Plays by August Strindberg Volume I Part 14

GUSTAV. Entirely! And for that very reason, you know, I am capable of thinking--in which you have had no experience whatever-and of acting--in which you have just had some slight experience.

TEKLA. And all this merely because I have hurt your vanity?

GUSTAV. Don't call that MERELY! You had better not go around hurting other people's vanity. They have no more sensitive spot than that.

TEKLA. Vindictive wretch--shame on you!

GUSTAV. Dissolute wretch--shame on you!

TEKLA. Oh, that's my character, is it?

GUSTAV. Oh, that's my character, is it?--You ought to learn something about human nature in others before you give your own nature free rein.

Otherwise you may get hurt, and then there will be wailing and gnas.h.i.+ng of teeth.

TEKLA. You can never forgive:--

GUSTAV. Yes, I have forgiven you!

TEKLA. You!

GUSTAV. Of course! Have I raised a hand against you during all these years? No! And now I came here only to have a look at you, and it was enough to burst your bubble. Have I uttered a single reproach? Have I moralised or preached sermons? No! I played a joke or two on your dear consort, and nothing more was needed to finish him.--But there is no reason why I, the complainant, should be defending myself as I am now--Tekla! Have you nothing at all to reproach yourself with?

TEKLA. Nothing at all! Christians say that our actions are governed by Providence; others call it Fate; in either case, are we not free from all liability?

GUSTAV. In a measure, yes; but there is always a narrow margin left unprotected, and there the liability applies in spite of all. And sooner or later the creditors make their appearance. Guiltless, but accountable! Guiltless in regard to one who is no more; accountable to oneself and one's fellow beings.

TEKLA. So you came here to dun me?

GUSTAV. I came to take back what you had stolen, not what you had received as a gift. You had stolen my honour, and I could recover it only by taking yours. This, I think, was my right--or was it not?

TEKLA. Honour? Hm! And now you feel satisfied?

GUSTAV. Now I feel satisfied. [Rings for a waiter.]

TEKLA. And now you are going home to your fiancee?

GUSTAV. I have no fiancee! Nor am I ever going to have one. I am not going home, for I have no home, and don't want one.

(A WAITER comes in.)

GUSTAV. Get me my bill--I am leaving by the eight o'clock boat.

(THE WAITER bows and goes out.)

TEKLA. Without making up?

GUSTAV. Making up? You use such a lot of words that have lost their--meaning. Why should we make up? Perhaps you want all three of us to live together? You, if anybody, ought to make up by making good what you took away, but this you cannot do. You just took, and what you took you consumed, so that there is nothing left to restore.--Will it satisfy you if I say like this: forgive me that you tore my heart to pieces; forgive me that you disgraced me; forgive me that you made me the laughing-stock of my pupils through every week-day of seven long years; forgive me that I set you free from parental restraints, that I released you from the tyranny of ignorance and superst.i.tion, that I set you to rule my house, that I gave you position and friends, that I made a woman out of the child you were before? Forgive me as I forgive you!--Now I have torn up your note! Now you can go and settle your account with the other one!

TEKLA. What have you done with him? I am beginning to suspect--something terrible!

GUSTAV. With him? Do you still love him?

TEKLA. Yes!

GUSTAV. And a moment ago it was me! Was that also true?

TEKLA. It was true.

GUSTAV. Do you know what you are then?

TEKLA. You despise me?

GUSTAV. I pity you. It is a trait--I don't call it a fault--just a trait, which is rendered disadvantageous by its results. Poor Tekla! I don't know--but it seems almost as if I were feeling a certain regret, although I am as free from any guilt--as you! But perhaps it will be useful to you to feel what I felt that time.--Do you know where your husband is?

TEKLA. I think I know now--he is in that room in there! And he has heard everything! And seen everything! And the man who sees his own wraith dies!

(ADOLPH appears in the doorway leading to the veranda. His face is white as a sheet, and there is a bleeding scratch on one cheek. His eyes are staring and void of all expression. His lips are covered with froth.)

GUSTAV. [Shrinking back] No, there he is!--Now you can settle with him and see if he proves as generous as I have been.--Good-bye!

(He goes toward the left, but stops before he reaches the door.)

TEKLA. [Goes to meet ADOLPH with open arms] Adolph!

(ADOLPH leans against the door-jamb and sinks gradually to the floor.)

TEKLA. [Throwing herself upon his prostrate body and caressing him]

Adolph! My own child! Are you still alive--oh, speak, speak!--Please forgive your nasty Tekla! Forgive me, forgive me, forgive me!--Little brother must say something, I tell him!--No, good G.o.d, he doesn't hear!

He is dead! O G.o.d in heaven! O my G.o.d! Help!

GUSTAV. Why, she really must have loved HIM, too!--Poor creature!

(Curtain.)

PARIAH

INTRODUCTION

Both "Creditors" and "Pariah" were written in the winter of 1888-89 at Holte, near Copenhagen, where Strindberg, a.s.sisted by his first wife, was then engaged in starting what he called a "Scandinavian Experimental Theatre." In March, 1889, the two plays were given by students from the University of Copenhagen, and with Mrs. von Essen Strindberg as Tekla. A couple of weeks later the performance was repeated across the Sound, in the Swedish city of Malmo, on which occasion the writer of this introduction, then a young actor, a.s.sisted in the stage management. One of the actors was Gustav Wied, a Danish playwright and novelist, whose exquisite art since then has won him European fame. In the audience was Ola Hansson, a Swedish novelist and poet who had just published a short story from which Strindberg, according to his own acknowledgment on playbill and t.i.tle-page, had taken the name and the theme of "Pariah."