Howard Barker: Plays Eleven

1870; Dans le Palais Je; Deep Wives / Shallow Animals; Knowledge and a Girl

Howard Barker

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9781786829696
• eBook ISBN:
  9781786829702
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: British Drama

The latest collection of plays from one of the most celebrated, influential and studied playwrights in the English-speaking world. Howard Barker's plays continue to challenge, unsettle and expose.

Barker's theatre has never sought to reproduce the real world on stage, but 1870 is the first of his plays to be set in Hell. An executed traitor, whose passion for betrayal is akin to a faith, meets other victims of that terrible year in a sordid room. Inevitably they are inspected by God, but in a shape none could have predicted and only he can delight in.

In Dans Le Palais Je, Barker's nihilistic landowner at once establishes a different tone as she survives waves of social unrest and outbids the cruel with her own cruelty. In this chaos, she relies on the delivery of obscure but meaningful words which arrive in sealed envelopes to prepare her for a succession of ordeals.

Deep Wives and Knowledge and a Girl are short pieces, firmly established in the European theatre repertoire. In the first, a revolutionary movement called the Alterations puts a rich woman in the hands of her servants. The body, and its political meanings, is at the heart of this uncanny work, written for two actresses and a mechanical dog. In Knowledge and a Girl, Barker reinterprets the Snow White fable from the perspective of the Stepmother.

DANS LE PALAIS JE

‘They built high walls around themselves, and kept ferocious dogs. Very rarely did they venture out, and it was widely believed they would perish in their solitude, unnoticed and unmourned. But it turned out they survived four plagues, and swarms of bandits who besieged the place eventually gave up. You can see for yourself all the villages are in ruins whereas the great house is intact, and whilst we still know nothing of the occupants, in winter the chimneys smoke, and in summer the peacocks cry, and the fragrance of roses drifts down to us…’

Chian H’si ‘Conversations with Hu’,

Circa 1380

Characters

DEFT	The Owner of a Great Estate
INKLING	A Servant, of 70, Male
BOYS	" " of 19, "
BUTTON	A Female Servant, of 70
AMERICA	" " " of 19
FINLAND	A Neologist
BACKLESS	A Retired Servant, Female
SEDAN	An Arsonist
NUMBER	A Voyeur with Principles
GERMAN	A Flute Player, once an arsonist
ANCIENT	A Redundant Friend, Female
LAZLO	The Son of Deft
CHALK	Father to Lazlo
FLORIST	A Doctor, Husband to Deft
COUGH	A Female Priest and Arsonist
PARIS	" " Poet " "
SLIM	A Midwife
NINE	A Child Servant

The Serial covers 30 years in the life of a woman and a house.

1

A woman seated.

DEFT: I sat under a wall / a twisting wall / my frock was dirty / and my knees / alone I was / alone / alone / always alone / and no mother /

(She tempts pity and abolishes it.)

what a gift from god that was / oh god / oh god / he showered me in privilege /

(She waits.)

and a little skin disease / in case I / just in case I / on some whim / thought of emerging from my solitude /

(And smiles. A servant enters. An envelope in one hand.)

FINLAND: I have a word for you /

DEFT: I’ll have it /

(He goes to her, and extends the envelope. He bows very slightly. DEFT opens the envelope with a finger, removes a sheet of paper on which one word is written, and studies it for some time.)

I have never seen this word / nor heard it spoken /

(FINLAND is gratified. She offers the paper. He takes it. He goes to leave, and stops.)

FINLAND: The meaning is /

DEFT: Thank you / I will guess the meaning for myself /

(FINLAND repeats his slight bow, and withdraws. After a while, DEFT resumes.)

this skin disease for some time I resented / thinking it an evil / and a taint /

(She is wan, briefly.)

at four years old you cannot separate the /

(She ceases. She frowns.)

from the /

(And ceases again. Her fingers drum nervously. She stands abruptly and calls.)

it means dark /

(There is no response.)

dark and /

(She plays with her fingers.)

more than dark / much more / because dark is beautiful and this is not / so /

(She struggles.)

a dark which /

(She frowns.)

a suffocating dark / an appalling and /

(She has arrived at the meaning and calls.)

a filthy dark /

(A second male servant enters, as if summoned. DEFT regards him disdainfully.)

not you /

BOYS: Not me /

(He goes to withdraw, respectfully.)

DEFT: (A swift revision.) You / yes / why not you /

(He bows. She utters the word.)

caliginous /

(BOYS remains trapped in the bow.)

BOYS: I’ll fetch Mr Finland / he /

DEFT: No /

(BOYS suffers.)

BOYS: He was in the scullery / I’ll /

DEFT: No /

(BOYS slowly lifts his head. Time passes. DEFT walks, stops.)

how filthy is the dark /

(BOYS shrugs pitifully.)

how filthy /

BOYS: I /

(He squirms.)

speaking for myself / I /

DEFT: Do that / do th...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Contents
• 1870
• Dans Le Palais Je
• Deep Wives / Shallow Animals
• Knowledge and A Girl
• eCopyright