Dream and Darkness: (A Chamber Play for Seven Human Voices and a Double Bass)

DREAM AND DARKNESS (a chamber play for seven human voices and a double bass) Ulla Ryum Translated from the Danish by Per K. Brask (DreamandDarknesswas first produced by Danish Radio's Radioteatret, directed by Ulla Ryum, and aired in February 1992.) CHARACTERS: THE WOMAN: who permits herself to remain unaffected (sonorous contralto) THE SECOND WOMAN: who must bring her message (hoarse mezzo) THE THIRD WOMAN: who describes what she sees (alto) THE FOURTH WOMAN: who wants to believe what she's saying (hoarse light soprano) THE MAN: who permits himself to move on (tenor) THE SECOND MAN: who lives in his own visions (bass baritone) THE THIRD MAN: who is found in his experiences (bass) A DOUBLE BASS: the echo of longing . TIME: At all times. PLACE: Everywhere inside, everywhere outside. THE WOMAN: I don't know how it began. (Double bass.) THE MAN: Who knew me before I was born? Whose voice forced my eyes to let light slip in? Whose hands cupped my ears and collected the sounds of the air? Who must I recognize? (Double bass.) THE WOMAN: Fertile as rain, in frightening volume the tears stream down. They know us before we are born. The white traces of salt join us to the sea, cuts our tongues when we question. Who can know without recognizing ? (Double bass, wind, andbirds in antiphony to the voices of The Man and The Woman.) U 77 THE WOMAN: THE WOMAN: Frightening streams Without recognizing Salt's voice THE MAN: Sees and calls Listens in his sleep Wants to be found THE WOMAN: The dreams of birds protect their eggs in shadow tracks THE MAN: Wants to be found knows himself in stones and grass THE WOMAN: I carry nothing Grab the earth disappear THE MAN: She does not exist Am myself I know that THE WOMAN: Listens in the light. THE MAN: I am recognized. THE MAN: Now we are. (Double bass by itself Double bassfades out.) THE WOMAN: Seen from the outside the house seemed to rise from the red clay soil. The walls were a little darker than the soil, the roof made from baked tiles was flaming yellow. White birds with red beaks and black legs came flying out through the dark doorway. I don't know how it began. The lilies resting on the shoulders of the young man bent forward and followed his movements. That's how it began. (Double bassfades out.) THE MAN: I left behind seventeen lilies in the darkness of the room when I left her house. Darkness enveloped them, no one sang any longer. Occasionally , they'll see you to the door, letting their voices hang in the air long after. But this time, they all stayed sitting along the walls counting the lilies. That's when I remembered where I had met the woman. (Double bass.) She had buried a child and she herself had carried the coffin past all the faces peering out from the houses in the town. THE SECOND WOMAN: That sort of thing is not said in regular language. It is the flying birds who tell each other all the things not even dusk has the strength to give voice. In sleeping position , the dead child was put into the coffin, one arm lay resting across the bluish, closed eyelids. (Double bassfades out.) 78 U PERFORMING ARTS JOURNAL 49 I exist here A B C THE WOMAN: I saw him that day. That day. He left half his lilies by the door. We didn't know him. Everyone stayed sitting along the walls in darkness . No one came with us. Their voices stumbled across the threshold, creeping along like shadows. THE MAN: I followed her. She carried a small handbag the same color as the walls in the house she left. She didn't look back, but her shoulders wished her body would turn around, stand for a moment and look at the house that no longer had anything to do with her. THE SECOND WOMAN: It's wrong to call it an epidemic. It would be better to call it poisoning. Some survived, others succumbed. The drinking water was blamed. But the hands which forced...