The Essential Russian Plays & Short Stories. Максим Горький
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problem — Begad, it’s so seductive to be a pioneer. (Picks up cards.) Still, I think I should have been a reactionary. I don’t know what would have been, and, what is, oh! better I didn’t! (Tears the pack of cards in half. Arab boy arranges swords for the dance.)
Companion: Ah! here’s the black boy.
Master (smiles): Young sulks!
Friend: What do you keep him for?
Master: Isn’t he interesting?
Companion: In his eyes there is so much longing for the sultry sun and the sweet palms, that beside it our sorrows seem pale and unsubstantial.
Friend: Excellent!
Master (to Companion): Play us something.
Companion (to Friend): But you like music?
Master: He adores it. (To Friend.) Would you like to hear Mozart on the clavichord?
Friend: Perhaps the andante from the C sharp?
Master: I agree. (Goes to the fire and throws away the halves of the torn cards.)
Friend: Listen. For the last time I ask you to come back to us. I can’t believe that you could seriously — Lord! how my head’s turning from the mead and everything!
Master (coolly): He who is free from too firm convictions, who has passed through the school of the new Sakya-Muni and the new Zarathustra, who is far too clever to be ashamed to talk nonsense, who so resembles an Olympian that he is strong enough even to laugh at others’ misfortunes — tell me on your conscience, what should such a man do among wretched, grey, blue-eyed neurasthenics, people who to-day or to-morrow will become Americans!
Friend: H’m. — Certainly, on those conditions — H’m — you know, it seems to me, the dramatic upshot of your working life would not be so terrible if you actually did go mad.
Master: You think so?
Friend: And know this, whether you’ll be angry with me or not, all the same I’ll tell everybody at Petersburg that you’re mad!
Master: What for?
Friend: What for? Can I explain all this to them, are they capable of allowing for—— No, it’s impossible. Well, what shall I tell them; what shall I tell them?
Master: Tell them I’m fastidious — after that it’s just routine! Say that I don’t want their life! Be it full of all possible happiness, but — life is a little twig of lilac seized in the hand in the search for happiness, many-leaved happiness. Their life is ugly, withered, confused, soiled — in short, it’s the life of the mob, though perhaps great happiness is hidden in it. My life is the twig of lilac which no one yet has touched, in which no one till me has yet sought his happiness——
Friend: You want them to think I’m laughing at them.
Master: And don’t they deserve to be laughed at?
Companion (sitting at clavichord): May I begin?
Master: Please! (Companion plays the andante cantabile from Mozart’s sonata in C sharp. Friend listens enraptured. Master stands by the hearth, smiling sadly. After the first few bars of the third part of the andante.)
Friend (as if raving): Lord! Oh, my God! I’m asleep — I know it — I’m asleep and can’t wake up! Divine Mozart! You died not long ago! Oh, my head! What’s wrong with my heart; why are there tears in my eyes? — Divine Mozart! What was far becomes near — very near. (To Master.) I know the worth of your words — they were all vain — vain — a game, a leap-frog of paradoxes, a dazzling firework of crackling phrases! I know you’re wrong, I know that well, but — my dear fellow — I — I feel for the moment as if you were right. D’you hear — I feel I understand it within my mind and — I’m ashamed, I’m absurdly ashamed to be in this grey, this shiny jacket. — Oh, my head! — It’s burning, it’s drugged with the floweriness of your words, the theatricalness of your poses — it’s drunk with the look of this room. Your pathos is contagious! I’ve become like you! I’ve made myself a faithful mirror. What herbs, what resins are you burning? Flight! I want to flee from here! The seduction is too great; my soul has become too yielding. I don’t want to be infected, I don’t want to die, and a life like yours is the beginning of death. You’ve heard how men that are being hanged or drowning or freezing see magic dreams as they die. This sort of life is such a dream; this sort of life is the beginning of death. You have separated from us, from all society, from real life, and an early death is inevitable for you! — It’s all the same, whether she comes as madness or in her usual guise — it’s inevitable, I tell you. This strong mead has heated my head; who knows, perhaps it has made me a prophet. — An early death is inevitable for you! D’you hear, inevitable!
Master: Amen.
Friend: If you permit, I shall sleep here to-night; I’m too tired, but early to-morrow morning, at sunrise, give me horses, the quickest you have. (A pause. Companion finishes the andante. Master kisses her.)
Master (passionately): Hey! Begin! Androgyne, where are you? Quick! (To Companion.) Play! I like that “Dance of the Wrathful Road.” It’s the path of our life. Oh, don’t joke! even we can be serious! It’s the path of our life with its fatal dangers! One must be very clever not to suffer on this wrathful road. Play, girl! Grusha, dance! Begin! (Companion begins Bach’s bourrée in E sharp. Fool and Arab laugh merrily. Enter Maid and begins to dance.)
(Curtain)
THE CHOICE OF A TUTOR
By Denis von Vísin
Characters
Count and Countess Weakhead
| Wisely The Young Count Countess Folliest | Flatternot Nurses Pelican |
Servant
The Choice of a Tutor
Scene I
Countess Weakhead (looking at the time): It has only just struck eight. Why have you risen so early, Count?
Count: In the country it is a good thing to get up a little early.
Countess: Yes, but not for a count. Your highness ought to live like a count; we do not have to manage our affairs; thank God, we own three thousand souls, and it will last our time; and then I am not educated to look after things.
Count: True, Countess; and I do not know anyone of your father's line who would be able to manage affairs. The line of Whirligigs is noble, I agree; but not one Whirligig can manage affairs.
Countess: Certainly; I, although not a countess in my own right, am, however, of a good family of nobles, and I think that my line does no discredit to the line of the Counts Weakhead.
Count: Countess, friend, I rose early to-day because I am concerned for the education of our Count Basil. Everyone tells me that he should now have a tutor: where will you find one here in the country?
Countess: It seems to me, it would not be a bad thing to discuss it with our marshal. Although he is not very nice to ladies, yet for Count Basil’s sake I am ready to speak to him; I only fear that he will give our son as instructor such a bear as himself. I mortally dislike serious faces
Count: I doubt whether Mr. Wisely be capable to choose an instructor for the son of Count Weakhead and his countess, born a Whirligig.
Countess: However that may be, I have already sent for him. I think that our Mr. Wisely will not be too proud to visit Count Weakhead. There, he has come already.
Wisely