Ubu Plays, The (12 page)

Meanwhile,
MEMNON
has picked himself up, readjusted his triple-decker cap, and his sewage-wader’s topboots, and signals

from the doorway.
MA UBU.

MEMNON. Sweet Mistress Ubu, you may come in - we are alone.

MA UBU. Oh my friend, I was so afraid for you when I heard all that shindy.

MEMNON. I want my barrel.

MA UBU. I don’t want old Ubu.

MEMNON. We are observed. Let us continue this conversation elsewhere.

They retire to the back of the stage.

The same. In the lavatory recess in the back,the door of which remains half open.
VOICES OF PA UBU
and
THE PALCONTENTS
offstage.

VOICE OF UBU. Hornstrumpot! We’ve taken possession of Mister Achras’s phynance, we’ve impaled him and commandeered his home, and in this home, stung by remorse, we are looking for somewhere where we can return to him the very tangible remains of what we have stolen - to wit, his dinner.

VOICES OF THE PALCONTENTS. In a great box of stainless steel ...

MA UBU. It’s Mister Ubu. I’m lost!

MEMNON. Through this diamond-shaped opening I see his horns shining in the distance. Where can I hide? Ah, in there.

MA UBU. Don’t even think of it, dear child, you’ll kill yourself!

MEMNON. Kill myself? By Gog and Magog, one can live, one can breathe down there. It’s all part of my job. One, two, hop!

The same,
CONSCIENCE.

CONSCIENCE (
coming out like a worm at the same moment as
MEMNON
dives in).
Ow! what a shock! my head is booming from it!

MEMNON. Like an empty barrel.

CONSCIENCE. Doesn’t yours boom?

MEMNON. Not in the least.

CONSCIENCE. Like a cracked pot. I’m keeping my eye on it.

MEMNON. More like an eye at the bottom of a chamber pot.

CONSCIENCE. I have in fact the honour to be the Conscience of Mister Ubu.

MEMNON. Was it he who precipitated Your Shapelessness into this hole ?

CONSCIENCE. I deserved it. I tormented him and he has punished me.

MA UBU. Poor young man ...

VOICES OF THE PALCONTENTS
(coming nearer and nearer).
Ears to the wind, without surprise ...

MEMNON. That’s why you must go back again, and me too, and Madam Ubu as well.

They descend.

THE PALCONTENTS
(behind the door):
We get our eats through platinum teats ...

PA UBU. Enter, hornstrumpot!

They all rush in.

THE PALCONTENTS,
carrying green candles.
PA UBU, in a
nightshirt.

PA UBU
(he squats down without a word. The whole thing collapses. He emerges again, thanks to the Archimedean principle. Then, with great simplicity and dignity, his nightshirt perhaps a shade darker).
Is the pschittapump out of order? Answer me or I’ll have you debrained!

The same.
MEMNON
showing his head.

MEMNON’S HEAD. It’s not functioning at all, it’s broken down. What a dirty business, like your debraining machine. I’m not afraid of that. It all proves my point - there’s nothing like a sewage barrel. In falling in and popping out again you’ve done more than half the work for me.

PA UBU. By my green candle, I’ll gouge your eyes out - barrel, pumpkin, refuse of humanity!
(He shoves him back, then shuts himself in the lavatory recess with
THE PALCONTENTS.)

ACHRAS, REBONTIER.

REBONTIER. Sir, I have just witnessed a most extraordinary incident.

ACHRAS. And I think, look you, Sir, that I’ve seen exactly the same. No matter, go on telling me about it, and we’ll try to find the explanation.

REBONTIER. Sir, I saw the customs officers at the Gare de Lyon opening a packing case to be delivered to - whom do you think?

ACHRAS. I believe I heard someone say that it was addressed to a Mister Ubu at the rue de l’Echaudé.

REBONTIER. Precisely, Sir, and inside were a man and a stuffed monkey.

ACHRAS. A large monkey?

REBONTIER. What do you mean by a large monkey? Simians are always fairly small, and can be recognised by their dark coats and collars of fur of a lighter colour. Great height is an indication of the soul’s aspiration to heaven.

ACHRAS. It’s the same with flies, look you. But shall I tell you what I think? I’m inclined to believe they were mummies.

REBONTIER. Egyptian mummies?

ACHRAS. Yes, Sir, that’s the explanation. There was one that looked like a crocodile, look you, dried up, the skull depressed as in primitive man; the other, look you, had the brow of a thinker, and a most dignified air, ah yes, his hair and beard were white as snow.

REBONTIER. Sir, I don’t know what you’re driving at. Besides, the mummies, including the dignified old monkey, jumped out of their case amid a chorus of yells from the customs men and, to the consternation of the onlookers, took the tram that crosses the pont de l’Alma.

ACHRAS. Great heavens! how astonishing, we too just came here by that conveyance or, look you, for the sake of accuracy, that tramway.

REBONTIER. That’s exactly what I said to myself, Sir. It’s most peculiar that we did not meet them.

The same.
PA UBU
opens the door, illuminated by
THE PALCONTENTS.

PA UBU. Ah-ha! Hornstrumpot!
(To
ACHRAS:) You, Sir, bugger off. You’ve been told to before.

ACHRAS. Oh, but it’s like this, look you. This happens to be my home.

PA UBU. Horn of Ubu, Mister Rebontier, it’s you, I don’t doubt any longer, who came to my house to cuckold me, who mistakes my virtuous wife, in other words, for a piss-pot. We shall find ourselves, one fine day, thanks to you, the father of an archaeopteryx or worse, which won’t look at all like us! Basically, we are of the opinion that cuckoldry implies marriage and therefore a marriage without cuckoldry has no validity. But for form’s sake we have decided to punish him severely. Palcontents, knock him down for me!

THE PALCONTENTS
belabour
REBONTIER.

Lights, please, and you, Sir, answer me. Am I a cuckold?

REBONTIER. OWOWOW, OWOWOWOW!

PA UBU. How disgusting. He can’t reply because he fell on his head. His brain has doubtless received an injury to the Broca convolution, where the faculty of holding forth resides. This convolution is the third frontal convolution on the left as you go in. Ask the hall-porter.... Excuse me, gentlemen, ask any philosopher: ‘This dissolution of the mind is caused by an atrophy which little by little invades the cerebral cortex, then the grey matter, producing a fatty degeneration and atheroma of the cells, tubes, and capillaries of the nerve-substance!’
⁹
There’s nothing to be done with him. We’ll have to make do with twisting the nose and nears, with removal of the tongue and extraction of the teeth, laceration of the posterior, hacking to pieces of the spinal marrow and the partial or total spaghettification of the brain through the heels. He shall first be impaled, then beheaded, then finally drawn and quartered. After which the gentleman will be free, through our great clemency, to go and get himself hanged anywhere he chooses. No more harm will come to him, for I wish to treat him well.

THE PALCONTENTS. Hoy, Mister!

PA UBU. Hornstrumpot! I forgot to consult my Conscience.

He goes back into the lavatory recess. Meanwhile
REBONTIER
escapes,
THE PALCONTENTS
howling and screaming at his heels.
PA UBU
reappears, leading his
CONSCIENCE
by the hand.

ACHRAS, PA UBU,
his
CONSCIENCE.

PA UBU
(to
ACHRAS). Hornstrumpot, Sir! So you refuse to bugger off. Like my Conscience here, whom I can’t get rid of.

CONSCIENCE. Sir, don’t make fun of Epictetus in his misfortune.

PA UBU. The stickabeatus is doubtless an ingenious instrument, but the play has gone on quite long enough and we are in no disposition to employ it today.

With a noise like an engine-whistle
THE CROCODILE
crosses the stage.

The same.
THE CROCODILE.

ACHRAS. Oh, but it’s like this, look you, what on earth is that ?

PA UBU. It’s a boidie.

CONSCIENCE. It’s a most characteristic reptile and moreover
(touching
it) its hands possess all the properties of a snake’s.

PA UBU. Then it must be a whale, for the whale is the most inflated boidie in existence and this animal seems thoroughly distended.

CONSCIENCE. I tell you it’s a snake.

PA UBU. That should prove to Mister Conscience his stupidity and absurdity. We had come to the same conclusion long before he said so: in fact it is a snake 1 A rattler into the bargain.

ACHRAS (
smelling
it). Ouf! One thing’s quite certain, look you, it ain’t no polyhedron.

Ubu Enchained

(Ubu Enchaîné)

Five Acts

Translated
by Simon Watson Taylor

To the several MASTERS
who acknowledged
his sovereignty while he was king
UBU ENCHAINED
offers the homage of
his shackles

PA UBU. - Homstrumpot! We shall not have suceeded in demolishing everything unless we demolish the ruins as well. But the only way I can see of doing that is to use them to put up a lot of fine, well-designed buildings.

CHARACTERS

Ubu Enchatné
remained unperformed until 1937, when ti was presented at the Théâtre de la comédie des Champs-Elysées, Paris, in a production directed by Sylvain Itkine, with sets designed by Mad Ernst and music composed by Frédéric O’Brady.

This translation was first performed by the Traverse Theatre Club, Edinburgh, on September 1st, 1967 with the following cast:

POLICEMEN, WRECKERS, PEOPLE

Directed by Gordon McDougall

Designed by Gerald Scarfe

Lighting by André Tammas

Effects by Ivor Davies

Music and special lighting effects by Mark Boyle and The Soft Machine.

This translation was adapted for radio by Martin Esslin and first broadcast on the BBC Third Programme in July 1967.