by David Hare
So? What are they suggesting? Are you trying to say he’s not allowed to speak?
Martinson No, no, goodness, Miss Whitton …
He turns round and smiles at the Diplomats, who smile and shake their heads.
Diplomats No! …
Martinson No one is suggesting … I think that would be terrible. Censorship is something we do not countenance at all.
Mehta Oh, really?
Martinson No.
Peggy frowns, still not understanding.
Peggy So?
Martinson has already begun to take a slip of paper from his pocket.
Martinson A preliminary statement.
Mehta You see!
Martinson That is the suggestion.
Peggy What about?
Martinson Well …
Peggy Is that it there?
Martinson Yes. (He has unfolded it, white, neat, a single page.) It’s been drafted by a committee, just a short statement, that is all.
Peggy Saying what?
Martinson Mr Mehta would read it before going on to give his own talk.
Peggy But what does it say?
Martinson It’s about the nature of fiction. (He smiles again, the quiet incendiarist.) I suppose it argues all fiction is lies.
Peggy reacts in disbelief.
Peggy Oh, my God … I don’t believe it.
Mehta Didn’t I say?
Martinson Please.
Mehta It is ludicrous.
Martinson No.
Peggy looks at him, lost for a response.
Peggy How long?
Martinson It’s brief. As I say, Mr Mehta would read it out before his address, then he would be free to go on and say whatever he likes.
Peggy is about to react, but Martinson carries on, suddenly on the offensive.
Please. I don’t like it. I am not easy at suggesting it. It is not the ideal procedure at all. However, bear in mind I am pleading for the survival of my conference. This seems to me a small price to pay.
Mehta I don’t accept that.
Martinson looks at him, authoritative.
Martinson We are here to discuss world poverty. The conference has taken many years to assemble, and in a week’s time, the reluctant governments of the West will return home and try to forget they have ever attended. It is true. Any excuse they can find to dismiss the whole occasion as a shambles they will seize on and exploit. Therefore it is, without question, essential that the conference is given every chance of life, every chance of success. If Mr Mehta refuses to read out this little concoction, then he will make a fine gesture of individual conscience against the pressures – I will say this and please do not repeat it – of less than scrupulous groups, and he will go home to Shropshire, and he will feel proud and clever and generally excellent. And Time magazine will write of him, yes, and there will be editorials on the bloody writer’s freedom, hurrah! But the conference will be destroyed. It is a short statement, it is an unimportant statement, because it is on a subject which is of no conceivable general interest or importance, namely, what a novel is, which I can hardly see is a subject of vital and continuing fascination to the poor. Frankly, who cares? is my attitude, and I think you will find it is the attitude of all the non-aligned countries …
He looks behind him for confirmation, and the Diplomats all nod.
Certainly the Scandinavian bloc …
Diplomats Yes … Indeed, it is our attitude.
Martinson What is your phrase? We do not give a toss what a novel is. I think I may even say this is Scandinavia’s official position, and if a man stands up at the beginning of this afternoon’s session and lies about what a novel is, I will just be grateful because then there is a better chance that aid will flow, because grain will flow, because water will flow …
Mehta This is blackmail!
Martinson No.
Mehta Exploitation of our feelings of guilt! In the West we are always being asked to feel guilty. And so we must pay a price in lies!
Peggy The West?
Mehta Drag us down to their standards! (He has got up and is now standing in animated argument with himself.) No, it is wrong!
Martinson turns coolly to Peggy.
Martinson Miss Whitton?
She has been sitting quietly through Martinson’s explanation.
Peggy (very casually) Well, I mean, we should hear it, shouldn’t we?
Mehta What?
Peggy The statement. (She turns to Mehta.) Have you read it?
Mehta Are you mad? I did not write it, therefore I shall not read it.
Peggy (to Martinson) Read it.
Mehta Don’t.
Then, before Mehta can interrupt:
Peggy Victor. Last night, when we went upstairs – to the bedroom.
Mehta Yes, all right, thank you …
She then turns and flashes a smile at Martinson.
Peggy We only met last night.
Mehta looks at her beadily. Then, with bitter quiet:
Mehta All right. Very well, yes, let us hear it. Thank you, Peggy.
He sits down to listen. Peggy smiles. Martinson begins very formally.
Martinson ‘Fiction, by its very nature, must always be different from fact, so in a way a man who stands before you as a writer of fiction is already half-way towards admitting that a great deal of what he makes up and invents is as much with an eye to entertainment as it is to presenting literal historical truth …
Mehta gets up, exploding.
Mehta No, no, no, no! It is not to be endured.
Peggy Victor …
Mehta It is Nazi.
Peggy It is not Nazi.
Mehta It is Nazi.
For the first time Peggy starts taking enthusiastic part in the argument, enjoying herself.
Peggy ‘Nazi’ means ‘National Socialist’. This is not National Socialist. It is not German propaganda of the thirties.
Mehta It is neo-Nazi.
Peggy No, it is a serious proposition.
Mehta Nonsense.
Peggy … to which we may listen rationally and calmly and as adults, and say, ‘Yes, mmm, this is so, this is not so.’ Let us therefore …
Mehta The woman is driving me crazy.
Peggy … exercise our minds and address the real, the central problem of the day, which is: is all fiction distortion? Come on, let’s examine this. I did a term paper. What do we mean by distortion? Are these good arguments on this piece of paper or are they bad?
Mehta Not enough the moral blackmail of the Third World, but now we have sexual blackmail. A poor man who stumbles into a bed … (He turns to explain to Martinson.) I have slept with this woman last night; this woman I have embraced …
Peggy (delighted, pretending shock) Really Victor, you mustn’t disclose to the entire UNESCO Secretariat …
Mehta I approach this woman, a dinner with friends, a conversation about Greek history, an understanding as between strangers that they will spend a night … a civilized arrangement …
Peggy (smiles) Yes.
Mehta … and now she must betray me.
Peggy smiles at him warmly, her mischievousness past.
Peggy Nobody betrays you, Victor. Perhaps Martinson is right. That in the scale of things this doesn’t matter very much.
There is a pause as Mehta stands alone, touched. Then he nods.
Mehta Bring me the man who has written this. I will negotiate.
At the back one of the Diplomats goes out.
I do this because she is beautiful. No other reason, yes? Why did Victor Mehta read the statement on the nature of fiction at the UNESCO conference in Bombay in 1978? For thighs, and hair that falls across the face.
At once Stephen Andrews comes in, smiling, talking to the Diplomat. He is followed by M’Bengue, a Senegalese in his thirties, small, bright, elegant. Stephen is gracious, but pleased.
Stephen Ah, well, this is excellent!
Peggy Stephen!
Stephen I hear there is to be a climb-down. Thank go
odness. The whole conference is endangered, I heard …
Mehta What? Is it him?
Stephen For something so petty, so meaningless …
Mehta (quietly) Peggy …
Peggy I didn’t know.
Stephen This is my friend M’Bengue of Senegal. He helped us draft …
Mehta Then I will not read it. No, if it is Mr Andrews …
He turns away. Stephen smiles.
Stephen … these few remarks.
Between them Martinson looks puzzled.
Martinson Are you old enemies?
Mehta No. He insulted me on my arrival here last night, and now I see, yes, it is because of Peggy, because he was to dine with her. That is the motive behind this fine display of principle. She stood him up to dine with me.
Peggy (looks down) Oh, lord.
Martinson is still frowning.
Martinson Well, this does not mean … surely the person must be separate from the argument?
Mehta No, absolutely not.
Martinson The motive for the argument does not affect its validity. As Miss Whitton said, a thing is true or untrue, worth proposing or not worth proposing …
Mehta No!
Martinson … no matter who proposes it. As for instance as one might say of Hitler’s love of Wagner …
Peggy (groaning) Oh, my God …
Martinson … it does not mean …
Mehta Let us not …
Martinson … that Wagner’s music is discredited …
The Diplomats shake their heads in agreement.
Diplomats No.
Peggy Please.
Martinson And so it is for whatever … I cannot say this well …
Mehta Indeed.
Martinson … reason it is that he comes …
Mehta (exasperated at Martinson’s dogged logic) But you said, you yourself said, less than scrupulous groups were using this argument to threaten …
Martinson But you, Mr Mehta, your motives. Only a moment ago you were saying it was not for principle that you would speak; it was for thighs.
M’Bengue (to Stephen) Thighs?
Mehta I would give in, yes. Then. But now I will not give in. I am shaken awake.
Elaine comes in, very cheerful.
Elaine Hey, I hear this is getting very interesting.
Martinson I’m not sure.
Mehta (at once) Please, no, nothing now, not in front of the press …
Elaine Off the record?
Martinson looks across to Mehta, who nods. Martinson takes advantage of the moment to reassert his chairmanship.
Martinson All right. Let us please to put motive aside. Let us examine the true reason for the dispute. You agree?
Mehta looks at him without enthusiasm, but he goes on.
Let us try to understand the feelings of the African countries in particular. Well, M. M’Bengue can explain.
There is a pause. The others look to M’Bengue.
M’Bengue It is true that we have chosen you, Mr Mehta, and it is to a degree arbitrary. There is a greater argument and we are using you as an instrument merely to draw attention to it. It happens that your novels are full of the most provocative observations – I will not linger on them. In particular, what you say of Madame Mao …
Martinson (panicking) Oh no.
Mehta (with renewed vigour) Ah well, yes.
M’Bengue You lack respect …
Mehta You ask me to desist from writing of Madame Mao?
M’Bengue No.
Mehta No, I cannot. I am a comic novelist. It would be superhuman to refrain.
Martinson It is not the point.
Mehta You ask me to refrain from writing of a woman who does not dare to make public the date of her birthday because she is afraid it will over-excite the masses? (He stares insanely at M’Bengue.) She is a gift. You ask me not to write of her.
Martinson (quietly leading M’Bengue back) The greater argument, M. M’Bengue, please.
Stephen Go on.
M’Bengue Very well, it is this. We take aid from the West because we are poor, and in everything we are made to feel our inferiority. The price you ask us to pay is not money but misrepresentation. The way the nations of the West make us pay is by representing us continually in their organs of publicity as bunglers and murderers and fools. I have spent time in England and there the yellow press does not speak of Africa except to report how a nun has been raped, or there has been a tribal massacre, or how we are slaughtering the elephants – the elephants who are so much more suitable for television programmes than the Africans – or how corrupt and incompetent such-and-such a government is. If the crop succeeds, it is not news. If we build a dam, it is called boring. ‘Oh, we do not report the building of dams,’ say your newspapers. Dam-building is dull. Boring. The white man’s word for everything with which he does not wish to come to terms. Yes, he will give us money, but the price we will pay is that he will not seek to understand our point of view. Pro-Moscow, pro-Washington, this is the only way you can see the world. All your terms are political, and your politics is the crude fight between your two great blocs. Is Angola pro-Russian? Is it pro-American? These are the only questions you ever ask yourselves. As if the whole world could be seen in those terms. In your terms. In the white man’s terms and through the white man’s media. (He looks down, as if to hide the strength of feeling behind what he says.) And so it hurts … it begins to hurt that the context of the struggle in Africa is never made clear. It is never explained. Your news agencies report our events, and from a point of view which is eccentric and sensational. All this, day in, day out, we endure and make no protest, and when we come to take part in this conference in Bombay, we find that UNESCO has invited a particular keynote speaker – a black man himself, though of course, because he is Indian, it is not how he sees himself: he thinks himself superior to the black man from the bush – a speaker whose reputation is for wit at the expense of others, whose reporting is not positive, so of course he is called a hero in the West. He is called a bringer of truths because he seeks to discredit those who struggle. And so it is true, yes, in the middle of the night, Mr Andrews and I, walking to the Gateway of India, did say: the greater, the larger misrepresentation we can do nothing about – those who control the money will control the information – but the lesser one, yes, and tonight. A stand is possible. (He turns to Mehta.) You distort things in your novels because it is funny to distort, because indeed the surface of things is funny, if you do not understand how that surface comes to be, if you do not look underneath. Just as a funeral may be funny to a small boy who sees it passing in the street and does not know the man who is dead. So also no doubt in Africa it is superficially funny to see us blundering about. But who makes the jokes? The rich nations.
Mehta No.
M’Bengue Jokes, Mr Mehta, are a product of security. If one is secure, one may laugh at others. That is the truth. Humour, like everything, is something you buy. Free speech? Buy. But what is this freedom? The luxury of the rich who are sure of what they have.
Mehta just looks at him.
Mehta (quietly) What would you do? Ban it?
M’Bengue No. I would ask that black men who ascend from their countries do not conspire in the humiliation of those they have left behind.
There is a pause. When Mehta replies it is with a gravity that matches M’Bengue’s.
Mehta People are venal and stupid and corrupt, no more so now than at any other time in history. They tell themselves lies. The writer asks no more than the right to point those lies out. What you say of how the press sees you is probably true, and the greater grievance you have I am sure is right. But I will not add to the lies.
There is a pause. And then he gets up.
And that is all I have to say.
Peggy Victor …
Mehta No.
Mehta goes out. The whole group is suspended for a moment, and M’Bengue gets up and leaves at the other side. Martinson looks behind him to one of his A
ides.
Martinson The educational motion from tomorrow’s agenda …
Aide Yes.
Martinson We may move it to today?
Aide It’s possible.
Martinson Delay Mr Mehta’s address until tomorrow. If that’s agreeable?
He looks to Stephen.
Stephen Yes.
Martinson The Committee, Mr Andrews, will give us twenty-four hours?
Stephen (conscious of Peggy’s gaze) Of course.
Martinson gets up and leads his team out silently. Elaine, Peggy and Stephen are left alone.
Stephen Well, there you are.
Elaine I’d thought M’Bengue was a fool …
Stephen No.
Elaine When we watched him yesterday, he seemed to be the worst kind of professional politician.
Stephen How wrong can you be? Don’t you think? Don’t you think, Peggy?
Peggy Oh, yes. He’s got a good case. (She is thoughtful. She starts to move.)
Stephen Are you off?
Peggy Why?
Stephen I was wondering, no, I’m sorry, it was silly. I wanted to have lunch. Fuck, I shouldn’t have mentioned it. Forget I mentioned it.
Elaine Why doesn’t everyone just eat their meals on a tray in their room?
Peggy I just don’t believe it. Why do people make things so hard? Stephen, last night if you were so upset about dinner, why didn’t you say?
Stephen Only slightly. And that’s not the whole story.
Peggy I ran down the corridor, I tried to find you after you made that ridiculous scene.
Stephen I’d gone.
Peggy I know.
Stephen I was sickened by Mehta.
Peggy It’s so typical. If you’d stayed we could have discussed it. But no – throw the whole chess table over. Now we have a problem. Well?
Stephen Well what?
Peggy Well, we’ve got to get them to sit down and talk.
Stephen Do you mean M’Bengue and Victor?
Peggy Of course.
Stephen Why us?
Elaine Not me, I’m press.
Stephen Anyway, it’s hardly likely.
Peggy Why not?
Stephen Well I know this will seem a very minor objection. But they do actually believe different things.
Peggy So what would you do?
Stephen Do?
Peggy Yes, do.
Stephen (shrugs) Do nothing. Either Victor agrees his novels are slanted and malicious – which they are – or we can kiss goodbye to the conference.