More Portmanteau Plays

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Stuart Walker. More Portmanteau Plays

INTRODUCTION

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

THE PROLOGUE TO THE PORTMANTEAU THEATER

THE PROLOGUE

THE LADY OF THE WEEPING WILLOW TREE

WEEPING WILLOW TREE

ACT I

ACT II

ACT III

THE VERY NAKED BOY

JONATHAN MAKES A WISH

ACT I. Jonathan Makes a Friend

ACT II. Jonathan Builds a Fear

ACT III. Jonathan Makes a Wish

APPENDIX

CASTS

The Lady of the Weeping Willow Tree

The Very Naked Boy

Jonathan Makes a Wish

Отрывок из книги

I wish to acknowledge with gratitude the assistance given me by Mr. Brander Matthews, Mr. Montrose Moses, and by Mr. Charles Henry Meltzer in obtaining data, verifying dates and names, and by their kindly advice.

Once upon a time, but not so very long ago, you very grownups believed in all true things. You believed until you met the Fourteen Doubters who were so positive in their unbelief that you weakly cast aside the things that made you happy for the hapless things that they were calling life. You were afraid or ashamed to persist in your old thoughts, and strong in your folly you discouraged your little boy, and other people's little boys from the pastimes they had loved. Yet all through the early days you had been surely building magnificent cities, and all about you laying out magnificent gardens, and, with an April pool you had made infinite seas where pirates fought or mermaids played in coral caves. Then came the Doubters, laughing and jeering at you, and you let your cities, and gardens, and seas go floating in the air—unseen, unsung—wonderful cities, and gardens, and seas, peopled with the realest of people.... So now you, and he, and I are met at the portals. Pass through them with me. I have something there that you think is lost. The key is the tiny regret for the real things, the little regret that sometimes seems to weight your spirit at twilight, and compress all life into a moment's longing. Come, pass through. You cannot lose your way. Here are your cities, your gardens, and your April pools. Come through the portals of once upon a time, but not so very long ago—today—now!

.....

[The Tree moans.

She will suffer in your stead.

.....