by Hua Bai
Serpent (female voice): This isn’t the Garden of Eden. And where are the naked Adam and Eve? Why have I come
here? Perhaps there’s some snake medicine in the cabinet.
Yes, there it is: a martyr from my serpentine family, preserved in a glass bottle. Even without life and power she looks real, raising her head, lashing her forked tongue, and dexterously twisting her body. She is trying to warn people: 1 6 5
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“I am a venomous snake. Be careful, everyone.” Thank
heavens, I am no ordinary snake. In fact, my venom is made from all kinds of seductive potions to catalyze people’s sexual desire, jealousy, hatred, courage, and pride. They are classified as number 1, number 2, number 3, number 4,
and number 5, respectively. If I prescribe the right seductive thing for the right person at the right moment, I will conduct all those tender, glorious, and heroic dramas in the arena of human life. Look at this respectable pair: the two of them seem pure and honest. Actually, they both
lost all human feeling long ago. Every cell in their bodies has abandoned its original function and turned into a
stronghold in which to seal the self and protect it from outsiders. However, I can turn them into Romeo and
Juliet, Othello and Desdemona, Hamlet and Ophelia, Pan
Jinlian and Ximen Qing, even Shi Xiu and Pan Qiaoyun,
although letting them retain their own appearances. Now
please watch closely how these two beings talk.
The doctor acts as if she were reading scripture. She reads and converses with her neighbor at the same time. Of course, the actress is highly skilled and can use a husky voice and perked-up ears to deliver and catch the necessary information without interrupt-ing her reading of Chairman Mao’s works. No doubt she should have a female voice because she is a woman. But because of years of shouting at her patients – including at her husband, who to some extent is also her patient – her voice has become hoarse but dignified, barely feminine. This lack of femininity is also caused by the fact that as a female she has had little chance to flatter her boss and has never had a lover. She is too chaste for anyone to find an unclean spot. She vigilantly stands guard over other female bodies as well.
Any potential flirting eye will be destroyed by her hateful stare.
L: Doctor Y … blah, blah, blah (“blah, blah, blah” indicates their recitations of Mao’s works) Comrade Qin Guangming… blah, blah, blah…
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Serpent: She is talking about her own husband.
L: Comrade Qin Guangming has never set high standards
for himself… blah, blah, blah… At every opportunity, he
allows himself to be eroded by bourgeois thought… blah,
blah, blah.… When I caught him… blah, blah, blah…
he not only refused to make revolution in the depth of his soul but also refused others’ help. He defies the slogan leniency to those who confess and resists to the end. Treating patients at the clinic from dawn to dusk in the service of the revolution, we can only study Chairman Mao’s works
profoundly at night… blah, blah, blah. This is a great
disservice to him. My heart keeps jumping to my mouth
as I sit here reading. I know I must undergo self-criti-
cism. As one must read Mao’s works with all one’s heart
and soul, my wandering thoughts reveal my disloyalty to
our Red Sun…blah, blah, blah. But I fear Qin Guang-
ming will be seduced by a bad woman…blah, blah,
blah.…
Y: Don’t worry… blah, blah, blah.… We are living in hard times…blah, blah, blah… and in a dismal place… blah,
blah, blah.… I bet he dares not even imagine that sort of thing…blah, blah, blah.…
L: I don’t know… blah, blah, blah. Bourgeois thoughts are pervasive. I am a decent, politically staunch comrade in arms and a life companion for him. Yet he shows no interest in me at all…blah, blah, blah.…
Y: How can that be? A person always climbs high; water
always runs downhill…blah, blah, blah.… He should
have enjoyed the sweetness of putting politics in com-
mand of the relationship between husband and
wife… blah, blah, blah.…
L: He is no longer a child. Strong liquor tastes better than mother’s milk… blah, blah, blah.…
Y: Why should you have to suffer?… blah, blah, blah
…These strong emotions will affect your study and your
work. Why don’t you change places with him… blah,
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blah, blah.… Let him be you and you be him… blah,
blah, blah.…
L: Blah, blah, blah…What do you mean by that?… blah,
blah, blah.…
Y: Blah, blah, blah… I mean… blah, blah, blah…let him
worry about you and snoop on you and lose sleep over
you…blah, blah, blah.… That way, you can transform
passive defense into offensive action, can’t you?… blah, blah, blah.…
L: Which wouldn’t be such a good thing for me. He doesn’t give a damn about me…blah, blah, blah.… Even if I
jumped into a well and rotted there for three days and
nights, he wouldn’t come looking for me… blah, blah,
blah.…
Serpent: See, now she needs a bit of seductive potion
number 1.
Y: I don’t mean you should jump into a well…blah, blah,
blah.…
L: Not jump into a well…blah, blah, blah…hang myself
from a beam, then?…blah, blah, blah.…
Y: Why do you always have to think of death?…blah, blah, blah.…
L: Should I think of living, then? As long as I am alive, I am a mote in his eye…blah, blah, blah.… The conflict between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat is irreconcil-
able. It is a struggle to the death.
Serpent (aside): There sure is no chance of changing her without drugs!
Serpent creeps along the wall toward L. She pops her head out from under the desk and stretches her fangs into the cup close to L ’s hand (in that strange country no state employee can tear his or her hand away from a teacup). After injecting one drop of seductive potion number 1, the serpent retreats under the desk.
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Y: Blah, blah, blah.… You must live, live better than he does!
L: Blah, blah, blah.… Don’t I live better than he does now?
Every year I am chosen a paragon for the study of the theory and practice of Mao Zedong thought… blah, blah,
blah…I have reported more than a dozen cases involving
self-inflicted wounds and fake diseases by people at-
tempting to escape reform through labor…blah, blah,
blah…and have I ever missed my chance to speak at
meetings where the paragons talk of their heroic ex-
periences?… blah, blah, blah.… He’s living better than
I?…blah, blah, blah.… Is that what you think?… blah,
blah, blah.… Then your mind has gone moldy!
Y (hurriedly): No. I meant you should live even better. Ten or a hundred times better than he does…blah, blah, blah.
Serpent (aside): Why isn’t she drinking yet? Further delay will really foul things up.
L takes her cup and, sipping a little, scrutinizes it immediately.
L (to herself, in amazement): Why so sweet? I put in only a pinch of cheap tea dust. How can anything be so tasty at twenty fen an ounce? Anything sweet and tasty is suspicious. Only a bourgeois loves sweet and tasty things.
L gulps down several mouthfuls at one go.
L (completely forgets her reading of Mao’s works; her voice grows tender): Tell me again, Doctor Y: how can I live better than he does?
Y (puzzled by the pitch of her voice and its musical tones, which seem strange because he hasn’t heard them for years, he retreats tactfully): What I meant is, you should live like a stain-less-steel screw, screwed into the machine of the proletarian dictatorship so that the great machine can run
properly…blah, blah, blah.…
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L (disappointed): Really? No, you must have meant something else. Did you say I should live more happily than he does?
Doctor L makes eyes at Doctor Y. Doctor Y is flabbergasted, as if he had caught a snake while groping for an eel.
L: That I should be more relaxed than he is?
Doctor L casts one glance after another. Leaving his seat, Doctor Y steps up to Doctor L, trying to feel her pulse.
Seizing her chance, Doctor L grabs his hand and pulls it to her breast. Astonished, Doctor Y struggles free and returns to his seat, gasping.
Serpent: Doctor Y’s sexual desire is not strong enough to overcome his suspicion and anxiety. I’d better give him some drugs, too.
Serpent pops her head out from under Doctor Y ’s desk and injects a drop of seductive potion number 1 into his cup through her fangs. Just then, in order to calm himself, Doctor Y gulps down several mouthfuls. He immediately puts on his spectacles to scrutinize the cup.
L (sweet as honey): Y – please tell me, tell me, tell me. What a naughty fellow you are. If you had the nerve to say it once, don’t take it back now. You mean I should live more freely than he, more romantically, more sensuously, more passionately, and more self-fulfillingly than he, don’t
you? Hmmmmm?
Y (the drug is beginning to take effect): Yes. Can you? Do you dare?
L (slants her eyes flirtatiously): Who’s going to stop me?
Doctor L extends her arms, much like Desdemona when Othello finishes his account of his heroic deeds at the sea.
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Y (the drug has not had its full effect on him): Please don’t let the others see us like this. If they do, at best we would be denounced at large criticism meetings and then sent to
the prison rock pile.
L: Nobody will see us, for nobody can imagine you and I
would… blah, blah, blah… (from now on, “ blah, blah, blah” means something other than that they are reciting Mao’s works) any more than he can imagine the two pillars outside our clinic door coming together of their own accord.
Y (his dry, sallow face gradually suffused with the color of pork liver): What you say is quite true.
Once more Doctor Y goes to Doctor L. But this time he behaves like that dandy Ximen, who approaches Golden Lotus when Old Woman Wang excuses herself and locks them in.
Doctor L unbuttons her blouse. Her modern outfit saves her a lot of time over Golden Lotus. Besides, she does not wear a beautiful and seductive red undergarment like that of Golden Lotus.
As soon as her blouse is opened, a pair of shriveled, baggy breasts flop out.
Serpent (aside): They do not need to steal the forbidden fruit. That has gone rotten a long time ago. Neither do
they need to cover themselves with red flowers and green leaves. The narrow hospital bed for examining patients
will do. Adopting a most economical method, they fold
themselves up, one on top of the other, like a double-
decker. Of course, there’s nothing new between her and
herself or between him and himself. But between she and
he or he and she, everything is brand-new. Therefore,
their love is most passionate.
Blackout.
Serpent: Blackout! Apparently even the electrical gen-
erator lacks courage and needs a drop of seductive potion 1 7 1
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number 4. But if I go to the power plant, the best episode will be over before I get back. It’s better to stay and listen to the sensuous music in the darkness.
Curtain falls.
a c t 2
Time: Twenty days later. Night.
Place: Doctor L’s home.
Characters (in order of appearance): Serpent from the Garden of Eden, Doctor L, J, Q, Doctor Y, etc.
As the curtain rises, Serpent is alone onstage, coiled in the middle of a square table in the center of the stage, thrusting its head high, swaying complacently.
Serpent (aside): The break in the play is to show the passage of time, as well as to omit repetitions that are not really worth seeing. It’s better to hide such vulgarity
between the acts. The love between L and Y can be called missed love, stolen love, and forgotten love; it also can be denounced as adultery, illicit intercourse, secret communication, ignoble combination, rape seduction, etc. From the very first day, it became an endless circle. Although their sexual contacts repeat themselves only mechanically, the lovers do not tire of them. To L and Y, their every lovemaking, like the mesh between two newly lubricated
old gears, always seems fresh and new. But for our audi-
ence it is a different matter: a word repeated three times will bore even a dog to death. No matter how brilliant
the director, he dare not allow a three-minute kiss in the movie. The explicit love scenes can recall only the monotonous motions of the crankshaft in a dull cylinder. Therefore, techniques such as fade-in, fade-out, or symbolism 1 7 2
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are often used. They are supposed to leave the audience’s imagination some room to maneuver: the more obscure,
the more suggestive. Is it not true that our audience can well imagine what L and Y are doing now in private, and
what they will do next? The divine dragon reveals only
its head, not its tail.
Because of the imaginative power of the director, the second act of the play is set in L ’s home, when L ’s husband has gone to the city to buy the month’s supply of sanitary pads for women laborers. Again L suffers a sleepless night. She suspects that Q must have a mistress; the recent change in herself convinced her that no matter how austere the circumstances, human lust floods irresistibly. The cinders of L ’s jealousy immediately burst into flame. On top of that, Y , although close to hand, cannot experience joy with her in a comfortable double bed. Y ’s wife, J , seems suspicious. Even the most stupid wife on earth is sensitive to her husband’s infidelity. Y cannot find an excuse to be absent from home for even one night. Now L is coming.
Look: her brows are heavily knitted, and her steps are hesitating.
She looks more a woman now than ever before.
Serpent turns and goes under the table.
L enters.
L: I’m thirsty, thirsty, thirsty!
Shakes thermos, then teapot. All empty.
L: Q! Oh, he’s gone to the city. Buying a ton of sanitary pads takes all day and – night! ( The actress should particularly stress the word night.) He didn’t even put the pot on to boil, forcing me to drink cold water.
Serpent (aside): I know which cup she is going to use. I must give her a combination of seductive potion number 1 and seductive potion number 2 to add fuel to her
fire.
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Serpent spits two drops of seductive potion into a cup. As expected, L takes that cup. Filling it with cold water under a tap, she drinks it down at a single gulp.
L: Delicious. Tastes like iced sweet-sour plum juice. How shall I pass the night? How shall I pass it? I’m asking you, L! How can I tolerate all this? What is Q doing? I can
neither know nor see nor feel, nor guess which bitch he is stuck on. (Maliciously) I hope he gets stuck inside her
and they can’t be separated, until some children drive them
into the street, throw stones at them, and parade them on carrying poles, making an exhibition of them in broad
daylight. What is Y doing now? There, too, I can neither know nor see nor feel. But I can well guess that he is
sleeping with that filthy old swine J. (Hysterically) Oh, my God! Why do I see them as clearly as if I were standing at the foot of their bed? You are torturing me. All of you are torturing me, you damned men and women! How
I wish I could snatch away your quilts and scorch you
with a red-hot iron! I’ll tell J, tell her to her face: “Y is mine. Y loves me from the bottom of his heart. He loves me. He belongs to me. I need him most, just as he needs me most.”
Serpent’s voice: How about Q? Who does Q belong to?
L: He’s mine! Can there be any doubt? I am his lawful wedded wife.
Serpent’s voice: J is Y ’s lawful wedded wife.
L: That’s beside the point. (Looking around) Who is speaking, anyway? Who are you? Your words are flatulent and
irrelevant.
Serpent’s voice: First of all, I admire your honesty – honest people are so hard to come by nowadays. However,
except for you, all the people recognize the marriage
license as valid. What can you do about it?
L (in extreme sorrow and exasperation): Yes, what can I do?
What can I do?
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Serpent’s voice: Here she comes, Y’s legitimate wife. J has come.
L (shocked): What? J has come? Can she possibly be coming here? What has she come here for? What can I do for her?
Ask her to forgive my sins?
Serpent’s voice: You’ve committed no sin, have you?
L: No. I’ve committed no sin. What sin have I ever com-
mitted?
Serpent’s voice: She is knocking at the door.
Sound of knocking.
L: She really has come. Should I open the door or not?
Serpent’s voice: Why don’t you open the door? Are you
afraid of her because you feel guilty? Are you her moral inferior?
L: By no means! I want to look her in the face, and she has arrived just at the right moment.