn, I went in and had a dance, and there I saw the young lady
leading the dance with the gamekeeper. But when she caught sight of
me, she rushed right up to me and asked me to dance the ladies'
waltz with her. And ever since she's been waltzing like--well, I
never saw the like of it. She's crazy!
CHRISTINE. And has always been, but never the way it's been this
last fortnight, since her engagement was broken.
JEAN. Well, what kind of a story was that anyhow? He's a fine
fellow, isn't he, although he isn't rich? Ugh, but they're so full
of notions. [Sits down at the end of the table] It's peculiar
anyhow, that a young lady--hm!--would rather stay at home with the
servants--don't you think?--than go with her father to their
relatives!
CHRISTINE. Oh, I guess she feels sort of embarrassed by that rumpus
with her fellow.
JEAN. Quite likely. But there was some backbone to that man just
the same. Do you know how it happened, Christine? I saw it,
although I didn't care to let on.
CHRISTINE. No, did you?
JEAN. Sure, I did. They were in the stable-yard one evening, and
the young lady was training him, as she called it. Do you know what
that meant? She made him leap over her horse-whip the way you teach
a dog to jump. Twice he jumped and got a cut each time. The third
time he took the whip out of her hand and broke it into a thousand
bits. And then he got out.
CHRISTINE. So that's the way it happened! You don't say!
JEAN. Yes, that's how that thing happened. Well, Christine, what
have you got that's tasty?
CHRISTINE. [Serves from the pan and puts the plate before Jean] Oh,
just some kidney which I cut out of the veal roast.
JEAN. [Smelling the food] Fine! That's my great _délice_. [Feeling
the plate] But you might have warmed the plate.
CHRISTINE. Well, if you ain't harder to please than the count
himself! [Pulls his hair playfully.]
JEAN. [Irritated] Don't pull my hair! You know how sensitive I am.
CHRISTINE. Well, well, it was nothing but a love pull, you know.
[JEAN eats.]
[CHRISTINE opens a bottle of beer.]
JEAN. Beer-on Midsummer Eve? No, thank you! Then I have something
better myself. [Opens a table-drawer and takes out a bottle of
claret with yellow cap] Yellow seal, mind you! Give me a glass—-and
you use those with stems when you drink it _pure_.
CHRISTINE. [Returns to the stove and puts a small pan on the fire]
Heaven preserve her that gets you for a husband, Mr. Finicky!
JEAN. Oh, rot! You'd be glad enough to get a smart fellow like me.
And I guess it hasn't hurt you that they call me your beau.
[Tasting the wine] Good! Pretty good! Just a tiny bit too cold. [He
warms the glass with his hand.] We got this at Dijon. It cost us
four francs per litre, not counting the bottle. And there was the
duty besides. What is it you're cooking--with that infernal smell?
CHRISTINE. Oh, it's some deviltry the young lady is going to give
Diana.
JEAN. You should choose your words with more care, Christine. But
why should you be cooking for a bitch on a holiday eve like this?
Is she sick?
CHRISTINE. Ye-es, she is sick. She's been running around with the
gate-keeper's pug--and now's there's trouble--and the young lady
just won't hear of it.
JEAN. The young lady is too stuck up in some ways and not proud
enough in others--just as was the countess while she lived. She was
most at home in the kitchen and among the cows, but she would never
drive with only one horse. She wore her cuffs till they were dirty,
but she had to have cuff buttons with a coronet on them. And
speaking of the young lady, she doesn't take proper care of herself
and her person. I might even say that she's lacking in refinement.
Just now, when she was dancing in the barn, she pulled the
gamekeeper away from Anna and asked him herself to come and dance
with her. We wouldn't act in that way. But that's just how it is:
when upper-class people want to demean themselves, then they grow—-
mean! But she's splendid! Magnificent! Oh, such shoulders! And--and
so on!
CHRISTINE. Oh, well, don't brag too much! I've heard Clara talking,
who tends to her dressing.
JEAN. Pooh, Clara! You're always jealous of each other. I, who have
been out riding with her--And then the way she dances!
CHRISTINE. Say, Jean, won't you dance with me when I'm done?
JEAN. Of course I will.
CHRISTINE. Do you promise?
JEAN. Promise? When I say so, I'll do it. Well, here's thanks for
the good food. It tasted fine! [Puts the cork back into the bottle.]
JULIA. [Appears in the doorway, speaking to somebody on the
outside] I'll be back in a minute. You go right on in the meantime.
[JEAN slips the bottle into the table-drawer and rises
respectfully.]
JULIA.[Enters and goes over to CHRISTINE by the wash-stand] Well,
is it done yet?
[CHRISTINE signs to her that JEAN is present.]
JEAN. [Gallantly] The ladies are having secrets, I believe.
JULIA. [Strikes him in the face with her handkerchief] That's for
you, Mr. Pry!
JEAN. Oh, what a delicious odor that violet has!
JULIA. [With coquetry] Impudent! So you know something about
perfumes also? And know pretty well how to dance--Now don't peep!
Go away!
JEAN. [With polite impudence] Is it some kind of witches' broth the
ladies are cooking on Midsummer Eve--something to tell fortunes by
and bring out the lucky star in which one's future love is seen?
JULIA. [Sharply] If you can see that, you'll have good eyes,
indeed! [To CHRISTINE] Put it in a pint bottle and cork it well.
Come and dance a _schottische_ with me now, Jean.
JEAN. [Hesitatingly] I don't want to be impolite, but I had
promised to dance with Christine this time—-
JULIA. Well, she can get somebody else--can't you, Christine? Won't
you let me borrow Jean from you?
CHRISTINE. That isn't for me to say. When Miss Julia is so
gracious, it isn't for him to say no. You just go along, and be
thankful for the honour, too!
JEAN. Frankly speaking, but not wishing to offend in any way, I
cannot help wondering if it's wise for Miss Julia to dance twice in
succession with the same partner, especially as the people here are
not slow in throwing out hints--
JULIA. [Flaring up] What is that? What kind of hints? What do you
mean?
JEAN. [Submissively] As you don't want to understand, I have to
speak more plainly. It don't look well to prefer one servant to all
the rest who are expecting to be honoured in the same unusual way--
JULIA. Prefer! What ideas! I'm surprised! I, the mistress of the
house, deign to honour this dance with my presence, and when it so
happens that I actually want to dance, I want to dance with one who
knows how to lead, so that I am not made ridiculous.
JEAN. As you command, Miss Julia! I am at your service!
JULIA. [Softened] Don't take it as a command. To-night we should
enjoy ourselves as a lot of happy people, and all rank should be
forgotten. Now give me your arm. Don't be afraid, Christine! I'll
return your beau to you!
[JEAN offers his arm to MISS JULIA and leads her out.]
***
PANTOMIME
Must be acted as if the actress were really alone in the place.
When necessary she turns her back to the public. She should not
look in the direction of the spectators, and she should not hurry
as if fearful that they might become impatient.
CHRISTINE is alone. A _schottische_ tune played on a violin is
heard faintly in the distance.
While humming the tune, CHRISTINE clears o$ the table after JEAN,
washes the plate at the kitchen table, wipes it, and puts it away
in a cupboard.
Then she takes of her apron, pulls out a small mirror from one of
the table-drawers and leans it against the flower jar on the table;
lights a tallow candle and heats a hairpin, which she uses to curl
her front hair.
Then she goes to the door and stands there listening. Returns to
the table. Discovers the handkerchief which MISS JULIA has left
behind, picks it up, and smells it, spreads it out absent-mindedly
and begins to stretch it, smooth it, fold it up, and so forth.
***
JEAN. [Enters alone] Crazy, that's what she is! The way she dances!
And the people stand behind the doors and grill at her. What do you
think of it, Christine?
CHRISTINE. Oh, she has her time now, and then she is always a
little queer like that. But are you going to dance with me now?
JEAN. You are not mad at me because I disappointed you?
CHRISTINE. No!--Not for a little thing like that, you know! And
also, I know my place--
JEAN. [Putting his arm around her waist] You are a, sensible girl,
Christine, and I think you'll make a good wife--
JULIA. [Enters and is unpleasantly surprised; speaks with forced
gayety] Yes, you are a fine partner--running away from your lady!
JEAN. On the contrary, Miss Julia. I have, as you see, looked up
the one I deserted.
JULIA. [Changing tone] Do you know, there is nobody that dances
like you!--But why do you wear your livery on an evening like this?
Take it off at once!
JEAN. Then I must ask you to step outside for a moment, as my black
coat is hanging right here. [Points toward the right and goes in
that direction.]
JULIA. Are you bashful on my account? Just to change a coat? Why
don't you go into your own room and come back again? Or, you can
stay right here, and I'll turn my back on you.
JEAN. With your permission, Miss Julia. [Goes further over to the
right; one of his arms can be seen as he changes his coat.]
JULIA [To CHRISTINE] Are you and Jean engaged, that he's so
familiar with you?
CHRISTINE. Engaged? Well, in a way. We call it that.
JULIA. Call it?
CHRISTINE. Well, Miss Julia, you have had a fellow of your own, and--
JULIA. We were really engaged--
CHRISTINE. But it didn't come to anything just the same--
[JEAN enters, dressed in black frock coat and black derby.]
JULIA. _Très gentil, Monsieur Jean! Très gentil!_
JEAN. _Vous voulez plaisanter, Madame!_
JULIA. _Et vous voulez parler français!_ Where did you learn it?
JEAN. In Switzerland, while I worked as _sommelier_ in one of the
big hotels at Lucerne.
JULIA. But you look like a real gentleman in your frock coat!
Charming! [Sits down at the table.]
JEAN. Oh, you flatter me.
JULIA. [Offended] Flatter--you!
JEAN. My natural modesty does not allow me to believe that you
could be paying genuine compliments to one like me, and so I dare
to assume that you are exaggerating, or, as we call it, flattering.
JULIA. Where did you learn to use your words like that? You must
have been to the theatre a great deal?
JEAN. That, too. I have been to a lot of places.
JULIA. But you were born in this neighbourhood?
JEAN. My father was a cotter on the county attorney's property
right by here, and I can recall seeing you as a child, although
you, of course, didn't notice me.
JULIA. No, really!
JEAN. Yes, and I remember one time in particular--but of that I
can't speak.
JULIA. Oh, yes, do! Why--just for once.
JEAN. No, really, I cannot do it now. Another time, perhaps.
JULIA. Another time is no time. Is it as bad as that?
JEAN. It isn't bad, but it comes a little hard. Look at that one!
[Points to CHRISTINE, who has fallen asleep on a chair by the stove.]
JULIA. She'll make a pleasant wife. And perhaps she snores, too.
JEAN. No, she doesn't, but she talks in her sleep.
JULIA. [Cynically] How do you know?
JEAN. [Insolently] I have heard it.
[Pause during which they study each other.]
JULIA. Why don't you sit down?
JEAN. It wouldn't be proper in your presence.
JULIA. But if I order you to do it?
JEAN. Then I obey.
JULIA. Sit down, then!--But wait a moment! Can you give me
something to drink first?
JEAN. I don't know what we have got in the icebox. I fear it is
nothing but beer.
JULIA. And you call that nothing? My taste is so simple that I
prefer it to wine.
JEAN. [Takes a bottle of beer from the icebox and opens it; gets a
glass and a plate from the cupboard, and serves the beer] Allow me!
JULIA. Thank you. Don't you want some yourself?
JEAN. I don't care very much for beer, but if it is a command, of
course--
JULIA. Command?--I should think a polite gentleman might keep his
lady company.
JEAN. Yes, that's the way it should be. [Opens another bottle and
takes out a glass.]
JULIA. Drink my health now!
[JEAN hesitates.]
JULIA. Are you bashful--a big, grown-up man?
JEAN. [Kneels with mock solemnity and raises his glass] To the
health of my liege lady!
JULIA. Bravo!--And now you must also kiss my shoe in order to get
it just right.
[JEAN hesitates a moment; then he takes hold of her foot and
touches it lightly with his lips.]
JULIA. Excellent! You should have been on the stage.
JEAN. [Rising to his feet] This won't do any longer, Miss Julia.
Somebody might see us.
JULIA. What would that matter?
JEAN. Oh, it would set the people talking--that's all! And if you
only knew how their tongues were wagging up there a while ago—-
JULIA. What did they have to say? Tell me--Sit down now!
JEAN. [Sits down] I don't want to hurt you, but they were using
expressions--which cast reflections of a kind that--oh, you know it
yourself! You are not a child, and when a lady is seen alone with a
man, drinking--no matter if he's only a servant--and at night-—then--
JULIA. Then what? And besides, we are not alone. Isn't Christine
with us?
JEAN. Yes--asleep!
JULIA. Then I'll wake her. [Rising] Christine, are you asleep?
CHRISTINE. [In her sleep] Blub-blub-blub-blub!
JULIA. Christine!--Did you ever see such a sleeper.
CHRISTINE. [In her sleep] The count's boots are polished--put on
the coffee--yes, yes, yes--my-my--pooh!
JULIA. [Pinches her nose] Can't you wake up?
JEAN. [Sternly] You shouldn't bother those that sleep.
JULIA. [Sharply] What's that?
JEAN. One who has stood by the stove all day has a right to be
tired at night. And sleep should be respected.
JULIA. [Changing tone] It is fine to think like that, and it does
you honour--I thank you for it. [Gives JEAN her hand] Come now and
pick some lilacs for me.
[During the following scene CHRISTINE wakes up. She moves as if
still asleep and goes out to the right in order to go to bed.]
JEAN. With you, Miss Julia?
JULIA. With me!
JEAN. But it won't do! Absolutely not!
JULIA. I can't understand what you are thinking of. You couldn't
possibly imagine--
JEAN. No, not I, but the people.
JULIA. What? That I am fond of the valet?
JEAN. I am not at all conceited, but such things have happened--and
to the people nothing is sacred.
JULIA. You are an aristocrat, I think.
JEAN. Yes, I am.
JULIA. And I am stepping down--
JEAN. Take my advice, Miss Julia, don't step down. Nobody will
believe you did it on purpose. The people will always say that you
fell down.
JULIA. I think better of the people than you do. Come and see if I
am not right. Come along! [She ogles him.]
JEAN. You're mighty queer, do you know!
JULIA. Perhaps. But so are you. And for that matter, everything is
queer. Life, men, everything--just a mush that floats on top of the
water until it sinks, sinks down! I have a dream that comes back to
me ever so often. And just now I am reminded of it. I have climbed
to the top of a column and sit there without being able to tell how
to get down again. I get dizzy when I look down, and I must get
down, but I haven't the courage to jump off. I cannot hold on, and
I am longing to fall, and yet I don't fall. But there will be no
rest for me until I get down, no rest until I get down, down on the
ground. And if I did reach the ground, I should want to get still
further down, into the ground itself--Have you ever felt like that?
JEAN. No, my dream is that I am lying under a tall tree in a dark
wood. I want to get up, up to the top, so that I can look out over
the smiling landscape, where the sun is shining, and so that I can
rob the nest in which lie the golden eggs. And I climb and climb,
but the trunk is so thick and smooth, and it is so far to the first
branch. But I know that if I could only reach that first branch,
then I should go right on to the top as on a ladder. I have not
reached it yet, but I am going to, if it only be in my dreams.
JULIA. Here I am chattering to you about dreams! Come along! Only
into the park! [She offers her arm to him, and they go toward the
door.]
JEAN. We must sleep on nine midsummer flowers to-night, Miss Julia—-
then our dreams will come true.
[They turn around in the doorway, and JEAN puts one hand up to his
eyes.]
JULIA. Let me see what you have got in your eye.
JEAN. Oh, nothing--just some dirt--it will soon be gone.
JULIA. It was my sleeve that rubbed against it. Sit down and let me
help you. [Takes him by the arm and makes him sit down; takes hold
of his head and bends it backwards; tries to get out the dirt with
a corner of her handkerchief] Sit still now, absolutely still!
[Slaps him on the hand] Well, can't you do as I say? I think you
are shaking—-a big, strong fellow like you! [Feels his biceps] And
with such arms!
JEAN. [Ominously] Miss Julia!
JULIA. Yes, Monsieur Jean.
JEAN. _Attention! Je ne suis qu'un homme._
JULIA. Can't you sit still!--There now! Now it's gone. Kiss my hand
now, and thank me.
JEAN. [Rising] Miss Julia, listen to me. Christine has gone to bed
now--Won't you listen to me?
JULIA. Kiss my hand first.
JEAN. Listen to me!
JULIA. Kiss my hand first!
JEAN. All right, but blame nobody but yourself!
JULIA. For what?
JEAN. For what? Are you still a mere child at twenty-five? Don't
you know that it is dangerous to play with fire?
JULIA. Not for me. I am insured.
JEAN. [Boldly] No, you are not. And even if you were, there are
inflammable surroundings to be counted with.
JULIA. That's you, I suppose?
JEAN. Yes. Not because I am I, but because I am a young man--
JULIA. Of handsome appearance--what an incredible conceit! A Don
Juan, perhaps. Or a Joseph? On my soul, I think you are a Joseph!
JEAN. Do you?
JULIA. I fear it almost.
[JEAN goes boldly up to her and takes her around the waist in order
to kiss her.]
JULIA. [Gives him a cuff on the ear] Shame!
JEAN. Was that in play or in earnest?
JULIA. In earnest.
JEAN. Then you were in earnest a moment ago also. Your playing is
too serious, and that's the dangerous thing about it. Now I am
tired of playing, and I ask to be excused in order to resume my
work. The count wants his boots to be ready for him, and it is
after midnight already.
JULIA. Put away the boots.
JEAN. No, it's my work, which I am bound to do. But I have not
undertaken to be your playmate. It's something I can never become—-
I hold myself too good for it.
JULIA. You're proud!
JEAN. In some ways, and not in others.
JULIA. Have you ever been in love?
JEAN. We don't use that word. But I have been fond of a lot of
girls, and once I was taken sick because I couldn't have the one I
wanted: sick, you know, like those princes in the Arabian Nights
who cannot eat or drink for sheer love.
JULIA. Who was it?
[JEAN remains silent.]
JULIA. Who was it?
JEAN. You cannot make me tell you.
JULIA. If I ask you as an equal, ask you as--a friend: who was it?
JEAN. It was you.
JULIA. [Sits down] How funny!
JEAN. Yes, as you say--it was ludicrous. That was the story, you
see, which I didn't want to tell you a while ago. But now I am
going to tell it. Do you know how the world looks from below--no,
you don't. No more than do hawks and falcons, of whom we never see
the back because they are always floating about high up in the sky.
I lived in the cotter's hovel, together with seven other children,
and a pig--out there on the grey plain, where there isn't a single
tree. But from our windows I could see the wall around the count's
park, and apple-trees above it. That was the Garden of Eden, and
many fierce angels were guarding it with flaming swords.
Nevertheless I and some other boys found our way to the Tree of
Life--now you despise me?
JULIA. Oh, stealing apples is something all boys do.
JEAN. You may say so now, but you despise me nevertheless. However—-
once I got into the Garden of Eden with my mother to weed the onion
beds. Near by stood a Turkish pavillion, shaded by trees and
covered with honeysuckle. I didn't know what it was used for, but I
had never seen a more beautiful building. People went in and came
out again, and one day the door was left wide open. I stole up and
saw the walls covered with pictures of kings and emperors, and the
windows were hung with red, fringed curtains--now you know what I
mean. I--[breaks off a lilac sprig and holds it under MISS JULIA's
nose]--I had never been inside the manor, and I had never seen
anything but the church--and this was much finer. No matter where
my thoughts ran, they returned always--to that place. And gradually
a longing arose within me to taste the full pleasure of--_enfin_! I
sneaked in, looked and admired. Then I heard somebody coming. There
was only one way out for fine people, but for me there was another,
and I could do nothing else but choose it.
[JULIA, who has taken the lilac sprig, lets it drop on the table.]
JEAN. Then I started to run, plunged through a hedge of raspberry
bushes, chased right across a strawberry plantation, and came out
on the terrace where the roses grow. There I caught sight of a pink
dress and pair of white stockings--that was you! I crawled under a
pile of weeds--right into it, you know--into stinging thistles and
wet, ill-smelling dirt. And I saw you walking among the roses, and
I thought: if it be possible for a robber to get into heaven and
dwell with the angels, then it is strange that a cotter's child,
here on God's own earth, cannot get into the park and play with the
count's daughter.
JULIA. [Sentimentally] Do you think all poor children have the same
thoughts as you had in this case?
JEAN. [Hesitatingly at first; then with conviction] If _all_ poor—-
yes—-of course. Of course!
JULIA. It must be a dreadful misfortune to be poor.
JEAN. [In a tone of deep distress and with rather exaggerated
emphasis] Oh, Miss Julia! Oh!--A dog may lie on her ladyship's
sofa; a horse may have his nose patted by the young lady's hand,
but a servant--[changing his tone]--oh well, here and there you
meet one made of different stuff, and he makes a way for himself in
the world, but how often does it happen?--However, do you know what
I did? I jumped into the mill brook with my clothes on, and was
pulled out, and got a licking. But the next Sunday, when my father
and the rest of the people were going over to my grandmother's, I
fixed it so that I could stay at home. And then I washed myself
with soap and hot water, and put on my best clothes, and went to
church, where I could see you. I did see you, and went home
determined to die. But I wanted to die beautifully and pleasantly,
without any pain. And then I recalled that it was dangerous to
sleep under an elder bush. We had a big one that was in full bloom.
I robbed it of all its flowers, and then I put them in the big box
where the oats were kept and lay down in them. Did you ever notice
the smoothness of oats? Soft to the touch as the skin of the human
body! However, I pulled down the lid and closed my eyes--fell
asleep and was waked up a very sick boy. But I didn't die, as you
can see. What I wanted--that's more than I can tell. Of course,
there was not the least hope of winning you—-but you symbolised the
hopelessness of trying to get out of the class into which I was
born.
JULIA. You narrate splendidly, do you know! Did you ever go to
school?
JEAN. A little. But I have read a lot of novels and gone to the
theatre a good deal. And besides, I have listened to the talk of
better-class people, and from that I have learned most of all.
JULIA. Do you stand around and listen to what we are saying?
JEAN. Of course! And I have heard a lot, too, when I was on the box
of the carriage, or rowing the boat. Once I heard you, Miss Julia,
and one of your girl friends--
JULIA. Oh!--What was it you heard then?
JEAN. Well, it wouldn't be easy to repeat. But I was rather
surprised, and I couldn't understand where you had learned all
those words. Perhaps, at bottom, there isn't quite so much
difference as they think between one kind of people and another.
JULIA. You ought to be ashamed of yourself! We don't live as you do
when we are engaged.
JEAN. [Looking hard at her] Is it so certain?--Well, Miss Julia, it
won't pay to make yourself out so very innocent to me—-
JULIA. The man on whom I bestowed my love was a scoundrel.
JEAN. That's what you always say--afterwards.
JULIA. Always?
JEAN. Always, I believe, for I have heard the same words used
several times before, on similar occasions.
JULIA. What occasions?
JEAN. Like the one of which we were speaking. The last time--
JULIA. [Rising] Stop! I don't want to hear any more!
JEAN. Nor did _she_--curiously enough! Well, then I ask permission
to go to bed.
JULIA. [Gently] Go to bed on Midsummer Eve?
JEAN. Yes, for dancing with that mob out there has really no
attraction for me.
JULIA. Get the key to the boat and take me out on the lake--I want
to watch the sunrise.
JEAN. Would that be wise?
JULIA. It sounds as if you were afraid of your reputation.
JEAN. Why not? I don't care to be made ridiculous, and I don't care
to be discharged without a recommendation, for I am trying to get
on in the world. And then I feel myself under a certain obligation
to Christine.
JULIA. So it's Christine now
JEAN. Yes, but it's you also--Take my advice and go to bed!
JULIA. Am I to obey you?
JEAN. For once--and for your own sake! The night is far gone.
Sleepiness makes us drunk, and the head grows hot. Go to bed! And
besides--if I am not mistaken—-I can hear the crowd coming this way
to look for me. And if we are found together here, you are lost!
CHORUS. [Is heard approaching]:
Through the fields come two ladies a-walking,
Treederee-derallah, treederee-derah.
And one has her shoes full of water,
Treederee-derallah-lah.
They're talking of hundreds of dollars,
Treederee-derallah, treederee-derah.
But have not between them a dollar
Treederee-derallah-lah.
This wreath I give you gladly,
Treederee-derallah, treederee-derah.
But love another madly,
Treederee-derallah-lah.
JULIA. I know the people, and I love them, just as they love me.
Let them come, and you'll see.
JEAN. No, Miss Julia, they don't love you. They take your food and
spit at your back. Believe me. Listen to me--can't you hear what
they are singing?--No, don't pay any attention to it!
JULIA. [Listening] What is it they are singing?
JEAN. Oh, something scurrilous. About you and me.
JULIA. How infamous! They ought to be ashamed! And the treachery of
it!
JEAN. The mob is always cowardly. And in such a fight as this there
is nothing to do but to run away.
JULIA. Run away? Where to? We cannot get out. And we cannot go into
Christine's room.