Читать книгу Howard Barker: Plays Nine - Howard Barker - Страница 7

Characters

WARDROBE

A Young Musician

BIBLE

A Young Poet

SISI

A Loved One

THRASH

An Old Woman

ENGINE

An Old Captain

SOLDIER

A Conscript

1

A wretched hut on the frontier. A canvas bed. A YOUTH runs in, naked and wild-eyed. He drags behind him vast photographs with which, flinging himself down, he ineffectively covers himself.

BIBLE: She sends me cunt / she sends me arse / she sends me cunt and arse pictures / and I / oh I /

(He is still. He stares out. A wind moans. At a distance, a bugle sounds.)

required her face to gaze on me / her hair severe / those lowered eyes / and on her lips a prayer / so I / when I lie here / I know somewhere /

(He is still as before. He frowns hugely.)

SHE SENDS ME CUNT AND ARSE PICTURES /

(The wind. He stares out. A cascade of boots, flung by invisible antagonists, causes him to shrink. The boots cease. BIBLE stares out. A violin is sent skimming over the floor. The wind. The distant bugle. An OLD WOMAN enters and squats on her heels. She gazes at the floor. She is an image of patience, endurance, antiquity.)

You are not the solution /

(THRASH ignores him.)

YOU STINK / YOU STINK AND YOU ARE NOT THE SOLUTION /

(A SECOND YOUTH enters, in formal dress. A violin bow limply in his fingers. He frowns, his shoulders droop.)

WARDROBE: Pigs are nearly everybody / and those not pigs / are bears /

(BIBLE spontaneously and bitterly weeps.)

It is / is it not? / profoundly melancholy / not to say grotesque / I am so sparing in my language / and reserve some words / for worse things may need naming that are yet to occur / melancholy / melancholy therefore / that I / by unanimous consent the most prodigiously gifted musician of his generation / and here again I shrink from hyperbole in my choice of words / should be coerced / invited / invited or coerced / these distinctions are debatable / into consuming his most critical and impressionable years performing / not in the provinces / not in some sordid city whose bickering and mediocre orchestra might blunt his sensibilities / but on this frozen frontier which / if the world knows anything of it / knows it to be the most wretched place on earth /

(BIBLE emits a profound sob.)

And worse / if worse were conceivable / performing to an audience of / oh / be wary / Wardrobe / be wary of your words / AN AUDIENCE OF PIGS AND BEARS /

(A boot flies in.)

Yes / yes /

(Followed by others.)

Oh yes / notwithstanding the specious argument / so routinely rehearsed /

(A rain of boots.)

That genius can only benefit from exposure to ignorance / on the contrary /

(BIBLE wails. The boots fly.)

THIS IS DAMAGING ME BEYOND REPAIR /

(The boots cease. BIBLE snorts. WARDROBE stares at the floor. The wind blows. The OLD WOMAN squats.)

Fuck me / mother / fuck or whip me / I don’t care /

(BIBLE, horrified, turns his back on the prospect. The OLD WOMAN ignores WARDROBE.)

FUCK / FUCK WITH ME / I SAID

(The wind blows. The floor creaks. WARDROBE retrieves the violin. The bridge hangs loose in the tangled strings.)

I had a dread / at eighteen months / a dread / do infants dread? / I dreaded / and to describe this dread as something less / an intuition / or an apprehension / would be to wilfully diminish it / no / I dreaded / I dreaded the failure of the world /

(He launches the wrecked violin against a wall.)

TO SATISFY MY EXPECTATIONS /

(He is still. He is judicious.)

And a dread is not / let us distinguish these conditions / simply a powerful anxiety / it is /

(He frowns.)

Informed /

(He goes to the OLD WOMAN. He places his hands on her shoulders.)

It is / as opposed to superstition / innate knowledge / dread does not guess / it knows /

(He leans over THRASH, and inhales deeply.)

You stink / you stink / and probably you are the solution /

(He seems to recollect.)

I smelled you with my first breath / I smelled you / and you were not then / nor are you now / a rose / though roses were near / oh yes / roses were near / they overhung the window / my dear father / supplemented even those / bouquet upon bouquet / by my mother’s bedside / on tables / thrust in buckets / but I chose / ha /

(He bites his lip in self-adoration.)

To inhale the midwife / a perspiring hag who / I daresay / had been put to considerable exertion persuading me to quit the womb /

(He smiles.)

She hoisted me / she dangled me / she slapped my arse / and I / precisely where her armpit was exposed /

(He exults.)

CHOKED ON THE ODOUR OF THE WORLD /

(He tilts up the face of THRASH with one hand.)

Kiss me / kiss me /

(She concedes. WARDROBE pulls away violently from her at the conclusion of the kiss, teetering and nauseous.)

I decline to discriminate / I declare / I /

(He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand.)

I assert / I yell my repudiation of /

(He spits.)

This / this / illogical and entirely artificial distinction between /

(And spits again.)

the so-called ugly / and the so-called beautiful /

(He presses his fingers to his lips.)

What is this / after all? / a discipline / an arbitrary discipline / to which no man need subscribe /

(He regards THRASH with a determined objectivity.)

Is it not an act of moral and aesthetic independence / on our part / to declare this / this /

(He experiences a wave of nausea, but controls it.)

Conventionally / odorous / and /

(His head swims.)

Conventionally /

(He suffers. He turns swiftly to the frowning yet fascinated BIBLE.)

ARE WE NOT PRIVILEGED / YES / PRIVILEGED / BY VIRTUE OF OUR APPALLING SOLITUDE / TO /

(He drags his gaze back to the unmoving old woman.)

Re / re /

(He bites his lip.)

Re-everything? /

(He disciplines the chaos of his thoughts.)

I say this woman is adorable / I both say it / and intend it / I cannot / can I? / only say it /

(He looks at BIBLE.)

The intention is all /

(He returns his gaze to THRASH. Slowly he proceeds to unbutton his waistcoat, dropping it to the floor. He then works at his shirt, methodically. BIBLE’s fascination draws him up out of his sheets, a pale spectator.)