by David Hare
There is a pause. Peter waits.
I didn’t know Matisse well. But I understood him. I understood what’s called his handwriting. I love this phrase. Do you know what it is?
Peter No.
Valentina It’s a painting term. Which is indefinable. It’s not quite even signature. It’s more than that. It’s spirit.
She looks at him a moment, then Sophia returns, silently, with tea in a pot and cups on a tray. She moves round.
Sophia Here’s tea.
Valentina Well, thank you.
Sophia Everyone’s vanished. The museum’s closed.
Valentina Already?
Sophia It’s dark now.
Valentina I didn’t notice. What have you done with the Assistant Curator?
Sophia I told him to wait. (Sophia gives her tea.)
Valentina Thank you. You’ve been talking of me, I gather, to Peter here.
Sophia Not in particular. Do you want tea?
Peter No, thank you.
Sophia We’re always short of time. Me and Linitsky. (She smiles affectionately at him.) We meet in a café far from our homes. Most of the time we talk about how to meet next. Then when we meet next, how to meet next. And so on.
Valentina It sounds most exhausting.
Sophia In China they say if you want to be taught by a particular professor, you must go to his door every day and ask to be a pupil. And every day for a year, two years three years, he will close the door in your face. Then one day he will suddenly accept you. He’s been testing your endurance. To see if you want the thing badly enough.
Valentina What a sentimental notion.
Sophia It’s true.
Valentina I’m sure it’s true. (The hardness of her tone suddenly returns.) And meanwhile your life has gone by.
Sophia looks a moment to Peter.
Sophia So what did you decide?
Peter Sorry?
Sophia The two of you.
Peter Oh. (He pauses.) About what?
Sophia Peter …
Peter Oh, I see.
Sophia I’m asking, will my mother help us?
Peter I don’t know. She didn’t say.
Valentina smiles to herself.
We didn’t get on to the subject. To be honest, we were talking about art.
Sophia Oh God.
Peter I know.
Sophia Really, Peter. I asked you …
Peter I know. I’m ashamed.
Valentina Did you give him a mission?
Peter I got distracted, that’s all.
Valentina What was he meant to be asking me?
Sophia (to Valentina) Nothing. Mind your own business. (to Peter) Really! Do I have to do everything myself? (She is at once contrite.) Oh God, I’m sorry.
Peter No, no …
Sophia Forgive me, I didn’t mean to be unpleasant.
Peter You’re not being unpleasant. Really.
Sophia I’m sorry, Peter.
Peter No, it’s my fault.
Valentina Is this how your home life will be? God help us. I think you’d both be better off on your own.
Sophia Well, perhaps. (She turns to Peter.) What do you say?
Peter No, I don’t think so. For me it’s an adventure, you see. At last something’s happening. Even if, as you say, its unbelievably uncomfortable. It uncovers feelings I didn’t know I had. (He smiles, nervously.) For a start, I’m jealous. It’s illogical. Jealous of the past. Of the life Sophia had before I even knew her. The further back, the worse. Even the idea … when I think of her as young … just young … in a short gingham dress, on a pavement, with a satchel, going to school, the idea of her life as an eight-year-old fills my heart with such terrible longing. Such a sense of loss. It makes no sense, it’s ridiculous. My brain reels, I can hardly think. Images of someone I never even knew have a power to disturb me, to hurt me in a way which is more profound than anything I’ve known. (He looks hopelessly to Valentina.) What can I do? Just abandon her.
Sophia No.
Peter Just say, ‘Well, that’s it. You’ve had your glimpse. Now go home and do nothing but glue balsa wood on your own’? (He shrugs.) Plainly it’s true, I’m not happy. I’m what the textbooks call ‘seriously disturbed’. I wish I were stronger. I wish she didn’t so upset me. (A pause.) But I think I have to go on.
There is silence. Sophia looks at him a moment.
Valentina I don’t know. Why is that?
Peter Why?
Valentina Yes, why?
Sophia He just told you.
Valentina Yes. But what he feels will have an effect. On Grigor. On the children.
Peter I love the children.
Sophia They will live with us.
Valentina Will they? And when will you tell them about the separation?
Sophia does not answer.
Sophia?
Sophia I already have.
Valentina What?
Sophia Yes. I told them.
Valentina Why did you do that?
Sophia I felt it would be honest.
Valentina Please don’t lie to me.
Peter Sophia …
Sophia Also …
Peter (to Valentina) I didn’t know.
Valentina Tell me your true reason.
Sophia Many things.
Valentina Such as?
There is a pause.
Sophia There would be no going back.
Peter is looking across at her, alarmed. Valentina nods slightly.
Valentina Yes. And Grigor? Was Grigor there?
Sophia No. He wasn’t with me. I did it this morning. He’ll be home about now.
Valentina You told them without asking him.
Sophia Look, Mother, I’ve asked him often. He always says no. But they must know eventually.
Valentina You told them without his permission?
Sophia He will never give his permission. He claims I’m in the grip of a decadent fantasy. He says I am inflamed by the morals of the West. Mother, he’s mad.
Valentina The children won’t love you. They will never forgive you.
Sophia is shaking her head, now very agitated.
Sophia All right, I’ll be there. I’ll go home now. I’ll tell him. I’ll say ‘Grigor, the children now know what you and I know.’ I broke the news because if I didn’t, nothing would have happened. Was that wrong? (She suddenly cries out.) Mother, don’t look at me like that.
Valentina What did the twins say?
Sophia Well …
Valentina Tell me.
Sophia Look, what d’you think? Of course it isn’t easy.
Valentina Well?
Sophia It’s a long process. It’s years.
Valentina Just today?
Sophia pauses a moment.
Sophia Nikolai was fine. At once he went back to playing. Alexandra said, would I please go away?
Valentina She’s eight.
Sophia Mother, don’t torture me.
Valentina turns to Peter.
Valentina Peter, are you shocked?
Peter No. (He pauses, uncertain.) Of course not. It had to be done. Eventually.
Valentina Is there anything worse? Is there anything worse than the weak when they try to be strong? They make such a job of it!
Peter That isn’t fair.
Valentina Oh, I see. Is this how you would have done it?
Peter I’m not Sophia. I haven’t suffered as she has.
Valentina How has she suffered? What does she suffer? Please. I would really like to know.
Peter Well …
Valentina In what way is she different from anyone in Russia? What is her complaint? That she is not free? That’s what I’ve been told. Well, who is free? Tell me, am I free?
Sophia No. No, Mother. But it’s you who always say I am docile … (She turns to Peter.) That’s what she tells me. That I’m passive; I’m second-rate, I agree to things too easily …
Valentina I say this?
Sophia Today!
Even today you said people take advantage of me. Now when I make a stand, you insult me.
Valentina I do. Because it is doomed. Because it’s not in your character.
Sophia No?
Valentina It’s just a little spurt. You don’t have the character to finish what you’ve started.
There is a pause. Sophia looks at her, as if finally understanding her objection. Then, with genuine interest:
Sophia Is that what you fear?
Valentina Yes, it is. You’ll fail. You’ll lose heart.
Sophia Is that all you fear?
Valentina looks slightly shifty.
Valentina Nor does he. I apologize for saying this. He’s ten years from dying.
Sophia Yes, thank you, Mother. Is there anything else?
She looks calmly to Peter who seems not remotely upset.
Peter It’s all right.
Sophia Perhaps you might explain. I suppose my mother did not tell you anything of her own life.
Peter Er, no.
Valentina We did not discuss it.
Sophia Valentina does not tell you why she’s so hard on me.
There’s a pause, the two women quite still.
My mother made a choice. Thirty-five years ago.
Valentina Yes.
Sophia I was a baby. She carried me in her arms into Russia, in 1921. She brought me here from Paris.
There is a pause.
Peter I see.
He waits for more, but the two women are still, both looking down. Eventually:
What … I don’t see … I don’t understand exactly … I mean …
Sophia Go on. Please. Yes. Ask.
Peter Well … I suppose I’m wondering … do you regret it?
Valentina How do you answer that question? At certain times everything is wrong.
Sophia smiles.
I was a wayward woman – that’s the word. I lay around in beds, in studios, with men, smoking too much and thinking, shall I grow my hair? I had a child. Oh, I was like Gorki’s mother, who stopped for fifteen minutes on a peasants’ march to give birth in a ditch. Then she ran to catch up with the marchers. I was the same. I had my little Sophia in an atelier in the Marais, with two jugs of hot water and a homosexual friend who delivered her. And then I thought – well, is this it? This lounging about? This thinking only of yourself? This – what word should I use – freedom? Having a child changed everything. I suddenly decided that Paris was meaningless. Indulgence only. I had a Russian daughter. I had to come home. (She sits back.) An artist in Russia. Oh, when I came back, of course, everything was possible. (She smiles.) But now. I have not exhibited in seventeen years. (She shrugs slightly.) Foreign painters are exhibited in all sorts of style. But Russians may have one style only. It does not suit me. That’s all there is to say.
There is another silence.
Sophia My mother is intolerant of those who complain.
Peter Yes. Do you ever think … you could have left here …
Valentina Exile, you mean?
Peter Yes.
Valentina It seemed to me cowardly. To give up seems cowardly. Finally that is always the choice. (She gestures suddenly towards the canvas on the other side of the room.) A painting, we are told, left by an aristocrat in his will. His last wish, to send it back to Russia. And he left in 1919! (She laughs.)
Peter I don’t know, I mean, for myself I’ve never even thought of it, why should I? But for you … with your background …
Valentina No, of course not. My life is not happy. I say this to you. But it would also be unhappy if I’d been cowardly. (She shakes her head.) Your life is defined by an absence, by what is not happening, by where you can’t be. You think all the time about ‘me’. Oh ‘me’! Oh ‘me’! The endless ‘me’ who takes over. ‘Me’ becomes everything. Oh ‘I’ decided. The self-dramatization. Turning your life into a crusade. A crusade in which you claim equal status with Russia. On the one hand, the whole of Russia, millions of square miles. On the other, ‘I’ think and ‘I’ feel. The battle is unequal. That kind of self-advertisement, it seemed to me wrong. And dangerous. And wilful. To drink wine or breed horses, and dream of elsewhere. (Pause.) I wasn’t a communist. I know what has happened since. I’m still not a communist. How could I be? But I made a decision.
Peter And were you right?
Valentina I have no idea.
There is a silence.
Sophia Peter. Please. I want to be alone with her.
Peter What? Oh, of course.
Sophia Please, Peter, she and I need to talk.
Peter Of course. (He is upset.) Now?
Sophia Yes.
He stands a moment.
Peter When shall I see you?
Sophia What?
Peter See you? We haven’t made an arrangement.
Sophia Oh no, that’s right.
Peter Well, er …
Sophia Do we have to fix it now?
Peter Of course we do, yes.
Sophia Sorry, I can’t think. You say.
Peter In three days, do you have …
Sophia Yes. Friday. The usual break after lunch.
Peter Three days.
Sophia Yes.
Peter I’ll see you then. And we’ll talk this over. Madame Nrovka, this has been a great honour. (He goes across to Valentina.)
Valentina I was pleased to meet you.
Peter To be honest I was scared. Not because of you. But because I care too much. I do crave her happiness.
Valentina Yes. That is clear.
He stands a moment.
Peter Three days then.
Sophia Yes.
Peter I must go. (Without looking at Sophia he turns and goes quickly out.)
Valentina Now it’s cold.
Sophia Yes.
Valentina It’s cold suddenly.
Sophia They turn the heating off, I suppose.
Valentina All the money they must need to heat art. To keep art warm for the public. (She looks across at Sophia.) Tell me, is it money you want?
Sophia Yes, of course.
Valentina I guessed that. Peter’s embarrassment was on such a scale. I knew you must have told him to ask me for money.
Sophia I did.
Valentina He’s too nice. He would have stood there for ever.
Sophia smiles.
How much do you need?
Sophia Two thousand.
Valentina When?
Sophia Well, after the counselling, and the advertisement, and the examination in the People’s Court, finally you need the money for the Regional Court. But I felt … there’s no point in my starting if at the end I can’t pay.
Valentina You should have asked me this morning. Before speaking to the children. But it did not occur to you that I would say no.
She looks at Sophia who does not answer.
Why should I give you money when I do not approve?
There is a silence. Sophia just looks at her. Valentina turns away.
You’re just unlucky. It’s historical accident. In the twenties it was easy.
Sophia I’ve heard.
Valentina In the first days of the Soviet Union, you didn’t need your partner’s consent. You could sue for a divorce by sending a postcard and three roubles. There was to be a revolution of the sexes. I must say I had my doubts at the time.
Sophia smiles as well.
I had a lover for a while. Or rather I tried to. Another soldier. Like you, we had nowhere to go. After Paris, Russia seemed ridiculous. Because even then, people got upset if you showed your feelings. People disapproved. So we noticed that at stations people may embrace openly because they’re always saying goodbye. So he and I used to go and pretend that one of us was catching a train. We embraced on the platform. We said a thousand goodbyes. Train after train went without us. Then an official came and said ‘You’ve watched enough trains.’ (She pauses, lost in thought.) And what will you have? A small room in the suburbs of Leningrad. No money. Children who
dislike you for taking them away from their father. From prosperity. From someone who belongs. Who fits in. Who is happy here.
Sophia Yes.
Valentina Have you thought of the effect the divorce will have on him? A Party member?
Sophia Of course. But if I don’t I will have no self-respect.
Valentina laughs.
Valentina Oh, please. You! No one cares. You have no status here. Be clear. You’re a private citizen. Love in a small flat, it’s nobody’s business. But Grigor – he will lose position. Influence. Friends. He will be discredited. It’s a sign of failure.
Sophia looks unapologetically at her.
Sophia Well, I can’t live with the Party any more. (She shakes her head.) I’ve always known … after all, in my profession I work with young people. I spread ideas. I can’t be considered for promotion unless I am also willing to join. The moment is looming when they will ask me. (She pauses a moment.) This way the moment will never arrive.
Valentina Ah, well, I see …
Sophia I think the only hope now is to live your life in private.
Valentina So you choose Peter.
Sophia Yes.
Valentina Because he’s ineffectual and hopeless and has no ambition. That’s clear. You love his hopelessness.
Sophia It seems a great virtue. Is that wrong? After watching Grigor. The way Grigor is. It comforts me that Peter has no wish to get on.
Valentina Yes. That’s attractive. But there’s a limit.
Sophia You mean Peter is beyond it?
Valentina He is the Soul of No Hope. (She smiles.) Everyone here has a vision. How it might be other. We all have a dream of something else. For you it’s Linitsky. Linitsky’s your escape. How will it be when he becomes your reality? When he’s not your escape? When he’s your life?
Sophia I don’t know.
Valentina Have you thought …
Sophia Of course.
Valentina It’s possible you’ll hate him? As you hate Grigor now.
Sophia No.
Valentina All the things that seem so attractive – that manner, the way he holds his hat in his hands, the gentleness – when they are your life, they will seem insufferable.
Sophia Perhaps. I don’t know. How can anyone know?
Valentina smiles.
Valentina Everyone here lives in the future. Or in the past. No one wants the present. What shall we do with the present? Oh, Paris! Oh, Linitsky! Anything but here! Anything but now! (She turns to Sophia.) I had a friend. She loved a violinist. They could rarely meet. He was married. She worshipped him. Eventually he could not play unless he sensed she was in the audience. She went to all his concerts for over three years. She later said to me, rather bitterly, the violin repertoire is remarkably small. The man’s wife died. He came to her and said, we’re free. It lasted a week. She no longer desired him. (A pause.) It seems to me the worst story I know.