The Book of Everything: the play

Richard Tulloch

• Publisher: Currency Press
• Year: 2017
• Topic: Literature
• eBook ISBN:
  9781760620684
• Subtopic: Drama
• Index: Literature

Thomas is nine and he's started writing a book. His father says all important books are about God. Even so, Thomas writes down all the interesting things he sees that other people seem to ignore: tropical fish in the canal, a deluge of frogs, the Son of God popping in for a chat...He also writes down his greatest determination: When I grow up, I'm going to be happy.Featuring Jesus, the angels, the Bottombiter, the startling Mrs Van Amersfoort and a beautiful girl with a leather leg, this is a totally magical story about a child learning to act when faced with fear and injustice.Adapted from the novel by Guus Kuijer.

ACT ONE

PROLOGUE

Cheerful music, suggesting a Dutch street organ.

THOMAS sits by a window, writing on the cover of a new exercise book.

THOMAS: The Book of Everything, by Thomas Klopper, aged nine … [crossing it out and writing again] nearly ten. Address: Breughelstreet 16, Amsterdam, Holland, Europe, Northern Hemisphere, Earth, Solar System, Galaxy, Universe, Space. Year: 1951.

Cheerful music.

My family. There are four people in my family. Me, Thomas Klopper, aged nearly ten, Pappa, who is my father. His name is Mr Abel Klopper.

FATHER enters the acting area, strides stiffly across it and leaves.

My mother is called Mamma, Mrs Klopper and Jannie. She is very kind to everybody.

MOTHER crosses the stage, pausing to give a small present to someone in the audience.

My sister is Margot and she is sixteen.

MARGOT flounces across the acting area.

Margot is stupid.

MARGOT stops and turns on Thomas, threatening him, then exits.

My neighbours.

AUNTIE PIE wobbles on, riding a bicycle.

Auntie Pie always rides a bike, even in the rain. She has been riding for forty-eight years, but she is not very good at it.

AUNTIE PIE and her bike wobble off. The sound of a crash offstage.

Next door to us lives a witch. Her name is Mrs van Amersfoort and she always wears black dresses.

MRS VAN AMERSFOORT crosses. She is dressed in black and a little eccentric, muttering to herself as she walks.

Mrs van Amersfoort gets teased a lot, because she is a witch.

Two children enter and start teasing her, walking behind her and imitating her gait. MRS VAN AMERSFOORT exits too.

The scariest thing in our neighbourhood is the Bumbiter.

The BUMBITER, a large vicious dog, springs into the acting area.

He’s a dog that dashes down our street, big and wild and mean. Nobody knows where he comes from—he’s just there. And he bites you on the bottom!

The BUMBITER, played by the actor playing FATHER, runs around snarling, trying to bite the bottoms of the children, played by the rest of the cast. They scatter in terror, hands covering their backsides.

The BUMBITER snarls, lost and alone in the space, then he too exits.

SCENE ONE

THOMAS: [to the audience] I don’t know why, but I see things that nobody else can see. I write them all down in my book, The Book of Everything. Like today, a day in summer in 1951, when I saw a terrible hailstorm in Jan van Eyckstreet. In the middle of summer!

There is a crash of thunder and a violent hailstorm starts.

Watching actors make the storm with a series of hand slaps, a gathering crescendo alarming THOMAS.

Mamma! Mamma!

He puts his hands over his ears. He runs home as MOTHER enters.

MOTHER: What is it, Thomas?

THOMAS: Winter’s here!

MOTHER: Really? How did you get that idea?

THOMAS: I saw it, a big hailstorm. The leaves were blasted off the trees.

MOTHER: Thomas, look—the trees are all still green.

THOMAS: The trees here are green. But round the corner in the Jan van Eyckstreet all the leaves have been ripped off. The whole street is covered in them!

MOTHER is a little concerned.

MOTHER: If you say so, Thomas.

She ruffles his hair and leaves.

THOMAS: Mamma doesn’t believe I saw it, but I know I did! There is something a bit weird about me. When I grow up I’m going to be a …

FATHER...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Playwright’s Biography
• Author’s Note
• First Production
• Characters, Setting and Style
• The Book of Everything
• Copyright Details