Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (6 page)

Beat
.

ROS
: Who was that?

OUIL
: Didn't you know him?

ROS
: He didn't know me.

GUIL
: He didn't see you.

ROS
: I didn't see him.

GUIL
: We shall see. I
hardly
knew him. he's changed.

ROS
: You could see that?

GUIL
: Transformed.

ROS: HOW
do you know?

GUIL
: Inside and out.

ROS
: I see.

GUIL
: He's not himself.

ROS
: He's changed.

GUIL
: I could see that.

Beat
.

Glean what afflicts him.

ROS
: Me?

GUIL
: Him.

ROS: HOW?

GUIL
: Question and answer. Old ways are the best ways.

ROS
: He's afflicted.

GUIL: YOU
question, I'll answer.

ROS
: He's not himself, you know.

GUIL
: I'm him, you see.

Beat
.

ROS
: Who am I then?

OUIL
: You're yourself.

ROS
: And he's you?

GUIL
: Not a bit of it.

ROS
: Are you afflicted?

GUIL
: That's the idea. Are you ready?

ROS
: Let's go back a bit.

GUIL
: I'm afflicted.

ROS
: I see.

GUIL
: Glean what afflicts me.

ROS
: Right.

GUIL
: Question and answer.

ROS: HOW
should
I
begin?

GUIL
: Address me.

ROS
: My dear Guildenstern!

GUIL
(quietly)
: You've forgotten—haven't you?

ROS
: My dear Rosencrantz!

GUIL
(great control):
I
don't think you quite understand. What we are attempting is a hypothesis in which / answer for
him
, while
you
ask me questions.

ROS
: Ah! Ready?

GUIL
: You know what to do?

ROS
: What?

GUIL
: Are you stupid?

ROS
: Pardon?

GUIL
: Are you deaf?

ROS
: Did you speak?

GUIL
(admonishing):
Not now

ROS
: Statement.

GUIL
(shouts)
: Not now!
(Pause.)
If I had any doubts, or rather hopes, they are dispelled. What could we possibly have in common except our situation?
(They separate and sit.)
Perhaps he'll come back this way.

ROS
: Should we go?

GUIL
: Why?

Pause
.

ROS
(starts up. Snaps fingers):
Oh! You mean—you pretend to be
him
, and / ask you questions!

GUIL
(dry):
Very good.

ROS
: You had me confused.

GUIL
: I could see I had.

ROS
: How should I begin?

GUIL
: Address me.

They stand and face each other, posing
.

ROS
: My honoured Lord!

GUIL
: My dear Rosencrantz!

Pause
.

ROS
: Am I pretending to be you, then?

GUIL
: Certainly not. If you like. Shall we continue?

ROS
: Question and answer.

GUIL
: Right.

ROS
: Right. My honoured lord!

GUIL
: My dear fellow!

ROS
: How are you?

GUIL
: Afflicted!

ROS
: Really? In what way?

GUIL
: Transformed.

ROS
: Inside or out?

GUIL
: Both.

ROS
: I see.
(Pause.)
Not much new there.

GUIL
: Go into details.
Delve
. Probe the background, establish the situation.

ROS
: So—so your uncle is the king of Denmark?!

GUIL
: And my father before him.

ROS
: His father before him?

GUIL
: No, my father before him.

ROS
: But surely——

GUIL: YOU
might well ask.

ROS
: Let me get it straight. Your father was king. You were his only son. Your father dies. You are of age. Your uncle becomes king.

GUIL
: Yes.

ROS:
Unorthodox.

GUIL
: Undid me.

ROS
: Undeniable. Where were you?

GUIL
: In Germany.

ROS
: Usurpation, then.

GUIL:
He slipped in.

ROS
: Which reminds me.

GUIL
: Well, it would.

ROS
: I don't want to be personal.

GUIL
: It's common knowledge.

ROS
: Your mother's marriage.

GUIL
: He slipped in.

Beat
.

Ros
(lugubriously):
His body was still warm.

GUIL
: So was hers.

ROS
: Extraordinary.

GUIL
: Indecent.

ROS
: Hasty.

GUIL
: Suspicious.

ROS
: It makes you think.

GUIL
: Don't think I haven't thought of it

ROS
: And with her husband's brother.

GUIL
: They were close.

ROS
: She went to him

GUIL
: —Too close

ROS
: —for comfort

GUIL
: It looks bad.

ROS
: It adds up.

GUIL
: Incest to adultery.

ROS
: Would you go so far?

OUIL
: Never.

ROS: TO
sum up: your father, whom you love, dies, you are his heir, you come back to find that hardly was the corpse cold before his young brother popped onto his throne and into his sheets, thereby offending both legal and natural practice. Now why exactly are you behaving in this extraordinary manner?

GUIL
: I can't imagine!
(Pause.)
But all that is well known, common property. Yet he sent for us. And we did come.

ROS
(alert, ear cocked):
I say! I heard music

GUIL
: We're here.

ROS
: —Like a band—I thought I heard a band.

GUIL
: Rosencrantz . . .

ROS
(absently, still listening)
: What?

Pause, short
.

GUIL
(gently wry):
Guildenstern. . .

ROS
(irritated by the repetition): What?

GUIL
: Don't you discriminate at all?

ROS
(turning dumbly)
: Wha'?

Pause
.

GUIL
: Go and see if he's there.

ROS
: Who?

GUIL
: There.

ROS
goes to an upstage wing, looks, returns, formally making his report
.

ROS
: Yes.

GUIL
: What is he doing?

ROS
repeats movement
.

AOS
: Talking.

GUIL
: To himself?

ROS
starts to move
,
GUIL
cuts in impatiently
.

Is he alone?

ROS: NO.

GUIL
: Then he's not talking to himself, is he?

ROS
: Not
by
himself. . . . Coming this way, I think.
(Shiftily.)
Should we go?

GUIL
: Why? We're marked now.

HAMLET
enters, backwards, talking, followed by
POLONIUS
,
upstage
,
ROS
and
GUIL
occupy the two downstage corners looking upstage
.

HAMLET
: . . . for you yourself, sir, should be as old as I am if like a crab you could go backward.

POLONIUS
(aside):
Though this be madness, yet there is method in it. Will you walk out of the air, my lord?

HAMLET
: Into my grave.

POLONIUS
: Indeed, that's out of the air.

HAMLET
crosses to upstage exit
,
POLONIUS
asiding unintelligibly until

My lord, I will take my leave of you.

HAMLET
: You cannot take from me anything that I will more willingly part withal—except my life, except my life, except my life. . . .

POLONIUS
(crossing downstage):
Fare you well, my lord.
(To
ROS
:) You go to seek Lord Hamlet? There he is.

ROS
(to
POLONIUS
) : God save you sir.

POLONIUS
goes
.

GUIL
(calls upstage to
HAMLET
) : My honoured lord!

ROS
: My most dear lord!

HAMLET
centred upstage, turns to them
.

HAMLET
: My excellent good friends! How dost thou Guildenstern?
(Coming downstage with an arm raised to
ROS, GUIL
meanwhile bowing to no greeting
,
HAMLET
corrects himself. Still to
ROS
:) Ah Rosencrantz!

They laugh good-naturedly at the mistake. They all meet midstage, turn upstage to walk
,
HAMLET
in the middle, arm over each shoulder
.

HAMLET
: Good lads how do you both?

BLACKOUT

HAMLET, ROS
and
GUIL
talking, the continuation of the previous scene. Their conversation, on the move, is indecipherable at first. The first intelligible line is
HAMLET
'
s, coming at the end of a short speech—see Shakespeare Act II, scene ii
.

HAMLET
: S'blood, there is something in this more than natural, if philosophy could find it out.

A flourish from the
TRAGEDIANS
'
band
.

GUIL
: There are the players.

HAMLET
: Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore. Your hands, come then.
(He takes their hands.)
The appurtenance of welcome is fashion and ceremony. Let me comply with you in this garb, lest my extent to the players (which I tell you must show fairly outwards) should more appear like entertainment than yours. You are welcome.
(About to leave.)
But my uncle-father and aunt-mother are deceived.

GUIL
: In what, my dear lord?

HAMLET
: I am but mad north north-west; when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw.

POLONIUS
enters as
GUIL
turns away
.

POLONIUS
: Well be with you gentlemen.

HAMLET
(to
ROS
): Mark you, Guildenstern
(uncertainly to
GUIL)
and you too; at each ear a hearer. That great baby you see there is not yet out of his swaddling clouts. . . .
(He takes
ROS
upstage with him, talking together.)

POLONIUS
: My Lord! I have news to tell you.

HAMLET
(releasing
ROS
and mimicking):
My lord, I have news to tell you. . . . When Roscius was an actor in Rome . . .

ROS
ccmes downstage to rejoin
GUIL.

POLONIUS
(as he follows
HAMLET
out)
: The actors are come hither my lord.

HAMLET
: Buzz, buzz.

Exeunt
HAMLET
and
POLONIUS.

ROS
and
GUIL
ponder. Each reluctant to speak first
.

GUIL
: Hm?

ROS
: Yes?

GUIL
: What?

ROS
: I thought you . . .

GUIL: NO.

ROS
: Ah.

Pause
.

GUIL
: I think we can say we made some headway.

ROS
: You think so?

GUIL
: I think we can say that.

ROS
: I think we can say he made us look ridiculous.