DRAMATIC MALE

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Albee, Edward - The Goat or, Who Is Sylvia//Anouilh, Jean - Antigone//Auburn, David - Proof//Ball, Alan - Power Lunch//Baron, Jeff - Visiting Mr. Green//Beane, Douglas Carter - The Country Club//Behn, Aphra - The Rover//Bermann, Karl - Paradise Infirm//Besier, Rudolf - The Barretts of Wimpole Street//Brecht, Bertolt - Galileo//Brevoort, Deborah - The Women of Lockerbie//Burrows, Abe - Cactus Flower//Churchill, Caryl - Cloud Nine//Dee, Peter - ... and stuff ...//Diamond, Lydia R. - Smart People//Eno, Will - The Flu Season//Fierstein, Harvey - Manny and Jake//Guirgis, Stephen Adly - The Motherfucker With The Hat//Ionesco, Eugene - Rhinoceros//Ives, David - Variations on the Death of Trotsky//Joseph, Rajiv - Gruesome Playground Injuries//Kaufman, Moises - The Laramie Project//LaBute, Neil - reasons to be pretty//Lindsay-Abaire, David - Rabbit Hole//Lonergan, Kenneth - Lobby Hero//Martin, Jane - Keely and Du//McNally, Terrence - It's Only A Play//Miller, Arthur - All My Sons//Miller, Arthur - Death of a Salesman//Payne, Topher - Evelyn in Purgatory//Pintauro, Joe - Reindeer Soup//Pinter, Harold - Betrayal//Read, David West - The Dream of the Burning Boy//Rudnick, Paul - I Hate Hamlet//Sherman, Jonathan Marc - Sophistry//Silver, Nicky - The Altruists//Simon, Neil - Lost in Yonkers//Simon, Neil - Proposals//Still, James - And Then They Came for Me: Remembering the World of Anne Frank//Swanson, C. Denby - The Norwegians//United States Theatre Project - columbinus//Williams, Tennessee - Cat On A Hot Tin Roof//Wilson, August - Fences

The Barretts of Wimpole Street by Rudolf Besier

BROWNING.

You tell me I don't understand. You are quite right. I don't. You tell me he is devoted to you. I don't understand a devotion that demands favors as if they were rights, demands duty and respect and obedience and love, demands all and takes all, and gives nothing in return - I don't understand a devotion that spends itself in petty tyrannies and gross bullying - I don't understand a devotion that grudges you and ray of light and glimpse of happiness, and doesn't even stop at risking your life to gratify its colossal selfishness! Devotion! Give me good, sound, honest hatred rather than devotion like that? Forgive me - but I won't be silent any longer! Even before I met you, I knew that sickness wasn't the only shadow on your life. And all these months - though you never once breathed a syllable of complaint - I felt that other shadow deepening, and I've stood by, and looked on, and said nothing. Who was I to step in between you and the man nature, as an ugly jest, chose for your father? A mere friend! I might find you tired and sick after hateful scenes I could picture only too vividly - and I must pretend to know nothing, see nothing, feel nothing. Well! I've done with pretense from to-day on! I refuse any longer to let myself be gagged and handcuffed! It's not just your comfort and happiness which are at stake now. It's your very life. And I forbid you to play with your life. And I have the right to forbid you. The right. And you won't deny it - you're too utterly candid and true. At our first meeting you forbade me to speak of love - there was to be nothing more than friendship between us. I obeyed you. But I knew well enough - we both knew - that I was to be much more than just your friend. Even before I passed that door, and our eyes first met across the room, I loved you - and I've gone on loving you - and I love you now more than words can tell - and I shall love you to the end, and beyond.

Antigone by Jean Anouilh (Adapted by Lewis Galantiere)

CREON.

The pride of Oedipus! Oedipus and his head-strong pride all over again. I can see your father in you - and I believe you. Of course you thought that I should have you killed! Proud as you are, it seemed to you a natural climax in your existence. Your father was like that. For him, as for you, human happiness was meaningless; and mere human misery was not enough to satisfy his passion for torment. You come of people for whom the human vestment is a kind of strait-jacket: it cracks at the seams: You spend your lives wriggling to get out of it. Nothing less than a cozy tea-party with death and destiny will quench your thirst. The happiest hour of your father's life came when he listened greedily to the story of how, unknown to himself, he had killed his own father and dishonored the bed of his own mother. Drop by drop, word by word, he drank in the dark story that the gods had destined him, first to live and then to hear. How avidly men and women drink the brew of such a tale when their names are Oedipus - and Antigone! And it is so simple, afterwards, to do what your father did, to put out his eyes and take you, his daughter, begging on the highways. Let me tell you this, Antigone: those days are over for Thebes. Thebes has a right to a king without a past. My name, thank God, is only Creon. I stand here with both feet firm on the ground; with both hands in my pockets; and I have decided that so long as I am king - being less ambitious than your father was - I shall merely devote myself to introducing a little order into this absurd kingdom - if that is possible. Don't think that being a king seems to be romantic. It is my trade; a trade a man has to work at every day; and like every other trade, it isn't all beer and skittles. But since it is my trade, I mean to take it seriously. And if, tomorrow, some wild and bearded messenger walks in from some wild and distant valley - which is what happened to your father - and tells me that he's not quite sure who my parents were, but thinks that my wife Eurydice is actually my mother, I shall ask him to do me the kindness to go back where he came from; and I shan't let a little matter like that persuade me to order my wife to take a blood test or the police to let me know whether or not my birth certificate was forged. Kings, my girl, have other things to do than to surrender themselves to their private feelings. Hand you over to be killed! I have other plans for you. You're going to marry Haemon, and you're going to give him a sturdy boy. Let me assure you that Thebes needs that boy a good deal more than it needs your death. Now, you will go straight to your room and do as you have been told; and not a word about this to anybody. Don't fret about the guards; I'll see that their mouths shut. And don't annihilate me with those eyes. I know that you think I am a brute, and I'm sure you must consider me very prosaic. But the fact is, I have always been fond of you, stubborn though you always were. Don't forget that the first doll you ever had came from me.

Betrayal by Harold Pinter

ROBERT.

Are you looking forward to Torcello? How many times have we been to Torcello? Twice. I remember how you loved it, the first time I took you there. You fell in love with it. That was about ten years ago, wasn't it? About... six months after we were married. Yes. Do you remember? I wonder if you'll like it as much as tomorrow. What do you think of Jerry as a letter writer? He used to write me at one time. Long letters about Ford Madox Ford. I used to write to him too, come to think of it. Long letters about... oh, W.B. Yeats, I suppose. That was the time when we were both editors of poetry magazines. Him at Cambridge, me at Oxford. Did you know that? We were bright young men. And close friends. Well, we are still close friends. All that was long before I met you. Long before he met you. I've been trying to remember when I introduced him to you. I simply can't remember. I take it I did introduce him to you? Yes. But when? Can you remember?

Betrayal by Harold Pinter

JERRY.

Look at the way you're looking at me. I can't wait for you, I'm bowled over, I'm totally knocked out, you dazzle me, you jewel, my jewel, I can't ever sleep again, no, listen, it's the truth, I won't walk, I'll be a cripple, I'll descend, I'll diminish, into total paralysis, my life is in your hands, that's what you're banishing me to, a state of catatonia, do you know the state of catatonia? Do you? Do you? The state of... where the reigning prince is the prince of emptiness, the prince of desolation. I love you. Everyone knows. The world knows. It knows. But they'll never know, they'll never know, they're in a different world. I adore you. I'm madly in love with you. I can't believe that what anyone is at this moment saying has ever happened has ever happened. Nothing has ever happened. Nothing. This is the only thing that has ever happened. Your eyes kill me. I'm lost. You're wonderful.

The Country Club by Douglas Carter Beane

BRIAN.

Shit. Another thing we're too late for. How many times does that happen, right? Something important happens and we're too late for it. It's like everything that's important has happened before us. I feel that I was late for the Sixties. Being too young and all. Protesting and shit? I would have done it. I would have been a real, you know, vigorous rebel against Vietnam. I would have hated Vietnam. I would have carried a sign. No sweat. If there were a Vietnam-like situation today, I would protest. I would sing songs with a guitar. Grow my hair long. Make peace signs. And just, you know... hate the establishment and stuff. But now wars are so short. By the time you figure out which side you're on, they're long over. I mean Vietnam was long enough to be so black and white. You knew what to be angry about. Wars now are like bright grey. The really good angry is gone. Civil rights, like. Case in fucking point. I would have been a champion of civil rights. Separate counters and such? Oh, I would have been so against it, it wouldn't even be funny. I would have marched with Martin Luther... King. But all that's... said and done. I mean there is inequality and racial stuff going on all over the world. Racial Whatnot. I'm not blind. But it's all over there. In... whattayacall? Kosovo. It's none of our business. For protest and rage and stuff? We're just too late. Face it.

And Then They Came for Me: Remembering the World of Anne Frank by James Still

YOUNG ED.

After that night when I jumped from the Nazi truck, my grandparents just couldn't take it anymore. And even though it was very dangerous to try and escape - it was something I had to risk. I am 16 years old. My parents have escaped from Germany and are living in Belgium. I have to try and find them. I have to try and get across the border into Belgium. But Jews are not allowed to travel, to cross borders. If I get caught, the Nazis will kill me. But if I stay... Many friends have simply disappeared. Anne and her family - are gone. Maybe they got away. Maybe I can get away too. We arrange with a friend of the family to take me across the border. We have secret information about when it might be safe to try and cross, about when the border guards won't see us. We hide in fields. We sneak into Belgium. Several days after saying goodbye to my grandparents, I am in Brussels. I have never been here before. My parents don't know I'm coming but I have their address. I get off the streetcar, the there - on the other side of the street - there is my father. We haven't seen each other for four years.

And Then They Came for Me: Remembering the World of Anne Frank by James Still

YOUNG ED.

I'm on this truck for about a half-hour. There's a young German guard who's holding a rifle and staring straight ahead. I know that if I'm going to escape - this is it. So I push him off-balance and I jump off the truck and into the road. For one second I think I'm safe and then I look up and I see headlights coming toward me. I roll away just in time to get away from the wheels from the next truck. I get up and start running. Running and running. I don't look back. I hide in a doorway of an apartment building where I know people. But I don't ring their bell. I just stay here for an hour or so. Finally, when it's really dark, I go home.

Keely and Du by Jane Martin

COLE.

Take me back, Forgive me. I loved you in a bad way, a terrible way, and I sinned against your flesh and spirit. God forgive me. I'm an alcoholic but I don't drink now. I don't know... I was... lived like... didn't know right from wrong, but I'm with Jesus now. I accept Him as my Lord and He leads me in His path. I will stay on the path. I will stay on the path. We were married, Keely, you are carrying my baby, let's start from there. I put you on a pedestal, Keely, I do, I wouldn't say it, and I am in the mud, I'm drowning and I ask you to lift me up and then we minister to this child. Jeez, Keely, our child. You know in my house, in my father's house, Jeez, what were those kids, they were nuthin', they were disposable. In your house, right, you know what a time you had. You know. But it can be different for him. I'm different, look in my eyes, you know that. Hey, my temper, you know, I don't do that, it's over... Ask him is it over. I think about you every minute, every day. I want to dedicate my life to you, because it's owed, it's owed to you. You got my baby. I hurt you so bad you would kill a baby! That's not you, who would describe you, you would do that? Jeez, Keely, don't kill the baby. I brought a book we could look up names, we could do that tonight. You pick the name, I would be proud. I'm going to wait on you. You're the boss. They got me a job. I'm employed. Five o'clock, I'm coming home. Boom. No arguments. I help with the house, we can be partners. I'm back from the dead. I don't say you should believe me but because the baby you should test me out. You gotta take my hand here, we could start from there, I'm asking you. Come on, Keely. I love you. I can't make love to another woman, you know what I mean. You loved me and I destroyed that out of the bottle. But, Jeez, look at me, took off thirty pounds, I don't care what they tell me at A.A., I'm never taking another drink. I'm never. I wanted to suffer what you suffered so I had them whip me, I wanted to take off the flesh, I wanted more pain. I wanted more pain. I wanted more pain. I wanted your pain. I wanted to be even with you so I could put out my hand and we could be one to one. Come on, take my hand. Come on, Keely. Come on, Keely. I dream of your body, baby. For all those years I knew the small of your back, it's burned into my hand. I worship your body, I adore you. Come on. Come on. You don't have to ask me to be on my knees, I'm on my knees. What am I without you? I'm only what I did to you. I can't demand. What could I demand? Choose to lift me up. Who else can you save, Keely, but me? I'm the only one you can save. Take my hand, come on. It's five inches, you know what I mean? It's right here. It's right here for us to do. You don't have to make me promises, I'm not saying that. How could I expect that. I'm saying take the hand alone. Let me touch your hand. Don't speak. Don't speak, I'm saying. Let me come this far and touch your hand, okay? Okay? Just the touch. Okay? Oh, my God. Oh, my God, there is stuff leaving me. Okay, Keely, I thought about a pledge, what I could make to you, if I could touch you. No harm. No harm is what I thought of. Look, I want to turn your hand over, make it palm up, okay? This is make or break, Keely. Right now. Right now. Close your hand, take my hand. You know what I mean? One gesture, you could save me. We could raise a child. With one gesture we could do that. Come on, Keely. Come on, Keely.

Lobby Hero by Kenneth Lonergan

BILL.

So listen... I heard about the whole thing with your brother, and I was in the neighborhood, and I just thought I'd come down and just talk to you a little bit in case I could be helpful. But I don't want you to feel nervous, this is totally unofficial, OK? You know what? Don't even say OK. Just listen to me: Now I understand he's possibly putting you in a very bad position - Please! Don't say anything. Just listen for a second. I just want to say that I don't know if you were really with him the other night or not, and I don't want to know. It's not my case, it's not my problem. Now, I'm sure you heard what happened to that nurse, so I'm not gonna go into that, but we're talking about a twenty-seven-year-old single mother, three children. OK? And I just want to say, if you were not with him last night, you're gonna need to talk to somebody. And I want you to know I'm available any time of the night or day. OK? I'm not gonna - you know - there's only so much I can do, of course, but I want you to know I'm here, I'm not judgin' you, I wanna try to help you out, and I'm gonna do everything I can for you within the law and maybe a little bit around the edges, OK? Just don't quote me on that.

Reindeer Soup by Joe Pintauro

POP.

When my kid's sneakers didn't fit anymore and my nineteen percent interest credit cards were over the limit and my overdraft checking privilege was over the limit too and they were charging me a hundred dollars a month interest and I needed gas for the car and the lighting company wanted to turn off the electricity. I was hurt. Hurt is the only word I have for it. We couldn't afford to see new movies and then we couldn't afford to rent old movies and we didn't have the mortgage payment or the car loan payment and I didn't know how to get food stamps and I woke up one morning in a sweat and looked out the window and Detroit wasn't there anymore.

Rhinoceros by Eugene Ionesco

BERENGER.

Men aren't so bad-looking, you know. And I'm not a particularly handsome specimen. Believe me, Daisy. Daisy! Daisy! Where are you, Daisy? You can't do that to me. Daisy! Daisy! Come back! Come back, my dear. You haven't even had your lunch. Daisy, don't leave me alone. Remember your promise. Daisy! Daisy! Well, it was obvious we weren't getting along together. The home was broken up. It just wasn't working out. But she shouldn't have left like that with no explanation. She didn't even leave a message. That's no way to behave. Now I'm all on my own. But they won't get me. You won't get me. I'm not joining you; I don't understand you. I'm staying as I am. I'm a human being. A human being. It's an impossible situation. It's my fault she's gone. I meant everything to her. What'll become of her? That's one more person on my conscience. Poor little thing left all alone in this world of monsters. Nobody can help me find her, nobody, because there's nobody left. I can't bear the sound of them any longer. I'm going to put cotton wool in my ears. The only solution is to convince them - but convince them of what? Can they be changed back? Can they? It would be a labour of Hercules, far beyond me. In any case, to convince them you'd have to talk to them. And to talk to them I'd have to learn their language. Or they'd have to learn mine. But what language do I speak? What is my language? Am I talking French? Yes, it must be French. But what is French? I can call it French if I want, and nobody can say it isn't - I'm the only one who speaks it. What am I saying? Do I understand what I'm saying? Do I? And what if it's true what Daisy said, and they're the ones in the right? A man's not ugly to look at, not ugly at all. What a funny-looking thing. What do I look like? What? Photographs! Who are all these people? Is it Mr. Papillon - or is it Daisy? And is that Botard or Dudard or Jean? Or is it me? Now I recognize me: that's me, that's me. That's me that's me. I'm not good-looking. I'm not good-looking. They're the good-looking ones. I was wrong. Oh, how I wish I was like them. I haven't got any horns, more's the pity. A smooth brow looks so ugly. I need one or two horns to give my sagging face a lift. Perhaps one will grow and I needn't be ashamed any more - then I could go and join them. But it will never grow. My hands are so smooth. Oh, why won't they get rough? My skin is so slack. I can't stand this white, hairy body. Oh, I'd love to have a hard skin in that wonderful dull green color - a skin that looks decent naked without any hair on it, like theirs. Their song is charming - a bit raucous, perhaps, but it does have charm. I wish I could do it. Ahh, Ahh, Brr! No, that's not it. Try again, louder. Ahh, Ahh, Brr! No, that's not it, it's too feeble, it's got no drive behind it. I'm not trumpeting at all; I'm just howling. Ahh, Ahh, Brr! There's a big difference between howling and trumpeting. I've only myself to blame; I should have gone with them while there was still time. Now, it's too late. Now I'm a monster, just a monster. Now I'll never become a rhinoceros, never, never. I've gone past changing. I want to, I really do, but I can't. I just can't. I can't stand the sight of me. I'm too ashamed. I'm so ugly. People who try to hang on to their individuality always come to a bad end. Oh, well, too bad. I'll take on all of them. I'll put up a fight against the lot of them, the whole lot of them. I'm the last man left, and I'm staying that way until the end. I'm not capitulating.

Rhinoceros by Eugene Ionesco

DUDARD.

My dear Berenger, one must always make an effort to understand. And in order to understand a phenomenon and its effects you need to work back to the initial causes, by honest intellectual effort. We must try to do this - because, after all, we are thinking beings. I haven't yet succeeded, as I told you, and I don't know if I shall succeed. But at any rate one must start out favorably disposed - or at least impartial; one has to keep an open mind - that's essential to a scientific mentality. Everything is logical. To understand is to justify.

On Tidy Endings by Harvey Fierstein

ARTHUR.

You didn't just lose him. I did! You lost him five years ago when he divorced you. This is not your moment of grief and loss, it's mine! These condolences do not belong to you, they're mine. His things are not yours to give away, they're mine. His things are not yours to give away, they're mine! This death does not belong to you, it's mine! Bought and paid for outright. I suffered for it, I bled for it. I was the one who cooked his meals. I was the one who spoon-fed them. I pushed his wheelchair. I carried and bathed him. I wiped his backside and changed his diapers. I breathed life into and wrestled fear out of his heart. I kept him alive for two years longer than any doctor thought possible and when it was time I was the one who prepared him for death. I paid in full for my place in his life and I will not share it with you. We are not the two widows of Collin Redding. Your life was not here. Your husband didn't just die. You've got a son and a life somewhere else. Your husband's sitting, waiting for you at home, wondering, as I am, what the hell you're doing here and why you can't let go. Let him go, Marion. He's mine. Dead or alive; mine.

Safe Sex by Harvey Fierstein

GHEE.

You know that you were my first love. My only love. Except if you count you then and you now. But then you'd have to count me then and me now, so I guess "only" still goes. You was a baby. I was all growed up. You practically lost your virginity. I'd practically lost count. I tiptoed through your life, living on the edges, covering my tracks, remaining secret and quiet, and was quite happy. They were different times. Is it enough to say that they were different times? I mean, I had a life, you had a life and we had a life. I lived in my world, you lived in your world and then we shared a bed. We had great sex, but argued politics: to be or not to be in the closet, separatism, legalization, legislation... Politics were argued, sex was great. Different times. I believe there were fewer Nautilus machines then. There certainly were fewer gyms. We were certainly happier with ourselves. And we loved each other. We shared what we could when we could and our fear was of them that would not let us be. Our comfort was being with each other. Not so different. But different enough. When I picture you then, I see a man prone in my bed and waiting. No expectations or demands. Just a man, waiting to be with another man, where he was happy and belonged. A nervous smile, an unassumed pose, patient, excited, warm and delicious. And we were together without question. There at that moment, in the present, together. Perfectly balanced: need and satisfaction. Evenly matched. We soared. And sex was unimportant like air and water. We had lists of Do's and Don'ts. There was no death count. The worst you could get from loving was a broken heart. Which you gave me! And I lived. Remember herpes? Remember crabs? Remember worrying about the clap? And we were invisible. Nobody knew who we were for sure. We were the great chic mysterious underground and I loved every minute! And then come now. Different times. Now we enjoy politics and argue sex. Not they know who we are. We're counted in their surveys. We're numbered in their watchfulness. We're powered in their press. We're courted, polled, placated... The myths slowly peel away and the mysteries fade. Now they know that we're teachers and doctors and lawyers and priests and mothers and babies. Now they see us everywhere: hospitals, classrooms, theaters, obituaries... Now when they tell us lies about us we answer back. We've found our voices. We know who we are. They know who we are. And they know that we care about what they think. And all because of a disease. A virus. I virus that you don't get because you're Gay, just because you're human. We were Gay. Now we're human. Y'know, if anyone had ever tried to tell me that one day I would push you across the bed... But I did. I did because it wasn't safe for one person to love another person as much as I loved you. And that was then! Now? I love you more now than I did on our most carefree day. I trust you more now than before you renounced our commitment. I need you more now than when you were away from me. I want you more now.. And it's impossible. Even if you fought me and won. Even if you broke through and got me to admit who you truly are to me... We can never touch as before. We can never be as before. "Now" will always define us. Different times. Too late. At least we have Safe Sex.

Manny and Jake by Harvey Fierstein

MANNY.

I never wanted anyone to wait. I never asked names. I offered a basic service; a barter, if you will. All up front. All explained. No small print. All understood. Your body for mine. Your moment for mine. Your knowledge technique, history, scars... Your faults and shortcomings, your talents and abundances... No man too old. No face too deformed, weathered or nubile, ethnic or cliche... No form too bizarre; pumped up, stretched out, anorectic or bloated. Closet cases and radicals, perfect tens and amputees... No advance too frivolous. No come-on waylaid. Want me? Take me. Be gentle. Be rough. Be generous. Be selfish. Go ahead; have a ball. Enjoy yourself. That's why I'm here. That's what I'm going to do. Satisfaction was my aim. Mine and theirs. Separation was my only rule. My rule. I'm here now. Take. Be. Here. One minute. One hour. One day. Week. As long as the moment lasted. As long or as short as it took to end. But an end, even a pause, was the end. No pleading. No excuses accepted. No arguments entertained. Understand and step aside. Say, "Thanks," and "Goodbye." My goal: Every man. My rule. My law. No repeats. No attachments. And I loved them all. And I missed them when they were gone. Done. Some more than others. And I was tempted to let them stay. Tempted to be tempted to stay. It would have been so easy so many times. So many Mr. Rights. So many comfortable beds. And lives. So many with so much of offer. Wealth, art, travel, danger... So much love, need, comfort... And the good-byes. And the tears. And the smiles. Sweet morning kisses and rumpled sheets. Warm beds and spring breezes. Morning chills by spent fireplaces. Crisp cotton sheets in air-conditioned suites. Damp sleeping bags on forest leaves. Car seats. Theater balconies. Park benches. And coffee. Oh, the coffee. Coffee and good-byes... Off-to-work good-byes. Off-to-shop good-byes. Going home. Going on. Good-byes. So many lives. So many ways to live. So many men.

Proposals by Neil Simon

BURT.

Just hear me out. When you first left, I was sure you'd be back. Then, when I knew it was over, I was angrier than I ever thought I could be... then came a sense of loss... followed by a deep, dark despair... I had no choice but to learn to live with it But then something happened... this summer. Up here... I started to realize I was robbing myself of something very precious... the memories... Of all that was good. I was blocking them out, giving them up, tossing them away... and I missed them... I forgot that if I allowed myself, I could keep them forever... The twenty-one years we were married... and the two years before... when you worked all week and spent your weekends helping me open the first store. And the thing that became so clear to me, was that loving you was only a part of it. The other part, was how much I enjoyed you. I liked you as much as I loved you, Annie... and I don't think I ever told you that.

Cactus Flower by Abe Burrows

JULIAN.

No, you don't understand why I got out and went drunk. When I walked out of there I was angry. Absolutely furious! Homicidal! I was sure as hell sore at Toni. And then all at once... it was like magic... my anger disappeared, and all I felt was a delicious feeling of relief. Blessed, joyous relief. I never loved Toni and she never loved me. Now I was out of it. I said to myself, "Julian, thank God that's over. Now you can go home to your wife." I scampered down the stairs singing to myself, and then... bam! I remembered. I had no wife! When I got home there would be nobody. And when I got to the office, you wouldn't be there either. So I went out and got drunk.

Cloud Nine by Caryl Churchill

MARTIN.

You take the job, you go to Manchester. You turn it down, you stay in London. People are making decisions like this every day of the week. It needn't be for more than a year. You get long vacations. Our relationship might well stand the strain of that, and if it doesn't we're better out of it. I don't want to put any pressure on you. I'd just like to know so we can sell the house. I think we're moving into an entirely different way of life if you go to Manchester because it won't end there. We could keep the house as security for Tommy, but he might as well get used to the fact that life nowadays is insecure. You should ask your mother what she thinks and then do the opposite. I could just take that room in Barbara's house, and then we could babysit for each other. You think that means I want to fuck Barbara. I don't. Well, I do, but I won't. And even if I did, what is a fuck between friends? What are we meant to do it with, strangers? Whatever you want to do, I'll be delighted. If you could just let me know what it is I'm to be delighted about. Don't cry again, Vicky. I'm not the sort of man who makes women cry.

Cloud Nine by Caryl Churchill

GERRY.

I didn't ask you to come. You have to get away sometimes or you lose sight of yourself. The train from Victoria to Clapham is one of the old type. Separate compartments, no connecting corridor, so once the train starts no one can get in or out until the next station. As soon as I got on the platform I saw who I wanted. Slim hips, tense shoulders, trying not to look at anyone. I put my hand on my packet just long enough so he couldn't miss it. The train came in. You don't want to get in too fast or some straight dumbo might get in with you. I stay by the window. I couldn't see where the fuk he'd got to. Then just as the whistle went he got in. Great. It's a six-minute journey so you can't start anything you can't finish. I stared at him and he unzipped his flies. Then he stopped. So I stood up and took my cock out. He took me in his mouth and shut his eyes tight. He was sort of mumbling it about as if he wasn't sure what to do, so I said, "A bit tighter son" and he said "Sorry" and then got on with it. He was jerking off with his left hand, and I could see he's got a fair-sized one. I wished he'd keep still so I could see his watch. I was getting really turned on. What if we pulled into Clapham Junction now. Of course by the time we sat down again the train was just slowing up. I felt wonderful. Then he started talking. It's better if nothing is said. Once you find he's a librarian in Walthamstow with a special interest in science fiction and lives with his aunt, then forget it. He said I hope you don't think I do this all the time. I said I hope you will from now on. He said he would if I was on the train, but why don't we go out for a meal? I opening the door before the train stopped. I told him I live with somebody, I don't want to know. He was jogging sideways to keep up. He said "what's your phone number, you're my ideal physical type, what sign of the zodiac are you? Where do you live? Where are you going now? It's not fair." I saw him at Victoria a couple of months later and I went straight down to the end of the platform and I picked up somebody really great who never said a word. Just smiled.

Cloud Nine by Caryl Churchill

JOSHUA.

First there was nothing then there was the great goddess. She was very large and she had golden eyes and she made the stars and the sun and the earth. But soon she was miserable and lonely and she cried like a great waterfall and her tears made all the rivers in the world. So the great spirit sent a terrible monster, a tree with hundreds of eyes and a long green tongue, and it came chasing after her and she jumped into a lake and the tree jumped in after her, and she jumped right up into the sky. And the tree couldn't follow, he was stuck in the mud. So he picked up a big handful of mud and he threw it at her, up among the stars, and it hit her on the head. And she fell down onto earth into his arms. And the ball of mud is the moon in the sky. And then they had children which is all of us. Of course it's not true. It's a bad story. Adam and Eve is true. God made man white like him and gave him the bad woman who liked the snake and gave us all this trouble.

Sophistry by Jonathan Marc Sherman

WHITEY.

What can I do? Leave. Pack up eighteen years of my life and sweep the floor for the next fool. I phoned a moving company today to find out how much it would cost to move my belongings to storage. You wouldn't believe the amount I was quoted. Gods should do the moving for the money they ask for. I have to pack up all the beautiful books on my shelves. My library. I can't afford to move my books. I don't know where the money will come from. I could never save money on my salary. If only I had been born into a wealthy family, I could have actually afforded to teach here. Only the wealthy can afford to teach, and only the wealthy can afford to study. It's all about the money. This has not yet turned on me. This has not yet betrayed me. I still have this. Eighteen years of teaching, not once has anybody so much as thought to accuse me of such a thing. Along comes this self-hating baby who can't come to terms with his own sexuality, whose name can't be printed in your paper because he's the supposed victim. He is no victim. I am the victim here. Two people know the truth. I know the truth and that crazy liar knows the truth, and our words conflict. Based on that, a decision was made by their committee, but they stalled it, waited until graduation was done, when all the students had left for the summer, two days after graduation, they told me. They knew all along. But they didn't want to create a stir. No fuss, no mess, because, you see, I'm mess. Nobody sticks their neck out on my behalf, because they're terrified their jobs will be the next to go, these supposedly fearless academic minds, cowering in corners, afraid of being spanked. This is my life, I know the truth. How can a judgement be made?

The Dream of the Burning Boy by David West Read

LARRY.

I wanted to ask... about you. I wanted to ask you how you're doing. And... I wanted to ask about your girl friend, if you have one. What you like about her... if you're happy... and if you know what you want to do with your life, although it's okay if you don't, because there's still lots of time. And I know you'll figure it out. I had this idea that I'd meet you again one day. We'd have coffee, or lunch, or a drink. We'd get drunk together, I don't know. We'd go out and get trashed somewhere, and it would be okay, because we'd both be adults. And you'd remember me as this great teacher and tell me I'd inspired you, and contributed to who you'd become, even if you didn't know who I was at the time. And we'd talk about books, and our lives. And I'd tell you that... the first day I saw you in my class, the first thing I noticed was your nose. He it was crooked, like mine. Like you broke it in a fight. And I'd tell you that, when you handed in your first paper to me, all those years ago, back when I was just your teacher, I felt this little bit of... pride. Something I'd never felt for anyone else before. And I wanted that. I'd missed that. To know that, even if I had nothing else, even if I could never have anything else... I could still feel proud of you.

The Dream of the Burning Boy by David West Read

STEVE.

I did read that Freud book, Interpretation of Dreams. Whether you read it or not, I read it, pretty much cover to cover. Well, I didn't read it to impress you, Larry. I read it because I wanted to help you. And, you know, there was a dream n there that made me think of you, so... It's the one about the father who loses his son. Okay, so yeah, in real life this boy dies, and his dad puts him in a coffin next to his bedroom, with a candle - like a vigil or whatever - and in the middle of the night, the candle falls on his body, and he like... bursts into flames. So the dad, sleeping next door, can smell the smoke and everything, but instead of waking up, he has this like... dream, that his son comes to him, burning, and speaks to him, like he's still alive. Which is - you know - that's pretty messed up. But Freud says the whole reason the dad doesn't wake up right away and put out the fire is that the dream, even though its really scary, is actually the fulfillment of this guy's wish to spend a little more time with his son. Even if he's... burning. Even if it's just a dream. Right? I thought it was interesting.

Evelyn in Purgatory by Topher Payne

TOBY.

Explain them? Huh. Nah. That's okay. Thanks, though. See, Ms. Atwood, Mr. Bhandari, Doctor Whatever, Mrs. Awkward Hyphenated Name, I don't see any point in defending my actions to people whose opinions don't matter to me. None of you are qualified to tell me if I belong in a classroom, because you don't have the balls to get in there and do it. You have no concept - You assign ratings and guidelines like they actually mean something, and you sit at a folding table in a little room, content with authority you never earned and plausible deniability. After all, you didn't put this system in place, it was the mayor, it was the unions, it was government announcing no child would be left behind. Bullshit. You did it with your votes. You did it when you got the new guidelines and didn't take to the streets in protest. You did it when you let them cut the arts, and music, and independent thought from our classrooms. What the hell do we pay you people for? Your system is broken. It's failing the teachers and the students. Shame on you. Shame on all of you. Fix it. This is why I'm gonna write sci-fi movies, so I can still inspire imaginations and a love for science without people like you getting in the way. Which is a shame, really, because when you lose the people who are as pissed off as I am, nothing's gonna change! Who's gonna fight to save these kids from idiots like you? If you really cared about these kids' futures, you'd send me back to my classroom, and let me do my job.

reasons to be pretty by Neil LaBute

GREG.

NO. Don't. You can walk out on me for... for some perceived slight that I did you, some horrible judgement I made about your womanhood, you can swear at me and, and, hit me - whatever the hell suits you, you just go ahead and do, that's always been the way with you - but you're not gonna be able to make up with me any time you want or look at my cheek right now or call me when this miserable shithead that you're out with tonight hurts you, because he is gonna, he will, he's a guy and so it's a done deal... he will find a way to damage you and that's a fact. But you know what? I will not be there for you. I won't be. You will be on your own then and you're gonna realize I wasn't so bad.

reasons to be pretty by Neil LaBute

GREG.

How do you want me to act, Steph? Huh? I am trying to be nice here, to, to, to... make up with you or kiss your ass, which is what I figured you were after - getting on my knees practically to make it up to you but no - you've gotta keep pushing it, pushing me away by saying that we're done - what the hell is all that crap? You're so angry... none of this makes any sense! - and I just wanna go home. Ya know? Just go back to the house and climb into bed with you, say "I'm sorry" again if you want me to, but crawl in and have you up against me... your back against me and I can feel your heartbeat when we get all quiet like that... that's what I want.

The Motherfucker With The Hat by Stephen Adly Guirgis

RAPLH D.

Your bravado, Veronica - it's a lotta transparently ignorant, defensive nonsense and you know it. It feels so good when you're spewing it, right? Because it's so "how we do," "in your face," "talk to the hand," fuckin' "you go girl!", and all that schoolyard, jailhouse, hood rat buncha bullshit? But what happens when the rush of acting like a fuckin' animal passes, Veronica - and you've vented all your shit, and there's nothing and no one left to lash out at, and no more drugs till morning, and you're just all alone, by yourself - with nothing to feel except how fucked up your life is and how you basically just wanna die? ...Again?! Yeah, that's right. And the one person you know with the actual means to help you, who actually got a real feeling in his heart for you, who thinks being with you would be nothing like "settling"; the one guy who's been there for you the last two years 24/7 whatever you need, who jeopardized his marriage for you, who picked you up out of bars when you were stumbling like a fuckin' suicidal, homeless zombie, who took you home and didn't fuck you? That guy?! Me?! Well, you just went "buck" on him, so forget about that guy.

Galileo by Bertolt Brecht

GALILEO.

In my spare time, I happen to have gone over this case. I have spare time. Even a man who sells wool, however good he is at buying wool cheap and selling it dear, must be concerned with the standing of the wool trade. The practice of science would seem to call for valor. SHe trades in knowledge, which is the product of doubt. And this new art of doubt has enchanted the public. The plight of the multitude is old as the rocks, and is believed to be basic as the rocks. But now they have learned to doubt. They snatched the telescopes out of our hands and had them trained on their tormentors: prince, official, public moralist. The mechanism of the heavens was clearer, the mechanism of their courts was still murky. The battle to measure the heavens is won by doubt; by credulity the Roman housewife's battle for milk will always be lost. Word is passed down that this is of no concern to the scientist, who is told he will only release such of his findings as do not disturb the peace, that it, the peace of mind of the well-to-do. Threats and bribed fill the air. Can the scientist hold out on the numbers? For what reason do you labor? I take it that the intent of science is to ease human existence. If you give way to coercion, science can be crippled, and your new machines may simply suggest new drudgeries. Should you, then, in time, discover all there is to be discovered, your progress must become a progress away from the bulk of humanity. The gulf might even grow so wide that the sound of your cheering at some new achievement would be echoed by a universal howl of horror. As a scientist I had an almost unique opportunity. In my day astronomy emerged into the market place. At that particular time, had one man put up a fight, it could have had wide repercussions. I have come to believe that I was never in real danger; for some years I was a strong as the authorities, and I surrendered my knowledge to the powers that be, to use it, no, not use it, abuse it, as it suits their ends. I have betrayed my profession. Any man who does what I have done must not be tolerated in the ranks of science.

Galileo by Bertolt Brecht

MATTI.

No necessity to be cautious with me, Mr. Galilei. I am on your side. I am not a man who knows about the motions of the stars, but you have championed the freedom to teach new things. That that mechanical cultivator they have in Germany which you described to me. I can tell you, it will never be used in this country. The same circles that are hampering you now will forbid the physicians at Bologna to cut up corpses for research. Do you know, they have such things as money markets in Amsterdam and in London? Schools for business, too. Regular papers with news. Here we are not even free to make money. I have a stake in your career. They are against iron foundries because they say the gathering of so many workers in one place fosters immortality! If they ever try anything, Mr. Galilei, remember you have friends in all walks of life, including an iron founder. Good luck to you.

Galileo by Bertolt Brecht

GALILEO.

Hm, well at least you have found out that it is not a question of the satellites of Jupiter, but of peasants of the Campagna! And don't try to break me down by the halo of beauty that radiates from old age. How does a pearl develop in an oyster? A jagged grain of sand makes its way into the oyster's shell and makes its life unbearable. The oyster exudes slime to cover the grain of sand and the slime eventually hardens into a pearl. The oyster nearly dies in the process. To hell with the pearl, give me the healthy oyster! And virtues are not exclusive to misery. If your parents were prosperous and happy, they might develop the virtues of happiness and prosperity. Today the virtues of exhaustion are caused by the exhausted land. For that, my new water pumps could work more wonders than their ridiculous super-human efforts. Be fruitful and multiply: for war will cut down the population, and our fields are barren! Shall I lie to your people?

Galileo by Bertolt Brecht

INQUISITOR.

They don't eat fish in the fisherman's house. I can tell you something about astronomy. My child, it seems that God has blessed our modern astronomers with imaginations. It is quite alarming! Do you know that the earth - which we old fogies supposed to be so large - has shrunk to something no bigger than a walnut, and the new universe has grown so vast the prelates - and even cardinals - look like ants. Why, God Almighty might lose sight of a Pope! I wonder if I know your Father Confessor. My dear child, your father will need you. Not so much now perhaps, but one of these days. You are pure, and there is strength in purity. Greatness is sometimes, indeed often, too heavy a burden for those to whom God has granted it. What man is so great that he has no place in a prayer? But I am keeping you, my dear. Your fiance will be jealous of me, and I am afraid your father will never forgive me for holding forth on astronomy. Go to your dancing and remember me to Father Christopherus.

Galileo by Bertolt Brecht

GALILEO.

For two thousand years we have been looking at the sky and didn't see the four moons of Jupiter, and there they were all the time. Why defend shaken teachings? You should be doing the shaking. Your Highness! My work in the Great Arsenal of Venice brought me in daily contact with sailors, carpenters, and so on. These men are unread. They depend on the evidence of their senses. But they taught me many new ways of doing things. The question is whether these gentleman here want to be found out as fools by men who might not have had the advantages of a classical education but who are not afraid to use their eyes. I tell you that our dockyards are stirring with that same high curiosity which was the true glory of ancient Greece.

The Laramie Project by Moises Kaufman

AARON KREIFELS.

Well, I, uh, I took of on my bicycle about five P.M. on Wednesday from my dorm. I just kinda felt like going for a ride. So I - I went up to the top of Cactus Canyon, and I'm not super familiar with that area, so on my way back down, I didn't know where I was going, I was just sort of picking the way to go, which now... it just makes me think that God wanted me to find him because there's no way that I was going to go that way. So I was in some deep-ass sand, and I wanted to turn around - but for some reason, I kept going. And, uh, I went along. And there was this rock, on the - on the ground - and I just drilled it. I went - over the handlebars and ended up on the ground. So, uh, I got up, and I was just kind of dusting myself off, and I was looking around and I noticed something - which ended up to be Matt, and he was just lying there by a fence, and I - I just thought it was a scarecrow. I was like, Halloween's coming up, thought it was a Halloween gag, so I didn't think much of it, so I got my bike, walked it around the fence that was there, it was a buck-type fence. And, uh, got closer to him, and I noticed his hair - and that was a major key to me noticing it was a human being - was his hair. 'Cause I just thought it was a dummy, seriously, I noticed - I even noticed the chest going up and down, I still thought it was a dummy, you know. I thought it was just like some kind of mechanism. But when I saw hair, well, I knew it was a human being. So... I ran to the nearest house and - I just ran as fast as I could... and called the police.

The Laramie Project by Moises Kaufman

JEDADIAH SCHULTZ.

I've lived in Wyoming my whole life. The family has been in Wyoming, well... for generations. Now when it came time to go to college, my parents can't - couldn't afford to send me to college. I wanted to study theater. And I knew that if I was going to go to college I was going to have to get on a scholarship - and so, uh, they have this competition each year, this Wyoming state high school competition. And I knew that if I didn't take first place in, uh, duets that I wasn't going to get a scholarship. So I went to the theater department of the university looking for good scenes, and I asked one of the professors - I was like, "I need - I need a killer scene," and he was like, "Here you go, this is it." And it was from Angels in America. So I read it and I knew that I could win best scene if I did a good enough job. And when the time came I told my mom and dad so that they would come to the competition. Now you have to understand, my parents go to everything - every ball game, every hockey game - everything I've ever done. And they brought me into their room and told me that if I did that scene, that they would not come to see me in the competition. Because they believed that it is wrong - that homosexuality is wrong - they felt that strongly about it that they didn't want to come see their son do probably the most important thing he'd done to that point in his life. And I didn't know what to do. I had never, ever gone against my parents' wishes. So I was kind of worried about it. But I decided to do it. And all I can remember about the competition is that when we were done, me and my scene partner, we came up to each other and we shook hands and there was a standing ovation. Oh, man, it was amazing! And we took first place and we won. And that's how come I can afford the be here and the university, because of that scene. It was one of the best moments of my life. And my parents weren't there. And to this day, that was the one thing that my parents didn't see me do. And thinking back on it, I think, why did I do it? Why did I oppose my parents? 'Cause I'm not gay. So why did I do it? And I guess the only honest answer I can give is that, well, I wanted to win. It was such a good scene; it was like the best scene!

Rabbit Hole by David Lindsay-Abaire

JASON.

I used to have a shirt just like that one. The one he's wearing in the picture. I might've been going too fast. That day. I'm not sure, but I might've been. So... that's one of the things I wanted to tell you. It's a thirty zone. And I might've been going thirty-three. Or thirty-two. I would usually look down, to check, and if I was a little over, then I'd slow down obviously. But I don't remember checking on your block, so it's possible I was going a little too fast. And then the dog came out, really quick, and so I swerved a little to avoid him, not knowing, obviously... So that's something I thought you should know. I might've been going a little over the limit. I can't be positive either way though.

The Flu Season by Will Eno

MAN.

Nice weather I'm having. Yes, I would have to agree with myself, there. That's a nice haircut I have. Yes, thank you, it is but a sign of human civilization. Like standing up straight and not eating worms, it's not something I can really take credit for. And I see you wander through life in a social architecture called the family, the rubbley remains of which we build our new relations on. Yes, we do, and we use the same name and share the same features and we all move apart so as to later hold reunions. Ice cream, you scream. This is how the mind works. Poorly. Around. On the ruin of the last thought. I'm glad we had this little chat. Et cetera. "Social architecture." I'm an idiot. She has nice hair. My last ruined thought.

Lost in Yonkers by Neil Simon

EDDIE.

I er... I wanted to tell you boys - It's so damn hot in here, isn't it?... So, I just had a talk inside with your grandmother... Because I've had a problem... When your mother and I had a problem, we always tried to keep it from you boys because we didn't want to worry you... Well, you can't keep cancer, a secret forever... You knew without me telling you, didn't you, Jay? I did everything I could. The best doctors, the best hospitals I could get into... She had a nice room, didn't she? Semi-private, no wards or anything... We're not rich people, boys. I know that doesn't come as a surprise to you... but I'm going to tell you something now I hoped I'd never have to tell you in my life... The doctors, the hospital, cost me everything I had... I was broke and I went into debt... So I went to a man... A loan shark... A moneylender... I couldn't go to a bank because they don't let you put up heartbreak and pain as a collateral... A loan shark doesn't need collateral... His collateral is your desperation... So he gives you his money... And he's got a clock... And what it keeps time of is your promise... If you keep your promise, he turns off the clock... and if not, it keeps ticking... and after a while, your heart starts ticking louder than his clock... Understand something. This man kept your mother alive... It was his painkillers that made her last days bearable... And for that I'm grateful... Jay! Remember what I taught you about taking things from people? So you never take for yourself... But for someone you love, there comes a time when you have no choice... There's a man in New York I owe... Nine thousand dollars... I could work and save four more years and I won't have nine thousand dollars... He wants his money this year. To his credit, I'll say one thing. He sent flowers to the funeral. No extra charge on my bill... Let me finish... There is no way I can pay this man back... So what'll he do? Kill me? ...Maybe... If he kills me, he not only loses his money, it'll probably cost him again for the flowers for my funeral... I needed a miracle... And the miracle happened... This country went to war... A war between us and the Japanese and the Germans... And if my mother didn't come to this country thirty-five years ago, I could have been fighting for the other side... Except I don't think they're putting guns in the hands of Jews over there... Let me tell you something. I love this country. Because they took in the Jews. They took in the Irish, the Italians and everyone else... Remember this. There's a lot of Germans in this country fighting for America, but there are no Americans over there fighting for Germany.... I hate this war, and God forgive me for saying this, but it's going to save my life... There are jobs I can get now that I could never get before... And I got a job... I'm working for a company that sells scrap iron... I thought you threw scrap iron away. Now they're building ships with it... Without even the slightest idea of what I'm doing, I can make that nine thousand dollars in less than a year... The factories that I would sell to are in the South... Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Texas, even New Mexico.... I'd be gone about ten months... Living in trains, buses, hotels, any place I can find a room... We'd be free and clear and back together again in less than a year... Okay?... So now comes the question, where do you two live while I'm gone?

Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller

BIFF.

No! Nobody's hanging himself, Willy! I ran down eleven flights with a pen in my hand today... and suddenly I stopped, you hear me? And in the middle of that office building... I saw... do you hear this! - I stopped in the middle of that building and I saw... the sky. I saw the things that I love in this world; the work and the food and time to sit and smoke. And I looked at the pen and said to myself what the hell am I grabbing this for? Why am I trying to become what I don't want to be? When am I doing in an office building making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I saw I know who I am! Why can't I say that, Willy!

Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller

BERNARD.

Well, just that when he came back... I'll never forget this... it always mystifies me. Because I'd thought so well of Biff, even though he'd always taken advantage of me. I loved him, Willy, y'know? And he came back after that month and took his sneakers - remember those sneakers with "University of Virginia" printed on them? He was so proud of those, wore them every day. And he took them down in the cellar... and burned them up in the furnace. We had a fist fight; it lasted at least half an hour. Just the two of us, punching each other down the cellar... and crying right through it... I've often thought of how strange it was that I knew right then that he'd given up his life... What happened in Boston, Willy? I just bring it up because you asked me.

Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller

WILLY.

Oh, yeah, my father lived many years in Alaska... he was an adventurous man... We've got quite a little streak of self-reliance in our family. I thought I'd go out with my older brother and try to locate him, and maybe settle in the North with the old man. And I was almost decided to go, when I met a salesman in the Parker House. His name was Dave Singleman. And he was eighty-four years old, and he'd drummed merchandise in thirty-one states. And old Dave... he'd go up to his room, y' understand, put on his green velvet slippers - I'll never forget - and pick up his phone and call the buyers and without ever leaving his room, at the age of eighty-four, he made his living. And when I saw that, I realized that selling was the greatest career a man could want. 'Cause what could be more satisfying than to be able to go, at the age of eighty-four, into twenty or thirty different cities, and pick up a phone, and be remembered and loved and helped, by so many different people? Do you know, when he died - and by the was he died the death of a salesman, in his green velvet slippers in the smoker of the New York, New Haven, and Hartford, going into Boston - but when he died, hundreds of salesman and buyers were at his funeral. Things were sad on a lotta trains for months after that. See what I mean? In those days there was personality in it, Howard; there was respect, and comradeship, and gratitude in it. Today, it's all cut and dried, and there's no chance for bringing friendship to bear... or personality. They don't know me any more.

Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller

BIFF.

Hap, I've had twenty or thirty different kinds of jobs since I left home before the war, and it always turns out the same. I just realized it lately. In Nebraska when I herded cattle, and the Dakotas, and Arizona, and now in Texas. It's why I came home now, I guess, because I realized it - this farm I work on, it's spring there now, see. And they've got about fifteen new colts. There's nothing more inspiring or... beautiful, than the sight of a mare and a new colt. And it's cool there now, see? Texas is cool now, and it's spring. And whenever spring comes to where I am, I suddenly get the feeling - My God, I'm not gettin' anywhere! What the hell am I doing, playing around with horses, twenty-eight dollars a week! I'm thirty-four years old, I oughta be makin' my future. That's when I come running home. And now - I get here, and I don't know what to do with myself. I've always made a point of not wasting my life, and every time I come back here I know that all I've done is to waste my life.

Smart People by Lydia R. Diamond

BRIAN.

I'd first like to thank the Institute for having me, and I have the pleasure of having in the audience two of my deans, Dean Jankowski, Dean Thompson... I won't begin to name the rest of you, I surely could only get in trouble that way... but suffice to say, it's wonderful to see so many of you from so many disciplines... No pressure. I will just dive in then. Our understanding of prejudice has largely been characterized as simple animosity born of fear and ignorance. We have subscribed relatively narrow parameters to the phenomenon of prejudice... Evidence for this can be found in bipolar attitude scales, like-dislike, that measure prejudice... Economists, sociologists and psychologists, we've seen this. There was a time when I'd have attributed your eyes rolling up into the back of your heads as a direct correlate to my inability to grab you, and hold you. I thought it was the words. How the words "racism," "prejudice," "discrimination" always send us into a collective tailspin, a downward spiral of defensiveness, embarrassment, animosity, inadequacy, or rage. I get that. I understand that. Honestly, I almost don't resent that. Just LISTEN! Please. So what are we to do? How then to approach the explaining of that which both defies and begs for explanation? You, my peers and superiors from the hard sciences, would say don't. We are not here to explain, we are here to present. God forbid anything as "subjective" as race touch our precious findings. So the data collective sits there, years and years and hundreds of thousands of dollars spent gathering and aggregating, and it sits there while we bullshit around it. God forbid we're the White people saying the wrong thing. Let's face it, you're afraid that government interests and the big moneyed donors you're in bed with will pull your resources. It's unconscionable. Tragic really - your silencing of truth. This dynamic has held our country hostage since its inception. And you'd rather we not look at it? Well I say, grow a pair. Suck it the fuck up. The level of aggressive passivity in this room, in these vocations, in this country, is shameful. Roll up your sleeves and wade through the muck. We must look at the scientific data and embrace that we, the White people, are implicated. Look... numbers, more numbers. What's that? Numbers. Cold, hard data. I'm speaking your language. I've proven that it's there, in our heads, in our cells, in our fucking blood. A predisposition to hate. We are programmed to distrust, and fear those with more melanin. We aren't defective, we just must understand our brains, accept our physiology and acknowledge the social reality that we so virulently deny. Goddamnit, we are scientists - and so bear the burden of enlightenment and reason. Don't we? Fine then.

Smart People by Lydia R. Diamond

JACKSON.

So here's what I do. I'm a surgeon. I've been studying to be a surgeon for the last eight years. That's not including all of the pre-meds in college. And I did well. Straight A's. It seems I have a natural proclivity for just about anything I do. You know a residency is a hazing, an endurance test. They put us on these crazy hours in emergency. It's just barfing, blood, crying babies, and boys trying to kill themselves via one another... We're supposed to pay our dues for a couple of years and then follow around a real surgeon. Who's supposed to teach me. Except they don't like me. We don't need to waste time deconstructing why the Black guy can't get a decent mentor in Boston. So, every now and then I don't feel like being treated like Sambo that day, and I push back, just a little. So today I say... "No... when I wrote that about that patient on that chart there that you're holding... it's because I knew what I was doing... and when that nurse came up behind me and called Doctor Whoever-the-fuck to come in and second-guess me, and he decided that I'm stucky and so arbitrarily prescribed some kind of bullshit course of action... And now the patient's worse, and you will not pin that on me..." It doesn't matter how I say it... I'm "angry" and "volatile" and "not good at working with others," so I get written up and have to do the whole fucking bedpan thing again. So today, I went to work, to the emergency room and I worked for ten straight hours, then I went to my clinic and worked another six... Because someone has to take care of those people... And then I made your ass dinner. And you're trippin' because I tease you about hot sauce. I don't have time for that.

It's Only A Play by Terrence McNally

PETER.

A Streetcar Named Desire opened at the same theatre we did tonight. December 3, 1947. Tennessee Williams paced nervously at the back of our orchestra, just like I did. I could feel him. Elia Kazan paced with him. I felt them both. I bet they held hands and squealed like schoolgirls when that curtain went up. It's from our stage where Marlon Brando first yelled "Stella" and Blanche DuBois told the world that she had always depended on the kindness of strangers. We have a lot to live up to tonight. It depends on us to remind this city that there is more to Broadway than guest appearances or special effects and revivals, or another play from London, or another Disney movie made live. We are an original American play. We must make that count for something. I'll get off my soapbox now. Before I knew it, the first act was over and everybody was on the sidewalk. I saw you, Jimmy, talking to Bernadette Peters. She was bent over double at something you were saying. It looked like you were imitating a giant chicken. God, you are a funny man. The lights flicked on and off. Everyone went in for the second act. That's when I began to take it all in. I was on Broadway. I was part of something bigger than myself. I was where I'd dreamed of being all my life. I started walking around the theatre district. So many memories of shows, actors, great productions. As of tonight, I was now a part of them. I saw that plaque to Eugene O'Neill, October 16, 1888 - November 27, 1953. "America's greatest playwright was born on this site then called Barrett House. Presented by Circle in the Square" - and I knew there would never be such a plaque for any American playwright again, no matter how great a writer he was, unless we did something about it. We've let Broadway stop mattering and hand it over to the Brits and the movie-to-musical franchises lock, stock, ad barrel. It's our fault, not theirs. Nature abhors a vacuum and they rushed right in. We all got so greedy. The theatre became a business to make a million when it should be a place to talk to one another in a mutual dialogue between stage and audience about what it means to be alive in this country in the first decades of the New Century. I walked to Shubert Alley, what's left of it, and stood looking at the three-sheets. When a British revival of Grease and the Kardashians in Three Sisters are the best we can offer, it's time to weep. With tears in my eyes I looked at the Marriott. They tore down three theatres to put up a hotel. Who let this happen? There's no more where they came from. Tear down a theatre and it's forever. You don't get a Salesman or an Oklahoma! when you tear down a theatre, you get a Marriott. When I finally turned back up 47th Street, our play was over and everyone was gone, but our marquee was still lit. The Golden Egg, a new play by Peter Austin. I looked at it and thought of Williams and O'Neill and Miller and Albee and I thought, we can turn back the tide. We can make a change. But this time it's entirely up to us. And then someone turned the lights off and we went dark.

I Hate Hamlet by Paul Rudnick

BARRYMORE.

There was a day, on set, when the cameras rolled, and... I couldn't remember a line. Nothing. Take after take. Not a word, not a speech, just haze and then - terror. And I wasn't drunk, no, stone sober. And everyone was more than kind, and the words were scribbled on shirt-sleeves, and cardboards held just out of camera range. But I knew - I knew instantly - I could never go back on the stage. The hopeless, unemployable lush! The public embarrassment! The off-color joke! Yes, I ran to Hollywood, you're quite right - and you can't imagine the life I led! I was a movie star, do you know what that means? My face five stories high, and six zeroes wide! But before all that, in my prime - I faced the dragon. I accepted a role so insanely complex, so fantastic and impossible, that any attempt is only that - an attempt! And I stood in the light, before a crowd fully prepared to dismiss, to deride, and to depart. And I shook them, I wooed them, and I said, yes, you will stay, and yes, you will remember! And for one moment in my life, I used all that I knew, every shred of talent, every ounce of gall! I was John Barrymore! And for those sacred evenings, there was no shame. I played Hamlet! Have you?

Gruesome Playground Injuries by Rajiv Joseph

DOUG.

You know what, Kayleen? Jesus Christ, you know, I came to your house last year and your dad was there, and I know he hates my guts, he always has, and he's like, She is where she is. I don't know where the girl is. He said he didn't care and didn't care to know. And I was about to just leave, but I didn't. I didn't and I said to that son of a bitch... You remember, asshole? You dead piece of shit! You remember what I said to you?! I said to him, you are fucking WORTHLESS. You have a daughter and she is a gift from God. She is the most perfect being to ever walk this earth and you don't even know it. And she loves you because you're her stupid father. But you've never loved her back, you've just damaged her and fucked her up, and never even bothered to notice she's this ANGEL. So FUCK YOU COCKSUCKER. And then I told him I hoped he'd die alone. Which he did. So I feel a little guilty about that now.

Gruesome Playground Injures by Rajiv Joseph

DOUG.

I go over and the place is collapsed. So I hoist myself up there and I'm walking on the roof and then I stepped through a weak board or something and this upright nail went clear through my foot. It was about eight inches long. Then the board with the nail in it - that board snapped through another board and I broke my leg in three places. It took them five hours to get me out. And then I got an infection. And that's why I have this cane now. But listen: I'm up there, you know? Stuck up there, waiting for them to come and get me. And there were these severed heads of a bunch of saints that had ended up all over the place, and they were just staring at me. And this owl was there too. And so I lean over and grab the little guy. I was in some serious pain, you know? And I just gripped him close to me, because... Because all of a sudden, I was like, Where the fuck is Kayleen? You know? All of a sudden, everything was clear.. trapped up on that roof, impaled, surrounded by all the angels and saints... That's my life, up there, Leenie. That's my life without you.

The Women of Lockerbie by Deborah Brevoort

BILL.

I want to believe that. I want nothing more than to believe that this has happened for a reason. But I can't. I just... can't. To believe that would mean that Adam died just so I could learn and grow. And that's not true. There is no lesson so important that it was worth the price of his life. To believe that would mean that I am at the center of the universe and that all things happen for my benefit. And they don't. The events of the world... the horrors... just happen. And they happen for no reason. The only thing you can do is accept that and carry on the best you can. Just... accept the suffering that comes to you and find some way to keep going. Love helps. Goodness and kindness do too. But the only reason they are in the world is not because God gave them to us but because along the way people discovered they can make our lives a little easier to bear. If there is a God... and sometimes when I lie in bed at night I think that there isn't... But if there is, he is absent from the world and pays no attention to the needs of men.

The Women of Lockerbie by Deborah Brevoort

BILL.

How could I, Maddie? I had to do everything! I had to do everything to keep you from falling apart! I had to send the medical records to Scotland. I had to talk to the friends and neighbors. I had to talk to the reporters wo stood on our lawn with cameras taking pictures of my grief! I even had to take his Christmas presents back to the mall because you couldn't stand the sight of them under the tree! Do you know what that was like? Can you even imagine it? Try! Try to imagine it, just for a moment! What do you say to the sales clerk? What do you say to the 16-year old school girl standing behind the counter at JC Penney's who smiles at you and asks "Why are you returning the sweater, sir?" Do you tell her? What do you say? I just looked at her. I could tell it was her first job. Her face was round and soft. Her hands were still chubby, like a child's. What do you say to someone so young and innocent? "This was for my son, but he died?" "He was blown to bits by a bomb?" "The plane he was taking home for Christmas... crashed?" What do you say? What do you say to the pretty young girl with red and green ribbons in her hair? I said, "My son..." I cannot tell her. I cannot show my grief, because to do so would take her innocence from the world. I just said... "My son doesn't need it anymore." And then I breathe a sigh of relief because I think I've gotten through it. But I haven't. Oh no! It doesn't stop there. She smiles and says "Would you like to exchange this for something else?" Do I want to exchange this for something else? Oh... yes. Oh, yes, yes, yes, I do. Oh, what I would do to turn this in for something else. But I say, "No. No, thank you. Your store doesn't carry what I want or need right now. Just give me the credit, please." And then I go to the next store. To return the Nikes. And the next store to return the pajamas. And the next store to return the bathrobe and the blue jeans and the bike helmet. I go to six stores before the day is through. I have that same conversation in every single place. She's right. I didn't show my grief. I couldn't. I had to keep myself numb just to get through it.

All My Sons by Arthur Miller

CHRIS.

One time it'd been raining several days and this kid came to me, and gave me his last pair of dry socks. Put them in my pocket. That's only a little thing... but... that's the kind of guys I had. They didn't die; they killed themselves for each other. I mean that exactly; a little more selfish and they'd've been here today. And I got an idea - watching them go down. Everything was being destroyed, see, but it seemed to me that one new thing was made. A kind of... responsibility. Man for man. You understand me? - To show that, to bring that on to the earth again like some kind of a monument and everyone would feel it standing there, behind him, and it would make a difference to him. And then I came home and it was incredible. I... there was no meaning in it here; the whole thing to them was a kind of a - bus accident. I went to work with Dad, and that rat-race again. I felt... what you said... ashamed somehow. Because nobody was changed at all. It seemed to make suckers out of a lot of guys. I felt wrong to be alive, to open the bank-book, to drive the new car, to see the new refrigerator. I mean you can take those things out of a war, but when you drive that car you've got to know that it came out of the love a man can have for a man, you've got to be a little better beause of that. Otherwise what you have is really loot, and there's blood on it. I didn't want to take any of it.

All My Sons by Arthur Miller

KELLER.

The man was a fool, but don't make a murderer out of him. You got no sense? Look what it does to her! Listen, you gotta appreciate what was doin' in that shop in the war. The both of you! It was a madhouse. Every half hour the Major callin' for cylinder heads, they were whippin' us with the telephone. The trucks were hauling them away hot, damn near. I mean just try to see it human, see it human. All of a sudden a batch comes out with a crack. That happens, that's the business. A fine, hairline crack. All right, so... so he's a little man, your father, always scared of loud voices. What'll the Major say? - Half a day's production shot.... What'll I say? You know what I mean? Human. So he takes out his tools and he... covers over the cracks. All right... that's bad, it's wrong, but that's what a little man does. If I could have gone in that day I'd a told him - junk 'em, Steve, we can afford it. But alone he was afraid. But I know he meant no harm. He believed they'd hold up a hundred percent. That's a mistake, but it ain't murder. You mustn't feel that way about him. You understand me? It ain't right.

All My Sons by Arthur Miller

KELLER.

Listen, you do like I did and you'll be all right. The day I came home, I got out of my car; - but not in front of the house... on the corner. You should've been here, Annie, and you too, Chris; you'd-a seen something. Everybody knew I was getting out that day; the porches were loaded. Picture it now; none of them believed I was innocent. The story was, I pulled a fast one getting myself exonerated. So I get out of my car, and I walk down the street. But very slow. And with a smile The beast! I was the beast; the guy who made twenty-one P-40's crash in Australia. Kid, walkin' down the street that day I was guilty as hell. Except I wasn't, and there was a court paper in my pocket to prove I wasn't, and I walked... past... the porches. Result? Fourteen months later I had one of the best shops in the state again, a respected man again; bigger than ever. That's the only way you lick 'em is guts! The worst thing you did was to move away from here. You made it tough for your father when he gets out. That's why I tell you, I like to see him move back right on this block. It ain't gonna end till they move back! Till people play cards with him again, and talk with him, and smile with him - you play cards with a man you know he can't be a murderer. And the next time you write him I like you to tell him just what I said.

Power Lunch by Alan Ball

MAN.

So what do you want me to be? Mr. Sensitive? Fine. I'll be happy to share my feelings with you. I'd love to show you just how fucking freaked out I really am, how my life is barely held together and at any minute the whole thing might just snap, and you can watch me when I just fall apart, and I will, because deep down, as deep as it gets, I know I don't have what it takes. I'm not talking about what it takes to be the best at everything., or what it takes to make an indelible mark on the world. Fuck that. I don't have what it takes to go across the street and buy a cup of coffee. Everybody else does, but not me. Because I'm missing - something. I don't know what it is, but I do know one thing. I know that sometimes I understand how a man could pick up a shotgun and go into a Burger King and just start spraying bullets. I would never do that. At least I don't think I would. But I can relate, you hear what I'm saying? Is this better? Not exactly what you had in mind, is it? I didn't think so.

The Norwegians by C. Denby Swanson

TOR.

Here's what I'm thinking in that moment. The moment of ending a life. It is the single most important moment they will ever have. The end. It's an event they will get to experience only once. Only once. They don't expect it to be happening now. But it is. It is. It is happening now. I want it to go well. Is it possible that a baseball bat isn't the best choice? Might seem that way. Sure. To an outsider. In 1991, the Minnesota Twins won the World Series. It was a magical season. Just magical. We haven't had one like it since. And I was there for the whole thing. The Twins and the Braves were the first two teams in Major League history to start out last and end up first. It's so biblical. Almost prophetic. So restrained. And so - so - so Norwegian. And the last shall be first. So deeply Norwegian. It took the whole seven games. Four at home. We could have been nice and come in second. We could have been true to our nature. But we got up our nerve and we actually won. That's the way that I think about growing the business as well. The Norwegians could be second in market share. Second in revenues. Third, even. And that would be fine. Because inside, we would know ourselves champions, gracious to the competition, we would know it in our hearts. We would even be nice about it. Or we could beat the living crap out of the other team, and win. I love the Minnesota Twins. I love them with all my heart. And this is their winning bat.

columbinus by The United States Theatre Project

JOCK.

It's been a few years now, and just the other day, I was driving past the school and I stopped at the stoplight and I looked at the kids yelling at each other on the sidewalk, guys on the court, the normalness of it all. And then I saw a kid get out of his car... he had on baggy pants, a lot of chains, combat boots and a long black trench coat. My God! I had to pull off the side of the road. Now, what was in my head, must have been in everyone's head from that day until now... like that look, those clothes meant "evil." Evil was present. But Christ, how the hell would I know that kid is evil unless I actually talk to him? So how do I think differently about someone? For days after yeah, we all treated each other differently, but time passes and we still make judgements, call people shit, and continue on, just as before. Even after living through your friends dying and those sounds of gunblasts and the fear of walking down those halls again... all of that. Who knows? Maybe I have changed, a little. For the moment I'm different? But is that enough?

columbinus by The United States Theatre Project

FREAK.

FRIEND, but thanks for asking, you little fucked-up man, with your bachelor's degree in business on your wall next to the three-day certificate in counseling. You are not equipped to handle what's going on inside of me. You want me to open up to you in one conversation? I don't think I'll be telling you anything today, sir, because I've just been humiliated. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I'm looking at a man, who is disgusted by me, sir, by the way I dress, by my choice of silence. He's looking right at me and actually thinks that I can't see right through him. But see, sit, I actually can see the sports page opened under my life. But see, he thinks I can't see that. I wonder why he would think that? No. No. I've decided that in our little ten-minute session I don't think we're going to be friends... because I'm smarter than you are, and I have something you don't have: self-awareness. You want to help me figure out the next eighty years of my life, why don't we start with today, or what's going to happen when the bell rings ten minutes from now? Tell me why I have a short temper and get angry at almost anything I don't like, like people I have no respect for trying to tell me what to do. Or why I have too many inside jokes or thoughts to have very many friends. You tell me why. And then we can talk. Okay?

columbinus by The United States Theatre Project

JOCK.

What? You're going to kick me out? Are you serious? This piece of shit writes about walking around the town shooting people for no reason, and you want me to what... to give constructive criticism? How about "throw this maniac out, and get him some fucking help"? Was I supposed to feel sorry for him or something? Look at him. What has he done to earn anyone's respect? What time did he wake up this morning? Seven? Seven-thirty? Try five a.m. I ran four miles before he even got out of bed this morning. And while he's home after school circle jerking to Laura Croft with his faggot-ass friends, I'll still be here, serving the school you teach in. Whether I feel like it or not, I'll show up and work. What does he do? Nothing. So, that's what he is: nobody. And, you know what, Teach? I'm valuable, and you should show me the respect I deserve.

columbinus by The United States Theatre Project

LONER.

I don't have a fucking clue what I'll major in, asshole. I'm dealing with the immediate here, and that should be okay. Why do we always have to know where we are going? And who's supposed to be guiding us? You? That's fucking hysterical. How are you qualified to guide me when you don't know the first thing about me? Yes, with a subtle glance from my file you glean that D in Political Science, or if you really want to impress the name of the show I did sound on. But let's see you name a friend, or the music I like... or where will I eat lunch today... and why do I eat lunch there? Oh, shit... there's the twitch. Uh-oh, Mr. Booger, he's on to you. Ah, well. Go on... Go on. Just wipe it away. You can't just ignore it. Maybe you can. It avoids the embarrassment, the awkward situation. Lucky for you, Little Buddy, he's gonna pretend that you don't exist. Too bad we don't have that in common.

Fences by August Wilson

BONO.

Troy... I done known you seem like damn near my whole life. You and Rose both. I done know both of you all for a long time. I remember when you met Rose. When you was hitting them baseball out the park. A lot of them old gals was after you then. You had the pick of the litter. When you picked Rose, I was happy for you. That was the first time I knew you had any sense. I said... My man Troy knows what he's doing... I'm gonna follow this nigger... he might take me somewhere. I been following you too. I done learned a whole heap of things about life watching you. I done learned how to tell where the shit lies. How to tell it from the alfalfa. You done learned me a lot of things. You showed me how to not make the same mistakes... to take life as it comes along and keep putting one foot in front of the other. Rose a good woman, Troy.

Fences by August Wilson

TROY.

My daddy ain't had them walking blues! What you talking about? He stayed right there with his family. But he was just as evil as he could be. My mama couldn't stand him. Couldn't stand that evilness. She run off when I was about eight. She sneaked off one night after he had gone to sleep. Told me she was coming back for me. I ain't never seen her no more. All his women run off and left him. He wasn't good for nobody. When my turn come to head out, I was fourteen and got to sniffing around to Joe Canewell's daughter. Ad us an old mule we called Greyboy. My daddy sent me out to do some plowing and I tied up Greyboy and went to fooling around with Joe Canewell's daughter. We done found us a nice little spot, got real cozy with each other. She about thirteen and we done figured we was grown anyway... so we down there enjoying ourselves... ain't thinking about nothing. We didn't know Greyboy had got loose and wandered back to the house and my daddy was looking for me. We down there by the creek enjoying ourselves when my daddy come up on us. Surprised us. He had them leather straps off the mule and commenced to whupping me like there was no tomorrow. I jumped up, mad and embarrassed. I was scared of my daddy. When he commenced to whupping on me... quite naturally I run to get out of the way. Now I thought he was mad cause I ain't done my work. But I see where he was chasing me off so he could have the gal for himself. When I see what the matter of it was, I lost all fear of my daddy. Right there is where I became a man... at fourteen years of age. Now it was my turn to run him off. I picked up them same reins that he had used on me. I picked up them reins and commenced to whupping on him. The gal jumped up and run off... and when my daddy turned to face me, I could see why the devil had never come to get him... cause he was the devil himself. I don't know what happened. When I woke up, I was laying right there by the creek, and Blue... this old dog we had... was licking my face. I thought I was blind. I couldn't see nothing. Both my eyes were swollen shut. I laid there and cried. I didn't know what I was gonna do. The only thing I knew was the time had come for me to leave my daddy's house. And right there the world suddenly got big. And it was a long time before I could cut it down to where I could handle it. Part of that cutting down was when I got to the place where I could feel him kicking in my blood and knew that the only thing that separated us was the matter of a few years.

Fences by August Wilson

TROY.

Like you? I go out of here every morning... bust my butt... putting up with them crackers every day... cause I like you? You about the biggest fool I ever saw. It's my job. It's my responsibility! You understand that? A man got to take care of his family. You live in my house... sleep you behind on my bedclothes... fill you belly up with food... cause you my son. You my flesh and blood. Not 'cause I like you! Cause it's my duty to take care of you. I owe a responsibility to you! Let's get this straight right here... before it go along any further... I ain't got to like you. Mr. Rand don't give me money come payday cause he likes me. He gives me cause he owe me. I done give you everything I had to give you. I gave you your life! Me and your mama worked that out between us. And liking your black ass wasn't part of the bargain. Don't you try to go through life worrying about it somebody like you or not. You best be making sure they doing right by you.

Fences by August Wilson

TROY.

You the one brought it up. Me and Bono was talking about baseball... you tell me I'm gonna drink myself to death. Ain't that right, Bono? You know I don't drink this but one night out of the week. That's Friday night. I'm gonna drink just enough to where I can handle it. Then I cuts it loose. I leave it alone. So don't you worry about me drinking myself to death. 'Cause I ain't worried about Death. I done seen him. I done wrestled with him. Look here, Bono... I looked up one day and Death was marching straight at me. Like Soldiers on Parade! The Army of Death was marching straight at me. The middle of July, 1941. It got real cold just like it be winter. It seem like Death himself reached out and touched me on the shoulder. He touch me just like I touch you. I got cold as ice and Death standing there grinning at me. I say... What you want, Mr. Death? You be wanting me? You done brought your army to be getting me? I looked him dead in the eye. I wasn't fearing nothing. I was ready to tangle. Just like I'm ready to tangle now. The Bible say be ever vigilant. That's why I don't get but so drunk. I got to keep watch. Death standing there staring at me... carrying that sickle in his hand. Finally he say, "You want bound over for another year?" See, just like that... "You want bound over for another year?" I told him, "Bound over hell! Let's settle this now!" It seem like he kinda fell back when I said that, and all the cold went out of me. I reached down and grabbed that sickle and threw it just as far as I could throw it... and me and him commenced to wrestling. We wrestled for three days and three nights. I can't say where I found the strength from. Every time it seemed like he was gonna get the best of me, I'd reach way down deep inside myself and find the strength to do him one better. I ain't making up nothing. I'm telling you the facts of what happened. I wrestled with Death for three days and three nights and I'm standing here to tell you about it. Alright. At the end of the third night we done weakened each other to where we can't hardly move. Death stood up, throwed on his robe... had him a white robe with a hood on it. He throwed on that robe and went off to look for his sickle. Say, "I'll be back." Just like that. "I'll be back." I told him, say, "Yeah, but... you gonna have to find me!" I wasn't no fool. I wasn't going looking for him. Death ain't nothing to play with. And I know he's gonna get me. I know I got to join his army... his camp followers. But as long as I keep my strength and see him coming... as long as I keep up my vigilance... he's gonna have to fight to get me. I ain't going easy.

Cat On A Hot Tin Roof by Tennessee Williams

BIG DADDY.

Oh, yes, I do, oh, yes, I do mean it! I put up with a whole lot of crap around here because I thought I was dyin' - An' you thought I was dyin' an' you started takin' over; well, you can stop takin' over, now, Ida, because I'm not goin' to die, you can just stop this business of takin' over because you're not takin' over because I'm not dyin'. I went through that laboratory and the exploratory operation and there's nothin' wrong with me but a spastic colon. An' I'm not dyin' of cancer which you thought I was dyin' of. Ain't that so? Didn't you think that I was dyin' of cancer? Ain't that so, Ida? Didn't you have an idea I was dyin' of cancer an' now you could take control of this place an' everything on it? I got that impression, I seemed to get that impression. Your lous voice everywhere, your damn' busy old body buttin' in here an' there! Rut the Preacher! Did you hear what I said? Rut the cotton-pickin', chicken-eatin', memorial-stained-glass Preacher! I went through that laboratory an' operation an' all just so I would know if you or me was boss here! Well, now it turns out that I am an' you ain't - and that's my birthday present - an' my cake an' champagne - because for three years now you been gradually takin' over. Bossin', talkin', sashayin' your ole butt aroun' this place I made! I made this place! I was overseer on it! I was the overseer on th' ole Straw an' Ochello plantation. I quit school at ten! I quit school at ten years old an' went to work like a nigger in th' fields. An' I rode to be overseer of th' Straw an' Ochello plantation. An' old Straw died an' I was Ochello's partner an' the place got bigger an' bigger an' bigger an' bigger! I did that all by myself with no goddam help from you, an' now you think that you're just about to take over. Well, I'm just about to tell you that you are not just about to take over, you are not just about to take over a goddam thing. Is that clear to you, Ida? Is that very plain to you now? Is that understood completely? I been through the laboratory from A to Z. I've had the goddam exploratory operation, an' nothin' is wrong with me but a spastic colon - made spastic, I guess, by all th' goddam lies an' liars that I have had to put up with, an' all th' hypocrisy that I have lived with all these forty years that I been livin' with you! Now, blow out the candles on th' birthday cake! Take a deep breath an' blow th' goddam candles on th' cake!

... and stuff ... by Peter Dee

NATHANIEL.

Mostly when I really know they're around is morning. They wake me like an alarm clock on the days our street gets the early route. Otherwise I see them when I'm walking around and stuff. I never mind them waking me. My brother goes crazy, calls them all kinds of names but I... tell him to shut up when he does that, 'cause if it wasn't for the sanitation workers the city would really stick, you know, even in the winter and it would be really unbearable in the summer, you know. Basically I think the sanitation workers are pretty great guys. There's a certain language in a way they toss the garbage cans around. The pros only make one big definite sound when they put it back down. Clunk, and it's back in place empty and ready for new action. The rookies are the ones that drag them and then toss them back on the sidewalk to show how macho they are and stuff. I like how the pros straighten the rookies out. They never bawl them out or put them down with lecturing words. They just give them a look that let's them know they're assholes to be making so much unnecessary noise. Those looks whip the rookies into shape faster than anything else. One morning I saw these sanitation guys feed a stove and a couch to this sanitation truck without batting an eye. I mean, I think I'd be a little tense around something that can eat a stove. Like what if I held on too long, say when i girl walked by with tits from here to Christmas. I mean I wouldn't be armless; I'd be dead. So these guys command a certain amount of admiration for their style. Plus if they weren't around we could never get past anything to get anywhere. I mean, they're doing a hell of a lot more for society than those boutiques that are popping up all over the city like mushrooms and taking away our pizza parlors, hardware stores, laundromats and stuff. Sanitation workers aren't all that friendly. I mean, they don't not and say hello. I guess they would if I had tits from here to Christmas but fortunately I don't being that I'm a guy. But they're not rude and really when you think that what they handle all day is just our shit, I think they deserve a great salary. So they can buy their own shit. I know you asked me to talk about an individual but I admire sanitation workers more than any one person. And that's the way it is.

... and stuff... by Peter Dee

BILLY.

I'm not sorry I did it. He deserved it. I'm not sorry. It was his fault. His fault. If it wasn't for him Mr. McKenzie would have stayed teaching. He's the one who broke Mr. McKenzie's spirit. He did. Everyone tried to tell me Mr. McKenzie left because of the low pay and the state legislature's decision to betray the teacher's retirement contract and because he got a better job with IBM but that's not true. Not true. Mr. McKenzie wasn't interested in that material crap. He was interested in us. Our spirit. Our getting to know things. He was like a father to us. He cared. He made us work hard. Be serious about what we're doing. He wasn't a stand up comedian. He was a teacher. I used to dream he'd marry my mother and be my father. Cause he was like what a father should be. Not like the saps most fathers are. You know what I mean, runaways and bullshitters. I never missed not having a father til Mr. McKenzie came along... then I thought in some crazy kind of way that I finally had one. I never told anyone that til now. I mean I know school's where you go to learn, not find a father but Mr. McKenzie was making me learn... teaching me it wasn't all... just a joke... that even though it wasn't easy... if I did work hard I'd get somewhere. That's important. I mean isn't that what school is all about? Teachers aren't stand up comedians. That crap belongs on television if that's what you're looking for in life. The day that George Blake tore Mr. McKenzie apart in class was the day Mr. McKenzie quit. I mean he stayed til the end of the year but his spirit died that day. I could see the change in his eyes and the way he held himself. I tried to say things to make him feel good about himself again but he wasn't listening anymore. George Blake spray-painted Mr. McKenzie's sport coat yellow. When Mr. McKenzie grabbed him, George just laughed in his face. Said it was time for him to get a new sport coat, that he looked like a bum and that it was hard enough to be taught by the dullest man in the world but did he have to look like a bum as well. He said his father made more in a month than Mr. McKenzie made in a year and he'd get his father to replace the sport coat he'd ruined with something that had some class. Mr. McKenzie could have reported him but he didn't. That wasn't his way. He wasn't like that. But George Blake didn't understand that kind of honor. George Blake only understood money and stand up comedians and picking up girls in his Mercedes Benz and stuff. That's George Blake's blood on there. I'm not sorry. It was his fault Mr. McKenzie disappeared from this town. There's no way anyone's ever going to make me feel sorry for what I did. He killed my father's spirit. So I killed him. I'm not sorry. I'm not. But if you ever run into Mr. McKenzie, don't tell him what I did. Somehow... I don't want him to know I'm going to jail. He'll think he failed me. And he didn't. He didn't.

The Altruists by Nicky Silver

ETHAN.

Sydney, it's your life. Fine. Do what you want. Stay in bed all day. If that's how you want to live your life, I can't stop you! But it would do you some good, it would do you a world of good to get out of that bed, out of this house. It would do you a lot of good to see yourself as part of something bigger, better, something more important than you. You, you, you, you, you! Not everything is about you. The earth's pull doesn't emanate from you, nor does the change of seasons, nor the ebb of tides. You're one person, Sydney! A crumb, a speck, a molecule, a mark on a molecule that means nothing. But do you ever put yourself out for the greater good? No. When I asked you to come to protest police brutality, did you? No, you turned up your nose. You snubbed the homeless and cancer research and AIDS funding and immigration, and the taxi drivers and free needles and the dolphins and animal testing and school funding and day-care centers and American Indians and gay rights, and black rights and women's rights and Spanish rights and Swedish rights and Chinese rights and handicapped rights and Armenia and Bosnia and arms for hostages and Mothers Against Drunk Driving. You snubbed welfare cutbacks and arts cutbacks and housing cutbacks and school cutbacks and lunch cutbacks and Medicare and Medicaid and needle exchange and government free cheese! And when Gustavo needed a bone marrow transplant, were you interested? You were not. Because it wasn't about you. You chose instead to lie there. That's right, lie there. Inert. Wallowing in the juices of your bourgeois squalor. Lie there like a corpse, like a beached sea creature, like a walrus - like the walruses you refused to help by protesting their poaching and slaughter for ivory tusks. What's wrong with you, Sydney? What is wrong with you?

Variations on the Death of Trotsky by David Ives

TROTSKY.

Well it's a little late for regrets, with a mountain climber's axe buried in one's skull. So it wasn't old age, or cancer, or even the ice pick that I feared for years. It was an axe wielded by a Spanish Communist posing as a gardener. So even an assassin can make the flowers grow. The gardener was false, and yet the garden that he tended was real. How was I to know he was my killer when I passed him every day? How was I to know that the man tending the nasturtiums would keep me from seeing what the weather will be like tomorrow? How was I to know I'd never get to see Casablanca, which wouldn't be made until 1942 and which I would have despised anyway? How was I to know I'd never get to know about the bomb, or the 80,000 dead at Hiroshima? Or rock-and-roll, or Gorbachev, or the state of Israel? How was I supposed to know I'd be erased from the history books of my own land...? Sometime, for everyone, there's a room that you go into, and it's the room that you never leave. Or else you go out of a room and it's the last room that you'll ever leave. This is my room.

The Goat or, Who Is Sylvia by Edward Albee

BILLY.

Yeah? Well... whatever. I think what I'll tell them is this: that I've been living with two people about as splendid as you can get; that if I'd been born to other people it couldn't have been any better. No; really; I mean it. You two guys are about as good as they come. You're smart, and fair, and you have a sense of humor - both of you - and... and you've Democrats. You are Democrats, aren't you? That's what I thought, and you've figured out that raising a kid does not include making him into a carbon copy of you, that you're letting me think you're putting up with me being gay far better than you probably are. Anyway, you've let me have it better than a lot of kids, better than a lot of "Moms and Dads" have, a lot closer to what being grown up will look like - as far as I can tell. Good guidance; it's great to see how two people can love each other. At least that's what I thought - until yesterday, until the shit hit the fan! Until the shit hit the fan, and the talk I was going to do at school because history. What will I say now!? Goodness me! The Good Ship Lollipop has gone and sunk. What will I say!? Well, let's see: I came home yesterday and everything had been great - absolutely normal, therefore great. Great parents, great house, great trees, great cars - you know: the old "great." But then today I come home and what do I find? I find my great Mom and my great Dad talking about a letter from great good friend Ross written to great good Mom about how great good Dad has been out in the barnyard fucking animals! Animals! Well, one in particular. A goat! A fucking goat! You see, guys, your stories are swell or whatever, but I've got one'll knock your socks off, as they used to say, wipe the tattoos right off your butts. Ya see, while great old Mom and great old Dad have been doing the great old parent thing, one of them has been underneath the house, down in the cellar, digging a pit so deep!, so wide!, so... HUGE!... we'll all fall in and, and never... be... able... to... climb... out... again - no matter how much we want to, how hard we try. And you see, kids, fellow students, you see, I love these people. I love the man who's been down there digging - when he's not giving it to a goat! I love this man! I love him!

Visiting Mr. Green by Jeff Baron

ROSS.

I went out for lunch today. It was a 60th birthday party for my father. Twelve people at a big table - his best friends, his partner and his wife, my mother, my cousins and me. In a private room at a fancy restaurant. My father is moving around the table, talking to everyone... you know, working the crowd. The waiter comes in to take our drink orders. He's obviously gay. My father, who is standing sort of behind the waiter, starts making fun of him, imitating his mannerisms. A few people start laughing, and I say to him, quietly, "That's enough, Dad." He looks at me for a second, then sits down. The waiter leaves, and my father gets up and does an impression of the waiter. "We have some delightful specials for you today. Herb-encrusted baby lamb chops with a mélange of grilled vegetables." Then he turns to my mother. "Those earrings. They're fabulous. Where did you find them?" The table is in hysterics. I can't take it anymore. I say, "Stop it, Dad." He stops. He turns to me and says, "Relax, Ross. We're in New York City. Our waiter's a fag. It's not gonna make national news." Everyone laughs. I say, "Oh yeah? Well, so is your son." A few people laugh... nervously... they're hoping it's a joke of some kind. Then everyone's quiet. Very quiet. Then my father says, "Well, maybe you could get a job here." Everyone laughs. I leave. That's it.

Visiting Mr. Green by Jeff Baron

ROSS.

Paul and I were in love. It was great. So easy. Until this one Saturday morning. I'm alone in my room, and my mother comes in and sits next to me on my bed and says, "Ross... and you and Paul... more than friends?" I couldn't believe it. I was not ready to have that conversation, but there she was... and we'd always been close... So I just said yes. She started crying. I kept saying, "Mom, it's okay. I'm really happy. You've met him. He's a great guy." But she stopped listening. And we never talked about it again. From that day on, whenever I was around, she was extremely cheerful. Like "Let's pretend you're still at Harvard and none of this is happening." It was creepy. My dad, on the other hand, just stopped talking to me. Completely. He wouldn't even look at me. Mr. Green, no one had ever treated me this way. And this was in my own house. My own parents. I didn't know what to do. I became completely self-conscious. Am I acting gay? Do I talk like I'm gay? Do I walk like I'm gay? Is this a gay tie? My mission in life was to never say or do anything that might make someone think I was gay. So I told Paul to stop calling me at the office. And I wouldn't go anywhere in public with him. I still loved him and he still loved me, but... I was just so uncomfortable. I didn't know what to do. So... I ended it. I never saw him again. After a while, I started dating women, which got my father to talk to me again. Well, that and moving up the corporate ladder. I went out with a series of very nice women who fell in love with me and couldn't figure out what I put up this... this wall. What was I gonna say? "I'm gay. I'm trying really hard not to be. Please be patient while I conduct this experiment." Finally I just stopped dating. These days you're always hearing about gay this and gay that, and I think okay, lots of people are dealing with it. Then I go to a club or a gay event, where I stay an average of six seconds. That's how terrified I am. You know what I'm afraid of? Meeting someone I like. Then what'll I do? Will I tell my parents? Will I treat him like I treated Paul? So I haven't touched or kissed another person in four years. I sort of got used to it. I thought I did. But when you started telling me about your life with Mrs. Green... how happy you were together... and then what you said about coming home to an empty apartment... I'm not used to it. I hate it.

Visiting Mr. Green by Jeff Baron

ROSS.

What? You don't care if you die? Mr. Green, I understand. It must be really, really hard. Your wife is gone. You're here all alone. You're not feeling so great. Part of which, I'm sure, is because you're not eating enough. But as bad as you feel... and as much as you might be wondering what there is to live for... I don't know... there probably is something. Maybe you just can't see it right now. But of course, I can't tell you what to do... Like you said, I don't really know you, you don't really know me... It's just... I'm kind of surprised. You seem like a religious man, so I'm sure you know this - I even remember it from Hebrew school. Jews aren't allowed to commit suicide. I'll be right back with the groceries. If you're asleep, I'll put them away.

The Rover by Aphra Behn

BLUNT.

Oh, Lord, I am got out at last, and, which is a miracle, without a clue. And now to damning and cursing! But if that would ease me, where shall I begin? With my fortune, myself, or the quean that cozened me? What a dog was I to believe in women! Oh, coxcomb! Ignorant conceited coxcomb! To fancy she could be enamored with my person! At first sight enamored! Oh, I'm a cursed puppy! 'Tis plain, fool was writ upon my forehead! She perceived it; saw the Essex calf there. For what allurements could there be in this countenance, which I can endure because I'm acquainted with it. Oh dull, silly dog, to be thus soothed into a cozening! Had I been drunk, I might fondly have credited the young quean; but as I was in my right wits to be thus cheated, confirms it: I am a dull believing English country fop. But my comrades! Death and be the devil, there's the worst of all! Then a ballad will be sung tomorrow on the Prado, to a lousy tune of the enchanted squire and the annihilated damsel. But Fred - the rogue - and the colonel will abuse me beyond all Christian patience. Had she left me my clothes, I have a bill of exchange at home would have saved my credit. But now all hope is taken from me. Well, I'll home, if I can find the way, with this consolation: that I am not the first kind believing coxcomb; but there are, gallants, many such good natures amongst ye.

Paradise Infirm by Karl Bermann

JUAN.

A little over a year ago, when the workers were preparing the ground for the spring planting, there was an incident. I was reprimanding one of the hands who lied to me about the reason his son hadn't come to work. I made a pompous speech about our duty as good citizens to speak out and not be silently complicit with wrongdoing. And in the course of that speech I chided the peasants in general, saying they would lack a sufficient sense of duty and justice even to come forward and report a murder if they had witnessed one. Well, it just so happened that poor Marcelo Negron overheard me, and so strong and obvious was his reaction to my words that I knew he must be concealing something. I ordered him to come to my study that night. When he did so, he told me he had witnessed a horrible event some two years previous. He had seen Eusebio Galante, who was then his employer, brutally and in a premeditated fashion, murder one of his neighbors whose land and wife he coveted. At the time the events were already cold - there may never have been enough evidence anyway - and so I didn't counsel Marcelo to come forward and testify. It would have exposed him pointlessly. But neither did I, myself, say anything to anyone until this moment. There have been other things about which I've had my suspicions. And then there was the mystery surrounding the break-in and murder at Andujar's store. I knew the hat they found belonged to that wretch Gaspar. And I knew also that the victim was none other than Deblas, Andujar's nephew, a fugitive from justice whole Andujar himself had been shielding. So I was just as guilty of complicity as the peasants. Unlike them I was never summoned before Judge Arce's inquest, but all the same... I can tell you I lost many a night's sleep over the whole business. A part of me would resolve to go forward and tell the truth, whatever the consequences. But then another voice would say no, you can't afford to make enemies; think of all you've got to lose here; think of Jacobo and what might become of him. So you see, in the end all my talk was hypocrisy. I find I'm no better than the basest of the peasants. There are so many things I'm coming to realize that I don't understand. Perhaps someday I may. For now, I'm empty. But soon I'll be with my son, and perhaps I can catch a glimpse of paradise again through his eyes.

Paradise Infirm by Karl Bermann

PINTADO.

I know what you mean. Rode up here from town with the boy just last month. But to tell Arce he didn't know how the stains got there - thought they came from bananas! How do you explain it? Arce's baffled by the whole thing. Why two doors with broken locks? Was there a gang of thieves? Dead man was certainly one of them - pockets full of booty from the store, but why was he killed? A fight over the booty? No, there was no sign of a struggle. He carried a dagger which was clean and still in its sheath. Another clean knife on the floor. And by the angle the pick entered his face and came out the back of his head he must have been lying down on the bed when the blow struck. Impossible, these peasants Some of them certainly know something - how many are involved? Yet not a single one would identify the hat found on the scene - much too big for the dead man, must have come from one of the killers. Not even Andujar had anything to say. It's how they are - shrink from authority as though it were a giant spider. To them the law is a vast web in which they fear getting entangled.

Paradise Infirm by Karl Bermann

JUAN.

He's such an idealist. He has so many illusions about his country. You know, he's been away at school in Spain ever since he was a young boy. His memories of his homeland are little more than pretty mental postcards. The mountains, the palm trees, fields of sugar cane, the cascading river, this house, the courtyard on a sunny day. I'm afraid that from these idyllic memories his romantic soul has conjured a sugar-coated dream world. A place of eternal poetry, where the soil teems with inexhaustible wealth and the inhabitants have nothing to do but enjoy the bounty. Let me read you something from his last letter. He writes, "Your words cause me pain, father. Do you think I am so naive as to imagine that our country is a Biblical paradise? I well realize it is a question of real human beings waging the struggles of daily life - human beings with all their weaknesses." Still, it's all in the realm of ideas. I worry that when he finally returns and confronts the reality, his illusions will suffer a terrible shock. You see, his sensibilities are delicate, as delicate as a Bohemian crystal. And without optimism and hope what is there for a young man? He writes me every month, and it's always difficult to know how to respond. I want to prepare him for the reality, but I don't want to dampen his optimism. Here he quotes from my last letter, in which I said, a little thoughtlessly, I'm afraid, "Trying to solve difficult social problems with bursts of lyricism is like trying to move a mountain with the wind from a fan." And then he says, "As a result of these words I tore up an 'Ode to My Island' that I had written, convinced it was nothing more than the ineffectual wind from the fan you spoke of." Listen to this. "Our compatriots are riding the waves of a difficult rebirth. What do they desire? A free country, a country redeemed through persuasion of through blood, a country that will emulate the heroism of others that have thrown off the yoke of their oppressors. But they lack confidence in themselves and fear defeat. Then they want to tighten their bonds with this country, which I have come to know intimately. It is a country of kind, affectionate, good people. And yet it is a country where the egoism and greed of a few bad people contravenes the good intentions of the rest." Yes, I know I worry too much. Jacobo has a shining future ahead of him, a future that a cultivated spirit and superior intelligence guarantee. And he's fortunate, too, that he'll come into a not inconsiderable sum of money that my own good fortune has allowed me to put aside for him.

Paradise Infirm by Karl Bermann

MARCELO.

One night, after a lot of rain. I was going to our hut, by myself. It was dark, like I said. When I came to the river I heard footsteps behind me. I was scared, so I hid behind a bush. Then I saw a man coming. When he got close I could see it was Senor Galante. I didn't know what he was doing there at night, but he was carrying a piece of rope. Well, Senor Galante, he crossed the river and when he got on the other side he bent down and I could see that he had a rock. Then, he climbed a tree. There is a big tree, just on the other side of the river, with big branches over the trail. That's the tree the Senor Galante climbed. He climbed up into that tree and then I saw the rock going up. I thought it was magic, but then I knew he had tied the piece of rope around the rock and he was pulling it up into the tree with the rope. I was even more afraid than before so I just stayed where I was behind that bush and tried not to make any noise. Well, after a little while I heard singing and I knew that Ramon Betances was coming along the trail on his way home. Then I saw Ramon. He crossed the river and when he got to the other side and came under the tree, Senor Galante threw the rock down right on his head. Ramon made a terrible cry and fell down dead. Then Senor Galante came down from the tree. He got the rock and threw it in the river. Then he took Ramon - Ramon's body - he pulled it by the feet, up the path. I couldn't see it from where I was, but I know he took him to a place a little way up the path where it's narrow and there's a ledge, and pushed him over. Then I saw him come back to the place where he killed him. He took some branches and brushed them over the spot where... I was so scared, Don Juan, I felt sick. I thought I would die right there.

Paradise Infirm by Karl Bermann

JUAN.

Do you know why I told you to come see me this evening? You were listening this afternoon when I reprimanded Diego Lopez because he lied and told me that lazy son of his had fallen and hurt himself, and that was the reason he didn't come to work today. When in fact the reason was that he got so drunk at Andujar's last night that he couldn't get up this morning. I got a bit carried away in lecturing him. But when I said the part about complicity with crime - about how the people here could even witness a murder and wouldn't come forward and speak up about it, you dropped your machete. I saw you. You were very pale and your hands were trembling. Your hands are trembling now. Suppose you tell me why my words made such an impression on you. Have you witnessed a crime? You have witnessed a crime and you've kept quiet about it. Don't bother trying to deny it. I'm an expert at reading people's faces. You either witnessed a crime or you have information about a crime. Now you mustn't hide it from me My reason for asking you about this is simply to help you if it's not too late, to save you, to steer you away from a bad path, a shameful path. I'm not going to report you to the police. My intentions are friendly, Marcelo. I'm not a judge, I'm not the police. You're one of my best workers and I want you to think of me as your friend. I'm concerned about you because I've always considered you an honorable man, a worker without the vices that so many others have. You're a good and conscientious worker, someone who's been a great help to me on my estate, I consider you more reliable even that your brother Ciro. Something's wearing on your heart. You need to unburden yourself. Tell me what it is. Tell me the truth.

Proof by David Auburn

ROBERT.

Goddamnit I am working! I say "I" - the machinery. The machinery is working. Catherine, it's on full blast. All the cylinders are firing, I'm on fire. That's why I came out here, to cool off. I haven't felt like this for years. I don't believe it either! But it's true. It started about a week ago. I woke up, came downstairs, made a cup of coffee and before I could pour in the milk it was like someone turned the light on in my head. Not the light, the whole power grid. I lit up and it's like no time has passed since I was twenty-one. I'm back! I'm back in touch with the source - the font, the - whatever the source of my creativity was all those years ago I'm in contact with it again. I'm sitting on it. It's a geyser and I'm shooting right up into the air on top of it. I'm not talking about divine inspiration. It's not funneling down into my head and onto the page. It'll take work to shape these things; I'm not saying it won't be a tremendous amount of work. It's not going to be easy. But the raw material is there. It's like I've been driving in traffic and now the lanes are opening up before me and I can accelerate. I see whole landscapes - places for the work to go, new techniques, revolutionary possibilities. I'm going to get whole branches of the profession talking to each other. I think there's enough here to keep me working the rest of my life. Not just me. I was starting to imagine I was finished, Catherine. Really finished. Don't get me wrong, I was grateful I could go to my office, have a life, but secretly I was terrified I'd never work again. Did you know that? I was absolutely fucking terrified. Then I remembered something and a part of the terror went away. I remembered you. Your creative years were just the beginning. You'd get your degree, do your own work. You were just getting started. If you hadn't gone into math that would have been all right. Claire's done well for herself. I'm satisfied with her. I'm proud of you. I don't mean to embarrass you. It's part of the reason we have children. We hope they'll survive us, accomplish what we can't. Now that I'm back in the game I admit I've got another idea, a better one. I know that you've got your own work. I don't want you to neglect that. You can't neglect it. But I could probably use some help. Work with me. If you want to, if you can work it out with your class schedule and everything else, I could help you with that, make some calls, talk to your teachers... I'm getting ahead of myself. Well, Jesus, look, enough bullshit, you asked to see something. Let's start with this. I've roughed something out. General outline for a proof. Major result. Important. It's not finished but you can see where it's going. It's very rough. The gaps might make it hard to follow. We can talk it through. Maybe we could work on this together. This might be a great place to start. What about it? What do you think? Let's talk it through. Look, read out the first couple of lines. That's how we start: You read, and we go line by line, out loud, through the argument. See if there's a better way, a shorter way. Let's collaborate.

Proof by David Auburn

ROBERT.

This is the time of year when you don't want to be tied down to anything. You want to be outside. I love Chicago in September. Perfect skies. Sailboats on the water. Cubs losing. Warm, the sun still hot... with the occasional blast of Arctic wind to keep you on your toes, remind you of winter. Students coming back, bookstores full, everybody busy. I was in a bookstore yesterday. Completely full, students buying books... browsing... Students do a hell of a lot of browsing, don't they? Just browsing. You see them shuffling around with their backpacks, goofing off, taking up space. You'd call it loitering except every once in a while they pick up a book and flip the pages: "Browsing." I admire it. It's an honest way to kill an afternoon. In the back of a used bookstore, or going through a crate of somebody's old record albums - not looking for anything, just looking, what the hell, touching the old book jackets, seeing what somebody threw out, seeing what they underlined... maybe you find something great, like an old thriller with a painted cover from the forties, or a textbook one of your professors used when he was a student - his name written in it very carefully... Yeah, I like it. I like watching the students. Wondering what they're gonna buy, what they're gonna read. What kind of ideas they'll come up with when they settle down and get to work... I'm not doing much right now. It does get harder. It's a stereotype that happens to be true, unfortunately for me - unfortunately for you, for all of us.