by Tom Stoppard
ANDERSON: A colleague. Mr McKendrick …
MCKENDRICK: You’re Crisp. (He takes CRISP’s hand and shakes it.) Bill McKendrick. I hear you’re doing some very interesting work in Newcastle. Great stuff. I still like to think of myself as a bit of a left-winger at Stoke. Of course, my stuff is largely empirical—I leave epistemologial questions to the scholastics—eh, Anderson? (He pokes ANDERSON in the ribs.)
ANDERSON: McKendrick …
BROADBENT: Did you say Stoke?
(The lift arives at the ground floor.)
MCKENDRICK: (To BROADBENT) We’ve met, haven’t we? Your face is familiar …
(BROADBENT, CRISP and MCKENDRICK in close attendance leave the lift. ANDERSON is slow on the uptake but follows.)
ANDERSON: McKendrick—?
MCKENDRICK: (Prattling) There’s a choice of open forums tonight—neo-Hegelians or Quinian neo-Positivists. Which do you fancy? Pity Quine couldn’t be here. And Hegel for that matter.
(MCKENDRICK laughs brazenly in the lobby, BROADBENT and CRISP eye him warily. ANDERSON winces.)
5. INT. THE COLLOQUIUM
The general idea is that a lot of philosophers sit in a sort of theatre while on stage one of their number reads a paper from behind a lectern, with a CHAIRMAN in attendance behind him. The set up however is quite complicated. To one side are three glassed-in booths, each one containing ‘simultaneous interpreters’. These interpreters have earphones and microphones. They also have a copy of the lecture being given. One of these interpreters is translating into Czech, another into French, another into German. The audience is furnished either with earphones or with those hand-held phones which are issued in theatres sometimes. Each of these phones can tune into any of the three interpreters depending upon the language of the listener. For our purposes it is better to have the hand-held phones.
It is important to the play, specifically to a later scene when ANDERSON is talking, that the hall and the audience should be substantial.
At the moment ANDERSON is in the audience, sitting next to MCKENDRICK. MCKENDRICK is still discomforted. CHETWYN is elsewhere in the audience.
We begin however with a large close-up of the speaker who is an American called STONE. After the first sentence or two of STONE’s speech, the camera will acquaint us with the situation. At different points during STONE’s speech, there is conversation between ANDERSON and MCKENDRICK. In this script, these conversations are placed immediately after that part of STONE’s speech which they will cover. This applies also to any other interpolations. Obviously, STONE does not pause to let these other things in.
STONE: The confusion which often arises from the ambiguity of ordinary language raises special problems for a logical language. This is especially so when the ambiguity is not casual and inadvertent—but when it’s contrived. In fact, the limitations of a logical language are likely to appear when we ask ourselves whether it can accommodate a literature, or whether poetry can be reduced to a logical language. It is here that deliberate ambiguity for effect makes problems.
ANDERSON: Perfectly understandable mistake.
STONE: Nor must we confuse ambiguity, furthermore, with mere synonymity. When we say that a politician ran for office, that is not an ambiguous statement, it is merely an instance of a word having different applications, literal, idiomatic and so on.
MCKENDRICK: I said I knew his face.
ANDERSON: Match of the Day.
STONE: The intent is clear in each application. The show ran well on Broadway. Native Dancer ran well at Kentucky, and so on. (In the audience a Frenchman expresses dismay and bewilderment as his earphones give out a literal translation of ‘a native dancer’ running well at Kentucky. Likewise a German listener has the same problem.)
And what about this word ‘Well’? Again, it is applied as a qualifier with various intent—the show ran for a long time, the horse ran fast, and so on.
MCKENDRICK: So this pressing engagement of yours is a football match.
ANDERSON: A World Cup qualifier is not just a football match.
STONE: Again, there is no problem here so long as these variations are what I propose to call reliable. ‘You eat well’ says Mary to John, ‘You cook well’ says John to Mary. We know that when Mary says ‘You eat well’ she does not mean that John eats skilfully. Just as we know that when John says ‘You cook well’ he does not mean that Mary cooks abundantly.
ANDERSON: But I’m sorry about missing your paper, I really am.
STONE: I say that we know this, but I mean only that our general experience indicates it. The qualifier takes its meaning from the contexual force of the verb it qualifies. But it is the mark of a sound theory that it should take account not merely of our general experience, but also of the particular experience, and not merely of the particular experience but also of the unique experience, and not merely of the unique experience but also of the hypothetical experience. It is when we consider the world of possibilities, hypothetical experience, that we get closer to ambiguity. ‘You cook well’ says John to Mary. ‘You eat well’ says Mary to John.
MCKENDRICK: Do you ever wonder whether all this is worthwhile?
ANDERSON: No.
MCKENDRICK: I know what you mean.
(CHETWYN is twisting the knob on his translation phone, to try all this out in different languages. He is clearly bored. He looks at his watch.)
STONE: No problems there. But I ask you to imagine a competition when what is being judged is table manners.
(Insert FRENCH INTERPRETER’s box—interior.)
INTERPRETER:… bonne tenue à table …
STONE: John enters this competition and afterwards Mary says, ‘Well, you certainly ate well!’ Now Mary seems to be saying that John ate skilfully—with refinement. And again, I ask you to imagine a competition where the amount of food eaten is taken into account along with refinement of table manners. Now Mary says to John, ‘Well, you didn’t eat very well, but at least you ate well.’
INTERPRETER: Alors, vous n’avez pas bien mangé … mais…
(All INTERPRETERS baffled by this.)
STONE: Now clearly there is no way to tell whether Mary means that John ate abundantly but clumsily, or that John ate frugally but elegantly. Here we have a genuine ambiguity. To restate Mary’s sentence in a logical language we would have to ask her what she meant.
MCKENDRICK: By the way, I’ve got you a copy of my paper.
ANDERSON: Oh, many thanks.
MCKENDRICK: It’s not a long paper. You could read it comfortably during half-time.
(MCKENDRICK gives ANDERSON his paper.)
STONE: But this is to assume that Mary exists. Let us say she is a fictitious character in a story I have written. Very well, you say to me, the author, ‘What did Mary mean?’ Well I might reply—‘I don’t know what she meant. Her ambiguity makes the necessary point of my story.’ And here I think the idea of a logical language which can only be unambiguous, breaks down.
(ANDERSON opens his briefcase and puts MCKENDRICK’s paper into it. He fingers HOLLAR’s envelope and broods over it. STONE has concluded. He sits down to applause. The CHAIRMAN, who has been sitting behind him has stood up.)
ANDERSON: I’m going to make a discreet exit—I’ve got a call to make before the match.
(ANDERSON stands up.)
CHAIRMAN: Yes—Professor Anderson I think …?
(ANDERSON is caught like a rabbit in the headlights, MCKENDRICK enjoys his predicament and becomes interested in how ANDERSON will deal with it.)
ANDERSON: Ah … I would only like to offer Professor Stone the observation that language is not the only level of human communication, and perhaps not the most important level. Whereof we cannot speak, thereof we are by no means silent.
(MCKENDRICK smiles ‘Bravo’.)
Verbal language is a technical refinement of our capacity for communication, rather than the fons et origo of that capacity. The likelihood is that language develops in an ad hoc way, so there is no reason to expect its development
to be logical. (A thought strikes him.) The importance of language is overrated. It allows me and Professor Stone to show off a bit, and it is very useful for communicating detail—but the important truths are simple and monolithic. The essentials of a given situation speak for themselves, and language is as capable of obscuring the truth as of revealing it. Thank you.
(ANDERSON edges his way out towards the door.)
CHAIRMAN: (Uncertainly) Professor Stone …
STONE: Well, what was the question?
6. EXT. FRONT DOOR OF THE HOLLAR APARTMENT
The apartment is one of two half-way up a large old building. The stairwell is dirty and uncared for. The HOLLAR front door is on a landing, and the front door of another flat is across the landing. Stairs go up and down. ANDERSON comes up the stairs and finds the right number on the door and rings the bell. He is carrying his briefcase.
All the men in this scene are Czech plainclothes POLICEMEN. They will be identified in this text merely by number. MAN 3 is the one in charge. Man I comes to the door.
ANDERSON: I’m looking for Mr Hollar.
(MAN 1 shakes his head. He looks behind him. MAN 2 comes to the door.)
MAN 2: (In Czech) Yes? Who are you?
ANDERSON: English? Um. Parlez-vous francais? Er. Spreckanzydoitch?
MAN 2: (In German) Deutch? Ein Bischen.
ANDERSON: Actually I don’t. Does Mr Hollar live here? Apartment Hollar?
(MAN 2 speaks to somebody behind him.)
MAN 2: (In Czech) An Englishman. Do you know him?
(MRS HOLLAR comes to the door. She is about the same age as HOLLAR.)
ANDERSON: Mrs Hollar?
(MRS HOLLAR nods.)
Is your husband here? Pavel…
MRS HOLLAR: (In Czech) Pavel is arrested.
(Inside, behind the door, MAN 3 is heard shouting, in Czech.)
MAN 3: (Not seen) What’s going on there?
(MAN 3 comes to the door.)
ANDERSON: I am looking for Mr Hollar. I am a friend from England. His Professor. My name is Anderson.
MAN 3: (In English) Not here. (In Czech to MRS HOLLAR.) He says he is a friend of your husband. Anderson.
ANDERSON: He was my student.
(MRS HOLLAR calls out.)
MAN 3: (In Czech) Shut up.
ANDERSON: Student. Philosophy.
(MRS HOLLAR calls out.)
MAN 3: Shut up.
(MAN 3 and MAN 2 come out of the flat on to the landing, closing the door behind them.)
ANDERSON: I just came to see him. Just to say hello. For a minute. I have a taxi waiting. Taxi.
MAN 3: Taxi.
ANDERSON: Yes. I can’t stay.
MAN 3: (In English) Moment. O.K.
ANDERSON: I can’t stay.
(MAN 3 rings the bell of the adjacent flat. A rather scared woman opens the door. MAN 3 asks, in Czech, to use the phone. MAN 3 goes inside the other flat. ANDERSON begins to realize the situation.)
Well, look, if you don’t mind—I’m on my way to—an engagement….
MAN 2: (In Czech) Stay here.
(Pause. ANDERSON looks at his watch. Then from inside the flat MRS HOLLAR is shouting in Czech.)
MRS HOLLAR: (Unseen) I’m entitled to a witness of my choice.
(The door is opened violently and immediately slammed. ANDERSON becomes agitated.)
ANDERSON: What’s going on in there?
MAN 2: (In Czech) Stay here, he won’t be a minute.
(ANDERSON can hear MRS HOLLAR shouting.)
ANDERSON: Now look here—
(ANDERSON rings the doorbell.
The door is opened by MAN 4.)
I demand to speak to Mrs Hollar.
(Upstairs and downstairs doors are opening and people are shouting, in Czech ‘What’s going on?’ And so on. There is also shouting from inside the flat. MAN 2 shouts up and down the staircase, in Czech.)
MAN 2: (In Czech) Go inside!
ANDERSON: Now look here, I am the J. S. Mill Professor of Ethics at the University of Cambridge and I demand that I am allowed to leave or to telephone the British Ambassador!
MAN 4: (In Czech) Bring him inside.
MAN 2: (In Czech) In.
(He pushes ANDERSON into the flat. Interior flat. The hallway. Inside it is apparent that the front door leads to more than one flat. Off the very small dirty hall there is a kitchen, a lavatory and two other doors, not counting the door to the HOLLAR rooms.)
MAN 4: (In Czech) Stay with him.
(The HOLLAR interior door is opened from inside by MRS HOLLAR.)
MRS HOLLAR: (In Czech) If he’s my witness he’s allowed in here.
MAN 4: (In Czech) Go inside—he’s not your witness.
(MAN 4 pushes MRS HOLLAR inside and closes the door from within. This leaves ANDERSON and MAN 2 in the little hall. Another door now opens, and a small girl, poorly dressed, looks round it. She is jerked back out of sight by someone and the door is pulled closed. The HOLLAR door is flung open again, by MRS HOLLAR.)
MRS HOLLAR: (In Czech) I want this door open.
MAN 2: (In Czech) Leave it open then. He’ll be back in a minute.
(MAN 4 disappears back inside the flat. MRS HOLLAR is heard.)
MRS HOLLAR: (Unseen. In Czech) Bastards.
(ANDERSON stands in the hallway. He can hear MRS HOLLAR starting to cry. ANDERSON looks completely out of his depth.)
ANDERSON: My God….
(Then the doorbell rings. MAN 2 opens it to let in MAN 3.)
MAN 2: (In Czech) We had to come in to shut her up.
MAN 3: (In Czech) Well, he’s coming over. (In English to ANDERSON.) Captain coming. Speak English.
ANDERSON: I would like to telephone the British Ambassador.
MAN 3: (In English) O.K. Captain coming.
ANDERSON: How long will he be? I have an appointment. (He looks at his watch.) Yes, by God! I do have an engagement and it starts in half an hour—
MAN 3: (In English) Please.
(A lavatory flushes. From the other interior door an OLD MAN comes out. MAN 3 nods curtly at the OLD MAN. The OLD MAN shuffles by looking at ANDERSON. MAN 3 becomes uneasy at being in the traffic. He decides to bring ANDERSON inside the flat. He does so.
Interior HOLLAR’s room. There are two connecting rooms. Beyond this room is a door leading to a bedroom. This door is open. The rooms seem full of people. The rooms are small and shabby. They are being thoroughly searched, and obviously have been in this process for hours. The searchers do not spoil or destroy anything. There are no torn cushions or anything like that. However, the floor of the first room is almost covered in books. The bookcases which line perhaps two of the walls are empty. The rug could be rolled up, and there could be one or two floorboards up.
MAN 1 is going through the books, leafing through each one and looking along the spine. He is starting to put books back on the shelves one by one. MAN 5 has emptied drawers of their contents and is going through a pile of papers. MRS HOLLAR stands in the doorway between the two rooms. Beyond her MAN 2 can be seen searching. [MAN 4 is out of sight in the bedroom.] MAN 3 indicates a chair on which ANDERSON should sit. ANDERSON sits putting his briefcase on the floor by his feet. He looks around. He sees a clock showing 2.35.
Mix to clock showing 2.55.
ANDERSON is where he was. MAN 1 is still on the books. MAN 5 is still looking through papers. MAN 3 is examining the inside of a radio set.
Voices are heard faintly on the stairs. There is a man remonstrating. A woman’s voice too.
The doorbell rings.
MAN 3 leaves the room, closing the door. ANDERSON hears him go to the front door. There is some conversation. The front door closes again and MAN 3 re-enters the room.)
MAN 3: (In English to ANDERSON) Taxi.
ANDERSON: Oh—I forgot him. Dear me.
MAN 3: O.K.
ANDERSON: I must pay him.
(ANDERSON takes out his wallet. MAN 3 takes it from him without snatching.)
MAN 3: O.K.
(MAN 3 looks through the wallet.)
ANDERSON: Give that back— (Furious) Now, you listen to me—this has gone on quite long enough—I demand—to be allowed to leave….
(ANDERSON has stood up. MAN 3 gently pushes him back into the chair. In ANDERSON’s wallet MAN 3 finds his envelope and discovers the football ticket. He puts it back. He looks sympathetically at ANDERSON.)
MAN 3: (In Czech) The old boy’s got a ticket for the England match. No wonder he’s furious. (He gives the wallet back to ANDERSON. In English.) Taxi O.K. No money. He go. Football no good.
ANDERSON: Serve me right.
MAN 5: (In Czech) It’s on the radio. Let him have it on.
(MAN 3 returns to the radio and turns it on.
MRS HOLLAR enters quickly from the bedroom and turns it off.)
MRS HOLLAR: (In Czech) That’s my radio.
MAN 3: (In Czech) Your friend wants to listen to the match.
(MRS HOLLAR looks at ANDERSON. She turns the radio on. The radio is talking about the match which is just about to begin.)
MAN 3: (In English) Is good. O.K.?
(ANDERSON, listening, realizes that the radio is listing the names of the English team.
Then the match begins.
Mix to:
The same situation about half an hour later. The radio is still on. MAN 1 is still on the books. He has put aside three or four English books. MAN 5 has disappeared. MAN 2 is sorting out the fluff from a carpet sweeper. MAN 4 is standing on a chair examining the inside of a ventilation grating.
ANDERSON gets up off his chair and starts to walk towards the bedroom. The three MEN in the room look up but don’t stop him.
ANDERSON enters the bedroom.
Interior bedroom.
MAN 3 is going through pockets in a wardrobe. MAN 5 is looking under floorboards. MRS HOLLAR is sitting on the bed watching them.)
ANDERSON: It’s half-past three. I demand to be allowed to leave or to telephone the British—
MAN 3: Please—too slow.
ANDERSON: I demand to leave—
MAN 3: O.K. Who wins football?
ANDERSON: (Pause) No score.
(The doorbell goes. MAN 3 goes into the other room and to the door. ANDERSON follows him as far as the other room. On the way through MAN 3 signals to turn off the radio, MAN 2 turns off the radio. MRS HOLLAR comes in and turns the radio on.)