The Grain Store (NHB Modern Plays)

Natal'ya Vorozhbit, Sasha Dugdale

• Publisher: Nick Hern Books
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781788502306
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: European Drama
• Index: Literature

Ukraine 1929. As Stalin launches the first of his Five-Year Plans, a closeknit rural community stands unwittingly in the path of his drive to create a thriving socialist Soviet Union. The outcome is catastrophic.

What begins for the people of the village as an amusingly alien concept rapidly becomes an unstoppable force for change. Robbed first of their land, then their religion and independence, the whole country soon becomes engulfed by a tragedy that will scar a nation for generations.

Natal'ia Vorozhbit's play The Grain Store was first staged in this English translation by Nina Raine by the Royal Shakespeare Company at the Courtyard Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, in 2009.

'A grim subject, but this extraordinary play by Natal'ya Vorozhbit tackles it, in Sasha Dugdale's translation, with passion, intelligence and cunning' - Guardian

'A disturbing vision of socialist dogma degenerating into corrosive megalomania' - Evening Standard

ACT ONE

16 August 1929

Peasant Feodosii’s yard.

A long wooden table in the cherry orchard, with benches on either side.

The table groans under the weight of the feast: weeping sliced melons, piping-hot potatoes, freshly dug vegetables, fried meat.

There is no one at the table and only the pretty flies are hanging over the food. They buzz and make lazy landings on it.

Everyone is sitting with their backs to the table, watching the AGITATORS’ performance.

They are performing a play, titled: FOR THE FEAR OF GOD!

On the imaginary stage there is a poster with a large icon pictured on it.

IVAN IVANYCH.

Will wonders never cease!

Mary from her icon speaks!

From all around they dodge and weave,

To look the icon in the teeth.

The AGITATORS enter, playing peasants. They take it in turns to pray before the speaking icon.

PEASANT. O Lord, grant me health, and grant my wife and children health, too!

ICON.

Pay me lots and lots and lots,

In no time at all you’ll be strong like an ox!

PEASANT GIRL. My beloved no longer loves me. Lord, what should I do?

ICON. A few coins should do the trick.

PEASANT.

And my cow, help me, Mary, please –

She has a fungus on her knees.

ICON. If that’s true, a note or two…

AGITATOR.

But along comes an atheist.

He pulls back the icon.

And behind it, the priest and his wife are counting money –

PRIEST’S WIFE.

This’ll go on lace and trim,

This on spoons and such.

AGITATOR.

The priest gives his wife a knocking-about,

And there she is: all stretched out –

That’s the last he’ll hear from her!

He hides the money under his skirts,

To keep him a while in drink and girls.

AGITATOR.

Good people, hear my word:

There is no Lord!

Take heed,

Comrades, friends,

And for all your needs,

Ask the Soviet!

The YOUNGER PEOPLE giggle and clap the ACTORS. The OLD WOMEN cross themselves quietly.

FEODOSII looks sternly at his daughter MOKRINA, who is laughing together with everyone else.

GOROBETS. They’re good, those actors! Could be talking about our priest’s wife.

SAMSON. Bless her memory…

SAMSON crosses himself three times. MASHA, an agitator, who has been giving him little glances, notices this.

MASHA. Hey, you, big fellow, do you cross yourself when you’re in bed with a woman, too?

SAMSON. Better believe it! Three times before and three after. And I make the sign of the cross on her. Like putting pepper on my soup, it’s that natural.

MASHA. Well, just so you know, I like pepper and all.

She shoots long looks at SAMSON with her beautiful eyes.

GOROBETS. Look at that, Samson, you’ve made an impression on their actress. Aren’t you a lucky boy…

SAMSON. Ah, she can go to the Devil for all I care, God forgive me. As long as I’m well fed, it’s all the same to me, an actress or an old hunchback. No, you tell me this, Gorobets, is it true that the new powers-that-be are going to knock down all the churches and build red towers in their place?

GOROBETS. Heaven forbid!

GOROBETS spits three times over each shoulder.

Handsome ARSEI, who is standing next to MOKRINA, begins flirting with her.

ARSEI. Mokrina, when you grow up we’ll run away with the agit-brigades. See the whole of Soviet Ukraine!

MOKRINA. Tsk! I’m not going anywhere with you.

ARSEI. But I thought you loved me?

MOKRINA. Like a dog loves a whip.

ARSEI. Well then?

MOKRINA. You haven’t asked them, Arsei.

ARSEI. I spoke to the man in charge. He promised to take me.

MOKRINA. I’m scared.

ARSEI. Of me? Kilina isn’t scared.

MOKRINA. Ha! Well, you take your Kilina with you, then!

MOKRINA gets up and runs away, angry and hurt.

ARSEI. Oh, come on! I was joking! I don’t want any old Kilina!

MOKRINA runs away from ARSEI and runs onto the improvised stage by mistake. IVAN IVANYCH seizes her around the waist.

IVAN IVANYCH. And now this pretty little lassie is going to tell us everything she knows about God and about collective farms.

MOKRINA squeals and tries to escape.

MOKRINA. Oh Lord, let me go…

IVAN IVANYCH. ‘Lord’, is it? No, my name is Ivan Ivanych. So, child, you tell me, does God exist?

MOKRINA (still shy, but slyly peeping at him with black eyes). Someone do away with Him, did they?

The CROWD laughs.

IVAN IVANYCH (laughing). Course they did. Soviet power.

MOKRINA. Did they ask God first?

IVAN IVANYCH. Sent Him a letter. But the letter came back unopened. So He can’t exist, seeing as He never read the letter.

MOKRINA. Maybe He just didn’t want to read it, when He saw it was from you.

The CROWD and the AGITATORS burst into laughter.

IVAN IVANYCH. Or maybe He couldn’t read?

MOKRINA. You’d be better off praying to Him and not writing.

IVAN IVANYCH (kindly). Such a pretty, clever little lassie, and she says such silly things. Never mind. I’ll be back in a year or two. What will you say then?

MOKRINA. I’ll wish you your good health, Ivan Ivanych.

IVAN IVANYCH. And I wish you yours, my beauty. What can we have from you, then? Can you sing?

OLD WOMAN. Sing for us, Mokrina.

EVERYONE. Sing for us.

MOKRINA, pensive, begins singing a sad song which doesn’t seem to fit the cheerful mood, the laughter and the feast on the table.

MOKRINA (singing).

Woe, woe, woe to the seagull,

O seagull, poor unhappy bird,

She who wove her nest, laid her eggs,

By the well-trod road.

Where some young travelling merchants,

There did stop to graze their oxen,

And did chase the gull away,

Stole her little children.

The seagull rose and there did circle,

Then down to the road did hurtle,

To the damp, cold earth she falls,

To the men she calls.

‘Oh, most kind and noble merchants,

Still so young, no more than children,

Give back my little chickens,

My own little children.’

‘No, you shall not ever see them,

Nor fold them close, no, I’ll not yield,

For you’ll gather them about you,

And fly off to the field.’

‘I will never fly away,

I’ll stay here, oh, I will stay,

Here to watch over your oxen,

To mind my little children.’

‘Fly, unhappy seagull, fly,

To the far green hills, fly,

For your children’s necks are broken,

And in my pot they lie.’

‘My children’s slim necks are broken,

Dead in your pot they lie,

Then may your oxen sicken,

Sicken all and die.

May you know no journey’s end,

May your travels last for ever,

For my children are dead,

Lost to me for ever.’

Everyone enjoys MOKRINA’s singing. Especially ARSEI. And especially the youngest agitator, YURKO. He looks at her with pleasure and interest. MOKRINA ends her song, looking sadly into the distance, as if, at her thirteen years, she knows something more than the others. Some are saddened, some sigh, IVAN IVANYCH smiles.

IVAN IVANYCH. So, whose are you, then?

FEODOSII (with well-rehearsed pride). Mine, that is. She’s the smartest girl in the class, mine is. She’s only thirteen, but she’s already got a few lads after her. Still, I won’t be giving her away in marriage. Not until she’s done her learning and grown up proper.

MOKRINA (outraged). Dad!

MOKRINA runs from the stage, covering her face with her hands. YURKO runs onto the stage and, in order to change the mood, launches into a jaunty foot-stamping chechetka.

The livestock return to the yard: cows, horses, goats and sheep. They are sleek and good to look at. The woman of the house sprinkles salt on bread and feeds her favourite cow.

The shepherd sits at the table and eats his fill after a long day at work.

* * *

A hospital ward. A...