The Complete Plays

by Oscar Wilde

  Are polished mirrors, and when I peer

  Into those mirrors I can see myself,

  And so I know my image lives in you.

  GUIDO (taking her in his arms). Stand still, thou hurrying orb

  in the high heavens,

  And make this hour immortal! (A pause.)

  DUCHESS. Sit down, here

  A little lower than me: yes, just so, sweet,

  That I may run my fingers through your hair,

  And see your face turn upwards like a flower

  To meet my kiss.

  Have you not sometimes noted,

  When we unlock some long disused room

  With heavy dust and soiling mildew filled,

  Where never foot of man has come for years,

  And from the windows take the rusty bar,

  And fling the broken shutters to the air,

  And let the bright sun in, how the good sun

  Turns every grimy particle of dust

  Into a little thing of dancing gold?

  Guido, my heart is that long-empty room,

  But you have let love in, and with its gold

  Guided all life. Do you not think that love

  Fills up the sum of life?

  GUIDO. Ay! without love

  Life is no better than the unhewn stone

  Which in the quarry lies, before the sculptor

  Has set the God within it. Without love

  Life is as silent as the common reeds

  That through the marshes or by rivers grow,

  And have no music in them.

  DUCHESS. Yet out of these

  The singer, who is Love, will make a pipe

  And from them he draws music; so I think

  Love will bring music out of any life.

  Is that not true?

  GUIDO. Sweet, women make it true.

  There are men who paint pictures, and carve statues,

  Paul of Verona and the dyer’s son,

  Or their great rival, who, by the sea at Venice,

  Has set God’s little maid upon the stair,

  White as her own white lily, and as tall,

  Or Raphael, whose Madonnas are divine

  Because they are mothers merely; yet I think

  Women are the best artists of the world,

  For they can take the common lives of men

  Soiled with the money-getting of our age,

  And with love make them beautiful.

  DUCHESS. Ah, dear,

  I wish that you and I were very poor;

  The poor, who love each other, are so rich.

  GUIDO. Tell me again you love me, Beatrice.

  DUCHESS (fingering his collar). How well this collar lies

  about your throat.

  LORD MORANZONE looks through the door from the corridor outside.

  GUIDO. Nay, tell me that you love me.

  DUCHESS. I remember,

  That when I was a child in my dear France,

  Being at Court at Fontainebleau, the King

  Wore such a collar.

  GUIDO. Will not you say you love me?

  DUCHESS (smiling). He was a very royal man, King Francis,

  Yet he was not royal as you are.

  Why need I tell you, Guido, that I love you?

  Takes his head in her hands and turns his face up to her.

  Do you not know that I am yours for ever,

  Body and soul.

  Kisses him, and then suddenly catches sight of MORANZONE and leaps up.

  Oh, what is that?

  MORANZONE disappears.

  GUIDO. What love?

  DUCHESS. Methought I saw a face with eyes of flame

  Look at us through the doorway.

  GUIDO. Nay, ’twas nothing:

  The passing shadow of the man on guard.

  The DUCHESS still stands looking at the window.

  ’Twas nothing, sweet.

  DUCHESS. Ay! what can harm us now,

  Who are in Love’s land? I do not think I’d care

  Though the vile world should with its lackey Slander

  Trample and tread upon my life; why should I?

  They say the common field-flowers of the field

  Have sweeter scent when they are trodden on

  Than when they bloom alone, and that some herbs

  Which have no perfume, on being bruised die

  With all Arabia round them; so it is

  With the young lives this dull world seeks to crush,

  It does but bring the sweetness out of them,

  And makes them lovelier often. And besides,

  While we have love we have the best of life:

  Is it not so?

  GUIDO. Dear, shall we play or sing?

  I think that I could sing now.

  DUCHESS. Do not speak,

  For there are times when all existences

  Seem narrowed to one single ecstasy,

  And Passion sets a seal upon the lips.

  GUIDO. Oh, with mine own lips at me break that seal! You love me, Beatrice?

  DUCHESS. Ay! is it not strange

  I should so love mine enemy?

  GUIDO. Who is he?

  DUCHESS. Why, you: that with your shaft didst pierce

  my heart!

  Poor heart, that lived its little lonely life

  Until it met your arrow.

  GUIDO. Ah, dear love,

  I am so wounded by that bolt myself

  That with untended wounds I lie a-dying,

  Unless you cure me, dear Physician.

  DUCHESS. I would not have you cured; for I am sick

  With the same malady.

  GUIDO. Oh how I love you!

  See, I must steal the cuckoo’s voice, and tell

  The one tale over.

  DUCHESS. Tell no other tale!

  For, if that is the little cuckoo’s song,

  The nightingale is hoarse, and the loud lark

  Has lost its music.

  GUIDO. Kiss me, Beatrice!

  She takes his face in her hands and bends down and kisses him; a loud knocking then comes at the door, and GUIDO leaps up; enter a SERVANT.

  SERVANT. A package for you, sir.

  GUIDO (carelessly). Ah! give it to me.

  SERVANT hands package wrapped in vermilion silk, and exit; as GUIDO is about to open it the DUCHESS comes up behind, and in sport takes it from him.

  DUCHESS (laughing). Now I will wager it is from some girl

  Who would have you wear her favour; I am so jealous

  I will not give up the least part in you,

  But like a miser keep you to myself,

  And spoil you perhaps in keeping.

  GUIDO. It is nothing.

  DUCHESS. Nay, it is from some girl.

  GUIDO. You know ’tis not.

  DUCHESS (turns her back and opens it). Now, traitor, tell

  me what does this sign mean,

  A dagger with two leopards wrought in steel?

  GUIDO (taking it from her). O God!

  DUCHESS. I’ll from the window look, and try

  If I can’st see the porter’s livery

  Who left it at the gate? I will not rest

  Till I have learned your secret.

  Runs laughing into the corridor.

  GUIDO. Oh, horrible!

  Had I so soon forgot my father’s death,

  Did I so soon let love into my heart,

  And must I banish love, and let in murder

  That beats and clamours at the outer gate?

  Ay, that I must! Have I not sworn an oath?

  Yet not to-night; nay, it must be to-night.

  Farewell then to all the joy and light of life,

  All dear recorded memories, farewell,

  Farewell all love! Could I with bloody hands

  Fondle and paddle with her innocent hands?

  Could I with lips fresh from this butchery

  Play with her lips? Could I with murderous eyes

 
; Look in those violet eyes, whose purity

  Would strike mind blind, and make each eyeball reel

  In night perpetual? No, murder has set

  A barrier between us far too high

  For us to kiss across it.

  DUCHESS. Guido!

  GUIDO. Beatrice,

  You must forget that name, and banish me

  Out of your life for ever.

  DUCHESS (going towards him). O dear love!

  GUIDO (stepping back). There lies a barrier between us two We dare not pass.

  DUCHESS. I dare do anything

  So that you are beside me.

  GUIDO. Ah! There it is,

  I cannot be beside you, cannot breathe

  The air you breathe; I cannot any more

  Stand face to face with beauty, which unnerves

  My shaking heart, and makes my desperate hand

  Fail of its purpose. Let me go hence, I pray;

  Forget you ever looked upon me.

  DUCHESS. What!

  With your hot kisses fresh upon my lips

  Forget the vows of love you made to me?

  GUIDO. I take them back!

  DUCHESS. Alas, you cannot, Guido,

  For they are part of nature now; the air

  Is tremulous with their music, and outside

  The little birds sing sweeter for those vows.

  GUIDO. There lies a barrier between us now,

  Which then I knew not, or I had forgot.

  DUCHESS. There is no barrier, Guido; why, I will go

  In poor atire, and will follow you

  Over the world.

  GUIDO (wildly). The world’s not wide enough

  To hold us two! Farewell, farewell for ever.

  DUCHESS (calm, and controlling her passion). Why did

  you come into my life at all, then,

  Or in the desolate garden of my heart

  Sow that white flower of love – ?

  GUIDO. O Beatrice!

  DUCHESS. Which now you would dig up, uproot, tear out,

  Though each small fibre doth so hold my heart

  That if you break one, my heart breaks with it?

  Why did you come into my life? Why open

  The secret wells of love I had sealed up?

  Why did you open them – ?

  GUIDO. O God!

  DUCHESS (clenching her hand). And let

  The floodgates of my passion swell and burst

  Till, like the wave when rivers overflow

  That sweeps the forest and the farm away,

  Love in the splendid avalanche of its might

  Swept my life with it? Must I drop by drop

  Gather these waters back and seal them up?

  Alas! Each drop will be a tear, and so

  Will with its saltness make life very bitter.

  GUIDO. I pray you speak no more, for I must go

  Forth from your life and love, and make a way

  On which you cannot follow.

  DUCHESS. I have heard

  That sailors dying of thirst upon a raft,

  Poor castaways upon a lonely sea,

  Dream of green fields and pleasant water-courses,

  And then wake up with red thirst in their throats,

  And die more miserably because sleep

  Has cheated them: so they die cursing sleep

  For having sent them dreams; I will not curse you

  Though I am cast away upon the sea

  Which men call Desolation.

  GUIDO. O God, God!

  DUCHESS. But you will stay: listen, I love you, Guido.

  She waits a little.

  Is echo dead, that when I say I love you

  There is no answer?

  GUIDO. Everything is dead,

  Save one thing only, which shall die to-night!

  DUCHESS. Then I must train my lips to say farewell,

  And yet I think they will not learn that lesson,

  For when I shape them for such utterance

  They do but say I love you: must I chide them?

  And if so, can my lips chide one another?

  Alas, they both are guilty, and refuse

  To say the word.

  GUIDO. Then I must say it for them,

  Farewell, we two can never meet again.

  Rushes towards her.

  DUCHESS. If you are going, touch me not, but go.

  Exit GUIDO.

  Never again, did he say never again?

  Well, well, I know my business! I will change

  The torch of love into a funeral torch,

  And with the flowers of love will strew my bier,

  And from love’s songs will make a dirge, and so

  Die, as the swan dies, singing.

  O misery.

  If thou wert so enamoured of my life,

  Why couldst thou not some other form have borne?

  The mask of pain, and not the mask of love,

  The raven’s voice, and not the nightingale’s,

  The blind mole’s eyes, and not those agate eyes

  Which, like the summer heavens, were so blue

  That one could fancy one saw God in them,

  So, misery, I had known thee.

  Barrier! Barrier!

  Why did he say there was a barrier?

  There is no barrier between us two.

  He lied to me, and shall I for that reason

  Loathe what I love, and what I worshipped, hate?

  I think we women do not love like that.

  For if I cut his image from my heart,

  My heart would, like a bleeding pilgrim, follow

  That image through the world, and call it back

  With little cries of love.

  Enter DUKE equipped for the chase, with falconers and hounds.

  DUKE. Madam, you keep us waiting;

  You keep my dogs waiting.

  DUCHESS. I will not ride to-day.

  DUKE. How now, what’s this?

  DUCHESS. My Lord, I cannot go.

  DUKE. What, pale face, do you dare to stand against me?

  Why, I could set you on a sorry jade

  And lead you through the town, till the low rabble

  You feed toss up their hats and mock at you.

  DUCHESS. Have you no word of kindness ever for me?

  DUKE. Kind words are lime to snare our enemies!

  I hold you in the hollow of my hand.

  And have no need on you to waste kind words.

  DUCHESS. Well, I will go.

  DUKE (slapping his boot with his whip). No, I have changed

  my mind,

  You will stay here, and like a faithful wife

  Watch from the window for our coming back.

  Were it not dreadful if some accident

  By chance should happen to your loving Lord?

  Come, gentlemen, my hounds begin to chafe,

  And I chafe too, having a patient wife.

  Where is young Guido?

  MAFFIO. My liege, I have not seen him

  For a full hour past.

  DUKE. It matters not,

  I dare say I shall see him soon enough.

  Well, Madam, you will sit at home and spin.

  I do protest, sirs, the domestic virtues

  Are often very beautiful in others.

  Exit DUKE with his Court.

  DUCHESS. The stars have fought against me, that is all,

  And thus to-night when my Lord lieth asleep,

  Will I fall upon my dagger, and so cease.

  My heart is such a stone nothing can reach it

  Except the dagger’s edge: let it go there,

  To find what name it carries: ay! to-night

  Death will divorce the Duke; and yet to-night

  He may die also, he is very old.

  Why should he not die? Yesterday his hand

  Shook with a palsy: men have died from palsy,

  And why not he? Are there not fevers also,

  Agues
and chills, and other maladies

  Most incident to old age?

  No, no, he will not die, he is too sinful;

  Honest men die before their proper time.

  Good men will die: men by whose side the Duke

  In all the sick pollution of his life

  Seems like a leper: women and children die,

  But the Duke will not die, he is too sinful.

  Oh, can it be

  There is some immortality in sin,

  Which virtue has not? And does the wicked man

  Draw life from what to other men were death,

  Like poisonous plants that on corruption live?

  No, no, I think God would not suffer that:

  Yet the Duke will not die; he is too sinful.

  But I will die alone, and on this night

  Grim Death shall be my bridegroom, and the tomb

  My secret house of pleasure: well, what of that?

  The world’s a graveyard, and we each, like coffins,

  Within us bear a skeleton.

  Enter LORD MORANZONE all in black; he passes across the back of the stage looking anxiously about.

  MORANZONE. Where is Guido?

  I cannot find him anywhere.

  DUCHESS (catches sight of him). O God!

  ’Twas thou who took my love away from me.

  MORANZONE (with a look of joy). What, has he left you?

  DUCHESS. Nay, you know he has.

  Oh, give him back to me, give him back, I say,

  Or I will tear your body limb from limb,

  And to the common gibbet nail your head

  Until the carrion crows have stripped it bare.

  Better you have crossed a hungry lioness

  Before you came between me and my love.

  With more pathos.

  Nay, give him back, you know not how I love him,

  Here by this chair he knelt a half hour since,

  ’Twas there he stood, and there he looked at me,

  This is the hand he kissed, these are the lips

  His lips made havoc of, and these the ears

  Into whose open portals he did pour

  A tale of love so musical that all

  The birds stopped singing! Oh give him back to me.

  MORANZONE. He does not love you, Madam.

  DUCHESS. May the plague

  Wither the tongue that says so! Give him back.

  MORANZONE. Madam, I tell you you will never see him.

  Neither to-night, nor any other night.

  DUCHESS. What is your name?

  MORANZONE. My name? Revenge!

  Exit.

  DUCHESS. Revenge!

  I think I never harmed a little child.

  What should Revenge do coming to my door?

  It matters not, for Death is there already,

  Waiting for his dim torch to light my way.

  ’Tis true men hate thee, Death, and yet I think

  Thou wilt be kinder to me than my lover,

  And so dispatch the messengers at once,

  Hurry the lazy steeds of lingering day,