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diff --git a/5053.txt b/5053.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cc32728 --- /dev/null +++ b/5053.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3573 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Creditors; Pariah, by August Strindberg + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Creditors; Pariah + (2 plays) + +Author: August Strindberg + +Translator: Edwin Bjorkman + + +Release Date: February, 2004 [EBook #5053] +This file was first posted on April 11, 2002 +Last Updated: May 5, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CREDITORS; PARIAH *** + + + + +Produced by Nicole Apostola, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + + + + + +CREDITORS and PARIAH + +Two Plays + +By August Strindberg + +Translated From The Swedish, With Introductions By Edwin Bjorkman + + + + +CREDITORS + + + + +INTRODUCTION + +This is one of the three plays which Strindberg placed at the head of +his dramatic production during the middle ultra-naturalistic period, the +other two being "The Father" and "Miss Julia." It is, in many ways, +one of the strongest he ever produced. Its rarely excelled unity +of construction, its tremendous dramatic tension, and its wonderful +psychological analysis combine to make it a masterpiece. + +In Swedish its name is "Fordringsagare." This indefinite form may be +either singular or plural, but it is rarely used except as a plural. And +the play itself makes it perfectly clear that the proper translation of +its title is "Creditors," for under this aspect appear both the former +and the present husband of Tekla. One of the main objects of the play is +to reveal her indebtedness first to one and then to the other of these +men, while all the time she is posing as a person of original gifts. + +I have little doubt that Strindberg, at the time he wrote this play--and +bear in mind that this happened only a year before he finally decided +to free himself from an impossible marriage by an appeal to the +law--believed Tekla to be fairly representative of womanhood in general. +The utter unreasonableness of such a view need hardly be pointed out, +and I shall waste no time on it. A question more worthy of discussion is +whether the figure of Tekla be true to life merely as the picture of +a personality--as one out of numerous imaginable variations on a type +decided not by sex but by faculties and qualities. And the same question +may well be raised in regard to the two men, both of whom are evidently +intended to win our sympathy: one as the victim of a fate stronger +than himself, and the other as the conqueror of adverse and humiliating +circumstances. + +Personally, I am inclined to doubt whether a Tekla can be found in +the flesh--and even if found, she might seem too exceptional to gain +acceptance as a real individuality. It must be remembered, however, +that, in spite of his avowed realism, Strindberg did not draw his men +and women in the spirit generally designated as impressionistic; that +is, with the idea that they might step straight from his pages into +life and there win recognition as human beings of familiar aspect. +His realism is always mixed with idealism; his figures are always +"doctored," so to speak. And they have been thus treated in order to +enable their creator to drive home the particular truth he is just then +concerned with. + +Consciously or unconsciously he sought to produce what may be designated +as "pure cultures" of certain human qualities. But these he took great +pains to arrange in their proper psychological settings, for mental and +moral qualities, like everything else, run in groups that are more +or less harmonious, if not exactly homogeneous. The man with a single +quality, like Moliere's Harpagon, was much too primitive and crude for +Strindberg's art, as he himself rightly asserted in his preface to "Miss +Julia." When he wanted to draw the genius of greed, so to speak, he did +it by setting it in the midst of related qualities of a kind most likely +to be attracted by it. + +Tekla is such a "pure culture" of a group of naturally correlated mental +and moral qualities and functions and tendencies--of a personality built +up logically around a dominant central note. There are within all of us +many personalities, some of which remain for ever potentialities. But it +is conceivable that any one of them, under circumstances different +from those in which we have been living, might have developed into its +severely logical consequence--or, if you please, into a human being that +would be held abnormal if actually encountered. + +This is exactly what Strindberg seems to have done time and again, both +in his middle and final periods, in his novels as well as in his +plays. In all of us a Tekla, an Adolph, a Gustav--or a Jean and a Miss +Julia--lie more or less dormant. And if we search our souls unsparingly, +I fear the result can only be an admission that--had the needed set of +circumstances been provided--we might have come unpleasantly close to +one of those Strindbergian creatures which we are now inclined to reject +as unhuman. + +Here we have the secret of what I believe to be the great Swedish +dramatist's strongest hold on our interest. How could it otherwise +happen that so many critics, of such widely differing temperaments, have +recorded identical feelings as springing from a study of his work: on +one side an active resentment, a keen unwillingness to be interested; on +the other, an attraction that would not be denied in spite of resolute +resistance to it! For Strindberg DOES hold us, even when we regret his +power of doing so. And no one familiar with the conclusions of modern +psychology could imagine such a paradox possible did not the object of +our sorely divided feelings provide us with something that our minds +instinctively recognise as true to life in some way, and for that reason +valuable to the art of living. + +There are so many ways of presenting truth. Strindberg's is only one of +them--and not the one commonly employed nowadays. Its main fault lies +perhaps in being too intellectual, too abstract. For while Strindberg +was intensely emotional, and while this fact colours all his writings, +he could only express himself through his reason. An emotion that would +move another man to murder would precipitate Strindberg into merciless +analysis of his own or somebody else's mental and moral make-up. At any +rate, I do not proclaim his way of presenting truth as the best one +of all available. But I suspect that this decidedly strange way of +Strindberg's--resulting in such repulsively superior beings as Gustav, +or in such grievously inferior ones as Adolph--may come nearer the +temper and needs of the future than do the ways of much more plausible +writers. This does not need to imply that the future will imitate +Strindberg. But it may ascertain what he aimed at doing, and then do it +with a degree of perfection which he, the pioneer, could never hope to +attain. + + + +CREDITORS + +A TRAGICOMEDY + +1889 + + + + +PERSONS + + +TEKLA + +ADOLPH, her husband, a painter + +GUSTAV, her divorced husband, a high-school teacher (who is travelling +under an assumed name) + + + + +SCENE + +(A parlor in a summer hotel on the sea-shore. The rear wall has a door +opening on a veranda, beyond which is seen a landscape. To the right of +the door stands a table with newspapers on it. There is a chair on the +left side of the stage. To the right of the table stands a sofa. A door +on the right leads to an adjoining room.) + + +(ADOLPH and GUSTAV, the latter seated on the sofa by the table to the +right.) + +ADOLPH. [At work on a wax figure on a miniature modelling stand; his +crutches are placed beside him]--and for all this I have to thank you! + +GUSTAV. [Smoking a cigar] Oh, nonsense! + +ADOLPH. Why, certainly! During the first days after my wife had gone, +I lay helpless on a sofa and did nothing but long for her. It was as if +she had taken away my crutches with her, so that I couldn't move from +the spot. When I had slept a couple of days, I seemed to come to, and +began to pull myself together. My head calmed down after having been +working feverishly. Old thoughts from days gone by bobbed up again. +The desire to work and the instinct for creation came back. My eyes +recovered their faculty of quick and straight vision--and then you +showed up. + +GUSTAV. I admit you were in a miserable condition when I first met you, +and you had to use your crutches when you walked, but this is not to say +that my presence has been the cause of your recovery. You needed a rest, +and you had a craving for masculine company. + +ADOLPH. Oh, that's true enough, like everything you say. Once I used to +have men for friends, but I thought them superfluous after I married, +and I felt quite satisfied with the one I had chosen. Later I was +drawn into new circles and made a lot of acquaintances, but my wife +was jealous of them--she wanted to keep me to herself: worse still--she +wanted also to keep my friends to herself. And so I was left alone with +my own jealousy. + +GUSTAV. Yes, you have a strong tendency toward that kind of disease. + +ADOLPH. I was afraid of losing her--and I tried to prevent it. There +is nothing strange in that. But I was never afraid that she might be +deceiving me-- + +GUSTAV. No, that's what married men are never afraid of. + +ADOLPH. Yes, isn't it queer? What I really feared was that her friends +would get such an influence over her that they would begin to exercise +some kind of indirect power over me--and THAT is something I couldn't +bear. + +GUSTAV. So your ideas don't agree--yours and your wife's? + +ADOLPH. Seeing that you have heard so much already, I may as well tell +you everything. My wife has an independent nature--what are you smiling +at? + +GUSTAV. Go on! She has an independent nature-- + +ADOLPH. Which cannot accept anything from me-- + +GUSTAV. But from everybody else. + +ADOLPH. [After a pause] Yes.--And it looked as if she especially hated +my ideas because they were mine, and not because there was anything +wrong about them. For it used to happen quite often that she advanced +ideas that had once been mine, and that she stood up for them as her +own. Yes, it even happened that friends of mine gave her ideas which +they had taken directly from me, and then they seemed all right. +Everything was all right except what came from me. + +GUSTAV. Which means that you are not entirely happy? + +ADOLPH. Oh yes, I am happy. I have the one I wanted, and I have never +wanted anybody else. + +GUSTAV. And you have never wanted to be free? + +ADOLPH. No, I can't say that I have. Oh, well, sometimes I have imagined +that it might seem like a rest to be free. But the moment she leaves me, +I begin to long for her--long for her as for my own arms and legs. It +is queer that sometimes I have a feeling that she is nothing in herself, +but only a part of myself--an organ that can take away with it my will, +my very desire to live. It seems almost as if I had deposited with her +that centre of vitality of which the anatomical books tell us. + +GUSTAV. Perhaps, when we get to the bottom of it, that is just what has +happened. + +ADOLPH. How could it be so? Is she not an independent being, with +thoughts of her own? And when I met her I was nothing--a child of an +artist whom she undertook to educate. + +GUSTAV. But later you developed her thoughts and educated her, didn't +you? + +ADOLPH. No, she stopped growing and I pushed on. + +GUSTAV. Yes, isn't it strange that her "authoring" seemed to fall off +after her first book--or that it failed to improve, at least? But that +first time she had a subject which wrote itself--for I understand she +used her former husband for a model. You never knew him, did you? They +say he was an idiot. + +ADOLPH. I never knew him, as he was away for six months at a time. But +he must have been an arch-idiot, judging by her picture of him. [Pause] +And you may feel sure that the picture was correct. + +GUSTAV. I do!--But why did she ever take him? + +ADOLPH. Because she didn't know him well enough. Of course, you never DO +get acquainted until afterward! + +GUSTAV. And for that reason one ought not to marry +until--afterward.--And he was a tyrant, of course? + +ADOLPH. Of course? + +GUSTAV. Why, so are all married men. [Feeling his way] And you not the +least. + +ADOLPH. I? Who let my wife come and go as she pleases-- + +GUSTAV. Well, that's nothing. You couldn't lock her up, could you? But +do you like her to stay away whole nights? + +ADOLPH. No, really, I don't. + +GUSTAV. There, you see! [With a change of tactics] And to tell the +truth, it would only make you ridiculous to like it. + +ADOLPH. Ridiculous? Can a man be ridiculous because he trusts his wife? + +GUSTAV. Of course he can. And it's just what you are already--and +thoroughly at that! + +ADOLPH. [Convulsively] I! It's what I dread most of all--and there's +going to be a change. + +GUSTAV. Don't get excited now--or you'll have another attack. + +ADOLPH. But why isn't she ridiculous when I stay out all night? + +GUSTAV. Yes, why? Well, it's nothing that concerns you, but that's the +way it is. And while you are trying to figure out why, the mishap has +already occurred. + +ADOLPH. What mishap? + +GUSTAV. However, the first husband was a tyrant, and she took him +only to get her freedom. You see, a girl cannot have freedom except by +providing herself with a chaperon--or what we call a husband. + +ADOLPH. Of course not. + +GUSTAV. And now you are the chaperon. + +ADOLPH. I? + +GUSTAV. Since you are her husband. + +(ADOLPH keeps a preoccupied silence.) + +GUSTAV. Am I not right? + +ADOLPH. [Uneasily] I don't know. You live with a woman for years, +and you never stop to analyse her, or your relationship with her, and +then--then you begin to think--and there you are!--Gustav, you are my +friend. The only male friend I have. During this last week you have +given me courage to live again. It is as if your own magnetism had been +poured into me. Like a watchmaker, you have fixed the works in my head +and wound up the spring again. Can't you hear, yourself, how I think +more clearly and speak more to the point? And to myself at least it +seems as if my voice had recovered its ring. + +GUSTAV. So it seems to me also. And why is that? + +ADOLPH. I shouldn't wonder if you grew accustomed to lower your voice in +talking to women. I know at least that Tekla always used to accuse me of +shouting. + +GUSTAV. And so you toned down your voice and accepted the rule of the +slipper? + +ADOLPH. That isn't quite the way to put it. [After some reflection] +I think it is even worse than that. But let us talk of something +else!--What was I saying?--Yes, you came here, and you enabled me to +see my art in its true light. Of course, for some time I had noticed my +growing lack of interest in painting, as it didn't seem to offer me the +proper medium for the expression of what I wanted to bring out. But when +you explained all this to me, and made it clear why painting must fail +as a timely outlet for the creative instinct, then I saw the light at +last--and I realised that hereafter it would not be possible for me to +express myself by means of colour only. + +GUSTAV. Are you quite sure now that you cannot go on painting--that you +may not have a relapse? + +ADOLPH. Perfectly sure! For I have tested myself. When I went to bed +that night after our talk, I rehearsed your argument point by point, and +I knew you had it right. But when I woke up from a good night's sleep +and my head was clear again, then it came over me in a flash that you +might be mistaken after all. And I jumped out of bed and got hold of +my brushes and paints--but it was no use! Every trace of illusion was +gone--it was nothing but smears of paint, and I quaked at the thought of +having believed, and having made others believe, that a painted canvas +could be anything but a painted canvas. The veil had fallen from my +eyes, and it was just as impossible for me to paint any more as it was +to become a child again. + +GUSTAV. And then you saw that the realistic tendency of our day, its +craving for actuality and tangibility, could only find its proper form +in sculpture, which gives you body, extension in all three dimensions-- + +ADOLPH. [Vaguely] The three dimensions--oh yes, body, in a word! + +GUSTAV. And then you became a sculptor yourself. Or rather, you have +been one all your life, but you had gone astray, and nothing was needed +but a guide to put you on the right road--Tell me, do you experience +supreme joy now when you are at work? + +ADOLPH. Now I am living! + +GUSTAV. May I see what you are doing? + +ADOLPH. A female figure. + +GUSTAV. Without a model? And so lifelike at that! + +ADOLPH. [Apathetically] Yes, but it resembles somebody. It is remarkable +that this woman seems to have become a part of my body as I of hers. + +GUSTAV. Well, that's not so very remarkable. Do you know what +transfusion is? + +ADOLPH. Of blood? Yes. + +GUSTAV. And you seem to have bled yourself a little too much. When +I look at the figure here I comprehend several things which I merely +guessed before. You have loved her tremendously! + +ADOLPH. Yes, to such an extent that I couldn't tell whether she was I or +I she. When she is smiling, I smile also. When she is weeping, I weep. +And when she--can you imagine anything like it?--when she was giving +life to our child--I felt the birth pangs within myself. + +GUSTAV. Do you know, my dear friend--I hate to speak of it, but you are +already showing the first symptoms of epilepsy. + +ADOLPH. [Agitated] I! How can you tell? + +GUSTAV. Because I have watched the symptoms in a younger brother of mine +who had been worshipping Venus a little too excessively. + +ADOLPH. How--how did it show itself--that thing you spoke of? + +[During the following passage GUSTAV speaks with great animation, and +ADOLPH listens so intently that, unconsciously, he imitates many of +GUSTAV'S gestures.] + +GUSTAV. It was dreadful to witness, and if you don't feel strong enough +I won't inflict a description of it on you. + +ADOLPH. [Nervously] Yes, go right on--just go on! + +GUSTAV. Well, the boy happened to marry an innocent little creature with +curls, and eyes like a turtle-dove; with the face of a child and the +pure soul of an angel. But nevertheless she managed to usurp the male +prerogative-- + +ADOLPH. What is that? + +GUSTAV. Initiative, of course. And with the result that the angel nearly +carried him off to heaven. But first he had to be put on the cross and +made to feel the nails in his flesh. It was horrible! + +ADOLPH. [Breathlessly] Well, what happened? + +GUSTAV. [Lingering on each word] We might be sitting together talking, +he and I--and when I had been speaking for a while his face would turn +white as chalk, his arms and legs would grow stiff, and his thumbs +became twisted against the palms of his hands--like this. [He +illustrates the movement and it is imitated by ADOLPH] Then his eyes +became bloodshot, and he began to chew--like this. [He chews, and again +ADOLPH imitates him] The saliva was rattling in his throat. His chest +was squeezed together as if it had been closed in a vice. The pupils +of his eyes flickered like gas-jets. His tongue beat the saliva into a +lather, and he sank--slowly--down--backward--into the chair--as if he +were drowning. And then--- + +ADOLPH. [In a whisper] Stop now! + +GUSTAV. And then--Are you not feeling well? + +ADOLPH. No. + +GUSTAV. [Gets a glass of water for him] There: drink now. And we'll talk +of something else. + +ADOLPH. [Feebly] Thank you! Please go on! + +GUSTAV. Well--when he came to he couldn't remember anything at all. He +had simply lost consciousness. Has that ever happened to you? + +ADOLPH. Yes, I have had attacks of vertigo now and then, but my +physician says it's only anaemia. + +GUSTAV. Well, that's the beginning of it, you know. But, believe me, it +will end in epilepsy if you don't take care of yourself. + +ADOLPH. What can I do? + +GUSTAV. To begin with, you will have to observe complete abstinence. + +ADOLPH. For how long? + +GUSTAV. For half a year at least. + +ADOLPH. I cannot do it. That would upset our married life. + +GUSTAV. Good-bye to you then! + +ADOLPH. [Covers up the wax figure] I cannot do it! + +GUSTAV. Can you not save your own life?--But tell me, as you have +already given me so much of your confidence--is there no other canker, +no secret wound, that troubles you? For it is very rare to find only +one cause of discord, as life is so full of variety and so fruitful in +chances for false relationships. Is there not a corpse in your cargo +that you are trying to hide from yourself?--For instance, you said a +minute ago that you have a child which has been left in other people's +care. Why don't you keep it with you? + +ADOLPH. My wife doesn't want us to do so. + +GUSTAV. And her reason? Speak up now! + +ADOLPH. Because, when it was about three years old, it began to look +like him, her former husband. + +GUSTAV. Well? Have you seen her former husband? + +ADOLPH. No, never. I have only had a casual glance at a very poor +portrait of him, and then I couldn't detect the slightest resemblance. + +GUSTAV. Oh, portraits are never like the original, and, besides, he +might have changed considerably since it was made. However, I hope it +hasn't aroused any suspicions in you? + +ADOLPH. Not at all. The child was born a year after our marriage, and +the husband was abroad when I first met Tekla--it happened right here, +in this very house even, and that's why we come here every summer. + +GUSTAV. No, then there can be no cause for suspicion. And you wouldn't +have had any reason to trouble yourself anyhow, for the children of a +widow who marries again often show a likeness to her dead husband. It +is annoying, of course, and that's why they used to burn all widows in +India, as you know.--But tell me: have you ever felt jealous of him--of +his memory? Would it not sicken you to meet him on a walk and hear him, +with his eyes on your Tekla, use the word "we" instead of "I"?--We! + +ADOLPH. I cannot deny that I have been pursued by that very thought. + +GUSTAV. There now!--And you'll never get rid of it. There are discords +in this life which can never be reduced to harmony. For this reason you +had better put wax in your ears and go to work. If you work, and grow +old, and pile masses of new impressions on the hatches, then the corpse +will stay quiet in the hold. + +ADOLPH. Pardon me for interrupting you, but--it is wonderful how you +resemble Tekla now and then while you are talking. You have a way of +blinking one eye as if you were taking aim with a gun, and your eyes +have the same influence on me as hers have at times. + +GUSTAV. No, really? + +ADOLPH. And now you said that "no, really" in the same indifferent +way that she does. She also has the habit of saying "no, really" quite +often. + +GUSTAV. Perhaps we are distantly related, seeing that all human beings +are said to be of one family. At any rate, it will be interesting to +make your wife's acquaintance to see if what you say is true. + +ADOLPH. And do you know, she never takes an expression from me. She +seems rather to avoid my vocabulary, and I have never caught her using +any of my gestures. And yet people as a rule develop what is called +"marital resemblance." + +GUSTAV. And do you know why this has not happened in your case?--That +woman has never loved you. + +ADOLPH. What do you mean? + +GUSTAV. I hope you will excuse what I am saying--but woman's love +consists in taking, in receiving, and one from whom she takes nothing +does not have her love. She has never loved you! + +ADOLPH. Don't you think her capable of loving more than once? + +GUSTAV. No, for we cannot be deceived more than once. Then our eyes are +opened once for all. You have never been deceived, and so you had better +beware of those that have. They are dangerous, I tell you. + +ADOLPH. Your words pierce me like knife thrusts, and I fool as if +something were being severed within me, but I cannot help it. And this +cutting brings a certain relief, too. For it means the pricking of +ulcers that never seemed to ripen.--She has never loved me!--Why, then, +did she ever take me? + +GUSTAV. Tell me first how she came to take you, and whether it was you +who took her or she who took you? + +ADOLPH. Heaven only knows if I can tell at all!--How did it happen? +Well, it didn't come about in one day. + +GUSTAV. Would you like to have me tell you how it did happen? + +ADOLPH. That's more than you can do. + +GUSTAV. Oh, by using the information about yourself and your wife that +you have given me, I think I can reconstruct the whole event. Listen +now, and you'll hear. [In a dispassionate tone, almost humorously] +The husband had gone abroad to study, and she was alone. At first her +freedom seemed rather pleasant. Then came a sense of vacancy, for +I presume she was pretty empty when she had lived by herself for a +fortnight. Then he appeared, and by and by the vacancy was filled up. By +comparison the absent one seemed to fade out, and for the simple reason +that he was at a distance--you know the law about the square of the +distance? But when they felt their passions stirring, then came fear--of +themselves, of their consciences, of him. For protection they played +brother and sister. And the more their feelings smacked of the flesh, +the more they tried to make their relationship appear spiritual. + +ADOLPH. Brother and sister? How could you know that? + +GUSTAV. I guessed it. Children are in the habit of playing papa and +mamma, but when they grow up they play brother and sister--in order to +hide what should be hidden!--And then they took the vow of chastity--and +then they played hide-and-seek--until they got in a dark corner where +they were sure of not being seen by anybody. [With mock severity] But +they felt that there was ONE whose eye reached them in the darkness--and +they grew frightened--and their fright raised the spectre of the +absent one--his figure began to assume immense proportions--it became +metamorphosed: turned into a nightmare that disturbed their amorous +slumbers; a creditor who knocked at all doors. Then they saw his black +hand between their own as these sneaked toward each other across the +table; and they heard his grating voice through that stillness of the +night that should have been broken only by the beating of their own +pulses. He did not prevent them from possessing each other but he +spoiled their happiness. And when they became aware of his invisible +interference with their happiness; when they took flight at last--a vain +flight from the memories that pursued them, from the liability they had +left behind, from the public opinion they could not face--and when they +found themselves without the strength needed to carry their own +guilt, then they had to send out into the fields for a scapegoat to be +sacrificed. They were free-thinkers, but they did not have the courage +to step forward and speak openly to him the words: "We love each +other!" To sum it up, they were cowards, and so the tyrant had to be +slaughtered. Is that right? + +ADOLPH. Yes, but you forget that she educated me, that she filled my +head with new thoughts-- + +GUSTAV. I have not forgotten it. But tell me: why could she not educate +the other man also--into a free-thinker? + +ADOLPH. Oh, he was an idiot! + +GUSTAV. Oh, of course--he was an idiot! But that's rather an ambiguous +term, and, as pictured in her novel, his idiocy seems mainly to have +consisted in failure to understand her. Pardon me a question: but is +your wife so very profound after all? I have discovered nothing profound +in her writings. + +ADOLPH. Neither have I.--But then I have also to confess a certain +difficulty in understanding her. It is as if the cogs of our brain +wheels didn't fit into each other, and as if something went to pieces in +my head when I try to comprehend her. + +GUSTAV. Maybe you are an idiot, too? + +ADOLPH. I don't THINK so! And it seems to me all the time as if she were +in the wrong--Would you care to read this letter, for instance, which I +got today? + +[Takes out a letter from his pocket-book.] + +GUSTAV. [Glancing through the letter] Hm! The handwriting seems +strangely familiar. + +ADOLPH. Rather masculine, don't you think? + +GUSTAV. Well, I know at least ONE man who writes that kind of hand--She +addresses you as "brother." Are you still playing comedy to each other? +And do you never permit yourselves any greater familiarity in speaking +to each other? + +ADOLPH. No, it seems to me that all mutual respect is lost in that way. + +GUSTAV. And is it to make you respect her that she calls herself your +sister? + +ADOLPH. I want to respect her more than myself. I want her to be the +better part of my own self. + +GUSTAV. Why don't you be that better part yourself? Would it be less +convenient than to permit somebody else to fill the part? Do you want to +place yourself beneath your wife? + +ADOLPH. Yes, I do. I take a pleasure in never quite reaching up to her. +I have taught her to swim, for example, and now I enjoy hearing her +boast that she surpasses me both in skill and daring. To begin with, I +merely pretended to be awkward and timid in order to raise her courage. +And so it ended with my actually being her inferior, more of a coward +than she. It almost seemed to me as if she had actually taken my courage +away from me. + +GUSTAV. Have you taught her anything else? + +ADOLPH. Yes--but it must stay between us--I have taught her how to +spell, which she didn't know before. But now, listen: when she took +charge of our domestic correspondence, I grew out of the habit of +writing. And think of it: as the years passed on, lack of practice made +me forget a little here and there of my grammar. But do you think she +recalls that I was the one who taught her at the start? No--and so I am +"the idiot," of course. + +GUSTAV. So you are an idiot already? + +ADOLPH. Oh, it's just a joke, of course! + +GUSTAV. Of course! But this is clear cannibalism, I think. Do you know +what's behind that sort of practice? The savages eat their enemies in +order to acquire their useful qualities. And this woman has been eating +your soul, your courage, your knowledge--- + +ADOLPH. And my faith! It was I who urged her to write her first book--- + +GUSTAV. [Making a face] Oh-h-h! + +ADOLPH. It was I who praised her, even when I found her stuff rather +poor. It was I who brought her into literary circles where she could +gather honey from our most ornamental literary flowers. It was I who +used my personal influence to keep the critics from her throat. It was I +who blew her faith in herself into flame; blew on it until I lost my own +breath. I gave, gave, gave--until I had nothing left for myself. Do you +know--I'll tell you everything now--do you know I really believe--and +the human soul is so peculiarly constituted--I believe that when my +artistic successes seemed about to put her in the shadow--as well as her +reputation--then I tried to put courage into her by belittling myself, +and by making my own art seem inferior to hers. I talked so long about +the insignificant part played by painting on the whole--talked so long +about it, and invented so many reasons to prove what I said, that one +fine day I found myself convinced of its futility. So all you had to do +was to breathe on a house of cards. + +GUSTAV. Pardon me for recalling what you said at the beginning of our +talk--that she had never taken anything from you. + +ADOLPH. She doesn't nowadays. Because there is nothing more to take. + +GUSTAV. The snake being full, it vomits now. + +ADOLPH. Perhaps she has been taking a good deal more from me than I have +been aware of? + +GUSTAV. You can be sure of that. She took when you were not looking, and +that is called theft. + +ADOLPH. Perhaps she never did educate me? + +GUSTAV. But you her? In all likelihood! But it was her trick to make it +appear the other way to you. May I ask how she set about educating you? + +ADOLPH. Oh, first of all--hm! + +GUSTAV. Well? + +ADOLPH. Well, I--- + +GUSTAV. No, we were speaking of her. + +ADOLPH. Really, I cannot tell now. + +GUSTAV. Do you see! + +ADOLPH. However--she devoured my faith also, and so I sank further and +further down, until you came along and gave me a new faith. + +GUSTAV. [Smiling] In sculpture? + +ADOLPH. [Doubtfully] Yes. + +GUSTAV. And have you really faith in it? In this abstract, antiquated +art that dates back to the childhood of civilisation? Do you +believe that you can obtain your effect by pure form--by the three +dimensions--tell me? That you can reach the practical mind of our own +day, and convey an illusion to it, without the use of colour--without +colour, mind you--do you really believe that? + +ADOLPH. [Crushed] No! + +GUSTAV. Well, I don't either. + +ADOLPH. Why, then, did you say you did? + +GUSTAV. Because I pitied you. + +ADOLPH. Yes, I am to be pitied! For now I am bankrupt! Finished!--And +worst of all: not even she is left to me! + +GUSTAV. Well, what could you do with her? + +ADOLPH. Oh, she would be to me what God was before I became an atheist: +an object that might help me to exercise my sense of veneration. + +GUSTAV. Bury your sense of veneration and let something else grow on top +of it. A little wholesome scorn, for instance. + +ADOLPH. I cannot live without having something to respect--- + +GUSTAV. Slave! + +ADOLPH.--without a woman to respect and worship! + +GUSTAV. Oh, HELL! Then you had better take back your God--if you needs +must have something to kow-tow to! You're a fine atheist, with all that +superstition about woman still in you! You're a fine free-thinker, +who dare not think freely about the dear ladies! Do you know what that +incomprehensible, sphinx-like, profound something in your wife really +is? It is sheer stupidity!--Look here: she cannot even distinguish +between th and t. And that, you know, means there is something +wrong with the mechanism. When you look at the case, it looks like +a chronometer, but the works inside are those of an ordinary cheap +watch.--Nothing but the skirts-that's all! Put trousers on her, give +her a pair of moustaches of soot under her nose, then take a good, +sober look at her, and listen to her in the same manner: you'll find +the instrument has another sound to it. A phonograph, and nothing +else--giving you back your own words, or those of other people--and +always in diluted form. Have you ever looked at a naked woman--oh yes, +yes, of course! A youth with over-developed breasts; an under-developed +man; a child that has shot up to full height and then stopped growing in +other respects; one who is chronically anaemic: what can you expect of +such a creature? + +ADOLPH. Supposing all that to be true--how can it be possible that I +still think her my equal? + +GUSTAV. Hallucination--the hypnotising power of skirts! Or--the two +of you may actually have become equals. The levelling process has been +finished. Her capillarity has brought the water in both tubes to the +same height.--Tell me [taking out his watch]: our talk has now lasted +six hours, and your wife ought soon to be here. Don't you think we had +better stop, so that you can get a rest? + +ADOLPH. No, don't leave me! I don't dare to be alone! + +GUSTAV. Oh, for a little while only--and then the lady will come. + +ADOLPH. Yes, she is coming!--It's all so queer! I long for her, but I +am afraid of her. She pets me, she is tender to me, but there is +suffocation in her kisses--something that pulls and numbs. And I feel +like a circus child that is being pinched by the clown in order that it +may look rosy-cheeked when it appears before the public. + +GUSTAV. I feel very sorry for you, my friend. Without being a physician, +I can tell that you are a dying man. It is enough to look at your latest +pictures in order to see that. + +ADOLPH. You think so? How can you see it? + +GUSTAV. Your colour is watery blue, anaemic, thin, so that the +cadaverous yellow of the canvas shines through. And it impresses me as +if your own hollow, putty-coloured checks were showing beneath-- + +ADOLPH. Oh, stop, stop! + +GUSTAV. Well, this is not only my personal opinion. Have you read +to-day's paper? + +ADOLPH. [Shrinking] No! + +GUSTAV. It's on the table here. + +ADOLPH. [Reaching for the paper without daring to take hold of it] Do +they speak of it there? + +GUSTAV. Read it--or do you want me to read it to you? + +ADOLPH. No! + +GUSTAV. I'll leave you, if you want me to. + +ADOLPH. No, no, no!--I don't know--it seems as if I were beginning to +hate you, and yet I cannot let you go.--You drag me out of the hole into +which I have fallen, but no sooner do you get me on firm ice, than you +knock me on the head and shove me into the water again. As long as my +secrets were my own, I had still something left within me, but now I am +quite empty. There is a canvas by an Italian master, showing a scene of +torture--a saint whose intestines are being torn out of him and rolled +on the axle of a windlass. The martyr is watching himself grow thinner +and thinner, while the roll on the axle grows thicker.--Now it seems to +me as if you had swelled out since you began to dig in me; and when you +leave, you'll carry away my vitals with you, and leave nothing but an +empty shell behind. + +GUSTAV. How you do let your fancy run away with you!--And besides, your +wife is bringing back your heart. + +ADOLPH. No, not since you have burned her to ashes. Everything is in +ashes where you have passed along: my art, my love, my hope, my faith! + +GUSTAV. All of it was pretty nearly finished before I came along. + +ADOLPH. Yes, but it might have been saved. Now it's too +late--incendiary! + +GUSTAV. We have cleared some ground only. Now we'll sow in the ashes. + +ADOLPH. I hate you! I curse you! + +GUSTAV. Good symptoms! There is still some strength left in you. And now +I'll pull you up on the ice again. Listen now! Do you want to listen to +me, and do you want to obey me? + +ADOLPH. Do with me what you will--I'll obey you! + +GUSTAV. [Rising] Look at me! + +ADOLPH. [Looking at GUSTAV] Now you are looking at me again with that +other pair of eyes which attracts me. + +GUSTAV. And listen to me! + +ADOLPH. Yes, but speak of yourself. Don't talk of me any longer: I am +like an open wound and cannot bear being touched. + +GUSTAV. No, there is nothing to say about me. I am a teacher of dead +languages, and a widower--that's all! Take my hand. + +ADOLPH. What terrible power there must be in you! It feels as if I were +touching an electrical generator. + +GUSTAV. And bear in mind that I have been as weak as you are now.--Stand +up! + +ADOLPH. [Rises, but keeps himself from falling only by throwing his arms +around the neck of GUSTAV] I am like a boneless baby, and my brain seems +to lie bare. + +GUSTAV. Take a turn across the floor! + +ADOLPH. I cannot! + +GUSTAV. Do what I say, or I'll strike you! + +ADOLPH. [Straightening himself up] What are you saying? + +GUSTAV. I'll strike you, I said. + +ADOLPH. [Leaping backward in a rage] You! + +GUSTAV. That's it! Now you have got the blood into your head, and your +self-assurance is awake. And now I'll give you some electriticy: where +is your wife? + +ADOLPH. Where is she? + +GUSTAV. Yes. + +ADOLPH. She is--at--a meeting. + +GUSTAV. Sure? + +ADOLPH. Absolutely! + +GUSTAV. What kind of meeting? + +ADOLPH. Oh, something relating to an orphan asylum. + +GUSTAV. Did you part as friends? + +ADOLPH. [With some hesitation] Not as friends. + +GUSTAV. As enemies then!--What did you say that provoked her? + +ADOLPH. You are terrible. I am afraid of you. How could you know? + +GUSTAV. It's very simple: I possess three known factors, and with their +help I figure out the unknown one. What did you say to her? + +ADOLPH. I said--two words only, but they were dreadful, and I regret +them--regret them very much. + +GUSTAV. Don't do it! Tell me now? + +ADOLPH. I said: "Old flirt!" + +GUSTAV. What more did you say? + +ADOLPH. Nothing at all. + +GUSTAV. Yes, you did, but you have forgotten it--perhaps because you +don't dare remember it. You have put it away in a secret drawer, but you +have got to open it now! + +ADOLPH. I can't remember! + +GUSTAV. But I know. This is what you said: "You ought to be ashamed of +flirting when you are too old to have any more lovers!" + +ADOLPH. Did I say that? I must have said it!--But how can you know that +I did? + +GUSTAV. I heard her tell the story on board the boat as I came here. + +ADOLPH. To whom? + +GUSTAV. To four young men who formed her company. She is already +developing a taste for chaste young men, just like-- + +ADOLPH. But there is nothing wrong in that? + +GUSTAV. No more than in playing brother and sister when you are papa and +mamma. + +ADOLPH. So you have seen her then? + +GUSTAV. Yes, I have. But you have never seen her when you didn't--I +mean, when you were not present. And there's the reason, you see, why a +husband can never really know his wife. Have you a portrait of her? + +(Adolph takes a photograph from his pocketbook. There is a look of +aroused curiosity on his face.) + +GUSTAV. You were not present when this was taken? + +ADOLPH. No. + +GUSTAV. Look at it. Does it bear much resemblance to the portrait +you painted of her? Hardly any! The features are the same, but the +expression is quite different. But you don't see this, because your own +picture of her creeps in between your eyes and this one. Look at it now +as a painter, without giving a thought to the original. What does +it represent? Nothing, so far as I can see, but an affected coquette +inviting somebody to come and play with her. Do you notice this cynical +line around the mouth which you are never allowed to see? Can you see +that her eyes are seeking out some man who is not you? Do you observe +that her dress is cut low at the neck, that her hair is done up in a +different way, that her sleeve has managed to slip back from her arm? +Can you see? + +ADOLPH. Yes--now I see. + +GUSTAV. Look out, my boy! + +ADOLPH. For what? + +GUSTAV. For her revenge! Bear in mind that when you said she could not +attract a man, you struck at what to her is most sacred--the one +thing above all others. If you had told her that she wrote nothing +but nonsense, she would have laughed at your poor taste. But as it +is--believe me, it will not be her fault if her desire for revenge has +not already been satisfied. + +ADOLPH. I must know if it is so! + +GUSTAV. Find out! + +ADOLPH. Find out? + +GUSTAV. Watch--I'll assist you, if you want me to. + +ADOLPH. As I am to die anyhow--it may as well come first as last! What +am I to do? + +GUSTAV. First of all a piece of information: has your wife any +vulnerable point? + +ADOLPH. Hardly! I think she must have nine lives, like a cat. + +GUSTAV. There--that was the boat whistling at the landing--now she'll +soon be here. + +ADOLPH. Then I must go down and meet her. + +GUSTAV. No, you are to stay here. You have to be impolite. If her +conscience is clear, you'll catch it until your ears tingle. If she is +guilty, she'll come up and pet you. + +ADOLPH. Are you so sure of that? + +GUSTAV. Not quite, because a rabbit will sometimes turn and run in +loops, but I'll follow. My room is nest to this. [He points to the door +on the right] There I shall take up my position and watch you while you +are playing the game in here. But when you are done, we'll change parts: +I'll enter the cage and do tricks with the snake while you stick to the +key-hole. Then we meet in the park to compare notes. But keep your back +stiff. And if you feel yourself weakening, knock twice on the floor with +a chair. + +ADOLPH. All right!--But don't go away. I must be sure that you are in +the next room. + +GUSTAV. You can be quite sure of that. But don't get scared afterward, +when you watch me dissecting a human soul and laying out its various +parts on the table. They say it is rather hard on a beginner, but +once you have seen it done, you never want to miss it.--And be sure to +remember one thing: not a word about having met me, or having made any +new acquaintance whatever while she was away. Not one word! And I'll +discover her weak point by myself. Hush, she has arrived--she is in her +room now. She's humming to herself. That means she is in a rage!--Now, +straight in the back, please! And sit down on that chair over there, so +that she has to sit here--then I can watch both of you at the same time. + +ADOLPH. It's only fifteen minutes to dinner--and no new guests have +arrived--for I haven't heard the bell ring. That means we shall be by +ourselves--worse luck! + +GUSTAV. Are you weak? + +ADOLPH. I am nothing at all!--Yes, I am afraid of what is now coming! +But I cannot keep it from coming! The stone has been set rolling--and +it was not the first drop of water that started it--nor wad it the last +one--but all of them together. + +GUSTAV. Let it roll then--for peace will come in no other way. Good-bye +for a while now! [Goes out] + +(ADOLPH nods back at him. Until then he has been standing with the +photograph in his hand. Now he tears it up and flings the pieces under +the table. Then he sits down on a chair, pulls nervously at his tie, +runs his fingers through his hair, crumples his coat lapel, and so on.) + +TEKLA. [Enters, goes straight up to him and gives him a kiss; her manner +is friendly, frank, happy, and engaging] Hello, little brother! How is +he getting on? + +ADOLPH. [Almost won over; speaking reluctantly and as if in jest] What +mischief have you been up to now that makes you come and kiss me? + +TEKLA. I'll tell you: I've spent an awful lot of money. + +ADOLPH. You have had a good time then? + +TEKLA. Very! But not exactly at that creche meeting. That was plain +piffle, to tell the truth.--But what has little brother found to divert +himself with while his Pussy was away? + +(Her eyes wander around the room as if she were looking for somebody or +sniffing something.) + +ADOLPH. I've simply been bored. + +TEKLA. And no company at all? + +ADOLPH. Quite by myself. + +TEKLA. [Watching him; she sits down on the sofa] Who has been sitting +here? ADOLPH. Over there? Nobody. + +TEKLA. That's funny! The seat is still warm, and there is a hollow +here that looks as if it had been made by an elbow. Have you had lady +callers? + +ADOLPH. I? You don't believe it, do you? + +TEKLA. But you blush. I think little brother is not telling the truth. +Come and tell Pussy now what he has on his conscience. + +(Draws him toward herself so that he sinks down with his head resting in +her lap.) + +ADOLPH. You're a little devil--do you know that? + +TEKLA. No, I don't know anything at all about myself. + +ADOLPH. You never think about yourself, do you? + +TEKLA. [Sniffing and taking notes] I think of nothing but myself--I am +a dreadful egoist. But what has made you turn so philosophical all at +once? + +ADOLPH. Put your hand on my forehead. + +TEKLA. [Prattling as if to a baby] Has he got ants in his head again? +Does he want me to take them away, does he? [Kisses him on the forehead] +There now! Is it all right now? + +ADOLPH. Now it's all right. [Pause] + +TEKLA. Well, tell me now what you have been doing to make the time go? +Have you painted anything? + +ADOLPH. No, I am done with painting. + +TEKLA. What? Done with painting? + +ADOLPH. Yes, but don't scold me for it. How can I help it that I can't +paint any longer! + +TEKLA. What do you mean to do then? + +ADOLPH. I'll become a sculptor. + +TEKLA. What a lot of brand new ideas again! + +ADOLPH. Yes, but please don't scold! Look at that figure over there. + +TEKLA. [Uncovering the wax figure] Well, I declare!--Who is that meant +for? + +ADOLPH. Guess! + +TEKLA. Is it Pussy? Has he got no shame at all? + +ADOLPH. Is it like? + +TEKLA. How can I tell when there is no face? + +ADOLPH. Yes, but there is so much else--that's beautiful! + +TEKLA. [Taps him playfully on the cheek] Now he must keep still or I'll +have to kiss him. + +ADOLPH. [Holding her back] Now, now!--Somebody might come! + +TEKLA. Well, what do I care? Can't I kiss my own husband, perhaps? Oh +yes, that's my lawful right. + +ADOLPH. Yes, but don't you know--in the hotel here, they don't believe +we are married, because we are kissing each other such a lot. And it +makes no difference that we quarrel now and then, for lovers are said to +do that also. + +TEKLA. Well, but what's the use of quarrelling? Why can't he always be +as nice as he is now? Tell me now? Can't he try? Doesn't he want us to +be happy? + +ADOLPH. Do I want it? Yes, but-- + +TEKLA. There we are again! Who has put it into his head that he is not +to paint any longer? + +ADOLPH. Who? You are always looking for somebody else behind me and my +thoughts. Are you jealous? + +TEKLA. Yes, I am. I'm afraid somebody might take him away from me. + +ADOLPH. Are you really afraid of that? You who know that no other woman +can take your place, and that I cannot live without you! + +TEKLA. Well, I am not afraid of the women--it's your friends that fill +your head with all sorts of notions. + +ADOLPH. [Watching her] You are afraid then? Of what are you afraid? + +TEKLA. [Getting up] Somebody has been here. Who has been here? + +ADOLPH. Don't you wish me to look at you? + +TEKLA. Not in that way: it's not the way you are accustomed to look at +me. + +ADOLPH. How was I looking at you then? + +TEKLA. Way up under my eyelids. + +ADOLPH. Under your eyelids--yes, I wanted to see what is behind them. + +TEKLA. See all you can! There is nothing that needs to be hidden. +But--you talk differently, too--you use expressions--[studying him] you +philosophise--that's what you do! [Approaches him threateningly] Who has +been here? + +ADOLPH. Nobody but my physician. + +TEKLA. Your physician? Who is he? + +ADOLPH. That doctor from Stromstad. + +TEKLA. What's his name? + +ADOLPH. Sjoberg. + +TEKLA. What did he have to say? + +ADOLPH. He said--well--among other things he said--that I am on the +verge of epilepsy-- + +TEKLA. Among other things? What more did he say? + +ADOLPH. Something very unpleasant. + +TEKLA. Tell me! + +ADOLPH. He forbade us to live as man and wife for a while. + +TEKLA. Oh, that's it! Didn't I just guess it! They want to separate us! +That's what I have understood a long time! + +ADOLPH. You can't have understood, because there was nothing to +understand. + +TEKLA. Oh yes, I have! + +ADOLPH. How can you see what doesn't exist, unless your fear of +something has stirred up your fancy into seeing what has never existed? +What is it you fear? That I might borrow somebody else's eyes in order +to see you as you are, and not as you seem to be? + +TEKLA. Keep your imagination in check, Adolph! It is the beast that +dwells in man's soul. + +ADOLPH. Where did you learn that? From those chaste young men on the +boat--did you? + +TEKLA. [Not at all abashed] Yes, there is something to be learned from +youth also. + +ADOLPH. I think you are already beginning to have a taste for youth? + +TEKLA. I have always liked youth. That's why I love you. Do you object? + +ADOLPH. No, but I should prefer to have no partners. + +TEKLA. [Prattling roguishly] My heart is so big, little brother, that +there is room in it for many more than him. + +ADOLPH. But little brother doesn't want any more brothers. + +TEKLA. Come here to Pussy now and get his hair pulled because he is +jealous--no, envious is the right word for it! + +(Two knocks with a chair are heard from the adjoining room, where GUSTAV +is.) + +ADOLPH. No, I don't want to play now. I want to talk seriously. + +TEKLA. [Prattling] Mercy me, does he want to talk seriously? Dreadful, +how serious he's become! [Takes hold of his head and kisses him] Smile a +little--there now! + +ADOLPH. [Smiling against his will] Oh, you're the--I might almost think +you knew how to use magic! + +TEKLA. Well, can't he see now? That's why he shouldn't start any +trouble--or I might use my magic to make him invisible! + +ADOLPH. [Gets up] Will you sit for me a moment, Tekla? With the side of +your face this way, so that I can put a face on my figure. + +TEKLA. Of course, I will. + +[Turns her head so he can see her in profile.] + +ADOLPH. [Gazes hard at her while pretending to work at the figure] Don't +think of me now--but of somebody else. + +TEKLA. I'll think of my latest conquest. + +ADOLPH. That chaste young man? + +TEKLA. Exactly! He had a pair of the prettiest, sweetest moustaches, +and his cheek looked like a peach--it was so soft and rosy that you just +wanted to bite it. + +ADOLPH. [Darkening] Please keep that expression about the mouth. + +TEKLA. What expression? + +ADOLPH. A cynical, brazen one that I have never seen before. + +TEKLA. [Making a face] This one? + +ADOLPH. Just that one! [Getting up] Do you know how Bret Harte pictures +an adulteress? + +TEKLA. [Smiling] No, I have never read Bret Something. + +ADOLPH. As a pale creature that cannot blush. + +TEKLA. Not at all? But when she meets her lover, then she must blush, I +am sure, although her husband or Mr. Bret may not be allowed to see it. + +ADOLPH. Are you so sure of that? + +TEKLA. [As before] Of course, as the husband is not capable of bringing +the blood up to her head, he cannot hope to behold the charming +spectacle. + +ADOLPH. [Enraged] Tekla! + +TEKLA. Oh, you little ninny! + +ADOLPH. Tekla! + +TEKLA. He should call her Pussy--then I might get up a pretty little +blush for his sake. Does he want me to? + +ADOLPH. [Disarmed] You minx, I'm so angry with you, that I could bite +you! + +TEKLA. [Playfully] Come and bite me then!--Come! + +[Opens her arms to him.] + +ADOLPH. [Puts his hands around her neck and kisses her] Yes, I'll bite +you to death! + +TEKLA. [Teasingly] Look out--somebody might come! + +ADOLPH. Well, what do I care! I care for nothing else in the world if I +can only have you! + +TEKLA. And when, you don't have me any longer? + +ADOLPH. Then I shall die! + +TEKLA. But you are not afraid of losing me, are you--as I am too old to +be wanted by anybody else? + +ADOLPH. You have not forgotten my words yet, Tekla! I take it all back +now! + +TEKLA. Can you explain to me why you are at once so jealous and so +cock-sure? + +ADOLPH. No, I cannot explain anything at all. But it's possible that +the thought of somebody else having possessed you may still be gnawing +within me. At times it appears to me as if our love were nothing but a +fiction, an attempt at self-defence, a passion kept up as a matter of +honor--and I can't think of anything that would give me more pain than +to have HIM know that I am unhappy. Oh, I have never seen him--but the +mere thought that a person exists who is waiting for my misfortune to +arrive, who is daily calling down curses on my head, who will roar +with laughter when I perish--the mere idea of it obsesses me, drives me +nearer to you, fascinates me, paralyses me! + +TEKLA. Do you think I would let him have that joy? Do you think I would +make his prophecy come true? + +ADOLPH. No, I cannot think you would. + +TEKLA. Why don't you keep calm then? + +ADOLPH. No, you upset me constantly by your coquetry. Why do you play +that kind of game? + +TEKLA. It is no game. I want to be admired--that's all! + +ADOLPH. Yes, but only by men! + +TEKLA. Of course! For a woman is never admired by other women. + +ADOLPH. Tell me, have you heard anything--from him--recently? + +TEKLA. Not in the last sis months. + +ADOLPH. Do you ever think of him? + +TEKLA. No!--Since the child died we have broken off our correspondence. + +ADOLPH. And you have never seen him at all? + +TEKLA. No, I understand he is living somewhere down on the West Coast. +But why is all this coming into your head just now? + +ADOLPH. I don't know. But during the last few days, while I was alone, I +kept thinking of him--how he might have felt when he was left alone that +time. + +TEKLA. Are you having an attack of bad conscience? + +ADOLPH. I am. + +TEKLA. You feel like a thief, do you? + +ADOLPH. Almost! + +TEKLA. Isn't that lovely! Women can be stolen as you steal children or +chickens? And you regard me as his chattel or personal property. I am +very much obliged to you! + +ADOLPH. No, I regard you as his wife. And that's a good deal more than +property--for there can be no substitute. TEKLA. Oh, yes! If you only +heard that he had married again, all these foolish notions would leave +you.--Have you not taken his place with me? + +ADOLPH. Well, have I?--And did you ever love him? + +TEKLA. Of course, I did! + +ADOLPH. And then-- + +TEKLA. I grew tired of him! + +ADOLPH. And if you should tire of me also? + +TEKLA. But I won't! + +ADOLPH. If somebody else should turn up--one who had all the qualities +you are looking for in a man now--suppose only--then you would leave me? + +TEKLA. No. + +ADOLPH. If he captivated you? So that you couldn't live without him? +Then you would leave me, of course? + +TEKLA. No, that doesn't follow. + +ADOLPH. But you couldn't love two at the same time, could you? + +TEKLA. Yes! Why not? + +ADOLPH. That's something I cannot understand. + +TEKLA. But things exist although you do not understand them. All persons +are not made in the same way, you know. + +ADOLPH. I begin to see now! + +TEKLA. No, really! + +ADOLPH. No, really? [A pause follows, during which he seems to struggle +with some--memory that will not come back] Do you know, Tekla, that your +frankness is beginning to be painful? + +TEKLA. And yet it used to be my foremost virtue In your mind, and one +that you taught me. + +ADOLPH. Yes, but it seems to me as if you were hiding something behind +that frankness of yours. + +TEKLA. That's the new tactics, you know. + +ADOLPH. I don't know why, but this place has suddenly become offensive +to me. If you feel like it, we might return home--this evening! + +TEKLA. What kind of notion is that? I have barely arrived and I don't +feel like starting on another trip. + +ADOLPH. But I want to. + +TEKLA. Well, what's that to me?--You can go! + +ADOLPH. But I demand that you take the next boat with me! + +TEKLA. Demand?--What are you talking about? + +ADOLPH. Do you realise that you are my wife? + +TEKLA. Do you realise that you are my husband? + +ADOLPH. Well, there's a difference between those two things. + +TEKLA. Oh, that's the way you are talking now!--You have never loved me! + +ADOLPH. Haven't I? + +TEKLA. No, for to love is to give. + +ADOLPH. To love like a man is to give; to love like a woman is to +take.--And I have given, given, given! + +TEKLA. Pooh! What have you given? + +ADOLPH. Everything! + +TEKLA. That's a lot! And if it be true, then I must have taken it. Are +you beginning to send in bills for your gifts now? And if I have taken +anything, this proves only my love for you. A woman cannot receive +anything except from her lover. + +ADOLPH. Her lover, yes! There you spoke the truth! I have been your +lover, but never your husband. + +TEKLA. Well, isn't that much more agreeable--to escape playing chaperon? +But if you are not satisfied with your position, I'll send you packing, +for I don't want a husband. + +ADOLPH. No, that's what I have noticed. For a while ago, when you began +to sneak away from me like a thief with his booty, and when you began to +seek company of your own where you could flaunt my plumes and display my +gems, then I felt, like reminding you of your debt. And at once I became +a troublesome creditor whom you wanted to get rid of. You wanted to +repudiate your own notes, and in order not to increase your debt to me, +you stopped pillaging my safe and began to try those of other people +instead. Without having done anything myself, I became to you merely the +husband. And now I am going to be your husband whether you like it or +not, as I am not allowed to be your lover any longer. + +TEKLA. [Playfully] Now he shouldn't talk nonsense, the sweet little +idiot! + +ADOLPH. Look out: it's dangerous to think everybody an idiot but +oneself! + +TEKLA. But that's what everybody thinks. + +ADOLPH. And I am beginning to suspect that he--your former husband--was +not so much of an idiot after all. + +TEKLA. Heavens! Are you beginning to sympathise with--him? + +ADOLPH. Yes, not far from it, + +TEKLA. Well, well! Perhaps you would like to make his acquaintance and +pour out your overflowing heart to him? What a striking picture! But I +am also beginning to feel drawn to him, as I am growing more and more +tired of acting as wetnurse. For he was at least a man, even though he +had the fault of being married to me. + +ADOLPH. There, you see! But you had better not talk so loud--we might be +overheard. + +TEKLA. What would it matter if they took us for married people? + +ADOLPH. So now you are getting fond of real male men also, and at the +same time you have a taste for chaste young men? + +TEKLA. There are no limits to what I can like, as you may see. My heart +is open to everybody and everything, to the big and the small, the +handsome and the ugly, the new and the old--I love the whole world. + +ADOLPH. Do you know what that means? + +TEKLA. No, I don't know anything at all. I just FEEL. + +ADOLPH. It means that old age is near. + +TEKLA. There you are again! Take care! + +ADOLPH. Take care yourself! + +TEKLA. Of what? + +ADOLPH. Of the knife! + +TEKLA. [Prattling] Little brother had better not play with such +dangerous things. + +ADOLPH. I have quit playing. + +TEKLA. Oh, it's earnest, is it? Dead earnest! Then I'll show you +that--you are mistaken. That is to say--you'll never see it, never know +it, but all the rest of the world will know It. And you'll suspect it, +you'll believe it, and you'll never have another moment's peace. You'll +have the feeling of being ridiculous, of being deceived, but you'll +never get any proof of it. For that's what married men never get. + +ADOLPH. You hate me then? + +TEKLA. No, I don't. And I don't think I shall either. But that's +probably because you are nothing to me but a child. + +ADOLPH. At this moment, yes. But do you remember how it was while the +storm swept over us? Then you lay there like an infant in arms and just +cried. Then you had to sit on my lap, and I had to kiss your eyes to +sleep. Then I had to be your nurse; had to see that you fixed your hair +before going out; had to send your shoes to the cobbler, and see that +there was food in the house. I had to sit by your side, holding your +hand for hours at a time: you were afraid, afraid of the whole world, +because you didn't have a single friend, and because you were crushed by +the hostility of public opinion. I had to talk courage into you until my +mouth was dry and my head ached. I had to make myself believe that I +was strong. I had to force myself into believing in the future. And so I +brought you back to life, when you seemed already dead. Then you admired +me. Then I was the man--not that kind of athlete you had just left, but +the man of will-power, the mesmerist who instilled new nervous energy +into your flabby muscles and charged your empty brain with a new store +of electricity. And then I gave you back your reputation. I brought you +new friends, furnished you with a little court of people who, for the +sake of friendship to me, let themselves be lured into admiring you. +I set you to rule me and my house. Then I painted my best pictures, +glimmering with reds and blues on backgrounds of gold, and there was not +an exhibition then where I didn't hold a place of honour. Sometimes you +were St. Cecilia, and sometimes Mary Stuart--or little Karin, whom King +Eric loved. And I turned public attention in your direction. I compelled +the clamorous herd to see you with my own infatuated vision. I plagued +them with your personality, forced you literally down their throats, +until that sympathy which makes everything possible became yours at +last--and you could stand on your own feet. When you reached that far, +then my strength was used up, and I collapsed from the overstrain--in +lifting you up, I had pushed myself down. I was taken ill, and my +illness seemed an annoyance to you at the moment when all life had just +begun to smile at you--and sometimes it seemed to me as if, in your +heart, there was a secret desire to get rid of your creditor and the +witness of your rise. Your love began to change into that of a grown-up +sister, and for lack of better I accustomed myself to the new part of +little brother. Your tenderness for me remained, and even increased, but +it was mingled with a suggestion of pity that had in it a good deal of +contempt. And this changed into open scorn as my talent withered and +your own sun rose higher. But in some mysterious way the fountainhead +of your inspiration seemed to dry up when I could no longer replenish +it--or rather when you wanted to show its independence of me. And at +last both of us began to lose ground. And then you looked for somebody +to put the blame on. A new victim! For you are weak, and you can never +carry your own burdens of guilt and debt. And so you picked me for a +scapegoat and doomed me to slaughter. But when you cut my thews, you +didn't realise that you were also crippling yourself, for by this time +our years of common life had made twins of us. You were a shoot sprung +from my stem, and you wanted to cut yourself loose before the shoot had +put out roots of its own, and that's why you couldn't grow by yourself. +And my stem could not spare its main branch--and so stem and branch must +die together. + +TEKLA. What you mean with all this, of course, is that you have written +my books. + +ADOLPH. No, that's what you want me to mean in order to make me out +a liar. I don't use such crude expressions as you do, and I spoke +for something like five minutes to get in all the nuances, all the +halftones, all the transitions--but your hand-organ has only a single +note in it. + +TEKLA. Yes, but the summary of the whole story is that you have written +my books. + +ADOLPH. No, there is no summary. You cannot reduce a chord into a single +note. You cannot translate a varied life into a sum of one figure. I +have made no blunt statements like that of having written your books. + +TEKLA. But that's what you meant! + +ADOLPH. [Beyond himself] I did not mean it. + +TEKLA. But the sum of it-- + +ADOLPH. [Wildly] There can be no sum without an addition. You get an +endless decimal fraction for quotient when your division does not work +out evenly. I have not added anything. + +TEKLA. But I can do the adding myself. + +ADOLPH. I believe it, but then I am not doing it. + +TEKLA. No, but that's what you wanted to do. + +ADOLPH. [Exhausted, closing his eyes] No, no, no--don't speak to +me--you'll drive me into convulsions. Keep silent! Leave me alone! You +mutilate my brain with your clumsy pincers--you put your claws into my +thoughts and tear them to pieces! + +(He seems almost unconscious and sits staring straight ahead while his +thumbs are bent inward against the palms of his hands.) + +TEKLA. [Tenderly] What is it? Are you sick? + +(ADOLPH motions her away.) + +TEKLA. Adolph! + +(ADOLPH shakes his head at her.) + +TEKLA. Adolph. + +ADOLPH. Yes. + +TEKLA. Do you admit that you were unjust a moment ago? + +ADOLPH. Yes, yes, yes, yes, I admit! + +TEKLA. And do you ask my pardon? + +ADOLPH. Yes, yes, yes, I ask your pardon--if you only won't speak to me! + +TEKLA. Kiss my hand then! + +ADOLPH. [Kissing her hand] I'll kiss your hand--if you only don't speak +to me! + +TEKLA. And now you had better go out for a breath of fresh air before +dinner. + +ADOLPH. Yes, I think I need it. And then we'll pack and leave. + +TEKLA. No! + +ADOLPH. [On his feet] Why? There must be a reason. + +TEKLA. The reason is that I have promised to be at the concert to-night. + +ADOLPH. Oh, that's it! + +TEKLA. Yes, that's it. I have promised to attend-- + +ADOLPH. Promised? Probably you said only that you might go, and that +wouldn't prevent you from saying now that you won't go. + +TEKLA. No, I am not like you: I keep my word. + +ADOLPH. Of course, promises should be kept, but we don't have to live +up to every little word we happen to drop. Perhaps there is somebody who +has made you promise to go. + +TEKLA. Yes. + +ADOLPH. Then you can ask to be released from your promise because your +husband is sick. + +TEKLA, No, I don't want to do that, and you are not sick enough to be +kept from going with me. + +ADOLPH. Why do you always want to drag me along? Do you feel safer then? + +TEKLA. I don't know what you mean. + +ADOLPH. That's what you always say when you know I mean something +that--doesn't please you. + +TEKLA. So-o! What is it now that doesn't please me? + +ADOLPH. Oh, I beg you, don't begin over again--Good-bye for a while! + +(Goes out through the door in the rear and then turns to the right.) + +(TEKLA is left alone. A moment later GUSTAV enters and goes straight +up to the table as if looking for a newspaper. He pretends not to see +TEKLA.) + +TEKLA. [Shows agitation, but manages to control herself] Oh, is it you? + +GUSTAV. Yes, it's me--I beg your pardon! + +TEKLA. Which way did you come? + +GUSTAV. By land. But--I am not going to stay, as-- + +TEKLA. Oh, there is no reason why you shouldn't.--Well, it was some time +ago-- + +GUSTAV. Yes, some time. + +TEKLA. You have changed a great deal. + +GUSTAV. And you are as charming as ever, A little younger, if anything. +Excuse me, however--I am not going to spoil your happiness by my +presence. And if I had known you were here, I should never-- + +TEKLA. If you don't think it improper, I should like you to stay. + +GUSTAV. On my part there could be no objection, but I fear--well, +whatever I say, I am sure to offend you. + +TEKLA. Sit down a moment. You don't offend me, for you possess that rare +gift--which was always yours--of tact and politeness. + +GUSTAV. It's very kind of you. But one could hardly expect--that your +husband might regard my qualities in the same generous light as you. + +TEKLA. On the contrary, he has just been speaking of you in very +sympathetic terms. + +GUSTAV. Oh!--Well, everything becomes covered up by time, like names cut +in a tree--and not even dislike can maintain itself permanently in our +minds. + +TEKLA. He has never disliked you, for he has never seen you. And as for +me, I have always cherished a dream--that of seeing you come together +as friends--or at least of seeing you meet for once in my presence--of +seeing you shake hands--and then go your different ways again. + +GUSTAV. It has also been my secret longing to see her whom I used to +love more than my own life--to make sure that she was in good hands. And +although I have heard nothing but good of him, and am familiar with all +his work, I should nevertheless have liked, before it grew too late, +to look into his eyes and beg him to take good care of the treasure +Providence has placed in his possession. In that way I hoped also to lay +the hatred that must have developed instinctively between us; I wished +to bring some peace and humility into my soul, so that I might manage to +live through the rest of my sorrowful days. + +TEKLA. You have uttered my own thoughts, and you have understood me. I +thank you for it! + +GUSTAV. Oh, I am a man of small account, and have always been too +insignificant to keep you in the shadow. My monotonous way of living, +my drudgery, my narrow horizons--all that could not satisfy a soul like +yours, longing for liberty. I admit it. But you understand--you who have +searched the human soul--what it cost me to make such a confession to +myself. + +TEKLA. It is noble, it is splendid, to acknowledge one's own +shortcomings--and it's not everybody that's capable of it. [Sighs] But +yours has always been an honest, and faithful, and reliable nature--one +that I had to respect--but-- + +GUSTAV. Not always--not at that time! But suffering purifies, sorrow +ennobles, and--I have suffered! + +TEKLA. Poor Gustav! Can you forgive me? Tell me, can you? + +GUSTAV. Forgive? What? I am the one who must ask you to forgive. + +TEKLA. [Changing tone] I believe we are crying, both of us--we who are +old enough to know better! + +GUSTAV. [Feeling his way] Old? Yes, I am old. But you--you grow younger +every day. + +(He has by that time manoeuvred himself up to the chair on the left and +sits down on it, whereupon TEKLA sits down on the sofa.) + +TEKLA. Do you think so? + +GUSTAV. And then you know how to dress. + +TEKLA. I learned that from you. Don't you remember how you figured out +what colors would be most becoming to me? + +GUSTAV. No. + +TEKLA. Yes, don't you remember--hm!--I can even recall how you used to +be angry with me whenever I failed to have at least a touch of crimson +about my dress. + +GUSTAV. No, not angry! I was never angry with you. + +TEKLA. Oh, yes, when you wanted to teach me how to think--do you +remember? For that was something I couldn't do at all. + +GUSTAV. Of course, you could. It's something every human being does. And +you have become quite keen at it--at least when you write. + +TEKLA. [Unpleasantly impressed; hurrying her words] Well, my dear +Gustav, it is pleasant to see you anyhow, and especially in a peaceful +way like this. + +GUSTAV. Well, I can hardly be called a troublemaker, and you had a +pretty peaceful time with me. + +TEKLA. Perhaps too much so. + +GUSTAV. Oh! But you see, I thought you wanted me that way. It was at +least the impression you gave me while we were engaged. + +TEKLA. Do you think one really knows what one wants at that time? And +then the mammas insist on all kinds of pretensions, of course. + +GUSTAV. Well, now you must be having all the excitement you can wish. +They say that life among artists is rather swift, and I don't think your +husband can be called a sluggard. + +TEKLA. You can get too much of a good thing. + +GUSTAV. [Trying a new tack] What! I do believe you are still wearing the +ear-rings I gave you? + +TEKLA. [Embarrassed] Why not? There was never any quarrel between +us--and then I thought I might wear them as a token--and a +reminder--that we were not enemies. And then, you know, it is impossible +to buy this kind of ear-rings any longer. [Takes off one of her +ear-rings.] + +GUSTAV. Oh, that's all right, but what does your husband say of it? + +TEKLA. Why should I mind what he says? + +GUSTAV. Don't you mind that?--But you may be doing him an injury. It is +likely to make him ridiculous. + +TEKLA. [Brusquely, as if speaking to herself almost] He was that before! + +GUSTAV. [Rises when he notes her difficulty in putting back the +ear-ring] May I help you, perhaps? + +TEKLA. Oh--thank you! + +GUSTAV. [Pinching her ear] That tiny ear!--Think only if your husband +could see us now! + +TEKLA. Wouldn't he howl, though! + +GUSTAV. Is he jealous also? + +TEKLA. Is he? I should say so! + +[A noise is heard from the room on the right.] + +GUSTAV. Who lives in that room? + +TEKLA. I don't know.--But tell me how you are getting along and what you +are doing? + +GUSTAV. Tell me rather how you are getting along? + +(TEKLA is visibly confused, and without realising what she is doing, she +takes the cover off the wax figure.) + +GUSTAV. Hello! What's that?--Well!--It must be you! + +TEKLA. I don't believe so. + +GUSTAV. But it is very like you. + +TEKLA. [Cynically] Do you think so? + +GUSTAV. That reminds me of the story--you know it--"How could your +majesty see that?" + +TEKLA, [Laughing aloud] You are impossible!--Do you know any new +stories? + +GUSTAV. No, but you ought to have some. + +TEKLA. Oh, I never hear anything funny nowadays. + +GUSTAV. Is he modest also? + +TEKLA. Oh--well-- + +GUSTAV. Not an everything? + +TEKLA. He isn't well just now. + +GUSTAV. Well, why should little brother put his nose into other people's +hives? + +TEKLA. [Laughing] You crazy thing! + +GUSTAV. Poor chap!--Do you remember once when we were just married--we +lived in this very room. It was furnished differently in those days. +There was a chest of drawers against that wall there--and over there +stood the big bed. + +TEKLA. Now you stop! + +GUSTAV. Look at me! + +TEKLA. Well, why shouldn't I? + +[They look hard at each other.] + +GUSTAV. Do you think a person can ever forget anything that has made a +very deep impression on him? + +TEKLA. No! And our memories have a tremendous power. Particularly the +memories of our youth. + +GUSTAV. Do you remember when I first met you? Then you were a pretty +little girl: a slate on which parents and governesses had made a few +scrawls that I had to wipe out. And then I filled it with inscriptions +that suited my own mind, until you believed the slate could hold nothing +more. That's the reason, you know, why I shouldn't care to be in your +husband's place--well, that's his business! But it's also the reason why +I take pleasure in meeting you again. Our thoughts fit together exactly. +And as I sit here and chat with you, it seems to me like drinking old +wine of my own bottling. Yes, it's my own wine, but it has gained a +great deal in flavour! And now, when I am about to marry again, I have +purposely picked out a young girl whom I can educate to suit myself. For +the woman, you know, is the man's child, and if she is not, he becomes +hers, and then the world turns topsy-turvy. + +TEKLA. Are you going to marry again? + +GUSTAV. Yes, I want to try my luck once more, but this time I am going +to make a better start, so that it won't end again with a spill. + +TEKLA. Is she good looking? + +GUSTAV. Yes, to me. But perhaps I am too old. It's queer--now when +chance has brought me together with you again--I am beginning to doubt +whether it will be possible to play the game over again. + +TEKLA. How do you mean? + +GUSTAV. I can feel that my roots stick in your soil, and the old wounds +are beginning to break open. You are a dangerous woman, Tekla! + +TEKLA. Am I? And my young husband says that I can make no more +conquests. + +GUSTAV. That means he has ceased to love you. + +TEKLA. Well, I can't quite make out what love means to him. + +GUSTAV. You have been playing hide and seek so long that at last you +cannot find each other at all. Such things do happen. You have had to +play the innocent to yourself, until he has lost his courage. There +ARE some drawbacks to a change, I tell you--there are drawbacks to it, +indeed. + +TEKLA. Do you mean to reproach-- + +GUSTAV. Not at all! Whatever happens is to a certain extent necessary, +for if it didn't happen, something else would--but now it did happen, +and so it had to happen. + +TEKLA. YOU are a man of discernment. And I have never met anybody with +whom I liked so much to exchange ideas. You are so utterly free from +all morality and preaching, and you ask so little of people, that it is +possible to be oneself in your presence. Do you know, I am jealous of +your intended wife! + +GUSTAV. And do you realise that I am jealous of your husband? + +TEKLA. [Rising] And now we must part! Forever! + +GUSTAV. Yes, we must part! But not without a farewell--or what do you +say? + +TEKLA. [Agitated] No! + +GUSTAV. [Following after her] Yes!--Let us have a farewell! Let us drown +our memories--you know, there are intoxications so deep that when you +wake up all memories are gone. [Putting his arm around her waist] You +have been dragged down by a diseased spirit, who is infecting you with +his own anaemia. I'll breathe new life into you. I'll make your talent +blossom again in your autumn days, like a remontant rose. I'll---- + +(Two LADIES in travelling dress are seen in the doorway leading to the +veranda. They look surprised. Then they point at those within, laugh, +and disappear.) + +TEKLA. [Freeing herself] Who was that? + +GUSTAV. [Indifferently] Some tourists. + +TEKLA. Leave me alone! I am afraid of you! + +GUSTAV. Why? + +TEKLA. You take my soul away from me! + +GUSTAV. And give you my own in its place! And you have no soul for that +matter--it's nothing but a delusion. + +TEKLA. You have a way of saying impolite things so that nobody can be +angry with you. + +GUSTAV. It's because you feel that I hold the first mortgage on +you--Tell me now, when--and--where? + +TEKLA. No, it wouldn't be right to him. I think he is still in love with +me, and I don't want to do any more harm. + +GUSTAV. He does not love you! Do you want proofs? + +TEKLA, Where can you get them? + +GUSTAV. [Picking up the pieces of the photograph from the floor] Here! +See for yourself! + +TEKLA. Oh, that's an outrage! + +GUSTAV. Do you see? Now then, when? And where? + +TEKLA. The false-hearted wretch! + +GUSTAV. When? + +TEKLA. He leaves to-night, with the eight-o'clock boat. + +GUSTAV. And then-- + +TEKLA. At nine! [A noise is heard from the adjoining room] Who can be +living in there that makes such a racket? + +GUSTAV. Let's see! [Goes over and looks through the keyhole] There's a +table that has been upset, and a smashed water caraffe--that's all! I +shouldn't wonder if they had left a dog locked up in there.--At nine +o'clock then? + +TEKLA. All right! And let him answer for it himself.--What a depth of +deceit! And he who has always preached about truthfulness, and tried +to teach me to tell the truth!--But wait a little--how was it now? +He received me with something like hostility--didn't meet me at the +landing--and then--and then he made some remark about young men on +board the boat, which I pretended not to hear--but how could he know? +Wait--and then he began to philosophise about women--and then the +spectre of you seemed to be haunting him--and he talked of becoming a +sculptor, that being the art of the time--exactly in accordance with +your old speculations! + +GUSTAV. No, really! + +TEKLA. No, really?--Oh, now I understand! Now I begin to see what a +hideous creature you are! You have been here before and stabbed him to +death! It was you who had been sitting there on the sofa; it was you who +made him think himself an epileptic--that he had to live in celibacy; +that he ought to rise in rebellion against his wife; yes, it was +you!--How long have you been here? + +GUSTAV. I have been here a week. + +TEKLA. It was you, then, I saw on board the boat? + +GUSTAV. It was. + +TEKLA. And now you were thinking you could trap me? + +GUSTAV. It has been done. + +TEKLA. Not yet! + +GUSTAV. Yes! + +TEKLA. Like a wolf you went after my lamb. You came here with a +villainous plan to break up my happiness, and you were carrying it out, +when my eyes were opened, and I foiled you. + +GUSTAV. Not quite that way, if you please. This is how it happened +in reality. Of course, it has been my secret hope that disaster might +overtake you. But I felt practically certain that no interference on +my part was required. And besides, I have been far too busy to have any +time left for intriguing. But when I happened to be moving about a bit, +and happened to see you with those young men on board the boat, then I +guessed the time had come for me to take a look at the situation. I came +here, and your lamb threw itself into the arms of the wolf. I won his +affection by some sort of reminiscent impression which I shall not be +tactless enough to explain to you. At first he aroused my sympathy, +because he seemed to be in the same fix as I was once. But then he +happened to touch old wounds--that book, you know, and "the idiot"--and +I was seized with a wish to pick him to pieces, and to mix up these so +thoroughly that they couldn't be put together again--and I succeeded, +thanks to the painstaking way in which you had done the work of +preparation. Then I had to deal with you. For you were the spring that +had kept the works moving, and you had to be taken apart--and what a +buzzing followed!--When I came in here, I didn't know exactly what to +say. Like a chess-player, I had laid a number of tentative plans, of +course, but my play had to depend on your moves. One thing led to the +other, chance lent me a hand, and finally I had you where I wanted +you.--Now you are caught! + +TEKLA. No! + +GUSTAV. Yes, you are! What you least wanted has happened. The world at +large, represented by two lady tourists--whom I had not sent for, as +I am not an intriguer--the world has seen how you became reconciled +to your former husband, and how you sneaked back repentantly into his +faithful arms. Isn't that enough? + +TEKLA. It ought to be enough for your revenge--But tell me, how can you, +who are so enlightened and so right-minded--how is it possible that you, +who think whatever happens must happen, and that all our actions are +determined in advance-- + +GUSTAV. [Correcting her] To a certain extent determined. + +TEKLA. That's the same thing! + +GUSTAV. No! + +TEKLA. [Disregarding him] How is it possible that you, who hold me +guiltless, as I was driven by my nature and the circumstances into +acting as I did--how can you think yourself entitled to revenge--? + +GUSTAV. For that very reason--for the reason that my nature and the +circumstances drove me into seeking revenge. Isn't that giving both +sides a square deal? But do you know why you two had to get the worst of +it in this struggle? + +(TEKLA looks scornful.) + +GUSTAV. And why you were doomed to be fooled? Because I am stronger than +you, and wiser also. You have been the idiot--and he! And now you may +perceive that a man need not be an idiot because he doesn't write novels +or paint pictures. It might be well for you to bear this in mind. + +TEKLA. Are you then entirely without feelings? + +GUSTAV. Entirely! And for that very reason, you know, I am capable of +thinking--in which you have had no experience whatever-and of acting--in +which you have just had some slight experience. + +TEKLA. And all this merely because I have hurt your vanity? + +GUSTAV. Don't call that MERELY! You had better not go around hurting +other people's vanity. They have no more sensitive spot than that. + +TEKLA. Vindictive wretch--shame on you! + +GUSTAV. Dissolute wretch--shame on you! + +TEKLA. Oh, that's my character, is it? + +GUSTAV. Oh, that's my character, is it?--You ought to learn something +about human nature in others before you give your own nature free rein. +Otherwise you may get hurt, and then there will be wailing and gnashing +of teeth. + +TEKLA. You can never forgive:-- + +GUSTAV. Yes, I have forgiven you! + +TEKLA. You! + +GUSTAV. Of course! Have I raised a hand against you during all these +years? No! And now I came here only to have a look at you, and it was +enough to burst your bubble. Have I uttered a single reproach? Have I +moralised or preached sermons? No! I played a joke or two on your dear +consort, and nothing more was needed to finish him.--But there is +no reason why I, the complainant, should be defending myself as I am +now--Tekla! Have you nothing at all to reproach yourself with? + +TEKLA. Nothing at all! Christians say that our actions are governed by +Providence; others call it Fate; in either case, are we not free from +all liability? + +GUSTAV. In a measure, yes; but there is always a narrow margin left +unprotected, and there the liability applies in spite of all. And +sooner or later the creditors make their appearance. Guiltless, but +accountable! Guiltless in regard to one who is no more; accountable to +oneself and one's fellow beings. + +TEKLA. So you came here to dun me? + +GUSTAV. I came to take back what you had stolen, not what you had +received as a gift. You had stolen my honour, and I could recover it +only by taking yours. This, I think, was my right--or was it not? + +TEKLA. Honour? Hm! And now you feel satisfied? + +GUSTAV. Now I feel satisfied. [Rings for a waiter.] + +TEKLA. And now you are going home to your fiancee? + +GUSTAV. I have no fiancee! Nor am I ever going to have one. I am not +going home, for I have no home, and don't want one. + +(A WAITER comes in.) + +GUSTAV. Get me my bill--I am leaving by the eight o'clock boat. + +(THE WAITER bows and goes out.) + +TEKLA. Without making up? + +GUSTAV. Making up? You use such a lot of words that have lost +their--meaning. Why should we make up? Perhaps you want all three of us +to live together? You, if anybody, ought to make up by making good what +you took away, but this you cannot do. You just took, and what you took +you consumed, so that there is nothing left to restore.--Will it satisfy +you if I say like this: forgive me that you tore my heart to pieces; +forgive me that you disgraced me; forgive me that you made me the +laughing-stock of my pupils through every week-day of seven long years; +forgive me that I set you free from parental restraints, that I released +you from the tyranny of ignorance and superstition, that I set you to +rule my house, that I gave you position and friends, that I made a woman +out of the child you were before? Forgive me as I forgive you!--Now I +have torn up your note! Now you can go and settle your account with the +other one! + +TEKLA. What have you done with him? I am beginning to suspect--something +terrible! + +GUSTAV. With him? Do you still love him? + +TEKLA. Yes! + +GUSTAV. And a moment ago it was me! Was that also true? + +TEKLA. It was true. + +GUSTAV. Do you know what you are then? + +TEKLA. You despise me? + +GUSTAV. I pity you. It is a trait--I don't call it a fault--just a +trait, which is rendered disadvantageous by its results. Poor Tekla! I +don't know--but it seems almost as if I were feeling a certain regret, +although I am as free from any guilt--as you! But perhaps it will be +useful to you to feel what I felt that time.--Do you know where your +husband is? + +TEKLA. I think I know now--he is in that room in there! And he has heard +everything! And seen everything! And the man who sees his own wraith +dies! + +(ADOLPH appears in the doorway leading to the veranda. His face is white +as a sheet, and there is a bleeding scratch on one cheek. His eyes are +staring and void of all expression. His lips are covered with froth.) + +GUSTAV. [Shrinking back] No, there he is!--Now you can settle with him +and see if he proves as generous as I have been.--Good-bye! + +(He goes toward the left, but stops before he reaches the door.) + +TEKLA. [Goes to meet ADOLPH with open arms] Adolph! + +(ADOLPH leans against the door-jamb and sinks gradually to the floor.) + +TEKLA. [Throwing herself upon his prostrate body and caressing him] +Adolph! My own child! Are you still alive--oh, speak, speak!--Please +forgive your nasty Tekla! Forgive me, forgive me, forgive me!--Little +brother must say something, I tell him!--No, good God, he doesn't hear! +He is dead! O God in heaven! O my God! Help! + +GUSTAV. Why, she really must have loved HIM, too!--Poor creature! + +(Curtain.) + + + + + +PARIAH + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +Both "Creditors" and "Pariah" were written in the winter of 1888-89 at +Holte, near Copenhagen, where Strindberg, assisted by his first wife, +was then engaged in starting what he called a "Scandinavian Experimental +Theatre." In March, 1889, the two plays were given by students from the +University of Copenhagen, and with Mrs. von Essen Strindberg as Tekla. A +couple of weeks later the performance was repeated across the Sound, +in the Swedish city of Malmo, on which occasion the writer of this +introduction, then a young actor, assisted in the stage management. One +of the actors was Gustav Wied, a Danish playwright and novelist, whose +exquisite art since then has won him European fame. In the audience was +Ola Hansson, a Swedish novelist and poet who had just published a short +story from which Strindberg, according to his own acknowledgment on +playbill and title-page, had taken the name and the theme of "Pariah." + +Mr. Hansson has printed a number of letters (Tilskueren, Copenhagen, +July, 1912) written to him by Strindberg about that time, as well as +some very informative comments of his own. Concerning the performance +of Malmo he writes: "It gave me a very unpleasant sensation. What did +it mean? Why had Strindberg turned my simple theme upsidedown so that +it became unrecognisable? Not a vestige of the 'theme from Ola Hansson' +remained. Yet he had even suggested that he and I act the play together, +I not knowing that it was to be a duel between two criminals. And he had +at first planned to call it 'Aryan and Pariah'--which meant, of course, +that the strong Aryan, Strindberg, was to crush the weak Pariah, +Hansson, coram populo." + +In regard to his own story Mr. Hansson informs us that it dealt with "a +man who commits a forgery and then tells about it, doing both in a sort +of somnambulistic state whereby everything is left vague and undefined." +At that moment "Raskolnikov" was in the air, so to speak. And without +wanting in any way to suggest imitation, I feel sure that the groundnote +of the story was distinctly Dostoievskian. Strindberg himself had been +reading Nietzsche and was--largely under the pressure of a reaction +against the popular disapproval of his anti-feministic attitude--being +driven more and more into a superman philosophy which reached its +climax in the two novels "Chandalah" (1889) and "At the Edge of the Sea" +(1890). The Nietzschean note is unmistakable in the two plays contained +in the present volume. + +But these plays are strongly colored by something else--by something +that is neither Hansson-Dostoievski nor Strindberg-Nietzsche. The +solution of the problem is found in the letters published by +Mr. Hansson. These show that while Strindberg was still planning +"Creditors," and before he had begun "Pariah," he had borrowed +from Hansson a volume of tales by Edgar Allan Poe. It was his +first acquaintance with the work of Poe, though not with American +literature--for among his first printed work was a series of +translations from American humourists; and not long ago a Swedish +critic (Gunnar Castren in Samtiden, Christiania, June, 1912) wrote of +Strindberg's literary beginnings that "he had learned much from Swedish +literature, but probably more from Mark Twain and Dickens." + +The impression Poe made on Strindberg was overwhelming. He returns to +it in one letter after another. Everything that suits his mood of the +moment is "Poesque" or "E. P-esque." The story that seems to have made +the deepest impression of all was "The Gold Bug," though his thought +seems to have distilled more useful material out of certain other +stories illustrating Poe's theories about mental suggestion. Under the +direct influence of these theories, Strindberg, according to his own +statements to Hansson, wrote the powerful one-act play "Simoom," and +made Gustav in "Creditors" actually CALL FORTH the latent epileptic +tendencies in Adolph. And on the same authority we must trace the method +of: psychological detection practised by Mr. X. in "Pariah" directly to +"The Gold Bug." + +Here we have the reason why Mr. Hansson could find so little of his +story in the play. And here we have the origin of a theme which, while +not quite new to him, was ever afterward to remain a favourite one with +Strindberg: that of a duel between intellect and cunning. It forms the +basis of such novels as "Chandalah" and "At the Edge of the Sea," but +it recurs in subtler form in works of much later date. To readers of the +present day, Mr. X.--that striking antithesis of everything a scientist +used to stand for in poetry--is much less interesting as a superman in +spe than as an illustration of what a morally and mentally normal man +can do with the tools furnished him by our new understanding of human +ways and human motives. And in giving us a play that holds our interest +as firmly as the best "love plot" ever devised, although the stage shows +us only two men engaged in an intellectual wrestling match, Strindberg +took another great step toward ridding the drama of its old, shackling +conventions. + +The name of this play has sometimes been translated as "The Outcast," +whereby it becomes confused with "The Outlaw," a much earlier play on +a theme from the old Sagas. I think it better, too, that the Hindu +allusion in the Swedish title be not lost, for the best of men may +become an outcast, but the baseness of the Pariah is not supposed to +spring only from lack of social position. + + + +PARIAH + +AN ACT + +1889 + + + + +PERSONS + + +MR. X., an archaeologist, Middle-aged man. + +MR. Y., an American traveller, Middle-aged man. + + + + +SCENE + +(A simply furnished room in a farmhouse. The door and the windows in the +background open on a landscape. In the middle of the room stands a +big dining-table, covered at one end by books, writing materials, +and antiquities; at the other end, by a microscope, insect cases, and +specimen jars full of alchohol.) + +(On the left side hangs a bookshelf. Otherwise the furniture is that of +a well-to-do farmer.) + +(MR. Y. enters in his shirt-sleeves, carrying a butterfly-net and a +botany-can. He goes straight up to the bookshelf and takes down a book, +which he begins to read on the spot.) + +(The landscape outside and the room itself are steeped in sunlight. The +ringing of church bells indicates that the morning services are just +over. Now and then the cackling of hens is heard from the outside.) + +(MR. X. enters, also in his shirt-sleeves.) + +(MR. Y. starts violently, puts the book back on the shelf upside-down, +and pretends to be looking for another volume.) + +MR. X. This heat is horrible. I guess we are going to have a +thunderstorm. + +MR. Y. What makes you think so? + +MR. X. The bells have a kind of dry ring to them, the flies are sticky, +and the hens cackle. I meant to go fishing, but I couldn't find any +worms. Don't you feel nervous? + +MR. Y. [Cautiously] I?--A little. + +MR. X. Well, for that matter, you always look as if you were expecting +thunderstorms. + +MR. Y. [With a start] Do I? + +MR. X. Now, you are going away tomorrow, of course, so it is not to be +wondered at that you are a little "journey-proud."--Anything new?--Oh, +there's the mail! [Picks up some letters from the table] My, I have +palpitation of the heart every time I open a letter! Nothing but debts, +debts, debts! Have you ever had any debts? + +MR. Y. [After some reflection] N-no. + +MR. X. Well, then you don't know what it means to receive a lot of +overdue bills. [Reads one of the letters] The rent unpaid--the landlord +acting nasty--my wife in despair. And here am I sitting waist-high in +gold! [He opens an iron-banded box that stands on the table; then both +sit down at the table, facing each other] Just look--here I have +six thousand crowns' worth of gold which I have dug up in the last +fortnight. This bracelet alone would bring me the three hundred and +fifty crowns I need. And with all of it I might make a fine career for +myself. Then I could get the illustrations made for my treatise at once; +I could get my work printed, and--I could travel! Why don't I do it, do +you suppose? + +MR. Y. I suppose you are afraid to be found out. + +MR. X. That, too, perhaps. But don't you think an intelligent fellow +like myself might fix matters so that he was never found out? I am alone +all the time--with nobody watching me--while I am digging out there in +the fields. It wouldn't be strange if I put something in my own pockets +now and then. + +MR. Y. Yes, but the worst danger lies in disposing of the stuff. + +MR. X. Pooh! I'd melt it down, of course--every bit of it--and then I'd +turn it into coins--with just as much gold in them as genuine ones, of +course--- + +MR. Y. Of course! + +MR. X. Well, you can easily see why. For if I wanted to dabble in +counterfeits, then I need not go digging for gold first. [Pause] It is a +strange thing anyhow, that if anybody else did what I cannot make myself +do, then I'd be willing to acquit him--but I couldn't possibly acquit +myself. I might even make a brilliant speech in defence of the thief, +proving that this gold was res nullius, or nobody's, as it had been +deposited at a time when property rights did not yet exist; that even +under existing rights it could belong only to the first finder of it, as +the ground-owner has never included it in the valuation of his property; +and so on. + +MR. Y. And probably it would be much easier for you to do this if +the--hm!--the thief had not been prompted by actual need, but by a +mania for collecting, for instance--or by scientific aspirations--by the +ambition to keep a discovery to himself. Don't you think so? + +MR. X. You mean that I could not acquit him if actual need had been the +motive? Yes, for that's the only motive which the law will not accept in +extenuation. That motive makes a plain theft of it. + +MR. Y. And this you couldn't excuse? + +MR. X. Oh, excuse--no, I guess not, as the law wouldn't. On the other +hand, I must admit that it would be hard for me to charge a collector +with theft merely because he had appropriated some specimen not yet +represented in his own collection. + +MR. Y. So that vanity or ambition might excuse what could not be excused +by need? + +MR. X. And yet need ought to be the more telling excuse--the only +one, in fact? But I feel as I have said. And I can no more change this +feeling than I can change my own determination not to steal under any +circumstances whatever. + +MR. Y. And I suppose you count it a great merit that you +cannot--hm!--steal? + +MR. X. No, my disinclination to steal is just as irresistible as the +inclination to do so is irresistible with some people. So it cannot be +called a merit. I cannot do it, and the other one cannot refrain!--But +you understand, of course, that I am not without a desire to own this +gold. Why don't I take it then? Because I cannot! It's an inability--and +the lack of something cannot be called a merit. There! + +[Closes the box with a slam. Stray clouds have cast their shadows on the +landscape and darkened the room now and then. Now it grows quite dark as +when a thunderstorm is approaching.] + +MR. X. How close the air is! I guess the storm is coming all right. + +[MR. Y. gets up and shuts the door and all the windows.] + +MR. X. Are you afraid of thunder? + +MR. Y. It's just as well to be careful. + +(They resume their seats at the table.) + +MR. X. You're a curious chap! Here you come dropping down like a bomb +a fortnight ago, introducing yourself as a Swedish-American who is +collecting flies for a small museum--- + +MR. Y. Oh, never mind me now! + +MR. X. That's what you always say when I grow tired of talking about +myself and want to turn my attention to you. Perhaps that was the reason +why I took to you as I did--because you let me talk about myself? All at +once we seemed like old friends. There were no angles about you against +which I could bump myself, no pins that pricked. There was something +soft about your whole person, and you overflowed with that tact which +only well-educated people know how to show. You never made a noise when +you came home late at night or got up early in the morning. You were +patient in small things, and you gave in whenever a conflict seemed +threatening. In a word, you proved yourself the perfect companion! But +you were entirely too compliant not to set me wondering about you in the +long run--and you are too timid, too easily frightened. It seems almost +as if you were made up of two different personalities. Why, as I sit +here looking at your back in the mirror over there--it is as if I were +looking at somebody else. + +(MR. Y. turns around and stares at the mirror.) + +MR. X. No, you cannot get a glimpse of your own back, man!--In front you +appear like a fearless sort of fellow, one meeting his fate with bared +breast, but from behind--really, I don't want to be impolite, but--you +look as if you were carrying a burden, or as if you were crouching to +escape a raised stick. And when I look at that red cross your suspenders +make on your white shirt--well, it looks to me like some kind of emblem, +like a trade-mark on a packing-box-- + +MR. Y. I feel as if I'd choke--if the storm doesn't break soon-- + +MR. X. It's coming--don't you worry!--And your neck! It looks as if +there ought to be another kind of face on top of it, a face quite +different in type from yours. And your ears come so close together +behind that sometimes I wonder what race you belong to. [A flash of +lightning lights up the room] Why, it looked as if that might have +struck the sheriff's house! + +MR. Y. [Alarmed] The sheriff's! + +MR. X. Oh, it just looked that way. But I don't think we'll get much of +this storm. Sit down now and let us have a talk, as you are going away +to-morrow. One thing I find strange is that you, with whom I have become +so intimate in this short time--that you are one of those whose image +I cannot call up when I am away from them. When you are not here, and +I happen to think of you, I always get the vision of another +acquaintance--one who does not resemble you, but with whom you have +certain traits in common. + +MR. Y. Who is he? + +MR. X. I don't want to name him, but--I used for several years to take +my meals at a certain place, and there, at the side-table where they +kept the whiskey and the otter preliminaries, I met a little blond man, +with blond, faded eyes. He had a wonderful faculty for making his way +through a crowd, without jostling anybody or being jostled himself. And +from his customary place down by the door he seemed perfectly able to +reach whatever he wanted on a table that stood some six feet away from +him. He seemed always happy just to be in company. But when he met +anybody he knew, then the joy of it made him roar with laughter, and he +would hug and pat the other fellow as if he hadn't seen a human face +for years. When anybody stepped on his foot, he smiled as if eager to +apologise for being in the way. For two years I watched him and amused +myself by guessing at his occupation and character. But I never asked +who he was; I didn't want to know, you see, for then all the fun would +have been spoiled at once. That man had just your quality of being +indefinite. At different times I made him out to be a teacher who +had never got his licence, a non-commissioned officer, a druggist, a +government clerk, a detective--and like you, he looked as if made out of +two pieces, for the front of him never quite fitted the back. One day +I happened to read in a newspaper about a big forgery committed by +a well-known government official. Then I learned that my indefinite +gentleman had been a partner of the forger's brother, and that his name +was Strawman. Later on I learned that the aforesaid Strawman used to run +a circulating library, but that he was now the police reporter of a big +daily. How in the world could I hope to establish a connection between +the forgery, the police, and my little man's peculiar manners? It was +beyond me; and when I asked a friend whether Strawman had ever been +punished for something, my friend couldn't answer either yes or no--he +just didn't know! [Pause.] + +MR. Y. Well, had he ever been--punished? + +MR. X. No, he had not. [Pause.] + +MR. Y. And that was the reason, you think, why the police had such an +attraction for him, and why he was so afraid of offending people? + +MR. X. Exactly! + +MR. Y. And did you become acquainted with him afterward? + +MR. X. No, I didn't want to. [Pause.] + +MR. Y. Would you have been willing to make his acquaintance if he had +been--punished? + +MR. X. Perfectly! + +(MR. Y. rises and walks back and forth several times.) + +MR. X. Sit still! Why can't you sit still? + +MR. Y. How did you get your liberal view of human conditions? Are you a +Christian? + +MR. X. Oh, can't you see that I am not? + +(MR. Y. makes a face.) + +MR. X. The Christians require forgiveness. But I require punishment in +order that the balance, or whatever you may call it, be restored. And +you, who have served a term, ought to know the difference. + +MR. Y. [Stands motionless and stares at MR. X., first with wild, hateful +eyes, then with surprise and admiration] How--could--you--know--that? + +MR. X. Why, I could see it. + +MR. Y. How? How could you see it? + +MR. X, Oh, with a little practice. It is an art, like many others. But +don't let us talk of it any more. [He looks at his watch, arranges a +document on the table, dips a pen in the ink-well, and hands it to MR. +Y.] I must be thinking of my tangled affairs. Won't you please witness +my signature on this note here? I am going to turn it in to the bank at +Malmo tomorrow, when I go to the city with you. + +MR. Y. I am not going by way of Malmo. + +MR. X. Oh, you are not? + +MR. Y. No. + +MR. X. But that need not prevent you from witnessing my signature. + +MR. Y. N-no!--I never write my name on papers of that kind-- + +MR. X.--any longer! This is the fifth time you have refused to write +your own name. The first time nothing more serious was involved than the +receipt for a registered letter. Then I began to watch you. And since +then I have noticed that you have a morbid fear of a pen filled with +ink. You have not written a single letter since you came here--only a +post-card, and that you wrote with a blue pencil. You understand now +that I have figured out the exact nature of your slip? Furthermore! This +is something like the seventh time you have refused to come with me to +Malmo, which place you have not visited at all during all this time. And +yet you came the whole way from America merely to have a look at Malmo! +And every morning you walk a couple of miles, up to the old mill, just +to get a glimpse of the roofs of Malmo in the distance. And when you +stand over there at the right-hand window and look out through the third +pane from the bottom on the left side, you can see the spired turrets of +the castle and the tall chimney of the county jail.--And now I hope you +see that it's your own stupidity rather than my cleverness which has +made everything clear to me. + +MR. Y. This means that you despise me? + +MR. X. Oh, no! + +MR. Y. Yes, you do--you cannot but do it! + +MR. X. No--here's my hand. + +(MR. Y. takes hold of the outstretched hand and kisses it.) + +MR. X. [Drawing back his hand] Don't lick hands like a dog! + +MR. Y. Pardon me, sir, but you are the first one who has let me touch +his hand after learning-- + +MR. X. And now you call me "sir!"--What scares me about you is that you +don't feel exonerated, washed clean, raised to the old level, as good +as anybody else, when you have suffered your punishment. Do you care to +tell me how it happened? Would you? + +MR. Y. [Twisting uneasily] Yes, but you won't believe what I say. But +I'll tell you. Then you can see for yourself that I am no ORDINARY +criminal. You'll become convinced, I think, that there are errors which, +so to speak, are involuntary--[twisting again] which seem to commit +themselves--spontaneously--without being willed by oneself, and for +which one cannot be held responsible--May I open the door a little now, +since the storm seems to have passed over? + +MR. X. Suit yourself. + +MR. Y. [Opens the door; then he sits down at the table and begins to +speak with exaggerated display of feeling, theatrical gestures, and a +good deal of false emphasis] Yes, I'll tell you! I was a student in the +university at Lund, and I needed to get a loan from a bank. I had no +pressing debts, and my father owned some property--not a great deal, of +course. However, I had sent the note to the second man of the two who +were to act as security, and, contrary to expectations, it came back +with a refusal. For a while I was completely stunned by the blow, for it +was a very unpleasant surprise--most unpleasant! The note was lying in +front of me on the table, and the letter lay beside it. At first my eyes +stared hopelessly at those lines that pronounced my doom--that is, not a +death-doom, of course, for I could easily find other securities, as many +as I wanted--but as I have already said, it was very annoying just +the same. And as I was sitting there quite unconscious of any evil +intention, my eyes fastened upon the signature of the letter, which +would have made my future secure if it had only appeared in the right +place. It was an unusually well-written signature--and you know how +sometimes one may absent-mindedly scribble a sheet of paper full of +meaningless words. I had a pen in my hand--[picks up a penholder from +the table] like this. And somehow it just began to run--I don't want +to claim that there was anything mystical--anything of a spiritualistic +nature back of it--for that kind of thing I don't believe in! It was +a wholly unreasoned, mechanical process--my copying of that beautiful +autograph over and over again. When all the clean space on the letter +was used up, I had learned to reproduce the signature automatically--and +then--[throwing away the penholder with a violent gesture] then I forgot +all about it. That night I slept long and heavily. And when I woke up, +I could feel that I had been dreaming, but I couldn't recall the dream +itself. At times it was as if a door had been thrown ajar, and then +I seemed to see the writing-table with the note on it as in a distant +memory--and when I got out of bed, I was forced up to the table, just as +if, after careful deliberation, I had formed an irrevocable decision to +sign the name to that fateful paper. All thought of the consequences, +of the risk involved, had disappeared--no hesitation remained--it was +almost as if I was fulfilling some sacred duty--and so I wrote! [Leaps +to his feet] What could it be? Was it some kind of outside influence, a +case of mental suggestion, as they call it? But from whom could it come? +I was sleeping alone in that room. Could it possibly be my primitive +self--the savage to whom the keeping of faith is an unknown thing--which +pushed to the front while my consciousness was asleep--together with the +criminal will of that self, and its inability to calculate the results +of an action? Tell me, what do you think of it? + +MR. X. [As if he had to force the words out of himself] Frankly +speaking, your story does not convince me--there are gaps in it, but +these may depend on your failure to recall all the details--and I +have read something about criminal suggestion--or I think I have, at +least--hm! But all that is neither here nor there! You have taken your +medicine--and you have had the courage to acknowledge your fault. Now we +won't talk of it any more. + +MR. Y. Yes, yes, yes, we must talk of it--till I become sure of my +innocence. + +MR. X. Well, are you not? + +MR. Y. No, I am not! + +MR. X. That's just what bothers me, I tell you. It's exactly what is +bothering me!--Don't you feel fairly sure that every human being hides +a skeleton in his closet? Have we not, all of us, stolen and lied as +children? Undoubtedly! Well, now there are persons who remain children +all their lives, so that they cannot control their unlawful desires. +Then comes the opportunity, and there you have your criminal.--But I +cannot understand why you don't feel innocent. If the child is not held +responsible, why should the criminal be regarded differently? It is +the more strange because--well, perhaps I may come to repent it later. +[Pause] I, for my part, have killed a man, and I have never suffered any +qualms on account of it. + +MR. Y. [Very much interested] Have--you? + +MR. X, Yes, I, and none else! Perhaps you don't care to shake hands with +a murderer? + +MR. Y. [Pleasantly] Oh, what nonsense! + +MR. X. Yes, but I have not been punished, + +ME. Y. [Growing more familiar and taking on a superior tone] So much the +better for you!--How did you get out of it? + +MR. X. There was nobody to accuse me, no suspicions, no witnesses. +This is the way it happened. One Christmas I was invited to hunt with +a fellow-student a little way out of Upsala. He sent a besotted old +coachman to meet me at the station, and this fellow went to sleep on the +box, drove the horses into a fence, and upset the whole equipage in +a ditch. I am not going to pretend that my life was in danger. It was +sheer impatience which made me hit him across the neck with the edge of +my hand--you know the way--just to wake him up--and the result was that +he never woke up at all, but collapsed then and there. + +MR. Y. [Craftily] And did you report it? + +MR. X. No, and these were my reasons for not doing so. The man left +no family behind him, or anybody else to whom his life could be of +the slightest use. He had already outlived his allotted period of +vegetation, and his place might just as well be filled by somebody more +in need of it. On the other hand, my life was necessary to the happiness +of my parents and myself, and perhaps also to the progress of my +science. The outcome had once for all cured me of any desire to wake up +people in that manner, and I didn't care to spoil both my own life and +that of my parents for the sake of an abstract principle of justice. + +MR. Y. Oh, that's the way you measure the value of a human life? + +MR. X. In the present case, yes. + +MR. Y. But the sense of guilt--that balance you were speaking of? + +MR. X. I had no sense of guilt, as I had committed no crime. As a boy I +had given and taken more than one blow of the same kind, and the fatal +outcome in this particular case was simply caused by my ignorance of the +effect such a blow might have on an elderly person. + +MR. Y. Yes, but even the unintentional killing of a man is punished +with a two-year term at hard labour--which is exactly what one gets +for--writing names. + +MR. X. Oh, you may be sure I have thought of it. And more than one night +I have dreamt myself in prison. Tell me now--is it really as bad as they +say to find oneself behind bolt and bar? + +MR. Y. You bet it is!--First of all they disfigure you by cutting off +your hair, and if you don't look like a criminal before, you are sure +to do so afterward. And when you catch sight of yourself in a mirror you +feel quite sure that you are a regular bandit. + +MR. X. Isn't it a mask that is being torn off, perhaps? Which wouldn't +be a bad idea, I should say. + +MR. Y. Yes, you can have your little jest about it!--And then they cut +down your food, so that every day and every hour you become conscious of +the border line between life and death. Every vital function is more or +less checked. You can feel yourself shrinking. And your soul, which was +to be cured and improved, is instead put on a starvation diet--pushed +back a thousand years into outlived ages. You are not permitted to +read anything but what was written for the savages who took part in the +migration of the peoples. You hear of nothing but what will never happen +in heaven; and what actually does happen on the earth is kept hidden +from you. You are torn out of your surroundings, reduced from your own +class, put beneath those who are really beneath yourself. Then you get +a sense of living in the bronze age. You come to feel as if you were +dressed in skins, as if you were living in a cave and eating out of a +trough--ugh! + +MR. X. But there is reason back of all that. One who acts as if he +belonged to the bronze age might surely be expected to don the proper +costume. + +MR. Y. [Irately] Yes, you sneer! You who have behaved like a man from +the stone age--and who are permitted to live in the golden age. + +MR. X. [Sharply, watching him closely] What do you mean with that last +expression--the golden age? + +MR. Y. [With a poorly suppressed snarl] Nothing at all. + +MR. X. Now you lie--because you are too much of a coward to say all you +think. + +MR. Y. Am I a coward? You think so? But I was no coward when I dared to +show myself around here, where I had had to suffer as I did.--But can +you tell what makes one suffer most while in there?--It is that the +others are not in there too! + +MR. X. What others? + +MR. Y. Those that go unpunished. + +MR. X. Are you thinking of me? + +MR. Y. I am. + +MR. X. But I have committed no crime. + +MR. Y. Oh, haven't you? + +MR. X. No, a misfortune is no crime. + +MR. Y. So, it's a misfortune to commit murder? + +MR. X. I have not committed murder. + +MR. Y. Is it not murder to kill a person? + +MR. X. Not always. The law speaks of murder, manslaughter, killing +in self-defence--and it makes a distinction between intentional and +unintentional killing. However--now you really frighten me, for it's +becoming plain to me that you belong to the most dangerous of all human +groups--that of the stupid. + +MR. Y. So you imagine that I am stupid? Well, listen--would you like me +to show you how clever I am? + +MR. X. Come on! + +MR. Y. I think you'll have to admit that there is both logic and +wisdom in the argument I'm now going to give you. You have suffered a +misfortune which might have brought you two years at hard labor. You +have completely escaped the disgrace of being punished. And here you see +before you a man--who has also suffered a misfortune--the victim of an +unconscious impulse--and who has had to stand two years of hard labor +for it. Only by some great scientific achievement can this man wipe +off the taint that has become attached to him without any fault of +his own--but in order to arrive at some such achievement, he must have +money--a lot of money--and money this minute! Don't you think that the +other one, the unpunished one, would bring a little better balance into +these unequal human conditions if he paid a penalty in the form of a +fine? Don't you think so? + +MR. X. [Calmly] Yes. + +MR. Y. Then we understand each other.--Hm! [Pause] What do you think +would be reasonable? + +MR. X. Reasonable? The minimum fine in such a case is fixed by the law +at fifty crowns. But this whole question is settled by the fact that the +dead man left no relatives. + +MR. Y. Apparently you don't want to understand. Then I'll have to speak +plainly: it is to me you must pay that fine. + +MR. X. I have never heard that forgers have the right to collect fines +imposed for manslaughter. And, besides, there is no prosecutor. + +MR. Y. There isn't? Well--how would I do? + +MR. X. Oh, NOW we are getting the matter cleared up! How much do you +want for becoming my accomplice? + +MR. Y. Six thousand crowns. + +MR. X. That's too much. And where am I to get them? + +(MR. Y. points to the box.) + +MR. X. No, I don't want to do that. I don't want to become a thief. + +MR. Y. Oh, don't put on any airs now! Do you think I'll believe that you +haven't helped yourself out of that box before? + +MR. X. [As if speaking to himself] Think only, that I could let myself +be fooled so completely. But that's the way with these soft natures. +You like them, and then it's so easy to believe that they like you. And +that's the reason why I have always been on my guard against people I +take a liking to!--So you are firmly convinced that I have helped myself +out of the box before? + +MR. Y. Certainly! MR. X. And you are going to report me if you don't get +six thousand crowns? + +MR. Y. Most decidedly! You can't get out of it, so there's no use +trying. + +MR. X. You think I am going to give my father a thief for son, my wife +a thief for husband, my children a thief for father, my fellow-workers a +thief for colleague? No, that will never happen!--Now I am going over to +the sheriff to report the killing myself. + +MR. Y. [Jumps up and begins to pick up his things] Wait a moment! + +MR. X. For what? + +MR. Y. [Stammering] Oh, I thought--as I am no longer needed--it wouldn't +be necessary for me to stay--and I might just as well leave. + +MR. X. No, you may not!--Sit down there at the table, where you sat +before, and we'll have another talk before you go. + +MR. Y. [Sits down after having put on a dark coat] What are you up to +now? + +MR. X. [Looking into the mirror back of MR. Y.] Oh, now I have it! +Oh-h-h! + +MR. Y. [Alarmed] What kind of wonderful things are you discovering now? + +MR. X. I see in the mirror that you are a thief--a plain, ordinary +thief! A moment ago, while you had only the white shirt on, I could +notice that there was something wrong about my book-shelf. I couldn't +make out just what it was, for I had to listen to you and watch you. But +as my antipathy increased, my vision became more acute. And now, with +your black coat to furnish the needed color contrast For the red back +of the book, which before couldn't be seen against the red of your +suspenders--now I see that you have been reading about forgeries in +Bernheim's work on mental suggestion--for you turned the book upsidedown +in putting it back. So even that story of yours was stolen! For tins +reason I think myself entitled to conclude that your crime must have +been prompted by need, or by mere love of pleasure. + +MR. Y. By need! If you only knew-- + +MR. X. If YOU only knew the extent of the need I have had to face and +live through! But that's another story! Let's proceed with your case. +That you have been in prison--I take that for granted. But it happened +in America, for it was American prison life you described. Another thing +may also be taken for granted, namely, that you have not borne your +punishment on this side. + +MR. Y. How can you imagine anything of the kind? + +MR. X. Wait until the sheriff gets here, and you'll learn all about it. + +(MR. Y. gets up.) + +ME. X. There you see! The first time I mentioned the sheriff, in +connection with the storm, you wanted also to run away. And when a +person has served out his time he doesn't care to visit an old mill +every day just to look at a prison, or to stand by the window--in a +word, you are at once punished and unpunished. And that's why it was so +hard to make you out. [Pause.] + +MR. Y. [Completely beaten] May I go now? + +MR. X. Now you can go. + +MR. Y. [Putting his things together] Are you angry at me? + +MR. X. Yes--would you prefer me to pity you? + +MR. Y. [Sulkily] Pity? Do you think you're any better than I? + +MR. X. Of course I do, as I AM better than you. I am wiser, and I am +less of a menace to prevailing property rights. + +MR. Y. You think you are clever, but perhaps I am as clever as you. For +the moment you have me checked, but in the next move I can mate you--all +the same! + +MR. X. [Looking hard at MR. Y.] So we have to have another bout! What +kind of mischief are you up to now? + +MR. Y. That's my secret. + +MR. X. Just look at me--oh, you mean to write my wife an anonymous +letter giving away MY secret! + +MR. Y. Well, how are you going to prevent it? You don't dare to have me +arrested. So you'll have to let me go. And when I am gone, I can do what +I please. + +MR. X. You devil! So you have found my vulnerable spot! Do you want to +make a real murderer out of me? + +MR. Y. That's more than you'll ever become--coward! + +MR. X. There you see how different people are. You have a feeling that I +cannot become guilty of the same kind of acts as you. And that gives you +the upper hand. But suppose you forced me to treat you as I treated that +coachman? + +[He lifts his hand as if ready to hit MR. Y.] + +MR. Y. [Staring MR. X. straight in the face] You can't! It's too much +for one who couldn't save himself by means of the box over there. + +ME. X. So you don't think I have taken anything out of the box? + +MR. Y. You were too cowardly--just as you were too cowardly to tell your +wife that she had married a murderer. + +MR. X. You are a different man from what I took you to be--if stronger +or weaker, I cannot tell--if more criminal or less, that's none of my +concern--but decidedly more stupid; that much is quite plain. For stupid +you were when you wrote another person's name instead of begging--as +I have had to do. Stupid you were when you stole things out of my +book--could you not guess that I might have read my own books? Stupid +you were when you thought yourself cleverer than me, and when you +thought that I could be lured into becoming a thief. Stupid you were +when you thought balance could be restored by giving the world two +thieves instead of one. But most stupid of all you were when you thought +I had failed to provide a safe corner-stone for my happiness. Go ahead +and write my wife as many anonymous letters as you please about +her husband having killed a man--she knew that long before we were +married!--Have you had enough now? + +MR. Y. May I go? + +MR. X. Now you HAVE to go! And at once! I'll send your things after +you!--Get out of here! + +(Curtain.) + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Creditors; Pariah, by August Strindberg + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CREDITORS; PARIAH *** + +***** This file should be named 5053.txt or 5053.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/0/5/5053/ + +Produced by Nicole Apostola, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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