Howard Barker: Plays Ten

Howard Barker

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9781786824219
• eBook ISBN: 9781786824226
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Theatre

The tenth collection of plays by Howard Barker, one of the most significant and controversial dramatists of our time. His plays challenge, unsettle and expose. Plays Ten comprises the plays Ahno, Distance, Critique of Pure Feeling, Irrespective, Immense Kiss, Exquisite. In Ahno, A Prince of Now, a youthful dictator is revealed as simultaneously revolutionary and reactionary, in politics and in love. His shocking efforts to create a new social order are mirrored in his unconventional passion for a seventy-five year old woman, who along with his devoted commissar, a group of fanatical priests, and a disturbingly perceptive Dalmatian, make up a menacing court of activists. In Exquisite, Barker's theme is the ethical ambiguity of slavery. In a dimly feudal setting, but constantly referring to our time, unsolved murders decimate a stable community. The protagonist, a loyal and uncritical serf, declines to speculate on the cause, whilst at the same time possessing the power to put an end to it. His ambiguous relationship with authority, and his refusal to quarrel with his own status, reveals Barker's heretical manner with moral platitudes. Alongside full-scale and even epic dramas, Barker has always written short works for small casts. In Distance he views the horrors of The Great War from an unusual perspective, that of the mother of a killed son, who arrives at her own philosophy of mourning. In Irrespective, a reclusive intellectual – in his final years – finds himself pestered for moral teaching by a wretched populace which has hitherto ignored him. In Critique of Pure Feeling, an old woman, sceptical of love but not of property, finds herself recklessly participating in an erotic duel. Immense Kiss, one of Barker's most terrible visions, takes place as an army enters a besieged city, where a young conscript, discovering a woman abandoned in a room, finds himself stretched between longing and civility.

AHNO

Characters

AHNO	A Prince of Now
APRON	His Mother
FALLA	His Lover
IRASH	His Servant
A MURDERER	Of 8 Children
STRAPP	A General Practitioner
PRITTY	A Commissar of Ahno
ECZEMAS	A Former Teacher of Ahno
BURNOW	A Novice
CASTOR	“ ”
LIEVENS	“ ”
QUARTZ	A Girl Off Remand
JUTLAND	A Clever Child
ATTENDANT
GUARD
UNDERTAKER
A HOUND

A single chair, unoccupied.

APRON: Lay a finger on that boy I’ll blind you / lay a finger / lay a finger / lay a finger on that boy /

(She laughs, shaking her head.)

I’ll blind you /

(A man enters, grey and distinguished.)

lay a /

(Her laughter consumes her.)

lay a /

(The man sits.)

finger on that boy I’ll /

(She chokes. Her shoulders shake.)

blind you /

(She recovers.)

AHNO: You were the best /

APRON: Was I /

AHNO: The best /

APRON: Was I /

AHNO: I didn’t know it at the time /

APRON: At the time /

AHNO: At the time I didn’t /

APRON: At the time /

(She smiles wanly.)

at the time /

AHNO: It isn’t possible /

APRON: No /

AHNO: To know things at the time /

APRON: (Suddenly.) Lay a finger on that boy /

AHNO: And if it were /

APRON: Lay a finger /

AHNO: If it were possible /

APRON: Lay a finger on that boy /

AHNO: It’s not obvious to me /

APRON: (Coolly.) I’ll blind you /

AHNO: It would be /

(He lacks the word, briefly.)

beneficial /

(They are silent for a time.)

I dislike the beneficial /

(And waits.)

bene /

bene /

(His smile is pained.)

bene-everything I hate /

(A woman marches in. She stops. She seems resolute.)

FALLA: My husband has to know /

(AHNO regards her dispassionately.)

I say know / how could he know /

(She bites her lip in her anxiety.)

not know / not know / of course he cannot know /

(She looks boldly at AHNO.)

he can however / be informed /

(AHNO’S gaze is unaltered. He does not assist her.)

for forty years we have / my husband and I /

AHNO: Forty-seven /

(FALLA is rebuked and resents it.)

FALLA: For forty-seven years we have /

(She stops.)

I so dislike you / so / so / so dislike you /

(And proceeds.)

lived in perfect amity / telling and hearing / hearing and forgiving / his tolerance / his generosity /

(She stops abruptly.)

I saw your fingers move /

(Her lips go tight.)

impatience made your fingers move /

AHNO: (In his own time.) Inform him /

(FALLA collects herself, lowers her head once and gathers up her skirts as if to leave.)

your appetite for cruelty is no more sordid than his pleasure in enduring it /

(She stares witheringly. He does not flinch.)

I daresay /

(She cannot move. He cannot cease.)

and he must be thinking / ‘she’s 74 / the era of forgiving has drawn to a close / no more sobbing in the mirthless corridors of the great house / it’s birds’ eggs now / birds’ eggs and opera scores’ /

(He throws back his head and laughs. The laugh is genuine.)

go and inform /

(They stare.)

watch him go down like a stricken ship / and then return / return and strip for me / pristine your garments / a froth from which you step perfect /

(He is visibly moved in h...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Ahno
• Exquisite
• Irrespective
• Distance
• Immense Kiss
• Critique of Pure Feeling