Idomeneus

Roland Schimmelpfennig, David Tushingham

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781783196487
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: European Drama
• Index: Literature

'A promise is a promise. A promise is a promise.' Idomeneus, King of Crete, has killed his son. Or maybe not. Maybe he's let his son live, but angered the gods in doing so. Or maybe the person he thinks is his son is an imposter. Maybe his real son actually turned into a talking, shape-shifting sea-creature and is back to have a heart-to-heart. Or maybe it's all true, all at once. A kaleidoscope of monsters, mythmaking and sudden, striking humor, Roland Schimmelpfennig's smash-hit Idomeneus details the end of a war between nations and the beginning of a war between reason and superstition. Idomeneus makes a promise to the gods, and what comes next is a fractured, mythic tidal wave, brought to life in an inventively staged quest-story.

1.

A MAN AND A WOMAN,

BOTH NO LONGER YOUNG:

Idomeneus,

King of Crete,

returning home

from Troy,

the city that had fallen

after ten years of war

with his eighty ships

the eighty ships

he’d set out with

ten years before

for Troy

to crush the city and its inhabitants,

FOUR WOMEN, FOUR GENERATIONS:

and with all the men

on those eighty ships

who were still alive

after ten years of war

A DIFFERENT WOMAN AND A DIFFERENT MAN:

Idomeneus

the Cretan King

returning home from Troy

coming home to Crete

is caught

FOUR WOMEN, FOUR MEN:

in a storm,

in a hurricane,

so terrible

that none of the ships

not one of them

none of the eighty

A MAN OF FIFTY:

except the ship belonging to the King himself,

can withstand the towering waves,

just one ship,

ALL:

only one out of eighty,

TWO:

the King’s ship,

ALL:

the others,

all of them,

all the other ships

sink in the storm,

and the men on those ships

drown in the mountainous waves,

A FEW, SPREAD OUT:

the great ships

fill with water the moment they capsize

and then:

ONE:

they hurtle straight down into the deep

dragging a thick veil

of bubbles behind them,

TWO:

and with those ships,

A GROUP:

trapped inside them,

A WOMAN:

the men sink to the bottom

of the sea

THREE WOMEN:

the men, the soldiers, the warriors

but not only them:

the women as well,

the hostages, prisoners,

the slaves,

and children too.

THREE OTHER WOMEN:

All of them struggling, fighting

desperately

hopelessly

helplessly

for their lives, their bare lives,

and dying anyway,

FIVE DIFFERENT PEOPLE:

drowning, perishing –

regardless

young and old. It takes them all.

A MAN:

The King,

no longer young after ten years of war,

Idomeneus,

who has seen many people go to their deaths, a great many,

shouts at the sea,

at God,

TWO WOMEN, ONE MAN:

the storm,

the waves,

these are the last moments

of his life,

he knows.

SIX PEOPLE WHO DON’T UNDERSTAND:

Why is he shouting,

why can’t he make peace

with his fate,

why is there no acceptance,

only anger and wrath?

TWO WOMEN:

This end,

God,

after everything that’s happened?

A MAN:

After everything that’s happened,

is this the end?

THREE PEOPLE WHO HAVE TO GET ON WITH EACH OTHER:

After everything

that’s happened,

after the war,

after waiting in the Trojan horse,

after surviving

and the vast slaughter

how should

how could

the ending make sense?

This ending,

not in the war,

but on the way home,

at sea.

A WOMAN:

The fear,

the fear of dying,

has not changed in those years,

ANOTHER WOMAN:

yes it has:

it has grown,...