LYSISTRATA – a free adaptation from the Greek of ARISTOPHANES

This play is, obviously, based on the original Greek play by Aristophanes. Whereas the original is very direct and uncompromising, this version uses more innuendo and suggestion, rather in the tradition of music hall and the Carry-On films.

Some characters and scenes have been added to help a more contemporary approach, in particular, the character of Gaythelos, the highly camp servant to Lysistrata, and the two old men.

The theme, however, is the eternally serious one of the desirability of love over lust and peace over conflict.

Age – 16 upwards

Characters:-

LYSISTRATA an Athenian woman

CLEONIKE    _.._

MYRRHINE  _.._

LAMPITO a Spartan woman

GAYTHELOS a slave

MAGISTRATE of the city of Athens

COXIAS an old man

BOXIAS another

NICODIKE another Athenian woman

CALYKE another ditto

CRATYLLE yet another

ISMENE a young wife

THEONOE another

CINESIAS a young man dying for love of his wife MYRRHINE

SLAVE to CINESIAS

CASSANDRA an old woman

HERALD 1 a herald

HERALD 2 another

PEACE a beautiful goddess

LYSISTRATA

Scene 1 – GAYTHELOS, LYSISTRATA, CLEONIKE, LAMPITO, MYRRHINE

GAY: (Enters looking back over his shoulder. Addresses audience directly) Honest to Zeus, I don’t know what’s got into her! Ever since the men all went off to the wars, she’s been so grumpy. She’s been going round chatting to all the old women of the city, plotting and planning, though Zeus knows what! And now it’s even worse! She’s got a bunch of women in there today from all over Greece! Oh yes! Sparta, Beotia, Anagyras, you name it! And the weird thing is, all those provinces are at war with each other! Yes, I know! Crazy, isn’t it! The men all knocking lumps off each other and those women are in there drinking herbal infusions and eating honey cakes! Absolutely daft! If you want my opinion: (looks over his shoulder to see if he’s overheard, then loud stage whisper) I think it might be the change! (Normal voice) No, cos they can go funny at that age, can’t they. I remember when her down the road started getting hot flushes, she was –

LYS: (off) Gaythelos!

GAY: Whoops! Coming madam. (turns to exit, but meets LYS coming out, followed by CLEO, LAMP, MYRR) Oh no, I see; you’re coming.

LYS: I want this place spick and span! We’re going to perform a solemn oath. (she crosses to GAY to give instructions sotto voce)

CLEO: Eh? What sort of solemn oath, Lysistrata?

MYRR: (girly) Ooh, I love surprises!

LAMP: (a bit butch) Yes, but don’t start shrieking, dear.

MYRR: What? I don’t shriek!

CLEO: You do.

MYRR: (shrieking) I DO NOT! Ooh!

CLEO: You’re doing it now, look.

MYRR: Well, everyone does that. It’s just the excitement.

LAMP: Yes, well. Some of us learn to contain ourselves, dear.

LYS: (leaves GAY sweeping and crosses back to the women) Now, where was I? Oh yes! The war!

CLEO: Oh don’t! I’m sick to death of it!

LAMP: Such a bore! No sooner are they home from one campaign than it’s on with the gear again, and off out to fight another one!

MYRR: I always ask him to bring me back something nice, and he never does!

CLEO: Oh, I don’t know. Homecomings have their compensations…

LAMP: (severely) Like what?

CLEO: (suggestively) Well, you know…

LYS: No, I don’t. Like what?

MYRR: I know what she means. (They nudge and giggle)

LYS: Oh no! This was just what I was afraid of!

LAMP: Well come on, Lizzie. Tell us your big idea.

LYS: All right. How would you like to stop our men going to war altogether?

LAMP: Capital idea.

CLEO: It would be rather good.

LYS: Rather good? Rather good? Is that all you can say?

CLEO: Well, all right, it would be maaaaaahvellous. But how could we ever stop them?

MYRR: They like it too much. All that going off with a lot of blokes and getting stuck in to a big ruck.

CLEO: Singing in the big soldiers’ bath afterwards, all lads together. They love it!

GAY: Mm. Some more than others. (women give him a severe look) Ooh. Sorry I spoke. (carries on sweeping)

LYS: While they’re off fighting, what are we doing?

LAMP: Everything!

CLEO: Looking after the house, looking after the business…

MYRR: Looking after the kids.

LYS: Exactly! They leave us to do all their work – which we do far better than they do, and our own work – which they could never do, and look after their children – which they would run a mile rather than do – and they treat us like one of their bloody conquests!

MYRR: She’s right, you know!

CLEO: She is!

LYS: (imitates husband) Bring me some wine, bring me my dinner, show me the accounts, get your kit off…

MYRR: And not always in that order!

LAMP: Even if you’ve been cleaning out the cess-pool. (Moment where the other women look at her in disgust) What?

CLEO: Lampito?

LAMP: Well someone’s got to do it, and it’s no use waiting for himself to come home from the wars to do it, is it?

MYRR: Haven’t you got any servants to do that?

LAMP: In Sparta, dear, we don’t need cosseting.

LYS: Cosseting! That’s it! That’s the key. Girls, do we want our men to stop going to war?

ALL: Yes!

LYS: Then here’s my plan: a sure-fire way of keeping them at home.

MYRR: Well come on, then!

LAMP: Spit it out, gel!

LYS: We refuse them their so-called conjugal rights!

CLEO: Oh, you are joking!

LAMP: How would that work?

MYRR: What would we refuse them? (CLEO whispers) Oh. (Horrified) Oh no!

LYS: Oh yes! After all, we’ve got to show them who’s boss!

CLEO: Yes, but within reason!

LYS: Ah, I might have known! What the poets say about us is right, after all. We’re a wanton, vice-ridden sex, good for nothing but lust and lewdness! I might just as well have saved my breath!

LAMP: You’re right, Lysistrata. It’s a hard thing to have to sleep alone, but after all, peace must come first!

CLEO: But if we refrained from heughmagandie, would it really bring peace?

LYS: By all the goddesses, of course it would!

MYRR: How?

LYS: Just picture it: your man comes back from the wars, and there we are, all in our clingiest, filmiest negligees, a wee touch of perfume behind the ears…

CLEO: A wee drop wine, candles, a whiff of incense…

LYS: And in he comes, raring to go, and we say: Not tonight darling. Maybe another night.

MYRR: Zeus! My man would go mental!

CLEO: Mine would be chewing up the carpets and climbing the curtains!

GAY: Zeus alive! What has she married? A cross between a moth and a monkey? A sort of mothney! Mothney! (he laughs)

LAMP: (to GAY) Quiet, you! (to the others) They say Menelaus threw his sword away when he saw Helen for the first time, naked as nature intended!

LYS: Yes, and he picked it up again as soon as she went off with Paris. We have to keep them on the boil if it’s going to work.

MYRR: But what if they go off and work out their frustrations elsewhere?

LYS: That won’t happen, as long as we women stick together and don’t weaken!

CLEO: Yes, it’s got to be all for one and one for all, and no backsliders!

MYRR: I still worry about them finding…other outlets…? (they meaningfully look at GAY)

GAY: Don’t look at me! I don’t cater for coach parties!

LYS: (approaches him menacingly) Are you with us or against us?

GAY: You know you can trust me, madam…Don’t you? (they look at him suspiciously) Well, don’t take a vote on it! Honestly!

LAMP: (approaches GAY threateningly) If we thought you’d betray our cause – what’s his name?

LYS: Gaythelos.

LAMP: If we thought you’d betray our cause, Gaythelos, do you know what we’d do to you?

GAY: I shudder to think!

LAMP: When we’d finished with you, you’d be no more than half the man you are now.

GAY: That leaves me a small percentage, anyway. Honestly, ladies, I’m on your side! Sisters doing it for themselves, and all that!

MYRR: Ahh! He’s sweet, isn’t he.

CLEO: I’d like to take him home with me.

GAY: Very flattering, I’m sure. But don’t get your hopes up.

LYS: So what about it, girls? Are you ready to take the oath?

LAMP: There’s a flaw in your reasoning, Lizzie.

LYS: What’s that?

LAMP: As long as there’s treasure stored in the temple of Athene and the Athenian ships are seaworthy, you’ll never stop your warlike Athenians from going to war!

LYS: Aha, but I’ve thought of that! All the old women of the city are already on our side! We’ve got it all organized.

LAMP: Well! You are a power to be reckoned with! Fair play to you!

LYS: They’ve gone up to the Acropolis, pretending to bring sacrifices, but in fact they’re going to seize the citadel! All it needs is your support!

MYRR: Oh Lizzie! You’re so masterful! I do like strong women!

LAMP: Excellent! Damn fine planning, gel!

LYS: So, are you ready to take the oath?

LAMP: Sooner the better.

MYRR: Ooh, it’s exciting!

CLEO: As long as we really are all in it together? I don’t want to take the oath and find out later that things have been going on behind my back!

GAY: Takes all sorts, dear.

LYS: Gaythelos, fetch the full wineskin and the big bowl.

GAY: I’m gone. (exits)

LAMP: Shouldn’t we sacrifice something? What about a horse?

LYS: What, in here?

MYRR: What about a cock?

(Re-enter GAY)

GAY: Honestly, some people have a one-track mind!

LYS: No, it’s enough to swear the oath over the bowl of wine, and then share the wine. That’s binding.

GAY: Ooh, I know! Wine does that to me sometimes!

LYS: Gaythelos!

GAY: Yes, yes! Coming, coming madam!

(GAY pours the wine. The women all lay their hands over the bowl)

LYS: I hereby solemnly swear…

ALL: I hereby solemnly swear…

LYS: I shall have nothing to do with my husband…

ALL: I shall have nothing to do with my husband…

LYS: Or lover…

CLEO: I was afraid of that!

LYS: (severely) Or lover!

ALL: Or lover…

LYS: No matter in what state of excitement he approach me…

MYRR: Ooh, you do make it difficult, Lizzie!

LYS: Come on! No matter…

ALL: No matter in what state of excitement he approach me…

LYS: I shall keep him in a state of ardent longing…

ALL: I shall keep him in a state of ardent longing…

LYS: To the end that war may cease and our men see sense and reason!

ALL: To the end that war may cease and our men see sense and reason.

LYS: Hear us, O Goddess Persuasion! Receive our sacrifice and be merciful to us poor women!

(They all drink)

GAY: (Weeping) Oh that was beautiful! That was so lovely!

LAMP: What’s the matter with you?

GAY: I always cry at ceremonies. I can’t help it!

LYS: Go and clean the cess-pool.

GAY: Yes madam. (exit. Sudden noise of shouts and cried off)

CLEO: What’s that?

LYS: It’s the old women! They’ve occupied the Acropolis! Lampito, hurry back to Sparta to organize your women! All of you; let’s get going!

CLEO: Power to the sisters!

ALL: (Triumphantly) All for one and one for all!

Exit.

THE DEATH OF IVAN ILYCH

Based on the story by LEO TOLSTOY

(N.B. The part of Ivan Ilych is played by two actors. Death is played in a long black cloak and a mask until the final scene.)

Scene 1: The Death Is Announced

LAWYERS & GERASIM, who is sweeping

LAWYERS:                         (ad lib) Bonjour mon ami!.. Enchanté…Ravi de vous voir…Bonjour…Bonjour…Cher monsieur! Quelle belle surprise…

GERASIM:                        (sings)            Rossiya, Rossiya! Rossiya rodina moya…

LAWYERS:                        Peasant!

GERASIM finishes sweeping & exits, passing IVANOVICH reading a newspaper

1^st LAWYER:                        What about the Melvinski trial, eh? An open and shut case, if ever I saw one!

2^nd LAWYER:                        Not at all, mon vieux. Very complex.

3^rd LAWYER:                        Looks black for the plaintiff.

1^st LAWYER:                        Au contraire, mon vieux. White as the driven snow.

3^rd LAWYER:                        He’ll be sent down at the latter end, mark my words.

1^st LAWYER:                        Nonsense! He’ll be awarded huge damages. Up for a fortune.

3^rd LAWYER:                        Black and down.

1^st LAWYER:                        White and up.

2^nd LAWYER:                        Left or right?

1^st LAWYER:                        Left, of course.

3^rd LAWYER:                        Right. No question about it.

1^st & 2^nd LAWYERS:             (ad lib)Black! White! Up! Down! Left! Right! (etc)

IVANOVICH:                        Gentlemen! Ivan Ilych has died!

LAWYERS:                             (cluster round IVANOVICH)Really? You don’t say! No! Is it true? (etc, ad lib)

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                  (upstage, in white nightshirt) WHY?

IVANOVICH:                        Here. Read it yourself. (Hands paper to LAWYERS)

2^nd LAWYER:                        Praskovya Fyodorovna, with profound sorrow –

3^rd LAWYER:                        Demise of her beloved husband, member of the Court of Justice –

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                   WHY?

3^rd LAWYER:                        Funeral will take place on Friday at one o’ clock –

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                   WHY ME?

LAWYERS:                              (separate and speak aside)

2^nd LAWYER:                        Well, he’s dead, but I’m alive!

1^st LAWYER:                        I shall be sure to get Vinnikov’s place now!

3^rd LAWYER:                        I must apply for my brother-in-law’s transfer right away!

IVANOVICH:                         It is he who is dead, and not I!

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                   But why?

LAWYERS :                             (come together again)

IVANOVICH:                        I thought he would never leave his bed again. It’s very sad.

3^rd LAWYER:                        But really, what was wrong with him?

1^st LAWYER:                        The doctors couldn’t say.

1^st IVAN ILYCH;                 They could say plenty!

1^st LAWYER:                        They could say plenty. But they all said different things.

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                 They all said different things!

3^rd LAWYER:                        When I last saw him, I thought he was getting better.

2^nd LAWYER:                        And I haven’t seen him since the holidays. I always meant to go.

IVANOVICH:                        Had he any property?

3^rd LAWYER:                        I think his wife had a little, but something quite trifling.

2^nd LAWYER:                        We shall have to go and see her, but they live so far away.

1^st LAWYER:                        Far away from you, you mean. Everything’s far away from your place.

2^nd LAWYER:                        You see? He can never forgive me for living on the other side of the river. Ah well, à toute à l’heure. (exit)

Enter DEATH, who taps each LAWYER on the shoulder, and frightens them offstage. He then goes upstage to join IVAN ILYCH. They exit together.)

Fade

Scene 2: IVANOVICH Visits PRASKOVYA FYODOROVNA

PRASKOVYA:                        I know you were a true friend of Ivan Ilych.

IVANOVICH:                        Believe me! (He shakes her hand with a tragic gesture. Brief tableau)

PRASKOVYA:                        (heaves a deep sigh)

IVANOVICH:                        (heaves a deeper sigh)

PRASKOVYA:                        (heaves a deeper sigh still)

IVANOVICH:                        (heaves a sigh even deeper, somewhat operatic)

PRASKOVYA:                        (a sigh like a groan of pain)

IVANOVICH:                        (a sigh like a farmyard noise)

PRASKOVYA:                        Shall I fetch you something for your stomach?

IVANOVICH:                        You are too kind, but no. No thank you.

PRASKOVYA:                        Come into the parlour. (She leads him to a sofa and a pouffe)

PRASKOVYA:                        Do sit down. (aside) I feel sure that he will sit on the pouffe, and it has loose springs. As a widow, of course, recently bereaved, I cannot warn him of anything as banal as a pouffe with loose springs.

IVANOVICH:                        (aside) Which should it be? The sofa or the pouffe? To sit on a sofa with a widow, even one so recently bereaved – nay, especially with one so recently bereaved – could lead to gossip! It had better be the pouffe.

(He sits. There is a grinding noise, and he is lowered almost to the floor.)

PRASKOVYA:                        (aside) I knew it! I shall pretend nothing has happened.

IVANOVICH:                        (aside) Damn! I shall pretend nothing has happened.

PRASKOVYA:                        Did I ever show you the little miniature of Ivan Ilych and myself on our (wipes away tear) wedding day?

IVANOVICH:                        No.

PRASKOVYA:                        Allow me to show it to you.

(She tries to rise, but her shawl is caught in the sofa. IVANOVICH tries to help her, but has to roll on to the floor to get up from the collapsed pouffe. Tableau: PRASKOVYA straining away from the sofa, IVANOVICH trying to get up. PRASKOVYA finally frees herself. IVANOVICH manages to stand upright. She shows him the miniature)

IVANOVICH:                        Charming. Charming.

PRASKOVYA:                        I’m so glad you like it. Do sit down.

IVANOVICH:                        I, er – Yes. Thanks.

(PRASKOVYA sits on the sofa. IVANOVICH goes to join her, but she lies full length. He wheels round abruptly, and sits on the pouffe, which collapses under him again.)

PRASKOVYA:                        Please smoke.

(Enter DEATH & 1^st IVAN ILYCH, unseen by the others)

IVANOVICH:                        (takes out pipe) Did he suffer much?

PRASKOVYA:                        He suffered dreadfully, especially during the last few days. He screamed unceasingly! Not for minutes, but for hours. For the last three days he simply shrieked incessantly. It was unendurable. I cannot understand how I bore it. Come into the garden. (IVANOVICH struggles to his feet) You could hear him from three rooms away. Oh, what I have suffered!

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                        Why have you brought me here? Why do you torment me like this? Go on! Strike me! Strike me down! (DEATH merely looks at him)

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                        But what is it for? What is it all for?

DEATH:                                    What is it that you want?

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                        What do I want? I want to live, and not to suffer.

DEATH:                                    To live – how?

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                        Why, to live as I used to. Well and pleasantly.

DEATH:                                    As you lived before. Well and pleasantly. You think you lived well. You think you lived pleasantly.

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                        Why, what do you mean?

DEATH:                                    Your life was most simple. Most ordinary.

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                        Exactly. Most simple and most ordinary.

DEATH:                                    Most simple, most ordinary, and therefore, most terrible. (Exit)

1^st IVAN ILYCH:                        Wait! What do you mean? Come back!…Most simple, most ordinary, and therefore most terrible? Simple, ordinary, terrible?

Fade into next scene

It is, of course, the well-known tale of the elves who help a poor shoemaker by making the most excellent shoes. The shoemaker and his wife reward the elves by making them a suit of clothes each.

The play contains a great deal of verse, which can be set to music if wanted. The players should be willing to use improv skills and interact with the audience for best results.

I am happy to make this play available at no cost. Below is the first scene.

Click the link to download the full play.

The Shoemaker and the Elves by PLSnow

Characters:-

Rags the Elf

Tatters the Elf

Shoemaker

Shoemaker’s wife

1^st Posh Customer

2^nd Posh Customer

(NB – The parts of the posh customers can be played by the same actors who play RAGS and TATTERS)

Scene 1:            The Shoemaker’s workshop. Workbench, tools etc. RAGS lies onstage in a bundle. The audience should not see that he is an elf. They should just see a bundle of rags.

Enter SHOEMAKER& WIFE

SHOEMAKER

Oh dear! What it is to be a poor shoemaker!

WIFE

We are very poor, but at least we’ve got each other.

SHOEMAKER

Of course we do, but the times are very hard. Very hard indeed! Here I am, a shoemaker, and a very good shoemaker too! Just ask anybody! They’ll tell you. I’m a very good shoemaker indeed, but nobody’s coming to buy my shoes! The rent is due at the end of the week; there’s no food in the house. And I’ve only got leather enough to make one more pair of shoes. But I’ll make the finest pair of shoes ever seen with these last pieces of leather! The very finest!

WIFE

Never mind, Cobblino! Your dinner’s on the table dear.

SHOEMAKER

Dinner! Have we got dinner? You are a clever little wifie, Cobblina! I didn’t know there was any food in the house! What have we got?

WIFE

Well, not very much, I’m afraid. It’s macaroni cheese. I had to use the aglets from the shoelaces for macaroni.

SHOEMAKER & WIFE

(Direct to audience with visual aid if appropriate) You know the little bits at the ends of shoelaces? They’re called aglets!

SHOEMAKER

We’ll be asking questions later. So you had to use aglets for the macaroni? What about the cheese?

WIFE

I had to get it out of the mousetrap.

SHOEMAKER & WIFE

You know what a mousetrap is? It’s a –

WIFE

Oh, they know what a mousetrap is!

SHOEMAKER

Yes, of course they do. But at least we’ve got some dinner. The mouse’ll just have to go hungry. Here, I’ll just lay out the pieces of leather to make a fine pair of shoes tomorrow, and then, well. We’ll see.

WIFE

No customers again today, then? And I work so hard to make sure the shop is neat and tidy!

SHOEMAKER

No. Nobody came today. Nobody came yesterday. Nobody came the day before that. And the weather’s so cold and wet!

WIFE

Perhaps that’s why they aren’t coming out to buy shoes!

SHOEMAKER

How do you work that out?

WIFE

Well, if you haven’t got any shoes, you don’t want to go out on cold, wet days to get some, do you? Your feet’ll get cold. You wait till it’s warmer and dryer.

SHOEMAKER

Oh, I see. But we can’t wait until the weather gets better to sell shoes! There’s the rent to pay! And we’ve got to eat!

WIFE

That’s true. Those aglets won’t last for ever. (To audience) Remember: aglets!

SHOEMAKER

Aglets! Well, anyway, the shoes that I’ll make tomorrow will be smart and proper shoes to wear on special days! Shoes that would make you proud to be seen in!

WIFE

Ooh! Will you really?

SHOEMAKER

Yes, I’ve got the leather all laid out ready. First thing tomorrow I’ll get to work and put them in pride of place in the window… Next to the tin of polish and the last pair of shoelaces –

SHOEMAKER & WIFE

With the aglets at each end.

SHOEMAKER

Whatever would you do

If you didn’t have a shoe?

No matter where you trod

Each step’s a painful plod

If you didn’t have a decent shoe.

WIFE

It wouldn’t suit

If you didn’t have a boot.

Each step you take

Would be a pain and ache

If you didn’t have a sturdy boot.

SHOEMAKER & WIFE

To make a shoe

Is a wonderful thing to do.

To stitch a boot

And make it look real cute

Is a thing to make you

Hop and skip

Run and jump

But mind you don’t trip!

You can walk for miles

If you’re soled and heeled

Over gates and stiles

Through wood and field,

With shoes so neat

Every road and street

Is like a velvet carpet

Under your feet –

Yes, whatever would you do

If you didn’t have a shoe?

WIFE

That’s right, dear. You make a smashing pair of shoes. They’ll look lovely. Well, come on, before the dinner gets cold.

SHOEMAKER

It’s a good word, aglets. Very good for crossword puzzles.

SHOEMAKER

Ooh, it’s a cold and damp winter’s day, I’ll carefully put away my tools, as usual –

WIFE

Dust down the workbench, as usual, and sweep the floor –

SHOEMAKER

But I’m down to the very last pieces of leather. There’s no more leather in the shop, and no money to buy any more –

WIFE

And no money to buy any food, or pay the rent, or buy coal for the fire.

SHOEMAKER

But still, I put out the last pieces of leather that I had, ready to make a pair of shoes in the morning. Cobblina! Don’t forget to put out a little jug of milk and a little bowl of porridge for the Good Folk –

WIFE

Now we mustn’t forget our prayers.

SHOEMAKER & WIFE

Bzzzbzzzbzzzbzzzmumble mumblebzzzbzzz…AMEN

SHOEMAKER

And off we go to bed, as usual.

Exit SHOEMAKER & WIFE

It was Malcolm Tregorran who broke her of that habit. She came out with it once when one of the perennial bits of organizational gristle had got stuck between our collective teeth; I don’t know what it was; dress code or curtains for the School Hall, or something. Old Tregorran waited for a few seconds before saying into the reverential calm, (for the Oracle had spoken, don’t you know): “Yes, that’s all very well, Edeltraut, but it doesn’t exactly get us anywhere. Does it!”

She never spoke to him again. Absolutely mortified, old man.

Well, the years rolled by in their ineluctable fashion, and Edeltraut got older and older. Now, it’s a truism in the Schnellentaten schools everywhere that the two things that are the most difficult to teach are languages – especially French – and Harmony of the Spheres. The younger element sometimes just doesn’t take to it, old man. And Harm involves a lot of running around with graceful arm movements, all dressed in long nighties and chiffon curtains. There comes a time when that sort of thing no longer sits well in the pre-adolescent mind. I mean, imagine if you’re painfully aware of your gangly appearance or big fat tummy, or whatever it is, and you’ve to perform a lot of slow arm waving and wandering about a stage with no fixed aim in view that anyone can distinguish, and you’ve to do it wearing this Miss Havisham get-up, in front of the while school, whom you know to be the sternest bunch of critics outside of the Académie des Beaux Arts. It’s what they call these days challenging, old man. It takes them right outside their comfort zone, as we have to call it these days. But what I’m getting at, old man, is that old Edeltraut had her work cut out for her, and very exhausting it was! I mean, fair play to her, she certainly earned her money. Of course, she cheated by having another teacher in the Harm class with her, so that she could do all the beautiful stuff, and the other teacher could keep order. Well this went down like a cup of cold sheep dip with the rest of the staff, I can tell you! I mean, it was hard enough to find teachers enough to cover the timetable needs as it was, without doubling up in this profligate manner. But old Edeltraut used to become very operatic whenever the subject was brought up at staffing meetings. Her eyes would bulge out of their sockets in the most terrifying way, and her Rs would rattle like a buzz saw.

“These childrrrren need Harrmony of the Spherrrres! It is imporrrtant not only for them but for the worrrrrld!”

Then old Larry Snudge, or whoever it was would say, “Yes, but Edeltraut …”

Never got any further than that, old man. She would come back at him with all the strength of her Viking ancestry. “Forr the WORRRRRLD, Larrrrry! Forr the WORRRRRRLD!”

And that would be it. Game set and match to Edeltraut. The thing is, you see, old Jakob Schnellentaten had more or less invented Harmony of the Spheres, and said a lot of things about how it was an important new art form and so on, and it was generally thought among the nibs that it was a necessary part of the Schnellentaten School curriculum. And she was the only teacher of it for the whole school, so she had us over a barrel. She had carved out a place for herself in the Moral High Ground that was unassailable, old man! Positively unassailable! Other Harmony of the Spheres teachers came along from time to time to help spread the teaching load, but she saw them all off, one by one.  She would say: “I mean, what she is doing is not Harrmony of the Spherrrres! I don’t know what it is, but it is NOT Harrmony of the Spherrres!”

Well, what could we say? She was the expert. And so the poor young neophyte had to go. Did you know there was a place in Norway called Hell, old man? There is. Larry Snudge used to say that Hell must have been Edeltraut’s home town, as she was the colleague from it.

Well, things got to a bit of a pass when Edeltraut took exception to the way school assemblies were going. One class sang a Beatles song at a Founder’s Day assembly, and for Edeltraut, this was the Slippery Slope, old man. She decided that she would take things in hand, and look after the assemblies from now on.

In our innocence, we supposed that this would mean that she would go round, asking colleagues what their classes would be doing at the next Swansmas festival, or what they’d be cooking up for St. Geoffrey’s Day: a few folk songs, a French poem here, a German song there, a few minutes of torture on the recorders. Is there anything more like an hour of root canal treatment than a concert of children of varying expertise playing the recorder, old man? I’ve yet to come across it. Still we would all screw our faces up into encouraging smiles and wait till it was all over.

Then Edeltraut took over. After a brief burst from the school orchestra, the assembly was all Harmony of the Spheres! I mean every single item! Except one: Class Two Recorders.

But then came the finale. It was Edeltraut herself, doing what she called a Humoresque. What it amounted to was herself coming on stage with a mask on the back of her head, and walking backwards with little skipping steps in time to some music by Erik Satie, or something similar. Her idea of a joke, you see. The trouble is, once you’ve grasped the nub of the gist of the gravamen that it’s some eccentric old lady with a mask on the back of her head pretending to walk forwards but really walking backwards, the gag has pretty much run its course.

But this went on for what seemed like an hour or two, though it was probably not quite as much, to be fair. And finally the music came to an end and Edeltraut made her way backwards towards the wings – and fell off the stage. She landed with a loud series of crashes among the timpani in a flurry of petticoats and stout Norwegian bloomers of the Noli Me Tangere type, you know.

Of course she leaped up at once, crying, “I’m all right, I’m all right. I walk across the Pentlands every Sunday!” Malcolm Tregorran used this in his classes later as an example of the non sequitur. Anyway, up she got, and promptly tripped over into the kettledrums again. There was a near riot, old man! The school orchestra was in a blind panic. Cymbals were rolling all over the floor, music stands were flying in all directions, the strings were exchanging blows with the woodwinds, orchestral scores were filling the air like snow, and in the midst of it was Edeltraut, clambering out of the melee, and into the grand piano, where the lid immediately fell, and there she was, engulfed and devoured by the Bechstein, with her feet sticking out.

Iain MacDonald, sitting on the piano stool, just cradled his head in his hands and groaned. It was Irmgard von Bösendorfer, the school valkyrie, who waded through the chaos, lifted the piano lid with one hand, yanked Edeltraut out by the scruff of the neck with the other, and set her on her feet again. Sending Edeltraut off with a little shove between the shoulder blades, she demanded calm in a voice that brooked no argument.

We all resumed our seats, and carried on with the most spirited rendering of the St. Geoffrey’s School Song that I’ve ever heard. Oh Happy Band Of Pilgrims was never given the brio that it had on that day, old man. It almost brought the ceiling down! It was a St. Geoffrey’s Day to remember all right, and no mistake.

Edeltraut spent the rest of the morning lying down with a cup of chamomile tea, waiting for the diagonal lines across her face from the piano wires to fade away. But her time was over.

She’s still at St. Geoffrey’s, of course, but only teaching the tiny tots. She’s Learned Her Lesson, old man. Others run the assemblies, and no Harm done, if you see what I mean. Another one of those, old man?

Loved a log of wood to life;

Shaped it with a knife.

Made of it a child.

He looked at her with eyes mild;

Looked at her and smiled.

Fed him bread and milk;

Wrapped him up in finest silk;

Silk and bread and milk.

Fed him milk and bread.

Her husband, coming home, said:

“I’ll make him a bed.”

The undertaker made

A bed where the child was laid -

But there he stayed.

Wouldn’t take more food;

Couldn’t take it if he would:

Once more, only wood.

of a mood of melancholy

in the corner of a room

where a woman sits at the piano,

white wrists arched over the keys,

and outside in the sun-heavy garden

bees work in the flowers.

And sometimes, from the corner

of your eye, you can glimpse them

cluster at wet window panes,

hungrily watching while a woman

at a glowing hearth

tells stories to children.

Perhaps an old letter falls out

of a book, and they are there

again, at their haunting.

Or, as you pass a school

and look through the bars

round the playground,

hearing the shouts, watching the games,

they are at your elbow,

and you feel your flesh, your bones

fading, and the wind

blowing through you.

disentangled herself at last,

clambering out of the thin, cumbering bones

as out of a deep armchair.

Each trivial thing is a weighty talisman;

the books, brush, comb, strings of beads,

hint at what made sense of her story,

but remain loyally silent in the dimness.

Outside, hard surfaces blaze

the light into our eyes,

surprise us with our unpreened reflections,

throw our shadows in among the traffic.

In here, the past, like dust,

falls dancing from the sunbeams,

on to these few abandoned fragments,

while she weaves her secret self into joy.

in the big black bowler hat?

Come away from the doorway, child;

come back here out of that!

His teeth are splinters of graveyard stone

and his eyes are balls of fire ;

his nose is as sharp as a raven’s beak

and his ears are telephone wire.

The lines on his face are thick with dust

and the grass dies where he stands;

his skin is clammy and cold as a frog

there are seventeen fingers on each of his hands.

I’ve seen him behind the playground walls,

he curses and spits and swears,

pulling the hair from the heads of dolls.

and the eyes off the teddy bears.

His pockets are full of mouldy crusts,

there are papers stuffing his case;

I can hear the jingling of hundreds of keys

when his grin cracks open his face.

The air around his hat is thick

with the buzzing of thousands of flies,

and every fly is the token true

of every one of his lies.

His voice is a croak, his voice is a squeak,

his voice is a shout in the dark;

he’s the man on the corner of Sinister Street;

he’s a shadow glimpsed in the park.

Spiders come tumbling out of his sleeves,

his collar is thick with flakes;

every joint in his body creaks,

and each bone in his skeleton aches.

What must we do to get rid of him, mam?

He frightens my sister and me.

Show him his face in the mirror, my lad.

It’s the last of him you’ll see.

Every lie that ever he told

is a scab encrusting his heart.

He dare not sneeze, he dare not cough

He dare not shiver or start,

for fear it falls apart.

on a rugged geometry,

move their bemerded back-shanks,

mud in the clefts of each splayed hoof.

The sun, netted in the branches

on the low horizon, gilds their steaming breath.

We are drawn into their earthbound, slow rhythm.

Then swans fly low over the lough;

we feel the thrill along the breastbone,

a surge of air about the shoulders.

I think they wish to teach us

how to fly.