Department of Postgraduate Studies
and Research in English
Open Elective for II Semester
PO 128.2 – Paper XVII: Reading
Literature
PO.128.2- PAPER XVII: READING LITERATURE
OPEN ELECTIVE: 3 CREDITS
CONTACT HOURS: 45
LEARNING OBJECTIVES: The paper is targeted for those students with an interest in
literature. The paper will introduce students to the various genres in literature, the concept
of the text and he canon. It also plans to introduce students to reading and analysing texts
by employing various theoretical concepts.
UNIT I: INTRODUCTING LITERATURE
What Is Literature? Discussion
Major Literary Terms
Genres of Literature
Interpretation of Literature
UNIT II: POETRY
William Shakespeare: “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s Day?
Langston Hughes: “Harlem”
Maya Angelou: “Still I Rise”
Wallace Stevens: “Anecdote of the Jar”
Paul Celan: “Death Fugue”
A. K Ramanujan: “Small Scale Reflections on a Great House”
Nissim Ezekiel: “Enterprise”
Adrienne Rich: “Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers”
UNIT III: SHORT STORIES
Edgar Allan Poe: “The Tell-Tale Heart”
Guy de Maupassant: “The Diamond Necklace”
Kate Chopin: “Désirée’s Baby”
Shashi Tharoor: “The Five Dollar Smile”
UNIT IV: ONE ACT PLAYS
Girish Karnad: “Broken Images”
Susan Glaspell: “Trifles”
* Note: Unit I is an introduction and it should be taught aligning it with the other units in
the syllabus, for instance “Harlem” with racism and slavery or “Death Fugue” with the
Holocaust. The pattern of testing may follow this line of thought.
REFERENCES:
1. Bennet, Andrew and Nicholas Royle: An Introduction to Literature, Criticism and
Theory, 2004.
2. Daiches David: Critical History of English literature
3. Evans, Sir Ifor: Short History of English literature
4. Kusch, Celena: Literary Analysis: The Basics
1
Sonnet 18: Shall I Compare thee to a Summer’s Day?
William Shakespeare
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
Harlem
Langston Hughes
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
2
Still I Rise
Maya Angelou
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.
Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
’Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.
Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.
Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries?
Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
’Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own backyard.
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.
Does my sexiness upset you?
3
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?
Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
Anecdote of the Jar
Wallace Stevens
I placed a jar in Tennessee,
And round it was, upon a hill.
It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.
The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in air.
It took dominion everywhere.
4
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.
Death Fuge
Paul Celan
Black milk of morning we drink you evenings
we drink you at noon and mornings we drink you at night
we drink and we drink
A man lives in the house he plays with the snakes he writes
he writes when it darkens to Deutschland your golden hair Margarete
he writes and steps in front of his house and the stars glisten and he whistles his
dogs to come
he whistles his jews to appear let a grave be dug in the earth
he commands us play up for the dance
Black milk of dawn we drink you at night
we drink you mornings and noontime we drink you evenings
we drink and we drink
A man lives in the house he plays with the snakes he writes
he writes when it turns dark to Deutschland your golden hair Margarete
Your ashen hair Shulamit we dig a grave in the air there one lies at ease
He calls jab deeper into the earth you there and you other men sing and play
he grabs the gun in his belt he draws it his eyes are blue
jab deeper your spades you there and you other men continue to play for the
dance
Black milk of dawn we drink you at night
we drink you at noon we drink you evenings
we drink you and drink
a man lives in the house your golden hair Margarete
your ashen hair Shulamit he plays with the snakes
5
He calls out play death more sweetly death is a master from Deutschland
he calls scrape those fiddles more darkly then as smoke you’ll rise in the air
then you’ll have a grave in the clouds there you’ll lie at ease
Black milk of dawn we drink you at night
we drink you at noon death is a master from Deutschland
we drink you evenings and mornings we drink and drink
death is a master from Deutschland his eye is blue
he strikes you with lead bullets his aim is true
a man lives in the house your golden hair Margarete
he sets his dogs on us he gifts us a grave in the air
he plays with the snakes and dreams death is a master from Deutschland
your golden hair Margarete
your ashen hair Shulamit
Small Scale Reflections on a Great House
AK Ramanujan
Sometimes I think that nothing
that ever comes into this house
goes out. Things that come in everyday
to lose themselves among other things
lost long ago among
other things lost long ago;
lame wandering cows from nowhere
have been known to be tethered,
given a name, encouraged
to get pregnant in the broad daylight
of the street under the elders'
supervision, the girls hiding
behind windows with holes in them.
6
Unread library books
usually mature in two weeks
and begin to lay a row
of little eggs in the ledgers
for fines, as silverfish
in the old man's office room
breed dynasties among long legal words
in the succulence
of Victorian parchment.
Neighbours' dishes brought up
with the greasy sweets they made
all night the day before yesterday
for the wedding anniversary of a god,
never leave the house they enter,
like the servants, the phonographs,
the epilepsies in the blood,
sons-in-law who quite forget
their mothers, but stay to check
accounts or teach arithmetic to nieces,
or the women who come as wives
from houses open on one side
to rising suns, on another
to the setting, accustomed
to wait and to yield to monsoons
in the mountains' calendar
beating through the hanging banana leaves
And also anything that goes out
will come back, processed and often
with long bills attached,
like the hooped bales of cotton
shipped off to invisible Manchesters
and brought back milled and folded
7
for a price, cloth for our days'
middle-class loins, and muslin
for our richer nights. Letters mailed
have a way of finding their way back
with many re-directions to wrong
addresses and red ink-marks
earned in Tiruvalla and Sialkot.
And ideas behave like rumours,
once casually mentioned somewhere
they come back to the door as prodigies
born to prodigal fathers, with eyes
that vaguely look like our own,
like what Uncle said the other day:
that every Plotinus we read
is what some Alexander looted
between the malarial rivers.
A beggar once came with a violin
to croak out a prostitute song
that our voiceless cook sang
all the time in our backyard.
Nothing stays out: daughters
get married to short-lived idiots;
sons who run away come back
in grand children who recite Sanskrit
to approving old men, or bring
betel nuts for visiting uncles
who keep them gaping with
anecdotes of unseen fathers,
or to bring Ganges water
in a copper pot
for the last of the dying
ancestors' rattle in the throat.
8
And though many times from everywhere,
recently only twice:
once in nineteen-forty-three
from as far as the Sahara,
half -gnawed by desert foxes,
and lately from somewhere
in the north, a nephew with stripes
on his shoulder was called
an incident on the border
and was brought back in plane
and train and military truck
even before the telegrams reached,
on a perfectly good
Chatty afternoon
Enterprise
Nissim Ezekiel
It started as a pilgrimage
Exalting minds and making all
The burdens light, The second stage
Explored but did not test the call.
The sun beat down to match our rage.
We stood it very well, I thought ,
Observed and put down copious notes
On things the peasants sold and bought
The way of serpents and of goats.
Three cities where a sage had taught
But when the differences arose
On how to cross a desert patch,
We lost a friend whose stylish prose
Was quite the best of all our batch.
A shadow falls on us and grows .
Another phase was reached when we
9
Were twice attacked , and lost our way.
A section claimed its liberty
To leave the group. I tried to prey .
Our leader said he smelt the sea
We noticed nothing as we went ,
A straggling crowd of little hope,
Ignoring what the thunder meant ,
Deprived of common needs like soap.
Some were broken , some merely bent.
When, finally , we reached the place ,
We hardly know why we were there.
The trip had darkened every face,
Our deeds were neither great nor rare.
Home is where we have to gather grace.
Aunt Jennifer's Tigers
Adrienne Rich
Aunt Jennifer's tigers prance across a screen,
Bright topaz denizens of a world of green.
They do not fear the men beneath the tree;
They pace in sleek chivalric certainty.
Aunt Jennifer's finger fluttering through her wool
Find even the ivory needle hard to pull.
The massive weight of Uncle's wedding band
Sits heavily upon Aunt Jennifer's hand.
When Aunt is dead, her terrified hands will lie
Still ringed with ordeals she was mastered by.
The tigers in the panel that she made
Will go on prancing, proud and unafraid.
The Tell-Tale Heart
Edgar Allan Poe
True! --nervous --very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say
that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my senses --not destroyed --not dulled them.
Above all was the sense of hearing acute. I heard all things in the heaven and in the
earth. I heard many things in hell. How, then, am I mad? Hearken! and observe how
healthily --how calmly I can tell you the whole story.
It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain; but once conceived, it
haunted me day and night. Object there was none. Passion there was none. I loved the
old man. He had never wronged me. He had never given me insult. For his gold I had no
desire. I think it was his eye! yes, it was this! He had the eye of a vulture --a pale blue
eye, with a film over it. Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and so by degrees
--very gradually -- I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself
of the eye forever.
Now this is the point. You fancy me mad. Madmen know nothing. But you should have
seen me. You should have seen how wisely I proceeded --with what caution --with what
foresight --with what dissimulation I went to work! I was never kinder to the old man
than during the whole week before I killed him. And every night, about midnight, I
turned the latch of his door and opened it --oh so gently! And then, when I had made an
opening sufficient for my head, I put in a dark lantern, all closed, closed, that no light
shone out, and then I thrust in my head. Oh, you would have laughed to see how
cunningly I thrust it in! I moved it slowly --very, very slowly, so that I might not disturb
the old man's sleep. It took me an hour to place my whole head within the opening so
far that I could see him as he lay upon his bed. Ha! would a madman have been so wise
as this, And then, when my head was well in the room, I undid the lantern cautiously-oh,
so cautiously --cautiously (for the hinges creaked) --I undid it just so much that a single
thin ray fell upon the vulture eye. And this I did for seven long nights --every night just at
midnight --but I found the eye always closed; and so it was impossible to do the work;
for it was not the old man who vexed me, but his Evil Eye. And every morning, when the
day broke, I went boldly into the chamber, and spoke courageously to him, calling him
by name in a hearty tone, and inquiring how he has passed the night. So you see he
would have been a very profound old man, indeed, to suspect that every night, just at
twelve, I looked in upon him while he slept.
Upon the eighth night I was more than usually cautious in opening the door. A watch's
minute hand moves more quickly than did mine. Never before that night had I felt the
extent of my own powers --of my sagacity. I could scarcely contain my feelings of
triumph. To think that there I was, opening the door, little by little, and he not even to
dream of my secret deeds or thoughts. I fairly chuckled at the idea; and perhaps he
heard me; for he moved on the bed suddenly, as if startled. Now you may think that I
drew back --but no. His room was as black as pitch with the thick darkness, (for the
shutters were close fastened, through fear of robbers,) and so I knew that he could not
see the opening of the door, and I kept pushing it on steadily, steadily. I had my head in,
and was about to open the lantern, when my thumb slipped upon the tin fastening, and
the old man sprang up in bed, crying out --"Who's there?" I kept quite still and said
nothing. For a whole hour I did not move a muscle, and in the meantime I did not hear
him lie down. He was still sitting up in the bed listening; --just as I have done, night after
night, hearkening to the death watches in the wall.
Presently I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was the groan of mortal terror. It was not
a groan of pain or of grief --oh, no! --it was the low stifled sound that arises from the
bottom of the soul when overcharged with awe. I knew the sound well. Many a night,
just at midnight, when all the world slept, it has welled up from my own bosom,
deepening, with its dreadful echo, the terrors that distracted me. I say I knew it well. I
knew what the old man felt, and pitied him, although I chuckled at heart. I knew that he
had been lying awake ever since the first slight noise, when he had turned in the bed.
His fears had been ever since growing upon him. He had been trying to fancy them
causeless, but could not. He had been saying to himself --"It is nothing but the wind in
the chimney --it is only a mouse crossing the floor," or "It is merely a cricket which has
made a single chirp." Yes, he had been trying to comfort himself with these
suppositions: but he had found all in vain. All in vain; because Death, in approaching him
had stalked with his black shadow before him, and enveloped the victim. And it was the
mournful influence of the unperceived shadow that caused him to feel --although he
neither saw nor heard --to feel the presence of my head within the room.
When I had waited a long time, very patiently, without hearing him lie down, I resolved
to open a little --a very, very little crevice in the lantern. So I opened it --you cannot
imagine how stealthily, stealthily --until, at length a simple dim ray, like the thread of
the spider, shot from out the crevice and fell full upon the vulture eye. It was open -wide, wide open --and I grew furious as I gazed upon it. I saw it with perfect distinctness
--all a dull blue, with a hideous veil over it that chilled the very marrow in my bones; but
I could see nothing else of the old man's face or person: for I had directed the ray as if
by instinct, precisely upon the damned spot. And have I not told you that what you
mistake for madness is but over-acuteness of the sense? --now, I say, there came to my
ears a low, dull, quick sound, such as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton. I knew
that sound well, too. It was the beating of the old man's heart. It increased my fury, as
the beating of a drum stimulates the soldier into courage.
But even yet I refrained and kept still. I scarcely breathed. I held the lantern motionless.
I tried how steadily I could maintain the ray upon the eye. Meantime the hellish tattoo
of the heart increased. It grew quicker and quicker, and louder and louder every instant.
The old man's terror must have been extreme! It grew louder, I say, louder every
moment! --do you mark me well I have told you that I am nervous: so I am. And now at
the dead hour of the night, amid the dreadful silence of that old house, so strange a
noise as this excited me to uncontrollable terror. Yet, for some minutes longer I
refrained and stood still. But the beating grew louder, louder! I thought the heart must
burst. And now a new anxiety seized me --the sound would be heard by a neighbour!
The old man's hour had come! With a loud yell, I threw open the lantern and leaped into
the room. He shrieked once --once only. In an instant I dragged him to the floor, and
pulled the heavy bed over him. I then smiled gaily, to find the deed so far done. But, for
many minutes, the heart beat on with a muffled sound. This, however, did not vex me; it
would not be heard through the wall. At length it ceased. The old man was dead. I
removed the bed and examined the corpse. Yes, he was stone, stone dead. I placed my
hand upon the heart and held it there many minutes. There was no pulsation. He was
stone dead. His eye would trouble me no more.
If still you think me mad, you will think so no longer when I describe the wise
precautions I took for the concealment of the body. The night waned, and I worked
hastily, but in silence. First of all I dismembered the corpse. I cut off the head and the
arms and the legs. I then took up three planks from the flooring of the chamber, and
deposited all between the scantlings. I then replaced the boards so cleverly, so
cunningly, that no human eye --not even his --could have detected any thing wrong.
There was nothing to wash out --no stain of any kind --no blood-spot whatever. I had
been too wary for that. A tub had caught all --ha! ha! When I had made an end of these
labors, it was four o'clock --still dark as midnight. As the bell sounded the hour, there
came a knocking at the street door. I went down to open it with a light heart, --for what
had I now to fear? There entered three men, who introduced themselves, with perfect
suavity, as officers of the police. A shriek had been heard by a neighbour during the
night; suspicion of foul play had been aroused; information had been lodged at the
police office, and they (the officers) had been deputed to search the premises. I smiled, -for what had I to fear? I bade the gentlemen welcome. The shriek, I said, was my own in
a dream. The old man, I mentioned, was absent in the country. I took my visitors all over
the house. I bade them search --search well. I led them, at length, to his chamber. I
showed them his treasures, secure, undisturbed. In the enthusiasm of my confidence, I
brought chairs into the room, and desired them here to rest from their fatigues, while I
myself, in the wild audacity of my perfect triumph, placed my own seat upon the very
spot beneath which reposed the corpse of the victim.
The officers were satisfied. My manner had convinced them. I was singularly at ease.
They sat, and while I answered cheerily, they chatted of familiar things. But, ere long, I
felt myself getting pale and wished them gone. My head ached, and I fancied a ringing in
my ears: but still they sat and still chatted. The ringing became more distinct: --It
continued and became more distinct: I talked more freely to get rid of the feeling: but it
continued and gained definiteness --until, at length, I found that the noise was not
within my ears. No doubt I now grew very pale; --but I talked more fluently, and with a
heightened voice. Yet the sound increased --and what could I do? It was a low, dull,
quick sound --much such a sound as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton. I gasped
for breath --and yet the officers heard it not. I talked more quickly --more vehemently;
but the noise steadily increased. I arose and argued about trifles, in a high key and with
violent gesticulations; but the noise steadily increased. Why would they not be gone? I
paced the floor to and fro with heavy strides, as if excited to fury by the observations of
the men --but the noise steadily increased. Oh God! what could I do? I foamed --I raved -I swore! I swung the chair upon which I had been sitting, and grated it upon the boards,
but the noise arose over all and continually increased. It grew louder --louder --louder!
And still the men chatted pleasantly, and smiled. Was it possible they heard not?
Almighty God! --no, no! They heard! --they suspected! --they knew! --they were making
a mockery of my horror!-this I thought, and this I think. But anything was better than
this agony! Anything was more tolerable than this derision! I could bear those
hypocritical smiles no longer! I felt that I must scream or die! and now --again! --hark!
louder! louder! louder! louder!
"Villains!" I shrieked, "dissemble no more! I admit the deed! --tear up the planks! here,
here! --It is the beating of his hideous heart!"
*******************
The Necklace
Guy de Maupassant
She was one of those pretty and charming girls born, as if by an error of fate, into a
family of clerks. She had no dowry, no expectations, no means of becoming known,
understood, loved or wedded by a man of wealth and distinction; and so she let herself
be married to a minor official at the Ministry of Education.
She dressed plainly because she had never been able to afford anything better, but
she was as unhappy as if she had once been wealthy. Women don't belong to a caste or
class; their beauty, grace, and natural charm take the place of birth and family. Natural
delicacy, instinctive elegance and a quick wit determine their place in society, and make
the daughters of commoners the equals of the very finest ladies.
She suffered endlessly, feeling she was entitled to all the delicacies and luxuries of
life. She suffered because of the poorness of her house as she looked at the dirty walls,
the worn-out chairs and the ugly curtains. All these things that another woman of her
class would not even have noticed, tormented her and made her resentful. The sight of
the little Brenton girl who did her housework filled her with terrible regrets and
hopeless fantasies. She dreamed of silent antechambers hung with Oriental tapestries,
lit from above by torches in bronze holders, while two tall footmen in knee-length
breeches napped in huge armchairs, sleepy from the stove's oppressive warmth. She
dreamed of vast living rooms furnished in rare old silks, elegant furniture loaded with
priceless ornaments, and inviting smaller rooms, perfumed, made for afternoon chats
with close friends - famous, sought after men, who all women envy and desire.
When she sat down to dinner at a round table covered with a three-day-old cloth
opposite her husband who, lifting the lid off the soup, shouted excitedly, "Ah! Beef
stew! What could be better," she dreamed of fine dinners, of shining silverware, of
tapestries which peopled the walls with figures from another time and strange birds in
fairy forests; she dreamed of delicious dishes served on wonderful plates, of whispered
gallantries listened to with an inscrutable smile as one ate the pink flesh of a trout or
the wings of a quail.
She had no dresses, no jewels, nothing; and these were the only things she
loved. She felt she was made for them alone. She wanted so much to charm, to be
envied, to be desired and sought after.
She had a rich friend, a former schoolmate at the convent, whom she no longer
wanted to visit because she suffered so much when she came home. For whole days
afterwards she would weep with sorrow, regret, despair and misery.
*
One evening her husband came home with an air of triumph, holding a large envelope in
his hand.
"Look," he said, "here's something for you."
She tore open the paper and drew out a card, on which was printed the words:
"The Minister of Education and Mme. Georges Rampouneau request the pleasure of
M. and Mme. Loisel's company at the Ministry, on the evening of Monday January
18th."
Instead of being delighted, as her husband had hoped, she threw the invitation on
the table resentfully, and muttered:
"What do you want me to do with that?"
"But, my dear, I thought you would be pleased. You never go out, and it will be such a
lovely occasion! I had awful trouble getting it. Every one wants to go; it is very exclusive,
and they're not giving many invitations to clerks. The whole ministry will be there."
She stared at him angrily, and said, impatiently:
"And what do you expect me to wear if I go?"
He hadn't thought of that. He stammered:
"Why, the dress you go to the theatre in. It seems very nice to me ..."
He stopped, stunned, distressed to see his wife crying. Two large tears ran slowly
from the corners of her eyes towards the corners of her mouth. He stuttered:
"What's the matter? What's the matter?"
With great effort she overcame her grief and replied in a calm voice, as she wiped her
wet cheeks:
"Nothing. Only I have no dress and so I can't go to this party. Give your invitation to a
friend whose wife has better clothes than I do."
He was distraught, but tried again:
"Let's see, Mathilde. How much would a suitable dress cost, one which you could use
again on other occasions, something very simple?"
She thought for a moment, computing the cost, and also wondering what amount
she could ask for without an immediate refusal and an alarmed exclamation from the
thrifty clerk.
At last she answered hesitantly:
"I don't know exactly, but I think I could do it with four hundred francs."
He turned a little pale, because he had been saving that exact amount to buy a gun
and treat himself to a hunting trip the following summer, in the country near Nanterre,
with a few friends who went lark-shooting there on Sundays.
However, he said:
"Very well, I can give you four hundred francs. But try and get a really beautiful
dress."
*
The day of the party drew near, and Madame Loisel seemed sad, restless, anxious. Her
dress was ready, however. One evening her husband said to her:
"What's the matter? You've been acting strange these last three days."
She replied: "I'm upset that I have no jewels, not a single stone to wear. I will look
cheap. I would almost rather not go to the party."
"You could wear flowers, " he said, "They are very fashionable at this time of year.
For ten francs you could get two or three magnificent roses."
She was not convinced.
"No; there is nothing more humiliating than looking poor in the middle of a lot of rich
women."
"How stupid you are!" her husband cried. "Go and see your friend Madame Forestier
and ask her to lend you some jewels. You know her well enough for that."
She uttered a cry of joy.
"Of course. I had not thought of that."
The next day she went to her friend's house and told her of her distress.
Madame Forestier went to her mirrored wardrobe, took out a large box, brought it
back, opened it, and said to Madame Loisel:
"Choose, my dear."
First she saw some bracelets, then a pearl necklace, then a gold Venetian cross set
with precious stones, of exquisite craftsmanship. She tried on the jewelry in the mirror,
hesitated, could not bear to part with them, to give them back. She kept asking:
"You have nothing else?"
"Why, yes. But I don't know what you like."
Suddenly she discovered, in a black satin box, a superb diamond necklace, and her
heart began to beat with uncontrolled desire. Her hands trembled as she took it. She
fastened it around her neck, over her high-necked dress, and stood lost in ecstasy as she
looked at herself.
Then she asked anxiously, hesitating:
"Would you lend me this, just this?"
"Why, yes, of course."
She threw her arms around her friend's neck, embraced her rapturously, then fled
with her treasure.
*
The day of the party arrived. Madame Loisel was a success. She was prettier than all the
other women, elegant, gracious, smiling, and full of joy. All the men stared at her, asked
her name, tried to be introduced. All the cabinet officials wanted to waltz with her. The
minister noticed her.
She danced wildly, with passion, drunk on pleasure, forgetting everything in the
triumph of her beauty, in the glory of her success, in a sort of cloud of happiness, made
up of all this respect, all this admiration, all these awakened desires, of that sense of
triumph that is so sweet to a woman's heart.
She left at about four o'clock in the morning. Her husband had been dozing since
midnight in a little deserted anteroom with three other gentlemen whose wives were
having a good time.
He threw over her shoulders the clothes he had brought for her to go outside in, the
modest clothes of an ordinary life, whose poverty contrasted sharply with the elegance
of the ball dress. She felt this and wanted to run away, so she wouldn't be noticed by
the other women who were wrapping themselves in expensive furs.
Loisel held her back.
"Wait a moment, you'll catch a cold outside. I'll go and find a cab."
But she would not listen to him, and ran down the stairs. When they were finally in
the street, they could not find a cab, and began to look for one, shouting at the cabmen
they saw passing in the distance.
They walked down toward the Seine in despair, shivering with cold. At last they found
on the quay one of those old night cabs that one sees in Paris only after dark, as if they
were ashamed to show their shabbiness during the day.
They were dropped off at their door in the Rue des Martyrs, and sadly walked up the
steps to their apartment. It was all over, for her. And he was remembering that he had
to be back at his office at ten o'clock.
In front of the mirror, she took off the clothes around her shoulders, taking a final
look at herself in all her glory. But suddenly she uttered a cry. She no longer had the
necklace round her neck!
"What is the matter?" asked her husband, already half undressed.
She turned towards him, panic-stricken.
"I have ... I have ... I no longer have Madame Forestier's necklace."
He stood up, distraught.
"What! ... how! ... That's impossible!"
They looked in the folds of her dress, in the folds of her cloak, in her pockets,
everywhere. But they could not find it.
"Are you sure you still had it on when you left the ball?" he asked.
"Yes. I touched it in the hall at the Ministry."
"But if you had lost it in the street we would have heard it fall. It must be in the cab."
"Yes. That's probably it. Did you take his number?"
"No. And you, didn't you notice it?"
"No."
They stared at each other, stunned. At last Loisel put his clothes on again.
"I'm going back," he said, "over the whole route we walked, see if I can find it."
He left. She remained in her ball dress all evening, without the strength to go to bed,
sitting on a chair, with no fire, her mind blank.
Her husband returned at about seven o'clock. He had found nothing.
He went to the police, to the newspapers to offer a reward, to the cab companies,
everywhere the tiniest glimmer of hope led him.
She waited all day, in the same state of blank despair from before this frightful
disaster.
Loisel returned in the evening, a hollow, pale figure; he had found nothing.
"You must write to your friend," he said, "tell her you have broken the clasp of her
necklace and that you are having it mended. It will give us time to look some more."
She wrote as he dictated.
*
At the end of one week they had lost all hope.
And Loisel, who had aged five years, declared:
"We must consider how to replace the jewel."
The next day they took the box which had held it, and went to the jeweler whose
name they found inside. He consulted his books.
"It was not I, madame, who sold the necklace; I must simply have supplied the case."
And so they went from jeweler to jeweler, looking for an necklace like the other one,
consulting their memories, both sick with grief and anguish.
In a shop at the Palais Royal, they found a string of diamonds which seemed to be
exactly what they were looking for. It was worth forty thousand francs. They could have
it for thirty-six thousand.
So they begged the jeweler not to sell it for three days. And they made an
arrangement that he would take it back for thirty-four thousand francs if the other
necklace was found before the end of February.
Loisel had eighteen thousand francs which his father had left him. He would borrow
the rest.
And he did borrow, asking for a thousand francs from one man, five hundred from
another, five louis here, three louis there. He gave notes, made ruinous agreements,
dealt with usurers, with every type of money-lender. He compromised the rest of his
life, risked signing notes without knowing if he could ever honor them, and, terrified by
the anguish still to come, by the black misery about to fall on him, by the prospect of
every physical privation and every moral torture he was about to suffer, he went to get
the new necklace, and laid down on the jeweler's counter thirty-six thousand francs.
When Madame Loisel took the necklace back, Madame Forestier said coldly:
"You should have returned it sooner, I might have needed it."
To the relief of her friend, she did not open the case. If she had detected the
substitution, what would she have thought? What would she have said? Would she have
taken her friend for a thief?
*
From then on, Madame Loisel knew the horrible life of the very poor. But she played her
part heroically. The dreadful debt must be paid. She would pay it. They dismissed their
maid; they changed their lodgings; they rented a garret under the roof.
She came to know the drudgery of housework, the odious labors of the kitchen. She
washed the dishes, staining her rosy nails on greasy pots and the bottoms of pans. She
washed the dirty linen, the shirts and the dishcloths, which she hung to dry on a line;
she carried the garbage down to the street every morning, and carried up the water,
stopping at each landing to catch her breath. And, dressed like a commoner, she went
to the fruiterer's, the grocer's, the butcher's, her basket on her arm, bargaining,
insulted, fighting over every miserable sou.
Each month they had to pay some notes, renew others, get more time.
Her husband worked every evening, doing accounts for a tradesman, and often, late
into the night, he sat copying a manuscript at five sous a page.
And this life lasted ten years.
At the end of ten years they had paid off everything, everything, at usurer's rates and
with the accumulations of compound interest.
Madame Loisel looked old now. She had become strong, hard and rough like all
women of impoverished households. With hair half combed, with skirts awry, and
reddened hands, she talked loudly as she washed the floor with great swishes of water.
But sometimes, when her husband was at the office, she sat down near the window and
thought of that evening at the ball so long ago, when she had been so beautiful and so
admired.
What would have happened if she had not lost that necklace? Who knows, who
knows? How strange life is, how fickle! How little is needed for one to be ruined or
saved!
*
One Sunday, as she was walking in the Champs Élysées to refresh herself after the
week's work, suddenly she saw a woman walking with a child. It was Madame Forestier,
still young, still beautiful, still charming.
Madame Loisel felt emotional. Should she speak to her? Yes, of course. And now that
she had paid, she would tell her all. Why not?
She went up to her.
"Good morning, Jeanne."
The other, astonished to be addressed so familiarly by this common woman, did not
recognize her. She stammered:
"But - madame - I don't know. You must have made a mistake."
"No, I am Mathilde Loisel."
Her friend uttered a cry.
"Oh! ... my poor Mathilde, how you've changed! ..."
"Yes, I have had some hard times since I last saw you, and many miseries ... and all
because of you! ..."
"Me? How can that be?"
"You remember that diamond necklace that you lent me to wear to the Ministry
party?"
"Yes. Well?"
"Well, I lost it."
"What do you mean? You brought it back."
"I brought you back another exactly like it. And it has taken us ten years to pay for it.
It wasn't easy for us, we had very little. But at last it is over, and I am very glad."
Madame Forestier was stunned.
"You say that you bought a diamond necklace to replace mine?"
"Yes; you didn't notice then? They were very similar."
And she smiled with proud and innocent pleasure.
Madame Forestier, deeply moved, took both her hands.
"Oh, my poor Mathilde! Mine was an imitation! It was worth five hundred francs at
most! ..."
*********************
Kate Chopin
Desiree's Baby
As the day was pleasant, Madame Valmonde drove over to L'Abri to see Desiree and the
baby. It made her laugh to think of Desiree with a baby. Why, it seemed but yesterday
that Desiree was little more than a baby herself; when Monsieur in riding through the
gateway of Valmonde had found her lying asleep in the shadow of the big stone pillar.
The little one awoke in his arms and began to cry for "Dada." That was as much as she
could do or say. Some people thought she might have strayed there of her own accord,
for she was of the toddling age. The prevailing belief was that she had been purposely
left by a party of Texans, whose canvas-covered wagon, late in the day, had crossed the
ferry that Coton Mais kept, just below the plantation. In time Madame Valmonde
abandoned every speculation but the one that Desiree had been sent to her by a
beneficent Providence to be the child of her affection, seeing that she was without child
of the flesh. For the girl grew to be beautiful and gentle, affectionate and sincere - the
idol of Valmonde.
It was no wonder, when she stood one day against the stone pillar in whose shadow
she had lain asleep, eighteen years before, that Armand Aubigny riding by and seeing
her there, had fallen in love with her. That was the way all the Aubignys fell in love, as if
struck by a pistol shot. The wonder was that he had not loved her before; for he had
known her since his father brought him home from Paris, a boy of eight, after his
mother died there. The passion that awoke in him that day, when he saw her at the
gate, swept along like an avalanche, or like a prairie fire, or like anything that drives
headlong over all obstacles.
Monsieur Valmonde grew practical and wanted things well considered: that is, the girl's
obscure origin. Armand looked into her eyes and did not care. He was reminded that she
was nameless. What did it matter about a name when he could give her one of the
oldest and proudest in Louisiana? He ordered the corbeille from Paris, and contained
himself with what patience he could until it arrived; then they were married.
Madame Valmonde had not seen Desiree and the baby for four weeks. When she
reached L'Abri she shuddered at the first sight of it, as she always did. It was a sad
looking place, which for many years had not known the gentle presence of a mistress,
old Monsieur Aubigny having married and buried his wife in France, and she having
loved her own land too well ever to leave it. The roof came down steep and black like a
cowl, reaching out beyond the wide galleries that encircled the yellow stuccoed house.
Big, solemn oaks grew close to it, and their thick-leaved, far-reaching branches
shadowed it like a pall. Young Aubigny's rule was a strict one, too, and under it his
negroes had forgotten how to be gay, as they had been during the old master's easygoing and indulgent lifetime.
The young mother was recovering slowly, and lay full length, in her soft white muslins
and laces, upon a couch. The baby was beside her, upon her arm, where he had fallen
asleep, at her breast. The yellow nurse woman sat beside a window fanning herself.
Madame Valmonde bent her portly figure over Desiree and kissed her, holding her an
instant tenderly in her arms. Then she turned to the child.
"This is not the baby!" she exclaimed, in startled tones. French was the language
spoken at Valmonde in those days.
"I knew you would be astonished," laughed Desiree, "at the way he has grown. The
little cochon de lait! Look at his legs, mamma, and his hands and fingernails - real fingernails. Zandrine had to cut them this morning. Isn't it true, Zandrine?"
The woman bowed her turbaned head majestically, "Mais si, Madame."
"And the way he cries," went on Desiree, "is deafening. Armand heard him the other
day as far away as La Blanche's cabin."
Madame Valmonde had never removed her eyes from the child. She lifted it and
walked with it over to the window that was lightest. She scanned the baby narrowly,
then looked as searchingly at Zandrine, whose face was turned to gaze across the fields.
"Yes, the child has grown, has changed," said Madame Valmonde, slowly, as she
replaced it beside its mother. "What does Armand say?"
Desiree's face became suffused with a glow that was happiness itself.
"Oh, Armand is the proudest father in the parish, I believe, chiefly because it is a boy,
to bear his name; though he says not - that he would have loved a girl as well. But I
know it isn't true. I know he says that to please me. And mamma," she added, drawing
Madame Valmonde's head down to her, and speaking in a whisper, "he hasn't punished
one of them - not one of them - since baby is born. Even Negrillon, who pretended to
have burnt his leg that he might rest from work - he only laughed, and said Negrillon
was a great scamp. Oh, mamma, I'm so happy; it frightens me."
What Desiree said was true. Marriage, and later the birth of his son had softened
Armand Aubigny's imperious and exacting nature greatly. This was what made the
gentle Desiree so happy, for she loved him desperately. When he frowned she trembled,
but loved him. When he smiled, she asked no greater blessing of God. But Armand's
dark, handsome face had not often been disfigured by frowns since the day he fell in
love with her.
When the baby was about three months old, Desiree awoke one day to the conviction
that there was something in the air menacing her peace. It was at first too subtle to
grasp. It had only been a disquieting suggestion; an air of mystery among the blacks;
unexpected visits from far-off neighbors who could hardly account for their coming.
Then a strange, an awful change in her husband's manner, which she dared not ask him
to explain. When he spoke to her, it was with averted eyes, from which the old lovelight seemed to have gone out. He absented himself from home; and when there,
avoided her presence and that of her child, without excuse. And the very spirit of Satan
seemed suddenly to take hold of him in his dealings with the slaves. Desiree was
miserable enough to die.
She sat in her room, one hot afternoon, in her peignoir, listlessly drawing through her
fingers the strands of her long, silky brown hair that hung about her shoulders. The
baby, half naked, lay asleep upon her own great mahogany bed, that was like a
sumptuous throne, with its satin-lined half-canopy. One of La Blanche's little quadroon
boys - half naked too - stood fanning the child slowly with a fan of peacock feathers.
Desiree's eyes had been fixed absently and sadly upon the baby, while she was striving
to penetrate the threatening mist that she felt closing about her. She looked from her
child to the boy who stood beside him, and back again; over and over. "Ah!" It was a cry
that she could not help; which she was not conscious of having uttered. The blood
turned like ice in her veins, and a clammy moisture gathered upon her face.
She tried to speak to the little quadroon boy; but no sound would come, at first. When
he heard his name uttered, he looked up, and his mistress was pointing to the door. He
laid aside the great, soft fan, and obediently stole away, over the polished floor, on his
bare tiptoes.
She stayed motionless, with gaze riveted upon her child, and her face the picture of
fright.
Presently her husband entered the room, and without noticing her, went to a table
and began to search among some papers which covered it.
"Armand," she called to him, in a voice which must have stabbed him, if he was
human. But he did not notice. "Armand," she said again. Then she rose and tottered
towards him. "Armand," she panted once more, clutching his arm, "look at our child.
What does it mean? Tell me."
He coldly but gently loosened her fingers from about his arm and thrust the hand
away from him. "Tell me what it means!" she cried despairingly.
"It means," he answered lightly, "that the child is not white; it means that you are not
white."
A quick conception of all that this accusation meant for her nerved her with
unwonted courage to deny it. "It is a lie; it is not true, I am white! Look at my hair, it is
brown; and my eyes are gray, Armand, you know they are gray. And my skin is fair,"
seizing his wrist. "Look at my hand; whiter than yours, Armand," she laughed
hysterically.
"As white as La Blanche's," he returned cruelly; and went away leaving her alone with
their child.
When she could hold a pen in her hand, she sent a despairing letter to Madame
Valmonde.
"My mother, they tell me I am not white. Armand has told me I am not white. For
God's sake tell them it is not true. You must know it is not true. I shall die. I must die. I
cannot be so unhappy, and live."
The answer that came was brief:
"My own Desiree: Come home to Valmonde; back to your mother who loves you.
Come with your child."
When the letter reached Desiree she went with it to her husband's study, and laid it
open upon the desk before which he sat. She was like a stone image: silent, white,
motionless after she placed it there.
In silence he ran his cold eyes over the written words.
He said nothing. "Shall I go, Armand?" she asked in tones sharp with agonized
suspense.
"Yes, go."
"Do you want me to go?"
"Yes, I want you to go."
He thought Almighty God had dealt cruelly and unjustly with him; and felt, somehow,
that he was paying Him back in kind when he stabbed thus into his wife's soul.
Moreover he no longer loved her, because of the unconscious injury she had brought
upon his home and his name.
She turned away like one stunned by a blow, and walked slowly towards the door,
hoping he would call her back.
"Good-by, Armand," she moaned.
He did not answer her. That was his last blow at fate.
Desiree went in search of her child. Zandrine was pacing the sombre gallery with it.
She took the little one from the nurse's arms with no word of explanation, and
descending the steps, walked away, under the live-oak branches.
It was an October afternoon; the sun was just sinking. Out in the still fields the
negroes were picking cotton.
Desiree had not changed the thin white garment nor the slippers which she wore.
Her hair was uncovered and the sun's rays brought a golden gleam from its brown
meshes. She did not take the broad, beaten road which led to the far-off plantation of
Valmonde. She walked across a deserted field, where the stubble bruised her tender
feet, so delicately shod, and tore her thin gown to shreds.
She disappeared among the reeds and willows that grew thick along the banks of the
deep, sluggish bayou; and she did not come back again.
Some weeks later there was a curious scene enacted at L'Abri. In the centre of the
smoothly swept back yard was a great bonfire. Armand Aubigny sat in the wide hallway
that commanded a view of the spectacle; and it was he who dealt out to a half dozen
negroes the material which kept this fire ablaze.
A graceful cradle of willow, with all its dainty furbishings, was laid upon the pyre,
which had already been fed with the richness of a priceless layette. Then there were silk
gowns, and velvet and satin ones added to these; laces, too, and embroideries; bonnets
and gloves; for the corbeille had been of rare quality.
The last thing to go was a tiny bundle of letters; innocent little scribblings that
Desiree had sent to him during the days of their espousal. There was the remnant of one
back in the drawer from which he took them. But it was not Desiree's; it was part of an
old letter from his mother to his father. He read it. She was thanking God for the
blessing of her husband's love:-"But above all," she wrote, "night and day, I thank the good God for having so
arranged our lives that our dear Armand will never know that his mother, who adores
him, belongs to the race that is cursed with the brand of slavery."
**********************
e Five-Dollar Smile
“MAKE THIS CHILD SMILE AGAIN,” the black type on the
crumpled, glossy news weekly page read. “All it takes is ve dollars a
month.”
Joseph stared at the picture sandwiched between the two halves of the
caption. He had seen it a thousand times—the tattered clothes, the dark,
intense, pleading eyes, the grubby little ngers thrust tightly into a sullenly
closed mouth. e photo that had launched the most successful, worldwide
appeal in HELP’s history, four years ago. His picture.
As usual, he viewed it once more with that curious detachment that had
come to him during those last four years. He could not see it as a
photograph of himself, a record of his past, a souvenir of his younger
childhood. It was not personal enough for that; it was in the public domain,
part of an advertisement, a poster, a campaign, and now an aging magazine
clipping in his hand. e little boy who stared out at him was not him,
Joseph Kumaran; he was part of a message, de ned by a slogan, serving a
purpose, and the fact that he was Joseph Kumaran did not matter. It never
had. Joseph looked once more at the picture, as he had ve times already
during the ight, as if to reassure himself that he knew what he was doing
on this large, cold, humming monster hurtling him towards a strange land
he had known only in postage stamps. at’s what this is all about, he
wanted the picture to say. at’s who you are and the reason why you are
on an unfamiliar thing called an airplane and why your feet don’t touch the
ground but your toes feel cold and you have to put a belt around your
waist that stops you from leaning forward comfortably to eat the strange
food they expect you to get at with plastic forks and knives, sealed
impossibly in polyethylene, while you wish you could pluck up the nerve to
ask the poised, distant, and impossibly tall, white lady to help you, help you
with a blanket and two pillows and some real food you can eat without
trying to gnaw at sealed packages of cutlery. . . .
He folded the picture again and pushed it into the pocket of the tight
little blazer he had been given the day he le the HELP office with Sister
Celine to go to the airport. It had been sent with a bundle of old clothes for
the disaster relief collection, he had learned, and though it was a little small
for him it was just the thing to smarten him up for the trip to the United
States. “Always be smart, Joseph,” Sister Celine had said. “Let them know
you’re poor but you’re smart, because we knew how to bring you up.”
Joseph sat back, his feet dangling from the airplane seat, and looked at
the largely uneaten food on the tray. When he thought of food he could
remember the day of the photograph. He had been seven then: that was
the day he had learned he was seven.
“How old’s that little kid? e one in the torn white shirt?”
“He’s about seven. No one’s really sure. He came here when he was a
little child. We couldn’t really tell when he’d been born.”
“About seven, eh. Looks younger.” Click, whirr. “Might be what I’m
looking for. Get him away from that food, Sister, will you please? We want a
hungry child, not a feeding one.”
Suddenly, a large, white hand interposed among the tiny, outstretched
brown ones crowded at the table, pulling Joseph’s away. “Come here,
Joseph. is nice man wants to see you.”
“But I want to eat, Sister.” Desperation, pleading in his voice. He knew
what could happen if he was too late. ere would be no food le for him:
it had happened before. And today was his favorite day, with crisp
papadams in the kanji gruel. He had watched the cooks rip up and fry the
papadams from behind the kitchen door, and he’d tried to get to the table
early so he wouldn’t miss out on his share. He’d had to ght the bigger boys
to stay there, too. But what determined resistance had preserved, Sister
Celine was taking away.
“Please, Sister, please.”
“Later, child. Now behave yourself.” He was dragging his feet and she
was pulling him quite rmly by the le hand. “And if you don’t walk
properly I shall have to take the cane to you.” He straightened up quickly;
he knew the cane well and did not want it again.
Would the stewardess take a cane to him if he asked her for a fork and
knife? Of course she wouldn’t, he knew that. He knew his nervousness was
silly, unnecessary. He was suddenly hungry, but he didn’t know how to
attract her attention. She was giving a man a drink several rows in front of
Joseph.
“Miss!” he called soly. His voice came out huskily, tripping over dry
obstacles in his throat. She didn’t hear him; he wished desperately that she
would catch his eye, and he trained his look on her with such fearful
intensity it was unbelievable she should not notice. “Miss!” he called again,
waving his hand. She was sticking a pin into the headrest of the man who’d
bought the drink, and she still didn’t hear.
“Miss!” is time it was too loud. It seemed to Joseph that everyone in
the plane had turned to look at him, as if he had done something very odd.
ere were a couple of smiles, but for the most part people looked
disapproving, frowning their displeasure at him and making comments to
their neighbors. Joseph’s dark cheeks ushed red with embarrassment.
e stewardess straightened up, controlled her irritation, and smiled
sweetly but briskly as she walked down to him. “Yes, what is it?”
“Can-I-have-a-knife-and-fork-please?” e words came out in a rush,
Sister Angela’s diction lessons forgotten in his anxiety.
She hardly seemed to pause in her stride. “It’s on your tray—here, on the
side, see? In this packet.” And she lied the packet, placed it on top of the
napkin for him to see, and before he could say anything more, strode off
down the aisle.
“Hold it there, kid.” Joseph, seven, wanting papadams, confronted
American slang for the rst time in the person of a large, white man with a
mustache and a camera. To little Joseph, everything seemed large about the
man: his body, his mustache, his camera. A large hand pushed him back a
little and a voice boomed: “Seems rather small for his age.”
“Infant malnutrition. Mother died in childbirth and his father brought
him through the forest alone. ese tribals are astonishingly hardy. God
knows how he survived without any permanent damage.”
“So there’s nothing really wrong with him, right? I mean, his brain’s okay
and everything? I’ve gotta be sure I’m selling the American public poverty
and not retardation, if you see what I mean. So he’s normal, huh?”
“Just a little stunted.” Sister Celine, quiet, precise. Click, whirr. Lights
exploded at him. His eyes widened.
“Let’s take him outside, if you don’t mind. I’d like to use the sun—I’m not
too sure of my ash.”
“Yes, of course, Mr. Cleaver. Come, Joseph.”
He squirmed out of the nun’s grasp. “But, Sister, I want to eat.”
“Later. Now if you’re difficult there’ll be no lunch at all for you.”
Resentfully, he followed them out into the courtyard. He stood there
sullenly, staring his quiet hatred at the large man. Click, whirr, click. “Move
him to this side a bit, won’t you, Sister?”
It was being pushed around that made him thrust his ngers into his
mouth, as much in self-protection as in appeasement of his palate. e
photographer clicked again.
Joseph turned to look at the stewardess’ retreating back in profound
dismay. Why hadn’t he told her that he knew he had a knife and fork, but
he didn’t know how to get at them? Why hadn’t he made clear what exactly
was the help he needed? Why had he been so scared?
He drew himself even more deeply into his seat and looked around
nervously. His neighbor, staring out the window, smiled brie y,
mechanically, at him. Joseph could not ask him to help. Or could he? e
man turned from the window to a magazine he was reading over dinner.
Joseph’s resolution faded.
at day, aer the photographs, there had been no papadams le for
him. Only cold kanji; the papadams were already nished.
“See—I told you you could have lunch later,” the nun said. “Here’s your
lunch now.”
But I wanted the papadams, he wanted to scream in rage and
frustration. And why did you need to take me away from my papadams?
What was so important about that man with the camera that you had to
deprive me of something I’ve been waiting a month to enjoy? But he did
not say all that. He could not. Instead, the lump in his throat almost
choking him, he ung the tin plate of gruel to the ground and burst into
tears.
“Good heavens—what’s the matter with him today? Very well, no lunch
for you then, Joseph. And you will clean this mess off the oor and come to
my office as soon as you have done so, so that you may be suitably
punished for your ingratitude. ere are many little boys not as fortunate
as you are, Joseph Kumaran. And don’t you forget it.”
Sniffing back his misery, Joseph knew he would not forget it. He would
have six strokes of the cane to remember it by.
How could he ask his neighbor to help open the packet? He was so
engrossed in his magazine. And he was eating. It seemed so wrong, and so
embarrassing. Joseph tried to speak, but the words would not come out.
At the head of the aisle, another stewardess was already bringing tea or
coffee around. e other passengers seemed to be nishing their meals.
ey would take his tray away from him and he would not even have
eaten. A panic, irrational but intense, rose to ood him.
He struggled with the packet. He tried to tear it, gnaw at it, rip it open. It
would not give way. e cutlery inside the packet jangled; at one point he
hit a cup on his tray and nearly broke it. Joseph’s attempts became even
wilder and he made little noises of desperation.
“Here,” his neighbor’s strong voice said. “Let me help you.”
Joseph turned to him in gratitude. He had hoped his desperation would
become apparent and attract assistance. It had worked.
“ank you,” he managed to say. “I didn’t know how to open it.”
“It’s quite easy,” his neighbor said.
e rst copies of the photographs arrived at the HELP Center a few
weeks aer the photographer had le. Joseph had almost forgotten the
incident, even the caning, though the frustration of the papadam-less gruel
remained. One of the nuns called him to Sister Eva’s office excitedly.
“Look, Joseph—these are the pictures the nice man took, the day you
were so bad,” Sister Celine told him. “is is you.”
Joseph looked at the black-and-white image without curiosity. He would
rather not have seen it, rather not have been reminded of their perverse
cruelty to him that day. He stared at the picture, made no comment, and
looked away.
“It’s going to be used in a worldwide appeal,” Sister said. “Your picture
will be in every important magazine in the world. Helping us get money to
help other children. Doesn’t that make you happy, Joseph?”
He had learned to be dutiful. “Yes, Sister,” he said.
e man in the seat next to him turned the polyethylene packet around,
slipped out a ap, and dely extricated a fork and a knife. He handed them
to Joseph with a cordial smile.
“ere—you see, easy.”
“ank you.” Joseph, taking the implements from the man, felt his ears
burning with shame. So there had been no need to try and tear open the
packet aer all. ere was a ap. He turned single-mindedly to the food,
wanting to shut the rest of the world, witness to his humiliation, out of his
sight and hearing.
e rst MAKE THIS CHILD SMILE AGAIN poster was put up in the
HELP office just behind Sister Eva’s desk, so those who came in would be
struck by it as soon as they entered and looked for her. It was put up
without any fuss or ceremony, and Joseph only knew it was there because
the door to Sister Eva’s office had been open when he and a group of boys
had been walking down the corridor to their daily classes. It was one of the
other boys who had noticed it rst and drawn everyone else’s attention to
it.
e slogan soon became a joke. “Smile, Joseph, smile,” his friends would
tease him. And if he was in a particularly angry mood, one of the boys
would ask with mock gravity, “Has anyone got ve dollars?” Sometimes
Joseph would only get angrier, but sometimes he would be provoked to
smile at them. ey used to call it the ve-dollar smile.
e food was terrible. It was totally unfamiliar to Joseph’s taste buds,
anyway, and he did not enjoy it. ere was, however, a bowl of fruit salad
on the tray that contained little diced apples. He ate those, spilling some on
the seat and the oor. He did not know whether to be happy about the
pieces he had eaten or sad about the ones he had lost. He looked around to
see if anyone was watching him. No one was. He tried to pick up a little
piece of apple from the oor, but the tray was in his way and he couldn’t
reach down far enough. It was frustrating. On balance, he felt miserable.
e stewardess swished by to collect his tray. Would he like some tea?
Joseph said, “Yes.” Actually he wanted coffee, but he was scared that if he
said “no” to the tea he might not be offered any coffee either. Why couldn’t
they have offered him coffee rst? he thought, as the pale, brown liquid
lled his cup. It was so unfair.
He was, not surprisingly, the rst child to be “adopted.” Other people
who responded to the campaign had sent in their ve dollars for the rst
month, and their pledges for a year or two years or a decade or a lifetime,
for any child HELP wanted to rescue. But three couples insisted their
money go to one speci c child—the child in the photograph. ey had seen
his sad, little face, and they wanted to make him smile again. No one else.
eir ve dollars were for Joseph Kumaran’s tiny little ngers to come out
of his hungry little mouth. And they insisted on being allowed to adopt
him alone.
e nuns had sighed when those letters came in. “Oh, what a nuisance
some people are,” Sister Eva said. “I have half a mind to return their money
to them. It’s none of their business to tell us where their money should go.”
But Sister Eva had kept the money and the pledges anyway—from all three
couples. Joseph Kumaran’s ve-dollar smile was actually netting HELP
een dollars a month.
So every month Joseph would have to sit down and, in his neat, strained
little hand, write a letter to each of his foster parents, thousands of miles
away, telling them how good and grateful he was. “Today we had
catechism, and I learned the story of how Lot’s wife turned into a banana
tree,” he would write to one couple. (Salt was an expensive commodity in
those parts, and the nuns didn’t want the children to derive the wrong
lessons from the Bible.) en he would copy the same line out neatly onto
the other two letters. As he grew older, Sister Celine would no longer
dictate the letters, but let him write them himself and correct them before
they were mailed. “Sister Angela has told me about America,” he wrote
once. “Is it true that everyone is rich there and always has plenty to eat?”
Sister Celine did not like that, scored it out, and was later seen speaking
sternly to Sister Angela.
e steward was coming down the aisle selling headphones. Joseph had
seen him doing that as the ight began, and though he did not know what
headphones were, he had discovered that they cost money and that people
put them into their ears. He shook his head vigorously when asked
whether he wanted one. But his anxious eyes rolled in curiosity as his
neighbor, who had also declined the rst time, looked at the approbation,
produced green notes and silver coins, and was rewarded with a
polyethylene packet. From this emerged a contraption even stranger at
close quarters than it had seemed from a distance.
e curtains were being drawn across the airplane windows; a screen was
lowered at the head of the cabin; images ickered on the whiteness ahead.
Joseph stared, trans xed, rapt. His neighbor had plugged in his headset
and was obviously listening to something Joseph could not hear. Titles
began to appear on the screen.
Joseph desperately wanted to hear the movie, too.
He would get letters in reply from his foster parents. Initially, they were
as frequent as his monthly letters to them, but later their interest seemed to
ag and he would get only occasional replies. One couple seemed the nicest
—they would always apologize profusely whenever their letters were too
late, and they would always ask about him, his schoolwork, his games. At
Christmas they would send little gis that Sister Celine would let him open
but which he would have to share with the other children. Joseph liked
their colored notepaper, the lady’s handwriting, which was so easy to read,
and the lingering smell of perfume that still clung to each sheet of
stationery. Frequently he would hold it up to his face, smothering his nose
in it, smelling America.
One day, aer several letters to this couple, he became bolder. “It is very
hot here at this time of year,” he had written in the version approved by
Sister Celine “I suppose it is cooler in America.” But while copying the
corrected dra out neatly on to an aerogram, he added: “I think I would
enjoy America very much.” He told no one about the addition, sealed the
aerogram, and waited excitedly for a reply.
When it came, there was no reference to what he had written. But
Joseph did not give up. “I oen wonder whether America has trees like the
ones in my drawing,” he hinted while enclosing a precocious crayon sketch.
And in the next letter, “If I came to America, do you think I might like it?”
He was so enamored of this approach that he copied that line into each of
his three letters and sent them away.
It worked. His favorite “parents,” the ones who sent him Christmas
presents, wrote to Sister Celine to say that they’d oen wanted to see the
little boy they’d “adopted” but they’d never been able to manage a trip to
India. Would it not be possible for young Joseph to be sent to America
instead? As soon as they heard from Sister Celine, they would be happy to
enclose a plane ticket for the little boy. Of course, they were not suggesting
that he should stay with them always. Obviously, his place was among “his
people” in India, and “with you all at HELP.” ey would send him back,
but they did so want to see him, just once.
Sister Celine seemed a little taken aback by the letter. It was not
customary for foster parents to evince such an interest in their protégés.
When they were old enough the children were simply taught an
elementary trade and packed off to earn their keep. Foreign trips, for
however short a duration, were highly unusual.
Sister Celine showed Joseph the letter and asked, “You haven’t been up
to anything, have you?” To his excited protestations she merely responded,
“We’ll see.” And then she went to talk to Sister Eva.
Joseph had only seen one movie before. at was a documentary about
HELP’s activities among orphan children in the wilds of Bihar, and it had
been shown one evening aer dinner by the man who made it, so that the
nuns could all see what the outside world was being told about their work.
Sister Eva, in a spirit of generosity, had suggested that the boys, at least
those over ve, be permitted to sit on the ground and watch it too. It might
teach them a few things, she told the other nuns, make them realize how
much we do for them, maybe instill some gratitude in them. Joseph had
fallen asleep halfway through that movie. He didn’t want to see starving
Adivasi children and warm-hearted nuns; he saw them every day. e
black-and-white images, the monotonous, superimposed voice of the
commentator, blurred in his mind; the nuns danced tiptoe through the
crevices of his brain, and the pictures pulsed and faded in his eyes. Firm
but gentle hands were rousing him.
“Get up—it’s time to go to bed.”
In the background, Sister Eva’s high-pitched voice rang through the clear
night: “Look at them! Give them a special treat like this and half of them go
off to sleep! Don’t ever let me catch any of you asking to see a movie again.
I mean it!”
But what a movie this was. Bright, vivid colors, pretty, white women in
short dresses, fast cars racing down broad, foreign streets. It was like
nothing he had ever seen before. And he wanted to hear it; hear the loud
roar of the car engines, the so, tinkling laughter of the women, the shouts
and the screams and all the sounds of bullets and people and whizzing
airplanes.
“Sir.” e steward who had dispensed the headphones was standing at
the end of the aisle, just behind Joseph, watching the movie too.
“Yes?”
“May I have some headphones too?”
“Of course.” e steward disappeared behind the partition and emerged
with a polyethylene packet. He handed it to Joseph.
Joseph reached out to take it with an ineffable feeling of awe, wonder,
and achievement. He pushed aside the ap, put in his hand, and touched
the cold plastic. e sensation was indescribably thrilling.
“Two dollars and y cents, please.”
“But . . . but . . . I don’t have any money,” Joseph said miserably. His eyes
pleaded with the steward. “Please?”
e steward had a why-are-you-wasting-my-time-you-dumb-child look
on his face. “I’m sorry,” he said, taking the packet out of Joseph’s hands,
“IATA regulations.”
And then he was gone, having invoked an authority higher than Joseph’s
longings, more powerful than philanthropy. When he reemerged from the
partition it was on the other side, on the aisle away from Joseph’s.
Sister Eva had taken some time to decide. It was not that she minded in
principle, she told Sister Celine, but this could set a dangerous precedent.
e other children would be wanting to go too, and how many had rich
American foster parents who would be willing to mail them plane tickets?
In the end, however, to Joseph’s great relief, she agreed. She would write
personally to the American couple making it clear Joseph was not to be
spoiled. And that he was to be back within a month, before he could
become entirely corrupted by American ways, to resume his place among
those as unfortunate as he was. Unless they wanted to keep him in America
for good, which they showed no intention of doing.
e next few weeks passed in a frenzy of preparation. e ticket had to
arrive, a ight had to be booked, a passport had to be issued to Joseph, a
visa obtained. He was given a little suitcase for his clothes, and he swelled
with pride at his tangible evidence of possessions. He had things, he was
somebody. With a passport, a suitcase, a ticket, he was not just a little
brown face in a crowd around the gruel bowl; he was Master Joseph
Kumaran, and he was going somewhere.
And nally, wearing the tight blazer he had been given on the morning
of his departure, its pocket stuffed with the news-magazine clipping he had
hoarded since it had been shown to him by Sister Celine four years ago, his
passport nestling next to a glossy color photo of his hosts sent to him so that
he would recognize them at the airport, Joseph was put on board the plane.
Sister Celine was there to see him off; she smiled at him through misty
glasses, and Joseph felt the wetness on her cheeks when she hugged him at
the departure gate. But he could not cry in return; he was a little scared,
but more excited than upset, and he certainly was not sad.
e man sitting next to him did not seem to care particularly for the
movie aer all. Twice, Joseph caught him dozing off, his eyes closing and
his chin sinking slowly to his chest; twice, with equal suddenness, his
neighbor’s head would jerk awake, prompted no doubt by some startling
sound on the headphones. e third time this happened, the man pulled
off his headphones in disgust and strode off, clambering over Joseph, in
quest of a sink.
Joseph could not resist this opportunity. It was too good to be true:
headphones plugged in, next to him, unused. He eased himself out of his
seatbelt and sat in his neighbor’s chair. en, tentatively, looking around
him to make sure no one had noticed him, he raised the tips to his ears.
Almost immediately he was assaulted by the sounds of the movie: brakes
screeched as a car drew to a halt; a man dashed down some stairs with a
gun in his hand; there was some panting dialogue; the gun went off, the
bullet’s report a deafening symphony in Joseph’s ear; a woman screamed.
And his neighbor returned from the toilet.
Joseph looked up, almost in agony. His pleasure had been so brief.
e man smiled down at him from the aisle. “Mine, sonny,” he beamed.
Joseph had been well brought up. “Excuse me,” he said, gently removing
the headphones and placing them on the seat. He slid into his place again,
his neighbor returned to his chair, the ear-plugs went back on, and Joseph
found he could not see the screen through his tears.
Hoping his neighbor would not notice, he dabbed at his eyes with the
clean, white handkerchief Sister Angela had pressed into his hand that
morning. at morning—it seemed so long ago. He returned the
handkerchief to his pocket, feeling once again the magazine clipping that,
four years ago, had started him on this journey. Resolutely, he refrained
from pulling it out. at was not him: he had another identity now. He
took out his passport, and his eyes caressed each detail on the inside page,
from the ctional birthdate (“it’s easier than going through the entire
‘birthdate unknown’ business,” Sister Eva had declared) to the inventory of
his characteristics (“Hair: black; eyes: black; skin: brown”) to the new,
awkward photograph, Joseph staring glassy-eyed into the studio camera.
And then, returning the passport at long last to his inside pocket, he
touched the other photo, the glossy, color portrait of his new, albeit
temporary, parents. Aer some hesitation, he took it out: these were the
people whose house he would call home for the next month.
But would he really? He stared at their forms in the photograph. ey
had sent Joseph their picture so he would recognize them, but they had not
asked for his. “We’re sure we’ll spot him as soon as he gets off the plane,”
the wife had written to Sister Celine. “We feel we’ve known him all our
lives.” Joseph had felt attered then, deeply touched. en one day, in a t
of temper, Sister Eva had threatened to replace Joseph with another little
dark-skinned boy from the orphanage. “Do you think they’d be able to tell
the difference?” she had demanded.
In silent, desperate misery, Joseph had not known what to say.
Looking at the photograph, Joseph tried to think of the magic of
America, of things there he had heard about and dreamed of—movies,
parties, delicious food of in nite variety, outings to the beach and to
Disneyland. But his eyes dilated and the photograph blurred. He did not
know why he felt suffused with a loneliness more intense, more
bewildering in its sadness than he had ever experienced in the gruel crowds
of HELP. He was alone, lost somewhere between a crumpled magazine
clipping and the glossy brightness of a color photograph.
On the seat next to him, his neighbor snored peacefully, chin resting in
surrender on his chest, headphones embedded into his ears. On the screen,
the magic images ickered, cascaded, and danced on.
1978
Broken Images
... for you know only
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter,...
T. S. E l i o t
The Waste Land
The interior o f a television studio. A big plasma screen hangs on
one side, big enough for a close-up on it to be seen clearly by the
audience. On the other side o f the stage, a chair and a typically
‘telly’ table—strong, wide, semi-circular. A t the back o f the stage
are several television sets, with screens o f varying sizes.
A small red bulb glows above the table, high enough not to appear
on the television screen.
Manjula Nayak walks in. She is in her mid-thirties/forties, and has
a confident stride. She is wearing a lapel mike. It is immediately
evident that she is at home in broadcasting studios. She looks around.
MANJULA: Nice, very nice. Neat!
(She goes and sits on the chair. Adjusts the earpiece.)
But where is the camera?
(Listens to the reply.)
Ah! I see. New technology. Isn’t it scary? The rate of ob­
solescence? (Listens.) O f course I have. In London. And in
Toronto. But when you think o f Indian television studios, you
262
BROKEN IMAGES
always imagine them cluttered. Lots of men and woman scur­
rying about, shouting orders. Elephantine lights. Headphones.
Cameras. You know what I mean. But h e re ...l mean, it’s all
so spartan... I know. But a bit lonely too. Like a sound stu­
dio ... All right. All rig h t... No camera. I just look ahead and
speak to an invisible audience in front of m e... Direct. Fine.
Fine... I can hear you. Clearly. Voice test?... ‘Testing, Testing,
One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Hello, Hello!’ Shall I tap on the
mike?
(Laughs.)
My speech will last exactly ten minutes. I have timed i t . .. No,
I won’t read. ‘Look ahead and speak!’ G o o d ... But that may
take a little longer. A couple of m inutes... if I don’t fumble too
much.
(Giggles.)
The yellow light?... Okay, okay, ready, fine!
(She mouths ‘Ten’ to ‘Zero’ silently, emphasizing each count with
her forefinger. A t the stroke o f ten, the light turns yellow. The
Announcer appears on the big plasma screen. The other screens
remain blank till the last few minutes o f the play.)
ANNOUNCER: Good evening. This is a proud evening for the
Shree-TV channel. For tonight we bring to you Ms Manjula
Nayak. Many of you will know her as a renowned Kannada
short-story writer. Until a year ago, she was a lecturer in
English in Bangalore. But she had been writing in Kannada.
Not unusual, as you know. It’s amazing how many o f our
Kannada writers are lecturers in English: From the earliest
days. B. M. Shree, Gokak, Adiga.
Even modern ones. Lankesh, Shantinath, Anantha Murthy.
And of course there is A. K. Ramanujan, who was equally at
home in both languages. But last year Mrs Nayak stunned the
world—yes, I mean, the world—by writing a novel. Her first
novel. In English! The River Has No Memories. The advance
she received from her British publishers made headlines, here
TWO MONOLOGUES
2 63
and in the West. And then the novel turned out to be a bestseller
all over the world. O ur heartiest congratulations to Mrs Nayak.
This evening we broadcast a Kannada telefilm based
on this remarkable novel. The film will begin in exacdy ten
minutes. And we have with us in the studio Ms Nayak herself,
who has graciously agreed to address our viewers about her
work. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome the Literary Phenom­
enon of the Decade, Mrs Manjula Nayak.
(Applause on the sound track. The light turns green. The Announcer
disappears and Manjula*s image appears in his place. She speaks.)
Namaskara. I am M anjula Nayak. I m ust m ention
that officially I am Mrs Manjula Murty, but my creative self
continues to be Manjula Nayak. There are some areas in which
we must not let marriage intrude too much.
(Laughter.)
Talking about one’s work is a very difficult task. So let me find
an easy way out. Let me just take up two questions I constantly
come across. They seem to bother everyone— here, abroad. I’ll
answer them to the best of my ability within the short time
at my disposal and shut up. Actually, that’s what a writer
should do, shouldn’t she?—Write and shut up!
(Laughs.)
The first question—you have probably guessed it already. After
having written in Kannada all your life, why did you choose—
suddenly—to write in English? Do you see yourself as a
Kannada writer or an English writer? What audience do you
write for? And variations on that theme.
Actually, let me confess. If I had foreseen how many people
I would upset by writing in English— I really would not have
committed that folly.
Intellectuals whom I respected, writers who were gurus to
me, friends who I thought would pat me on my back and share
my delight—they are all suddenly breathing fire. How dare I
write in English and betray Kannada!
MANJULA:
264
BROKEN IMAGES
(Laughs.)
Betray! The answer is simple; if there was betrayal, it was not
a matter of conscious choice. 1 wrote the novel in English
because it burst out in English. It surprised even me. I
couldn’t understand why it was all coming out in English. But
it did. That’s all. There is no other explanation.
What baffles me— actually, let me confess, hurts me—is
why our intellectuals can’t grasp this simple fact! I have been
accused of writing for foreign readers. Accused! As though I
had committed a crime. A writer seeks audiences where she
or he can find them! My British publishers said to me: ‘We like
your book because it’s so Indian. We receive any num ber of
manuscripts from India but they are all written with the western
reader in view. Your novel has the genuine Indian feel!’
(Laughs.)
But who listens here? A pundit for instance has stated th at no
Indian writer can express herself—or himself—honestly in
English. ‘For Indian writers, English is a medium of dishonesty.’
Of course, one could also ask how many Kannada writers
are honest in what they write— in Kannada. But if you did
that, you would be immediately condemned as a traitor. You
can’t win!
Recently the President of the Central Sahitya Akademi—
the National Academy of the Letters— (who shall remain
nameless) declared that Indians who write in English do so
in order to make money. That by writing in English they
confess their complicity in the global consumer market economy.
He of course spoke in English. Speaking in English, as you
know, gives you the authority to make oracular pronounce­
ments on Indian literatures and languages. But my response
to the charge that I write in English for money would be: Why
not? Isn’t that a good enough reason? Would you like to see
what royalties I earned when I wrote in Kannada?
(Pause.)
TWO MONOLOGUES
26 5
Yet the accusation hides— or perhaps reveals— a grim
anxiety. As is clear from the dictum of the President of the
Akademi, what is at issue is not Creativity but Money. What
hits everyone in the eye is the money a writer in English can
earn. The advance I received for my novel—the advance only,
mind you—helped me resign my job and concentrate on
writing. O f course it is a cause for jealousy. Having struggled
in Kannada, I can understand that. A Kannada proverb says:
‘A response is good. But a meaningful response is better.’
Meaningful: Arthapooma. The Kannada word for Meaning is
Artha—which also means money! And of course, fame,
publicity, glam our... power.
(Laughs.)
Let me leave it at that.
The second question everyone asks is about the book
itself: thank God! How could you—you seem so strong and
active— I was a long jum p athlete in college, though of course
no Anju Bobby George— how could you so vividly recreate
the inner life of a person confined to bed all her life? How
can a healthy, outdoor woman be so empathetic to the
emotional world of a disabled person? Well, it is sad, but I
owe that to my younger sister, Malini.
She was physically challenged. Suffered from what is tech­
nically called, meningomyelocele— the upper part of her body
was perfectly normal; below the waist, the nervous system was
damaged. Completely dysfunctional. A series of operations,
which started soon after her birth, reduced her existence to
misery—she spent her entire life confined to the wheel-chair.
Six years ago my parents died. She came to stay with us in
our house in Jayanagar, and I nursed her. During the last few
m onths it was quite clear she didn’t have much time left. I am
childless and she became my child! Truly, the book is about
her. I have dedicated it to her memory. She died last year—
just a few months before the book came out. I have tried to
266
BROKEN IMAGES
relive what I learnt about her emotional life as I nursed her—
tended to her—watched helplessly as she floated into death.
I miss her. I miss my beautiful, gentle sister.
(Her eyes moisten.)
She is the only character in the novel drawn from life. The
other characters and the plot are entirely fictional. Invented.
(Pause.)
I must here acknowledge the support I received from one
person while I wrote the novel— my husband, Pram od Murty.
I was working full time as a lecturer then. College chores. And
home was full of her memories. And there was I, suddenly
writing in English. Floundering. Sinking. I was utterly clueless.
There were moments when I broke down, when I felt I couldn’t
go on. But he was always there at my side, encouraging me,
prodding me on. W ithout him, I would never have com pleted
the novel. Thank you, Pramod.
( The overhead light turns yellow.)
Well, that’s it. I have committed the cardinal sin o f writing
in English.
(Laughs.)
There is no prayashchitta for it, no absolution. But fortunately
the film you are about to see is in Kannada. That makes me
very happy. After all, the family I have w ritten ab o u t is
Kannada. I am a Kannada writer myself, born to the language
and civilization, and proud of it. The Kannada reality I
conceived in English has been translated back into Kannada—
to perfection—by the Director. I couldn’t have done it better.
My thanks to the cast and the crew and of course, Shree-TV.
Well, enjoy the telefilm.
Good Night. Namaskara.
( The light turns red. She leans back in her chair. Pause. Then into
the lapel mike.)
I hope that was okay? I didn’t fumble too much, did I?
(Listens.)
TWO MONOLOGUES
267
Thank you, Raza. The pleasure’s all mine. See you outside?
(The red light switches off. She smiles contentedly.)
Whew! That’ll get them. Good. I have taken enough shit from
them.
(Laughs and gets up. Manjula’s image on the screen should have
given way to the film, but hasn’t. Instead, the Image continues as
before, watching her calmly. She is o f course unaware o f it.
She makes a move to the door.)
im a g e : Where
are you going?
(Startled, Manjula stops and looks around. Touches her earpiece to
check if the sound came from there and moves on.)
You can’t go yet. — Manjula!
(Manjula looks around baffled and sees that her image continues
on the screen. She does a double take.
From now on, throughout the play, Manjula and her image react
to each other exactly as though they were both live characters.)
m a n ju l a :
Oh God! Am I s till on?
(Confused, she rushes back to the chair and stops.)
IMAGE: You are not. The camera is off.
m a n ju l a :
Is i t ? . . . T h e n ... h o w ?
IMAGE: You are standing up. If the camera were on, I would be
standing up too. I’m not.
MANJULA: Is this some kind of a trick?
(Into her lapel mike.)
Hello! Hello! Can you hear me? How come I’m still on the
screen? Raza, h ello ...
(Taps her mike. No response.)
Is there a technical hitch?
IMAGE: No hitch.
MANJULA (to the Image): But h o w ... Who are y o u ... H o w ... Has
the tape got stuck?
(Calls out into the mike.)
BROKEN IMAGES
268
Raza, Raza. Help! Help!
IMAGE: W hat are you screaming for? What are you afraid of? It’s
only me.
m a n j u l a : Who
are you?
i m a g e : Me? You.
m a n ju l a
(to herself): This is absurd.
Quite.
(A long pause while Manjula refuses to acknowledge the presence
o f the Image. Then she slowly looks up. The Image smiles.)
im a g e :
i m a g e : A good speech, I m ust say. My compliments. An excellent
performance. The viewers loved it. All two million o f them .
MANJULA: But the film? H asn't it started?
IMAGE: Aw, screw the film ... It’s awful anyway.
MANJULA: I told them it won’t work. A telefilm needs lots o f move­
ment. Different locations. Pace. Action. Drama. ‘A good novel
does not necessarily make a good film,’ I argued. But they
were persistent. Sponsors were easy to find. (Pause.) They
paid well.
IMAGE: Your performance
n o w ... this introduction... it will be
the best thing this evening. You’ll be all over the papers. You
have managed to upset a lot of people.
m a n j u l a : Thanks.
I meant to.
(Pause.)
IMAGE: If one had to co m m en t...in
the extreme case that one
had t o ... that bit about your sister M alini... the te ars... that
could have been played down.
MANJULA: I wasn’t pretending. I loved her.
(Pause.)
I love her. Still. I don’t think I have ever been as close to
anyone else.
IMAGE: It w as a c lo se bond?
TWO MONOLOGUES
269
m a n ju l a : The novel doesn’t really do her justice. She was attrac­
tive— more attractive than me. Intelligent— more intelligent
than me. And vivacious, which I never was. I accepted that.
She radiated life from the wheelchair to which she was con­
fined. I have always been reconciled to being the second best.
IMAGE: Her illness was unfortunate. But because of it, she got the
best of everything.
m a n ju l a (defensive): She never asked for anything. Soon after her
birth, the moment the gravity of her situation was realized, my
parents moved to Bangalore. Took a house in the Koramangala
Extension. She became th e ...th e (searches for a phrase and
then settles for) ... the apple of their eye. When she was old
enough to go to school, a teacher came home to teach her
English and Mathematics. Everything else, she read up for
herself. History, Philosophy, Anatomy. She was hungry—
hungry for life. Gobbled it all up.
IMAGE: And you?
m a n ju l a : I
have often wondered whether I would have been as
bright if I’d received all that love and attention.
IMAGE: No, you wouldn’t. Let’s face it.
MANJULA (defensively): I did write a bestseller.
im a g e : That’s true.
m a n j u l a : But you are right. I wouldn’t. They left me with grand­
parents in Dharwad. An affectionate couple. They fussed over
me. But no substitute for parents. When vacations approached
I could barely wait to get to Bangalore. And once I finished
college, I found a job in Bangalore and came and lived with
them. Those were the happiest days of my life! Halcyon! But
then I met Pramod. We got married and settled down in
Jayanagar. Father helped with the house but he left most of
his money in her name—for her care. She was always the
focus. Naturally.
BROKEN IMAGES
270
IMAGE: But when your parents died, why didn’t you move into
the Koramangala house? Such a nice, big house. The garden.
The sense of space.
m a n j u l a : The
Jayanagar house was my house. I was used to it.
My college was in Jayanagar. We had selected a house which
was within walking distance. Koramangala would have meant
a long haul every morning.
And then such a huge house! Not easy to look after. I
would have had to stay home all day like Mother. Give up my
job probably.
No, as I said, she was one of the most sensitive people I
have known. She realized moving to Koramangala would turn
my life upside down. She insisted that we sell the Koramangala
house. I was reluctant but she wouldn’t listen. She wanted no
sacrifices on her account, no compromises. And she adjusted
beautifully to the smaller house.
(Pause.)
Actually I couldn’t take Koramangala! Non-Kannadigas, most
of them. And of course all those empty houses bought as
investments by Non-Resident Indians. I fancied myself a
Kannada writer in those days. W anted to breathe the language.
Live in the heart of Kannada culture.
IMAGE: Now that you are a success in English, have you bought
a big bungalow in Koramangala?
m a n j u l a : Aw,
shut up!
IMAGE: Was Malini at home with Kannada?
m a n j u l a : O f course, it is our mother-tongue. But she rarely used
it. Her Kannada was limited to the cook and the maid.
im a g e :
So Kannada was the one area that became yours?
MANJULA: You could say that. I tried to occupy it and make it
mine.
(Laughs.)
Actually, I have never said it publicly, but if you argue that
TWO MONOLOGUES
271
a novel written in English cannot express truth about India
because we do not express ourselves in English—
( Takes a breath. Laughs.)
God, what a sentence! But if you believe that, then let me say
I could not have written about my sister in Kannada. She
breathed, laughed, dreamt in English. Her friends spoke only
English. Having her in my house for six years helped improve
my English.
(Pause.)
IMAGE: So when are you going to write your next novel? Will it
also be in English?
I think I have already answered that question. Why
need I write another novel? Surely one is more than enough?
m a n ju l a :
IMAGE: Critically and financially. But then what are you going to
do? You have resigned your job. You are rich—
MANJULA: Well-to-do.
IMAGE: Well-to-do. You have no sister to look after. An empty
house. Nothing you can use.
MANJULA: Are you trying to make me feel guilty? Are you implying
I ‘used’ her? It was my life as well you know. I am in the book
too, though I would never admit to it publicly. Most readers
find the girl’s ‘first cousin’ quite unattractive.
IMAGE: Eek! That odious character! Is that you?
m a n j u l a : Well!
There you are!
im a g e : A trium ph
of objective self-analysis, shall we say?
m a n j u l a : If you must.
But I am not that wicked really. It was a
narrative necessity to have a negative character. A matter of
technique. The sympathetic heroine. A villain as a counter­
point. You see?
IMAGE: But Pramod
must be pleased by your treatment of his
character. He comes across as not very good-looking or
striking...
BROKEN IMAGES
272
m a n j u l a : But
not bad-looking, either. Good enough for me.
...b u t an intelligent, warm and lovable person. Funloving. Fond of practical jokes. Noble and simple. Almost
simple-minded.
IMAGE:
m a n j u l a : Y o u can say that again! You know, we met soon after I
moved to Bangalore. He felt attracted to me. Didn’t know how
to convey it. So do you know what he did? I had a friend called
Lucy. A close friend. He wrote a letter to her about me. And
wrote me a letter about Lucy. Then he mailed her letter in an
envelope addressed to me and vice versa. So I received this
letter addressed to Lucy— moaning and groaning about how
I tortured him. And I didn’t even know he was interested in
me. And of course Lucy received the other letter. He thought
he was being absolutely clever—original. We went and confronted
him. Lucy tore her letter to shreds and flung the pieces on him
and stormed off. Melodramatically. I felt sorry for him and
said, ‘Idiot, every fifteen-year old tries that trick, convinced it’s
never been done before.’ He blushed to the roots of his hair.
IMAGE: But you got married. So the ruse worked.
m a n j u l a : No ruse. He had made such a fool of himself, he did the
only thing he could to save his self-respect. He married me.
I didn’t mind.
Mind? You would never have got another man of his
calibre.
IMAGE:
m a n ju l a :
I s u p p o s e so .
IMAGE: And what happened to Lucy?
m a n j u l a : She
stopped talking to me.
( They both laugh.)
Women found him attractive.
IMAGE: Malini to o ?
MANJULA: O f course. She was a woman, after all.
image: T hey w ere c lo se to each other?
TWO MONOLOGUES
27 3
m a n ju l a : Very.
im a g e :
And you didn’t mind?
Mind? Thank God for it. You see, he is in software
development. Works from home. She was confined to her
chair. Can you imagine what would have happened if they
hadn’t got on? He is basically a two-woman man. Likes to have
one on either side. I used to call him Tirupati Thimmappa.
m a n ju l a :
IMAGE: He must be proud of you. That flattering portrayal of him
in the novel. The moving acknowledgment in your speech
today...
MANJULA: I doubt if he will even hear of my speech. Ever. He is
in the US.
i m a g e : Oh!
When did he go?
MANJULA: Last year. He lives in Los Angeles now. He is in demand
as a software wizard.
IMAGE: Last year! So has he even read the novel?
MANJULA: The launching of the novel was a major media event in
the US. After all, you must remember it had already proved
a super hit in Britain. They invited me to New York for the
release. There was much fanfare. He sent me an email of
congratulations. From Los Angeles. Apologized that he couldn’t
get leave to attend.
IMAGE: And you didn’t go to LA?
MANJULA: He didn’t even hint at it.
IMAGE: I’m sorry. But the chronology is beginning to confuse me.
When did he decide to go to the States? Was it after Malini’s
death?
MANJULA: Yes.
IMAGE: Immediately after?
m a n ju l a : N o .
B u t s o o n a f te r .
IMAGE: H o w lo n g after?
BROKEN IMAGES
274
m a n j u l a (explodes): Who are you, for God’s sake? W hat gives you
the right to interrogate me like this— about my private life?
Either you are me in which case you know everything. Or
you are an electronic image, externally prying. In which case,
you can ju s t...ju s t...f...s w itc h off.
(The Image smiles. Suddenly Manjula becomes calm.)
All right. Let me explain. The offer from the American
Software Company had been hanging fire for a while. Even
when Malini was alive. In fact, she became quite agitated
when he received the offer—although of course she was also
happy. I knew he too was dragging his feet because o f her.
We knew she was dying. Then she died. Then, I wrote the
novel and sent it to a literary agent in Britain. W ithin a couple
of weeks we received an email from the agent accepting the
novel for publication. Mentioning the advance. That did it.
Everything fell apart.
im a g e : Really?
What happened?
m a n ju l a : I suppose
it was to be expected. Until that m om ent I
was essentially dependent on him— emotionally, financially.
He was the quiet bread winner. Also the more successful
partner—the pillar of the family. Then suddenly, the rave
response, the enormous advance. I had achieved a status he
did not care for.
IMAGE: So?
m a n ju l a : His behaviour took an odd turn. I was of course inundated
with invitations to public functions, cultural events, literary
conferences and so on. He had never attended these events
before. He didn’t now. That was fine. But one day Lucy called.
You know— my friend Lucy—of the mixed-up letters? I knew
she was still unmarried—living by herself. She hadn’t talked
to me since that episode. She rang. Pramod had begun to
invite her out in the evenings. To dinner in expensive restaurants.
IMAGE: W ere th ey h avin g an affair?
TWO MONOLOGUES
275
m a n j u l a : N o , no, no. He would never even make a pass. I knew
that. In fact, I wish he had had a full-scale affair with her—
with anyone, in fact. That might have eased the tension in
the house. But he just isn’t the roaming type. Too much a
creature of habit.
IMAGE: So they only talked? What about? Did he complain against
you?
MANJULA: Lucy said he never so much as mentioned me.
IMAGE: Then?
MANJULA: He told her jokes.
IMAGE: He did what?
MANJULA: He cracked jokes. Of course he talked of other things,
but everything was honed to delivering the jokes he had
carefully selected, polished, tabulated and fitted into the
larger narrative.
IMAGE: Not smutty jokes then?
MANJULA (exasperated): No, no, no. That’s just not like him. Jokes
about his work. About Information Technology. About Bill
Gates and Wipro and Infosys. Cyberjokes. And she said he was
hilarious. Had her in stitches. She enjoyed the evenings
enormously.
It was his inexhaustible gaiety that worried her. Did he
tell me jokes too? she wanted to know. I said no, he may have
in the early days of marriage, but not any more. So she said:
‘If it doesn’t worry you, it doesn’t worry me. If you don’t
mind, I would like to continue the evenings. So please don’t
question him .’ That was the last I heard from her.
(Pause.)
Then he opened a new office for himself away from home.
(Pause.)
I had resigned my job, you see. We were both home all the time.
People dropped in to see me now. That disturbed him, or he
couldn’t stand them. He made remarks about the woodworks
BROKEN IMAGES
276
they m ust have crawled out of, which began to annoy me. His
complaints multiplied. The maid didn’t clean his office prop­
erly. Or she was too thorough and he couldn’t find anything
he needed. The quality of food at home was deteriorating.
Then one day he wondered if we could reemploy the nurse.
IMAGE: The nurse?
m a n j u l a : Yes, the
nurse who had attended on Malini. ‘Can she
just come and go once a day?’ he asked. I was taken aback.
‘Why?’ I asked, ‘Malini is dead and neither of us is ill.’ He
stared at his toes, went out of the room without replying. I
don’t know if he had the nurse visit him in his new office!
IMAGE: He obviously missed Malini.
m a n ju l a :
H m ...
i m a g e : So the collapse of your marriage may have nothing to
do
with your literary success. It was her.
MANJULA: There was something insidious in the way she had taken
over my home.
im a g e : You can’t
m a n ju l a :
blame her. You almost willed it.
How do you mean?
IMGE: You let her take over your home. You were out all day. You
didn’t have much time for the house or them.
I was a working woman, you know. I wasn’t out
gallivanting.
m a n ju l a :
i m a g e : You
made yourself more and m o re ...o r rather less and
less a part of the home scene. The cook came and went?
(Manjula nods.)
The maid came and went? The nurse similarly?
So Malini and Pramod were together—virtually all day.
And she was pretty.
Very, with a soft skin, almost translucent. Never
exposed to sun or wind.
Most people in her situation would have grown fat—
m a n ju l a :
TWO MONOLOGUES
277
obese. Developed diabetes. I’m told many kill the boredom of
confinement by gorging and so put on weight. She didn’t. She
was never bored. She remained alert and supple and glowed.
IMAGE: A young shapely body? Small but firm breasts. When you
bathed or changed her, you must have compared her physique
with your own?
MANJULA: Funnily, whenever I sponged her, it was she who looked
away.
IMAGE: Perhaps she couldn’t bear the look in your eyes?
(Pause.)
MANJULA: Was I jealous? Of course not. She was paralysed below
the waist. There was no possibility of any physical intimacy.
IMAGE: Intimacy can mean anything two people agree to.
(Pause.)
All right. It bothered me. Shall we say it was that
irritation that produced this novel? W hat went on between
them? Even if it was only words, what words?
(Pause.)
I tried various experiments. If I turned the key in the main
door noisily enough before going in—sure enough I would
find him at his table, studious, a picture of concentration.
She would be deep into her book or her laptop, but never so
absorbed that she couldn’t give me that warm, welcoming
smile. If I surprised them by entering silently, animated
conversation would suddenly come to a stop— a guilty pause—
before she picked the exact note effortlessly and continued,
involving me too in their talk. It was always her. He was no
good at subterfuge.
MANJULA:
IMAGE: But what were they talking about? After all, six years! They
couldn’t have been declaring love all that time.
MANJULA: One day I returned home early. A furious battle was
raging. I eavesdropped. They were squabbling like a married
couple. It was about ethics. He was arguing that any system
BROKEN IMAGES
278
of ethics demanded a single universal principle applicable
to everyone. A command that bound every human being without
exception. She was horrified by this. Different hum an situa­
tions called for different principles on which to act. Ethical
demands are ethical because they are conflicting, she said.
She found a universal principal inhuman.
They were screaming their heads off. He said Hinduism
knew no real ethics. She called Immanuel Kant a fascist. But
it all seemed impersonal. Abstruse. Innocuous. So I stepped
in. They saw me, a sudden look of guilty horror as though
I had caught them making love. Silence. Then she picks up
again. She asks my opinion. W hat did I think?
I couldn’t try the experiment too often of course. They
knew my timings. There were occasions when I felt, ‘This isn’t
my home. I am an intruder here: someone external to the soul
of this house— along with the cook, the maid and the nurse.’
IMAGE: Did Pramod come to your bed willingly?
m a n j u l a : Almost
too willingly. After all, he was not paralysed.
(Suddenly.)
But the film must be halfway by now. W hat about the
commercial break? I was told advertisers were queuing up. We
can’t be kept locked in here for ever.
IMAGE (quietly): You were talking about your bed.
m a n j u l a : There were moments when
I wondered if he was fan­
tasizing about having Malini instead of me in bed with him.
IMAGE: And she no doubt lay listening, beyond earshot. Imagining
the two of you together.
m a n j u l a : It was painful...
There seemed to be no end in sight.
No resolution. Critics have commented on the sensually
charged atmosphere of the novel. The despair—
(Pause.)
IMAGE: Y ou fo u n d the p erfect ‘O b jective C orrelative’ fo r it.
m a n ju l a : It
sold the book.
TWO MONOLOGUES
279
im a g e : But you have to keep protesting that the plot was not taken
from life?
{Manjula shrugs.)
By the way, did Malini know you were writing a book about
her?
m a n j u l a : How could
she? I hadn’t even thought of it when she
was alive. Have a heart! I was a working woman. English
literature. At home, there was Malini. Completely dependant.
And a quintessentially Indian husband— caring, but useless.
W here was the time? Besides you need distance. ‘Emotion
recollected’, etc.
IMAGE: But once you found Tranquility you must have written at
a tremendous pace.
m a n j u l a : It
poured out. It was one way of making up for her
absence.
She died. Within a couple of weeks of her death you
mailed the typescript to your literary agent. 350 printed pages
worth of material within two weeks.
IMAGE:
MANJULA: I w o r k e d m y f in g e r s to th e b o n e .
im a g e : A gigantic
task, worthy of the Guinness Book of World
Records. Do you know the publishers of the Guinness Book
say they receive the largest num ber of applications from
India? We are a nation that aspires to being the world-recordholder in world-record-holding.
{flares up): W hat are you burbling? Are you being
willfully obtuse? Or plain stupid? And nasty. All those hints.
Jibes. Innuendos.
MANJULA
IMAGE: But one hundred and fifty thousand words in two weeks?
Ten thousand words a day! It wasn’t inspiration. It was a
cataract— of words. A deluge not matched since N oah’s Ark!
MANJULA {explodes): All right! I didn’t write the novel. She did.
She wrote it. Every word of it.
BROKEN IMAGES
280
IMAGE: Dear me!
m a n ju l a : Once her health began to collapse, about eighteen months
before the end, she began hammering away at the laptop. I
knew she was writing something. But I had no time for it. After
her death, I found the typescript in her drawer. I read it.
(Pause.)
I was decimated.
IMAGE: It was brilliant. A masterpiece. You knew that as a writer
you could never dream of such heights. The passion. The
clarity. The insights. The total control. A work of genius.
MANJULA: Absolutely. I looked up a Directory of Literary Agents
in the British Council and mailed the typescript to them . I
didn’t know if they would even respond. Then it happened.
IMAGE: What?
m a n j u l a : I tried to explain to Pramod. But he would have none
of it. He was unforgiving.
IMAGE: About stealing the book?
MANJULA: I did not steal it. Malini liked to sign herself M. Nayak.
My letter accompanying the manuscript was signed Manjula
Nayak. The agent obviously thought we were the same person.
His reply arrived at Pramod’s email address. We shared a
computer, you see. Why does a Kannada writer need a com­
puter anyway? He printed off a copy of the reply and left it
for me—on the kitchen table.
As I read the email, I could sense him watching me. From
his corner. I decided to face him.
‘How can you accuse me of plagiarism?’ I wanted to demand.
‘Are you implying I knowingly stole my sister’s novel?’
I knew he would deny any such insinuation. I was rearing
to pitch into him—wring the truth out of him.
‘Why don’t you say what is on your mind?’ I wanted to
go on. ‘You know it was a genuine mistake. The Agent is an
Englishman, unfamiliar with Indian names.’
TWO MONOLOGUES
281
Instead, I heard myself asking, ‘Why did you leave the
email message on the kitchen table?’ He looked nonplussed.
And it wasn’t what I had meant to ask. But I had to plunge on.
‘You know I have a study of my own—a desk at which I work.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ he said, picked up the message from the kitchen
table, took it into my study and plonked it down on my writing
desk, ‘Here. The message.’ That was it. He pretended he didn’t
know what I was getting at. But he did know. You could see it
in his anger. He had never been so angry before— not with me.
The subject was never mentioned again.
im a g e :
Then?
m a n j u l a : We lived entombed in silence. The last real com m uni­
cation between us—the last moment of privacy—was when
he’d asked whether we could call the nurse back. I had replied
with a flippant why, but as we looked at each other— for a
moment only—the room had suddenly filled with the reek
of her incontinence, her phlegm and sweat, her perfumes,
medicines and disinfectants. This was weeks after she had
died! Before long, the press got wind of the deal and invaded
our home. The enormous advance. The rave previews. The
literary tours. It was all too late...
IMAGE {gently): Let’s just go back a bit. The plot is a little too neat,
don’t you agree?
(Manjula stares dourly.)
All that spiel about the Literary Agent confusing Malini with
Manjula. Such melodrama! Sounds like one of your Kannada
short stories.
(A very long pause.)
MANJULA: After her death, I looked for her papers. I could not find
them in her room. I dashed to Pramod’s office. Rifled through
his papers. There it was, the typescript. Not even a floppy
which you might miss or not recognize. She had printed
off the entire novel and arranged the pages, carefully. It lay
BROKEN IMAGES
282
there, hidden away in his drawer. Or at least he thought so.
He is no good at concealment. He did not even know I had
filched the typescript until the agent’s email arrived... I read
the typescript.
IMAGE: You were decimated. It was brilliant, a masterpiece, etc.
It was venomous. I was camouflaged as the first cousin,
and not sister. But it was me all right and the portrayal was
rancorous. I was a shallow woman, a pretentious mediocrity,
a gushy, conniving and devious relative who had taken her
in for her inheritance. But there were no adjectives. Just
facts. The events were from life. They were accurately de­
scribed. The conversations were recorded verbatim. I couldn’t
deny them.
m a n ju l a :
im a g e :
Perhaps that’s why Pramod had hidden the script.
m a n ju l a : Or perhaps
they had shared it together? Laughed and
exchanged notes? Perhaps he was not simple at ail—she had
brought out an aspect of him I never suspected? She could not
have imagined her work would find the light of day. So it was
either meant to be read by me— or to be shared between them.
She despised me. Perhaps they both did. Perhaps she had
turned him against me.
At that moment I knew—that I hated the cripple. I had
always hated her. I was only waiting for her to die.
IMAGE: And she had recognized the truth all along.
MANJULA: And she was right! Once again! It was maddening.
(Pause.)
For six years, from her wheelchair, she had watched me,
stalked me in every move. Then she had pinned me down in
coruscating prose.
(Pause.)
From beyond the funeral pyre, my sister was challenging me
to burn the script. If I succumbed, I would stand condemned
in my own eyes for destroying a masterpiece.
TWO MONOLOGUES
283
im a g e : And if you published it, everyone would see who ‘the first
cousin’ was. You would become the laughing stock. Worse
still, you would go down in history as a footnote in the life
o f a brilliant author. Dangling by an insignificant asterix.
Malini had nicely crucified you.
I had to do something she could not have possibly
anticipated. I had to solve all problems at one stroke. I had
to survive.
(Pause.)
And this time I had one advantage. She was dead and I was
not.
(Pause.)
I published the novel in my name. I won!
(The Image claps. Manjula takes a bow. Smiling.)
Shall we go then?
(Makes a move to the door. Suddenly the Image stops clapping.)
m a n ju l a :
i m a g e : Wait a bit.
m a n j u l a : How
Perhaps... she did win in the end?
do you mean?
IMAGE: If she meant to prove to you that you were a fraud, she
certainly succeeded.
MANJULA: You—you— I'll show you.
(She rushes to the screen and looks for the cable connecting it.)
i m a g e : What
are you doing?
I’ve had enough of you. I want to unplug you. I want
to wipe you out.
(She goes behind the screen looking for the connections, so that the
Image seems to become the upper part o f her body. Suddenly,
Manjula’s body, gesticulating in sync with the words o f the Image,
almost becomes an extension o f the Image. The Image intones the
following speech.)
MANJULA:
i m a g e : I am Malini Nayak, the English novelist. Manjula Nayak,
the Kannada short-story writer, was decimated the moment
she read my novel. She thus obliterated all differences of ink
284
BROKEN IMAGES
and blood and language between us and at one full stroke
morphed into me.
( If there is a revolving stage available, it begins to revolve taking
Manjula-cum-the-Image with it, as the television sets at the back
come alive one after another. Every screen shows a different Image
o f Manjula, silent but gesticulating.)
Of course, I shall continue with the name of Manjula Nayak.
As Manjula Nayak, I have been invited as Visiting Professor
to seven prestigious American Universities. I use that nom en­
clature for my passport, my bank accounts, property and
financial investments. However I am in truth Malini, my
genius of a sister who loved my husband and knew Kannada
and wrote in English.
(Suddenly all the screens start speaking loudly, some in Kannada,
the others in English. The cacophony is deafening. The revolving
stage moves Manjula out into the dark. Then one by one, the sets
switch off, leaving the studio, dark and empty.)
“Trifles” by Susan Glaspell (1916)
CAST
•
GEORGE HENDERSON, County Attorney
•
HENRY PETERS, Sheriff
•
LEWIS HALE, A Neighboring Farmer
•
MRS. PETERS
•
MRS. HALE
————————————————————————————————————
Scene: The kitchen in the now abandoned farmhouse of John Wright, a gloomy kitchen, and left without
having been put in order—unwashed pans under the sink, a loaf of bread outside the breadbox, a dish
towel on the table—other signs of uncompleted work. At the rear the outer door opens, and the Sheriff
comes in, followed by the county Attorney and Hale. The Sheriff and Hale are men in middle life, the
county Attorney is a young man; all are much bundled up and go at once to the stove. They are followed by
the two women—the Sheriff’s Wife first; she is a slight wiry woman, a thin nervous face. Mrs. Hale is
larger and would ordinarily be called more comfortable looking, but she is disturbed now and looks
fearfully about as she enters. The women have come in slowly and stand close together near the door.
COUNTY ATTORNEY (rubbing his hands). This feels good. Come up to the fire, ladies.
MRS. PETERS (after taking a step forward). I’m not—cold.
SHERIFF (unbuttoning his overcoat and stepping away from the stove as if to the beginning of official
business). Now, Mr. Hale, before we move things about, you explain to Mr. Henderson just what you saw
when you came here yesterday morning.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. By the way, has anything been moved? Are things just as you left them yesterday?
SHERIFF (looking about). It’s just the same. When it dropped below zero last night, I thought I’d better
send Frank out this morning to make a fire for us—no use getting pneumonia with a big case on; but I told
him not to touch anything except the stove—and you know Frank.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. Somebody should have been left here yesterday.
SHERIFF. Oh—yesterday. When I had to send Frank to Morris Center for that man who went crazy—I
want you to know I ha d my hands full yesterday. I knew you could get back from Omaha by today, and as
long as I went over everything here myself—
COUNTY ATTORNEY. Well, Mr. Hale, tell just what happened when you came here yesterday morning.
HALE. Harry and I had started to town with a load of potatoes. We came along the road from my place;
and as I got here, I said, “I’m going to see if I can’t get John Wright to go in with me on a party telephone.”
I spoke to Wright about it once before, and he put me off, saying folks talked too much anyway, and all he
asked was peace and quiet—I guess you know about how much he talked himself; but I thought maybe if I
went to the house and talked about it before his wife, though I said to Harry that I didn’t know as what his
wife wanted made much difference to John—
COUNTY ATTORNEY. Let’s talk about that later, Mr. Hale. I do want to talk about that, but tell now just
“Trifles” Page 1/11
what happened when you got to the house.
HALE. I didn’t hear or see anything; I knocked at the door, and still it was all quiet inside. I knew they
must be up, it was past eight o’clock. so I knocked again, and I thought I heard somebody say, “Come in.” I
wasn’t sure, I’m not sure yet, but I opened the door—this door (indicating the door by which the two
women are still standing), and there in that rocker— (pointing to it) sat Mrs. Wright. (They all look at the
rocker.)
COUNTY ATTORNEY. What—was she doing?
HALE. She was rockin’ back and forth. She had her apron in her hand and was kind of—pleating it.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. And how did she—look?
HALE. Well, she looked queer.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. How do you mean—queer?
HALE. Well, as if she didn’t know what she was going to do next. And kind of done up.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. How did she seem to feel about your coming?
HALE. Why, I don’t think she minded—one way or other. She didn’t pay much attention. I said, “How do,
Mrs. Wright, it’s cold, ain’t it?” And she said, “Is it?"—and went on kind of pleating at her apron. Well, I
was surprised; she didn’t ask me to come up to the stove, or to set down, but just sat there, not even looking
at me, so I said, “I want to see John.” And then she—laughed. I guess you would call it a laugh. I thought
of Harry and the team outside, so I said a little sharp. “Can’t I see John?” “No,” she says, kind o’ dull like.
“Ain’t he home?” says I. “Yes,” says she, “he’s home.” “Then why can’t I see him?” I asked her, out of
patience. “’Cause he’s dead,” says she. “Dead?” says I. She just nodded her head, not getting a bit excited,
but rockin’ back and forth. “Why—where is he?” says I, not knowing what to say. She just pointed upstairs
—like that (himself pointing to the room above). I got up, with the idea of going up there. I talked from
there to here—then I says, “Why, what did he die of?” “He died of a rope around his neck,” says she, and
just went on pleatin’ at her apron. Well, I went out and called Harry. I thought I might—need help. We went
upstairs, and there he was lying’—
COUNTY ATTORNEY. I think I’d rather have you go into that upstairs, where you can point in all out. Just
go on now with the rest of the story.
HALE. Well, my first thought was to get that rope off. I looked… (Stops, his face twitches.)… but Harry,
he went up to him, and he said, “No, he’s dead all right, and we’d better not touch anything.” So we went
back downstairs. She was still sitting that same way. “Has anybody been notified?” I asked.” “No,” says
she, unconcerned. “Who did this, Mrs. Wright?” said Harry. He said it business-like—and she stopped
pleatin’ of her apron. “I don’t know,” she says. “You don’t know?” says Harry. “No,” says she, “Weren’t
you sleepin’ in the bed with him?” says Harry. “Yes,” says she, “but I was on the inside.” “Somebody
slipped a rope round his neck and strangled him, and you didn’t wake up?” says Harry. “I didn’t wake up,”
she said after him. We must ’a looked as if we didn’t see how that could be, for after a minute she said, “I
sleep sound.” Harry was going to ask her more questions, but I said maybe we ought to let her tell her story
first to the coroner, or the sheriff, so Harry went fast as he could to Rivers’ place, where there’s a telephone.
“Trifles” Page 2/11
COUNTY ATTORNEY. And what did Mrs. Wright do when she knew that you had gone for the coroner.
HALE. she moved from that chair to this over here… (Pointing to a small chair in the corner)… and just
sat there with her hand held together and looking down. I got a feeling that I ought to make some
conversation, so I said I had come in to see if John wanted to put in a telephone, and at that she started to
laugh, and then she stopped and looked at me—scared.
(The County Attorney, who has had his notebook out, makes a note.) I dunno, maybe it wasn’t scared. I
wouldn’t like to say it was. Soon Harry got back, and then Dr. Lloyd came, and you, Mr. Peters, and so I
guess that’s all I know that you don’t.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. (looking around). I guess we’ll go upstairs first—and then out to the barn and
around there. (To the Sheriff). You’re convinced that there was nothing important here—nothing that would
point to any motive?
SHERIFF. Nothing here but kitchen things.
(The County Attorney, after again looking around the kitchen, opens the door of a cupboard closet. He gets
up on a chair and looks on a shelf. Pulls his hand away, sticky.)
COUNTY ATTORNEY. Here’s a nice mess.
(The women draw nearer.)
MRS. PETERS (to the other woman). Oh, her fruit; it did freeze. (To the Lawyer). She worried about that
when it turned so cold. She said the fire’d go out and her jars would break.
SHERIFF. Well, can you beat the women! Held for murder and worryin’ about her preserves.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. I guess before we’re through she may have something more serious than preserves
to worry about.
HALE. Well, women are used to worrying over trifles.
(The two women move a little closer together.)
COUNTY ATTORNEY (with the gallantry of a young politician). And yet, for all their worries, what
would we do without the ladies? (The women do not unbend. He goes to the sink, takes dipperful of water
form the pail and, pouring it into a basin, washes his hands. Starts to wipe them on the roller towel, turns it
for a cleaner place.) Dirty towels! (Kicks his foot against the pans under the sink.) Not much of a
housekeeper, would you say, ladies?
MRS. HALE (stiffly). There’s a great deal of work to be done on a farm.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. To be sure. And yet… (With a little bow to her.) … I know there are some
Dickson county farmhouses which do not have such roller towels. (He gives it a pull to expose its full
length again.)
MRS. HALE. Those towels get dirty awful quick. Men’s hands aren’t always as clean as they might be.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. Ah, loyal to your sex, I see. But you and Mrs. Wright were neighbors. I suppose
“Trifles” Page 3/11
you were friends, too.
MRS. HALE (shaking her head.) I’ve not seen much of her of late years. I’ve not been in this house—it’s
more than a year.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. And why was that? You didn’t like her?
MRS. HALE. I liked her all well enough. Farmers’ wives have their hands full, Mr. Henderson. And then—
COUNTY ATTORNEY. Yes—?
MRS. HALE (looking about.) It never seemed a very cheerful place.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. No—it’s not cheerful. I shouldn’t say she had the homemaking instinct.
MRS. HALE. Well, I don’t know as Wright had, either.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. You mean that they didn’t get on very well?
MRS. HALE. No, I don’t mean anything. But I don’t think a place’d be any cheerfuller for John Wright’s
being in it.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. I’d like to talk more of that a little later. I want to get the lay of things upstairs
now. (He goes to the left, where three steps lead to a stair door.)
SHERIFF. I suppose anything Mrs. Peters does’ll be all right. She was to take in some clothes for her, you
know, and a few little things. We left in such a hurry yesterday.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. Yes, but I would like to see what you take, Mrs. Peters, and keep an eye out for
anything that might be of use to us.
MRS. PETERS. Yes, Mr. Henderson.
(The women listen to the men’s steps on the stairs, then look about the kitchen.)
MRS. HALE. I’d hate to have men coming into my kitchen, snooping around and criticizing. (She
arranges the pans under sink which the Lawyer had shoved out of place.)
MRS. PETERS. Of course it’s no more than their duty.
MRS. HALE. Duty’s all right, but I guess that deputy sheriff that came out to make the fire might have got
a little of this on. (Gives the roller towel a pull.) Wish I’d thought of that sooner. Seems mean to talk about
her for not having things slicked up when she had to come away in such a hurry.
MRS. PETERS. (who has gone to a small table in the left rear corner of the room, and lifted on end of a
towel that covers a pan). She had bread set. (Stands still.)
MRS. HALE (eyes fixed on a loaf of bread beside the breadbox, which is on a low shelf at the other side of
the room. Moves slowly toward it.)she was going to put this in there. (Picks up loaf, then abruptly drops it.
In a manner of returning to familiar things.) It’s a shame about her fruit. I wonder if it’s all gone. (Gets up
“Trifles” Page 4/11
on the chair and looks.) I think there’s some here that’s all right, Mrs. Peters. Yes—here; (Holding it
toward the window.) This is cherries, too. (Looking again.) I declare I believe that’s the only one. (Gets
down, bottle in her hand. Goes to the sink and wipes it off on the outside.) She’ll feel awful bad after all her
hard work in the hot weather. I remember the afternoon I put up my cherries last summer. (She puts the
bottle on the big kitchen table, center of the room, front table. With a sigh, is about to sit down in the
rocking chair. Before she is seated realizes what chair it is; with a slow look at it, steps back. The chair,
which she has touched, rocks back and forth.)
MRS. PETERS. Well, I must get those things from the front room closet. [She goes to the door at the right,
but after looking into the other room, steps back.] You coming with me, Mrs. Hale? You could help me
carry them. (They go into the other room; reappear, Mrs. Peters carrying a dress and skirt, Mrs. Hale
following with a pair of shoes.)
MRS. PETERS. My, it’s cold in there. (She puts the cloth on the big table, and hurries to the stove.)
MRS. HALE (examining the skirt). Wright was close. I think maybe that’s why she kept so much to herself.
She didn’t even belong to the Ladies’ Aid. I suppose she felt she couldn’t do her part, and then you don’t
enjoy things when you feel shabby. She used to wear pretty clothes and be lively, when she was Minnie
Foster, one of the town girls singing in the choir. But that—oh, that was thirty years ago. This all you was
to take?
MRS. PETERS. She said she wanted an apron. Funny thing to want, for there isn’t much to get you dirty in
jail, goodness knows. But I suppose just to make her feel more natural. She said they was in the top drawer
in this cupboard. Yes, here. And then her little shawl that always hung behind the door. (Opens stair door
and looks.) Yes, here it is. (Quickly shuts door leading upstairs.)
MRS. HALE (abruptly moving toward her.) Mrs. Peters?
MRS. PETERS. Do you think she did it?
MRS. HALE (in a frightened voice.) Oh, I don’t know.
MRS. PETERS. Well, I don’t think she did. Asking for an apron and her little shawl. Worrying about her
fruit.
MRS. PETERS (starts to speak, glances up, where footsteps are heard in the room above. In a low voice.)
Mrs. Peters says it looks bad for her. Mr. Henderson is awful sarcastic in speech, and he’ll make fun of her
sayin’ she didn’t wake up.
MRS. HALE. Well, I guess John Wright didn’t wake when they was slipping that rope under his neck.
MRS. PETERS. No, it’s strange. It must have been done awful crafty and still. They say it was such a —
funny way to kill a man, rigging it all up like that.
MRS. HALE. That’s just what Mr. Hale said. There was a gun in the house. He says that’s what he can’t
understand.
MRS. PETERS. Mr. Henderson said coming out that what was needed for the case was a motive;
something to show anger or—sudden feeling.
“Trifles” Page 5/11
MRS. HALE (who is standing by the table). Well, I don’t see any signs of anger around here. (she puts her
hand on the dish towel which lies on the table, stands looking down at the table, one half of which is clean,
the other half messy.) It’s wiped here. (Makes a move as if to finish work, then turns and looks at loaf of
bread outside the breadbox. Drops towel. In that voice of coming back to familiar things. ) Wonder how
they are finding things upstairs? I hope she had it a little more there. You know, it seems kind of sneaking.
Locking her up in town and then coming out here and trying to get her own house to turn against her!
MRS. PETERS. But, Mrs. Hale, the law is the law.
MRS. HALE. I s’pose ’tis. (Unbuttoning her coat.) Better loosen up your things, Mrs. Peters. You won’t
feel them when you go out. (Mrs. Peters takes off her fur tippet, goes to hang it on hook at the back of
room, stands looking at the under part of the small corner table.)
MRS. PETERS. She was piecing a quilt. (She brings the large sewing basket, and they look at the bright
pieces.)
MRS. HALE. It’s log cabin pattern. Pretty, isn’t it? I wonder if she was goin’ to quilt or just knot it?
(Footsteps have been heard coming down the stairs. The Sheriff enters, followed by Hale and the County
Attorney.)
SHERIFF. They wonder if she was going to quilt it or just knot it. (The men laugh, the women look
abashed.)
COUNTY ATTORNEY (rubbing his hands over the stove). Frank’s fire didn’t do much up there, did it?
Well, let’s go out to the barn and get that cleared up. (The men go outside.)
MRS. HALE (resentfully). I don’t know as there’s anything so strange, our takin’ up our time with little
things while we’re waiting for them to get the evidence. (She sits down at the big table, smoothing out a
block with decision.) I don’t see as it’s anything to laugh about.
MRS. PETERS. (apologetically). Of course they’ve got awful important things on their minds. (Pulls up a
chair and joins Mrs. Hale at the table.)
MRS. HALE (examining another block.) Mrs. Peters, look at this one. Here, this is the one she was working
on, and look at the sewing! All the rest of it has been so nice and even. And look at this! It’s all over the
place! Why, it looks as if she didn’t know what she was about! (After she has said this, they look at each
other, then start to glance back at the door. After an instant Mrs. Hale has pulled at a knot and ripped the
sewing.)
MRS. PETERS. Oh, what are you doing, Mrs. Hale?
MRS. HALE (mildly). Just pulling out a stitch or two that’s not sewed very good. (Threading a needle).
Bad sewing always made me fidgety.
MRS. PETERS. (nervously). I don’t think we ought to touch things.
MRS. HALE. I’ll just finish up this end. (Suddenly stopping and leaning forward.) Mrs. Peters?
“Trifles” Page 6/11
MRS. PETERS. Yes, Mrs. Hale?
MRS. HALE. What do you suppose she was so nervous about?
MRS. PETERS. Oh—I don’t know. I don’t know as she was nervous. I sometimes sew awful queer when
I’m just tired. (Mrs. Hale starts to say something looks at Mrs. Peters, then goes on sewing.) Well, I must
get these things wrapped up. They may be through sooner than we think. (Putting apron and other things
together.) I wonder where I can find a piece of paper, and string.
MRS. HALE. In that cupboard, maybe.
MRS. PETER. (looking in cupboard). Why, here’s a birdcage. (Holds it up.) Did she have a bird, Mrs.
Hale?
MRS. HALE. Why, I don’t know whether she did or not—I’ve not been here for so long. There was a man
around last year selling canaries cheap, but I don’t know as she took one; maybe she did. She used to sing
real pretty herself.
MRS. PETERS. (glancing around). Seems funny to think of a bird here. But she must have had one, or
why should she have a cage? I wonder what happened to it?
MRS. HALE. I s’pose maybe the cat got it.
MRS. PETERS. No, she didn’t have a cat. She’s got that feeling some people have about cats—being afraid
of them. My cat got in her room, and she was real upset and asked me to take it out.
MRS. HALE. My sister Bessie was like that. Queer, ain’t it?
MRS. PETERS. (examining the cage). Why, look at this door. It’s broke. One hinge is pulled apart.
MRS. HALE. (looking, too.) Looks as if someone must have been rough with it.
MRS. PETERS. Why, yes. (she brings the cage forward and puts it on the table.)
MRS. HALE. I wish if they’re going to find any evidence they’d be about it. I don’t like this place.
MRS. PETERS. But I’m awful glad you came with me, Mrs. Hale. It would be lonesome of me sitting here
alone.
MRS. HALE. It would, wouldn’t it? (Dropping her sewing). But I tell you what I do wish, Mrs. Peters. I
wish I had come over sometimes she was here. I— (Looking around the room.)—wish I had.
MRS. PETERS. But of course you were awful busy, Mrs. Hale—-your house and your children.
MRS. HALE. I could’ve come. I stayed away because it weren’t cheerful—and that’s why I ought to have
come. I—I’ve never liked this place. Maybe because it’s down in a hollow, and you don’t see the road. I
dunno what it is, but it’s a lonesome place and always was. I wish I had come over to see Minnie Foster
sometimes. I can see now—(Shakes her head.)
“Trifles” Page 7/11
MRS. PETERS. Well, you mustn’t reproach yourself, Mrs. Hale. Somehow we just don’t see how it is with
other folks until—something comes up.
MRS. HALE. Not having children makes less work—but it makes a quiet house, and Wright out to work all
day, and no company when he did come in. Did you know John Wright, Mrs. Peters?
MRS. PETERS. Not to know him; I’ve seen him in town. They say he was a good man.
MRS. HALE. Yes—good; he didn’t drink, and kept his word as well as most, I guess, and paid his debts.
But he was a hard man, Mrs. Peters. Just to pass the time of day with him. (Shivers.) Like a raw wind that
gets to the bone. (Pauses, her eye falling on the cage.) I should think she would ’a wanted a bird. But what
do you suppose went with it?
MRS. PETERS. I don’t know, unless it got sick and died. (She reaches over and swings the broken door,
swings it again; both women watch it.)
MRS. HALE. She—come to think of it, she was kind of like a bird herself—real sweet and pretty, but kind
of timid and—fluttery. How—she—did—change. (Silence; then as if struck by a happy thought and
relieved to get back to everyday things.) Tell you what, Mrs. Peters, why don’t you take the quilt in with
you? It might take up her mind.
MRS. PETERS. Why, I think that’s a real nice idea, Mrs. Hale. There couldn’t possible be any objection to
it, could there? Now, just what would I take? I wonder if her patches are in here—and her things. (They
look in the sewing basket.)
MRS. HALE. Here’s some red. I expect this has got sewing things in it (Brings out a fancy box.) What a
pretty box. Looks like something somebody would give you. Maybe her scissors are in here. (Opens box.
Suddenly puts her hand to her nose.) Why— (Mrs. Peters bend nearer, then turns her face away.) There’s
something wrapped up in this piece of silk.
MRS. PETERS. Why, this isn’t her scissors.
MRS. HALE (lifting the silk.) Oh, Mrs. Peters—it’s— (Mrs. Peters bend closer.)
MRS. PETERS. It’s the bird.
MRS. HALE (jumping up.) But, Mrs. Peters—look at it. Its neck! Look at its neck! It’s all—other side to.
MRS. PETERS. Somebody—wrung—its neck.
(Their eyes meet. A look of growing comprehension of horror. Steps are heard outside. Mrs. Hale slips box
under quilt pieces, and sinks into her chair. Enter Sheriff and County Attorney. Mrs. Peters rises.)
COUNTY ATTORNEY (as one turning from serious thing to little pleasantries). Well, ladies, have you
decided whether she was going to quilt it or knot it?
MRS. PETERS. We think she was going to—knot it.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. Well, that’s interesting, I’m sure. (Seeing the birdcage.) Has the bird flown?
“Trifles” Page 8/11
MRS. HALE (putting more quilt pieces over the box.) We think the—cat got it.
COUNTY ATTORNEY (preoccupied). Is there a cat?
(Mrs. Hale glances in a quick covert way at Mrs. Peters.)
MRS. PETERS. Well, not now. They’re superstitious, you know. They leave.
COUNTY ATTORNEY (to Sheriff Peters, continuing an interrupted conversation.) No sign at all of
anyone having come from the outside. Their own rope. Now let’s go up again and go over it piece by piece.
(They start upstairs.) It would have to have been someone who knew just the—
(Mrs. Peters sits down. The two women sit there not looking at one another, but as if peering into
something and at the same time holding back. When they talk now, it is the manner of feeling their way
over strange ground, as if afraid of what they are saying, but as if they cannot help saying it.)
MRS. HALE. She liked the bird. She was going to bury it in that pretty box.
MRS. PETERS. (in a whisper). When I was a girl—my kitten—there was a boy took a hatchet, and before
my eyes—and before I could get there—(Covers her face an instant.) If they hadn’t held me back, I would
have— (Catches herself, looks upstairs, where steps are heard, falters weakly.)—hurt him.
MRS. HALE (with a slow look around her.) I wonder how it would seem never to have had any children
around. (Pause.) No, Wright wouldn’t like the bird—a thing that sang. She used to sing. He killed that, too.
MRS. PETERS (moving uneasily). We don’t know who killed the bird.
MRS. HALE. I knew John Wright.
MRS. PETERS. It was an awful thing was done in this house that night, Mrs. Hale. Killing a man while he
slept, slipping a rope around his neck that choked the life out of him.
MRS. HALE. His neck, Choked the life out of him.
(Her hand goes out and rests on the birdcage.)
MRS. PETERS (with a rising voice). We don’t know who killed him. We don’t know.
MRS. HALE (her own feeling not interrupted.) If there’d been years and years of nothing, then a bird to
sing to you, it would be awful—still, after the bird was still.
MRS. PETERS (something within her speaking). I know what stillness is. When we homesteaded in
Dakota, and my first baby died—after he was two years old, and me with no other then—
MRS. HALE (moving). How soon do you suppose they’ll be through, looking for evidence?
MRS. PETERS. I know what stillness is. (Pulling herself back). The law has got to punish crime, Mrs.
Hale.
MRS. HALE (not as if answering that). I wish you’d seen Minnie Foster when she wore a white dress with
blue ribbons and stood up there in the choir and sang. (A look around the room). Oh, I wish I’d come over
here once in a while! That was a crime! That was a crime! Who’s going to punish that?
“Trifles” Page 9/11
MRS. Peters (looking upstairs). We mustn’t—take on.
MRS. HALE. I might have known she needed help! I know how things can be—for women. I tell you, it’s
queer, Mrs. Peters. We live close together and we live far apart. We all go through the same things—it’s all
just a different kind of the same thing. (Brushes her eyes, noticing the bottle of fruit, reaches out for it.) If I
was you, I wouldn’t tell her her fruit was gone. Tell her it ain’t. Tell her it’s all right. Take this in to prove it
to her. She—she may never know whether it was broke or not.
MRS. PETERS (takes the bottle, looks about for something to wrap it in; takes petticoat from the clothes
brought from the other room, very nervously begins winding this around the bottle. In a false voice). My,
it’s a good thing the men couldn’t hear us. Wouldn’t they just laugh! Getting all stirred up over a little thing
like a—dead canary. As if that could have anything to do with—with—wouldn’t they laugh!
(The men are heard coming downstairs.)
MRS. HALE (under her breath). Maybe they would—maybe they wouldn’t.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. No, Peters, it’s all perfectly clear except a reason for doing it. But you know juries
when it comes to women. If there was some definite thing. Something to show—something to make a story
about—a thing that would connect up with this strange way of doing it.
(The women’s eyes meet for an instant. Enter Hale from outer door.)
HALE. Well, I’ve got the team around. Pretty cold out there.
COUNTY ATTORNEY. I’m going to stay here awhile by myself (To the Sheriff). You can send Frank out
for me, can’t you? I want to go over everything. I’m not satisfied that we can’t do better.
SHERIFF. Do you want to see what Mrs. Peters is going to take in?
(The Lawyer goes to the table, picks up the apron, laughs.)
COUNTY ATTORNEY. Oh I guess they’re not very dangerous things the ladies have picked up. (Moves a
few things about, disturbing the quilt pieces which cover the box. Steps back.) No, Mrs. Peters doesn’t need
supervising. For that matter, a sheriff’s wife is married to the law. Ever think of it that way, Mrs. Peters?
MRS. PETERS. Not—just that way.
SHERIFF (chuckling). Married to the law. (Moves toward the other room.) I just want you to come in here
a minute, George. We ought to take a look at these windows.
COUNTY ATTORNEY (scoffingly). Oh, windows!
SHERIFF. We’ll be right out, Mr. Hale.
(Hale goes outside. The Sheriff follows the County Attorney into the other room. Then Mrs. Hale rises,
hands tight together, looking intensely at Mrs. Peters, whose eyes take a slow turn, finally meeting Mrs.
Hale’s. A moment Mrs. Hale holds her, then her own eyes point the way to where the box is concealed.
Suddenly Mrs. Peters throws back quilt pieces and tries to put the box in the bag she is wearing. It is too
big. She opens box, starts to take the bird out, cannot touch it, goes to pieces, stands there helpless. Sound
of a knob turning in the other room. Mrs. Hale snatches the box and puts it in the pocket of her big coat.
Enter County Attorney and Sheriff.)
“Trifles” Page 10/11
COUNTY ATTORNEY (facetiously). Well, Henry, at least we found out that she was not going to quilt it.
She was going to—what is it you call it, ladies!
MRS. HALE (her hand against her pocket). We call it—knot it, Mr. Henderson.
“Trifles” Page 11/11