The Infernal Machine and Other Plays

by Jean Cocteau

  BLANDINE. You’re no longer pale! Your eyes are bright! Look, Gawain, is n’t he a fine figure of a knight? He might easily be taken for Sir Launcelot.

  ARTHUR, to Galahad. She too.

  GALAHAD. Gawain has been living in the shadows. It is a fresh way of looking at things. Everyone sees now what before was concealed by habit.

  ARTHUR. Gawain saw Segramor yesterday.

  GALAHAD. I know, but it is here, in the castle, that the enchantment has ceased and reality is beginning. Wonders will follow wonders, or rather what men call wonders, which only means, what they didn’t see before. The Grail is announcing its coming.

  ARTHUR. If only your quest could reach its goal at Camelot, and this glory be reserved for my house.

  GALAHAD. The quest of the Grail is another matter, Your Majesty. I must look for Carbonek, but the Grail manifests itself wherever it chooses, and now this castle is free of all that prevented its coming.

  SEGRAMOR. Father

  BLANDINE. Father, Father, Galahad!

  GAWAIN. Come here, all of you. Look! Look!

  ARTHUR. What have they seen now?

  GAWAIN. There!… on the road…. Merlin is leaving. There’s a sort of ragamuffin skipping and hopping along beside him. Behind them, the fields are becoming green again, the trees covered with leaves; the grass grows, the mist rolls away, and you can see blue sky, clouds, sunshine.

  ARTHUR. Life.

  GALAHAD, mysteriously. … is at hand.

  At this, the light increases and slowly it floods the room. The birds start singing.

  ARTHUR. Sir Galahad … it seems to me … I would say … No, I daren’t.

  GALAHAD. You’re going to see it now.

  ALL. The Grail! The Grail! The Grail! I see it. Do you see it? There it is!

  GALAHAD. Do you see it, Arthur?

  ARTHUR, in ecstasy. I see it.

  GALAHAD. What shape is it?

  ARTHUR. No particular shape. I couldn’t describe it.

  GALAHAD. Do you see it, Blandine?

  BLANDINE. I see it.

  GALAHAD. What color is it?

  BLANDINE. All colors. I couldn’t paint it.

  GALAHAD. Segramor, Gawain, do you see it?

  SEGRAMOR AND GAWAIN. I see it.

  GALAHAD. What does it smell like? Where is it?

  GAWAIN. Lovely!

  SEGRAMOR. It blazes. It is nowhere. It is everywhere. It moves.

  GALAHAD. It is within you. Each of you sees it as soon as he is in harmony with himself. Now you have all seen it, my task is done.

  ARTHUR. Galahad, why do you ask us to describe the Grail? Surely, you should be telling us about it.

  GALAHAD. I cannot see it.

  ARTHUR. You!

  GALAHAD. I shall never see it. I am the one who makes it visible to others.

  Sunlight fills the room. Galahad draws hack the curtains of the alcove.

  GALAHAD. And now I shall draw back the curtains of the alcove. Look.

  ARTHUR. Why. The bed is empty.

  GALAHAD. That is the elves’ doing. They hate death and manufacture invisibility as bees distill honey. Knights of the Round Table, the time has come for me to say good-by.

  ARTHUR. Don’t go, become one of us, stay here.

  GALAHAD. Merlin moves quickly. He is already doing his damage somewhere else. I never stay long in one place. As you know, Arthur, I seek the High Adventure. Everyone must always pay, pay in his person and in his actions.

  ARTHUR. King of Knights, our love goes with you.

  GALAHAD. I am neither a knight nor a king. I am only a poet….

  SEGRAMOR, kneeling before Galahad and kissing his tunic. Poet!

  GALAHAD. Like you, Segramor.

  SEGRAMOR. Alas, I thought so once. The Siege Perilous has taught me to be less ambitious.

  GALAHAD. On the contrary, you should congratulate yourself. The time may come when you will miss your blemish, for it is by some such blemish or other that men are kept in touch with the earth. My arms are without blemish and I can keep in touch with no one.

  SEGRAMOR. If you must go, at least put off your departure for a little. We love you.

  ALL. We all love you.

  GALAHAD. I am snatched away from all whom I love.

  Already he is outside and has shut the door. The children try to follow him but the King holds them back.

  ARTHUR. Let him go.

  The singing of the birds becomes louder.

  BLANDINE. The birds. I never thought I should hear them again. What a row they’re making!

  ARTHUR. It’s enough to drive one mad. Was it like this in the old days?

  GAWAIN. I remember how they used to sound before my imprisonment. They sang just the same songs and kicked up the same sort of racket.

  BLANDINE. The sunlight is so dazzling.

  GAWAIN. We got into the habit of living in shadows and silence. Now the Grail has restored everything to order. Let us worship it.

  ARTHUR. At my age, it is difficult to come to life again. My poor eyes! My poor ears!

  He puts his arms around his son and daughter.

  Blandine, Segramor, that reminds me, you understand the language of the birds. Won’t you tell us what they’re saying? Why shouldn’t they add their word to the whole story?

  SEGRAMOR. It’s such a long time since I tried. I’m quite out of practice.

  ALL. Try, Segramor, do, please do…. Please try.

  SEGRAMOR. Wait a moment.

  He shuts his eyes and listens. The birds-redouble their cries…

  They’re saying … Yes, I’ve got it now. They’re saying: Pay, pay, pay, pay, pay, pay, pay. You must pay, you must pay, you must pay. Pay, pay, pay, pay. pay, pay, pay. You must pay, you must pay, you must pay. Pay, pay, pay….

  CURTAIN

  BACCHUS

  translated by

  MARY HOECK

  PREFACE

  Bacchus is a play concerning hard kindness, which I oppose to soft kindness. This was the misunderstood theme of the Letter to Maritain. Rendering to God the intelligence attributed to the devil, which was more particularly attributed to him in the sixteenth century when the devil had the leading role.

  Hans is kind. The Duke is kind. The Cardinal is kind. Lothar is kind. Christine is kind. That’s what seems to me fresh in this play, as we usually look for strength in a background of evil.

  A high-minded Roman Cardinal has the insight to perceive the high-mindedness of a young heretic. He tries to save him even after his death. He does save him from an ignominious death, by means of a “pious lie” and so permits of his burial in holy ground.

  The play is not vowed to a cause. It shows nothing but the terrible loneliness of youth which has no allegiances outside itself and will not accept the tenets of any kind of policy.

  The custom around which action turns is an old Byzantine one. But in Byzantium when the chosen one was elected, he accepted his own doom. He was sacrificed on the seventh day. I am not sure whether a Dionysus was involved. The rather attenuated form of the custom survived in Switzerland until recently, at Vevey, I think at the time of the wine harvest. Ramuz told me about it and spoke of it as disastrous because the young men elected lost their heads over it and refused to go back to their former dull way of life. Naturally I envisaged the custom carried to its nth degree, when the whole show went beyond the limits of a masquerade.

  The deep confusion of minds in the sixteenth century, which was dominated by the wisdom of Erasmus, does not allow my characters to use very clear arguments. They can only throw intuitive but often contradictory gleams of light on the scene and feel their way blindfold through darkness full of snares and flashes of lightning.

  The ideas expressed in Bacchus are not those of the author, they belong to his characters. This is what the stage demands, as it is a place which belongs to objectivity and action.

  NOTE WRITTEN AFTER THE FIRST NIGHT

  Bacchus shows the plight of youth seeking to find itself but not knowing whic
h way to turn among the dogmas opposing it. This is what happens to Hans.

  In reply to Catholic comments, it is necessary to appreciate that the Pater Noster is said as by a child, that any seemingly subversive sentences are said by a “village idiot,” by a young heretic, or by a vulgar provost. It would be childish to impute them to me or to blame me for them.

  JEAN COCTEAU

  1951

  Bacchus was first performed at the Théatre Marigny on December 20, 1951, by the Madeleine Renaud — Jean-Louis Barrault Company.

  CHARACTERS

  HANS, Bacchus

  THE DUKE

  LOTHAR, The Duke’s Son

  CHRISTINE, The Duke’s Daughter

  CARDINAL ZAMPI, Envoy Extraordinary of the Holy See

  THE BISHOP

  THE PROVOST MARSHAL, Head of the Garrison Town

  THE SYNDIC, Head of the Merchants’ Companies

  KARI, Captain of the Archers

  FIFTEEN ARCHERS

  DÉCOR

  Action takes place in a German town near the Swiss borders in the year 1523 in an audience chamber in the Duke’s castle. The hall is plain, in the English baronial style of the period. At the back of the stage there is a large doorway leading to a flight of steps. Center stage, left, a window looks onto the Cathedral Square and a concealed balcony. Center stage, right, a low door gives access to the other rooms and floors of the building. By the side of this door there is a huge fireplace surmounted by a mirror which slopes slightly forward.

  In the middle of the hall to the left, there is a long table, surrounded by upright chairs and chairs with arms. The table is covered with sheets of parchment, writing sets and goose quills. To the right of the door at the back of the stage, there is a large chest.

  The window and the small door are opposite each other, and are both surrounded by light architectural structures in the shape of beams such as those seen in Holbein’s Thomas More and Family at Basle.

  For décor and costumes I have taken inspiration from the paintings of Holbein and Dürer, and from the Naples tapestries.

  ACT ONE

  As the curtain rises, the audience chamber is empty, except for Lothar, who picks up some red material and a crown of vine leaves from the table. He puts on the crown and drapes the material around him, then he goes over to the sloping mirror above the mantelpiece, and in front of it he arranges the folds of material and the angle of the headdress. Christine comes in through the doorway at the back of the stage, pretending not to see her brother. She goes toward the little door on the right. As she opens the little door, Lothar springs back toward the table. Christine comes forward.

  CHRISTINE. Did I startle you?

  LOTHAR. I didn’t see you come in.

  CHRISTINE. Too busy with your little self.

  LOTHAR. NO. But my little self needed a lot of room to show off its costume. How do you like it? Of course it’s not finished yet.

  No reply.

  Well?

  CHRISTINE. I suppose it would be more civilized to finish it off.

  LOTHAR. You’re too witty for me.

  CHRISTINE. As for you … you’re too blind.

  LOTHAR. Blind?

  CHRISTINE. Look here, Lothar, where did you find that costume?

  LOTHAR. In Ulrich’s cupboard.

  CHRISTINE. Aren’t you ashamed of rummaging around in Ulrich’s room, stealing his costume and strutting about in it like a peacock?

  LOTHAR. I must. I need it. The wine festival begins tomorrow, and you’re not going to buy me the stuff I need.

  CHRISTINE. Neither I nor your father.

  LOTHAR. Very well, then.

  CHRISTINE. Lothar, don’t you understand — your brother is dead, and you’re wearing all that’s left of his costume.

  LOTHAR. Ulrich would be glad to see me in it.

  CHRISTINE. Don’t you understand that this costume killed him?

  LOTHAR, flinging off the crown. What?

  CHRISTINE. The only thing to be said for you is that you were too young to be told the truth.

  LOTHAR. What truth?

  CHRISTINE. Ulrich killed himself because of this disgusting festival. Now perhaps you see what it would mean to Father if you put your name forward and wore your brother’s old costume.

  LOTHAR, slowly taking off the finery. Ulrich killed himself….

  CHRISTINE. Yes, Lothar, and this is how it happened. Take warning. He wanted to be Bacchus. You know what that means every five years to the people here.

  LOTHAR. TO be a god and a king for seven whole days. Who wouldn’t like to give it a try?

  CHRISTINE. Then they burn the costume in the Square, and Bacchus goes back to what he was. That’s what Ulrich couldn’t stand. The heartless set we belong to played out the comedy for him right to the bitter end. They made an idol of him. But as soon as the festival was over, they took it out of him for his perversities by making a public fool of him, until they made his life impossible. First he went into a temper, then he became silent like a wild thing, finally worn out by their damnable jokes he drowned himself. Mother died of it… that’s what our family has to thank the wine harvest for.

  LOTHAR. I didn’t know.

  CHRISTINE. And now that you do, surely you’ll take off that costume and put it away where you found it — where Ulrich himself hid it.

  LOTHAR. No, Christine. That’s not my idea at all!

  CHRISTINE. Don’t be a fool!

  LOTHAR. No! I’ll avenge Ulrich by entering the competition and winning. That’ll do for them! And when I’ve got the power, I’ll use my week to rub their noses in the dust.

  CHRISTINE. But they’re not the same people.

  LOTHAR. Today’s lot are no better.

  CHRISTINE. For one thing, you’ve neither the looks nor the money for the jury to choose you.

  LOTHAR. I’ll take my chances.

  CHRISTINE. You can do more than that for Ulrich.

  LOTHAR. How?

  CHRISTINE. The Church refused to give him last rites and burial in consecrated ground. The Church refused them, and so I have declared war on the Church, and on our so-called friends, who are its slaves.

  LOTHAR. Christine, don’t talk so loud.

  CHRISTINE, in a low voice. I’d never have opened my mouth if I hadn’t known that you’re in the underground movement too.

  LOTHAR. You’re mad!

  CHRISTINE. Listen to me, Lothar. You’re only sixteen and I’m twenty. I have to be a mother to you, and you must listen to me. Anyone can be burned here for saying “yes“or “no. ”

  LOTHAR. But — !

  CHRISTINE. Now, listen. Your life and mine are at stake. Don’t forget you’re in the public eye; if they follow you, they’ll get me. And my motives are not yours — they’re serious. You mustn’t expose me to danger. No one even suspects me.

  LOTHAR, bringing her forward to the front of the stage. Now, Christine, as you’ve been frank with me, I’ll tell you something you’ll hardly believe.

  CHRISTINE. Be quick. Father will soon be back.

  LOTHAR. I went to a meeting yesterday, Christine.

  CHRISTINE. I knew and that’s why I wasn’t there.

  LOTHAR. It was held in a cellar in the Upper Town — it was all in the dark. Suddenly, the door began to open and I saw — can you guess?

  CHRISTINE. Get on with it….

  LOTHAR. I saw Father come and go like a ghost — he must have seen me.

  CHRISTINE. It was only your imagination.

  LOTHAR. It wasn’t. I’ll swear it on the Bible.

  CHRISTINE. Father …

  LOTHAR. Father. I didn’t ask any questions. One can’t at these meetings.

  CHRISTINE. I’d have known — if it was so….

  LOTHAR. No, Christine. They arrange it so that we don’t meet him. I should not have been there yesterday, but for a mistake.

  CHRISTINE. If he does know about us, he doesn’t want to, and he wants us to pretend we don’t know about him. Until he speaks abo
ut it, we must pretend it was a dream. But it was no dream — I knew.

  LOTHAR. What did you know?

  CHRISTINE. I was trying to mislead you a moment ago. But now I must be really frank with you. I knew Father took part in these meetings in secret, but we weren’t supposed to know.

  LOTHAR. DO you think he goes there for the same reasons as you do?

  CHRISTINE. Yes.

  LOTHAR. But, Christine, he’s too powerful to be nothing but a follower. There must be something more behind it. Now, I’ll tell you something else — he knows where Martin Luther is hidden away, and last year he went to see him in his mountain hide-out.

  CHRISTINE. Does he really know Martin Luther?

  LOTHAR. He went to Thuringia, to Wartburg. The Elector of Saxony keeps him hidden there — I’m right, I know it. And now Father’s been to see him in his new hiding place in the hills. I remember heaps of things which show I’m right.

  CHRISTINE. If he’s in communication with Brother Martin, he’s in terrible danger. The Emperor spares Luther, the little pope of Wittenberg as they call him, in the meantime, but he doesn’t spare his followers. The Archbishop of Trèves grabbed all his goods. Let’s give up the movement. That’s what our friends would advise us to do if they dared to mention the subject.

  LOTHAR. Now I know why they ask me to so few meetings.

  CHRISTINE. You are a booby. It’s not only that. They’re afraid you might give them away.

  LOTHAR. I’ll be on the lookout. Perhaps some day Father will take you into his confidence, Christine. If he does, tell him I do have some sense, that I admire Luther and that I could wish for nothing better in all my life than to see him and hear him.

  CHRISTINE. That won’t be for some time. Since he burned the Papal Bull of Excommunication, the powers that be are after him in every country. He can’t do a thing in public now.

  LOTHAR. He’s a brave man.

  CHRISTINE. Truth, as he sees it, is dearer to him than life. But if he wants to convince others of that truth, he’ll have to look after his life.