A Gray Play Book by Alasdair Gray sampler

CAPTAIN Full steam ahead!
SOUND of louder engine thuds as backcloth slides left, bringing
summit of lighthouse and tops of sailing boats in from right. These
too slide off left leaving plain blue ocean horizon. The sky darkens.
Distant. SOUND of low thunder.
CAPTAIN [loudly] Mr Mate!
MATE [head rising from hatch] Sir?
CAPTAIN A storm coming up. Batten down everything
you can.
MATE [descending] Aye aye sir.
SOUND: wind and slapping waves. The horizon is hidden by crests
of high froth-capped waves resembling Hokusai’s. If the deck can
be made to rock like a see-saw it increasingly does so: if not the
wheel starts rocking as if the deck did. The captain clings to it.
Louder SOUNDS of wind, splashing waters, thunder, then loud
off-stage cries of terror.
The MATE’s head appears.
MATE [shouting over the noise] The crew are panicking, sir!
CAPTAIN [wrestling with wheel] Praying is the only thing
they can do! This bloody wind’s – hitting us – from every
corner – of the compass – it’s no canny! Order every
man – to cry for help – to every God they have!
MATE’s head disappears.
SOUND: [offstage cries] Adonai help us! Zeus forgive me!
Dagon Dagon Dagon, spare me! O save us Poseidon!
[etcetera]
MATE [head reappears shouting] Everyone’s praying but the
passenger, Captain!
CAPTAIN Why not?
MATE He’s sound asleep and snoring!
CAPTAIN In this din? That’s no canny either – have him
up here!
SOUND: more wind, thunder, cries of prayer.
JONAH struggles on to the deck, grabs the stay-rope for support.
CAPTAIN Pray, damn you!
JONAH [desperate] Useless! God hates me! You’ll all drown
if you don’t fling me overboard!
CAPTAIN We’ll drown if I leave this wheel.
JONAH Please! Tell your men to do it!
CAPTAIN [enraged] Are you totally gutless?
JONAH [gazing upward] Help! O help!
He jumps into the sea. The waves subside. The wheel comes
upright. SOUND: thunder stops, wind fades. The MATE climbs
on deck.
CAPTAIN [gruffly] There you are. Take the wheel. I’ve never
seen the like of that before.
MATE [taking his place at the wheel] I thought we were done
for that time. Where’s the passenger?
CAPTAIN He’s certainly done for, but he wasn’t a coward
at the end.
3: A DARK INTERIOR
Total darkness.
SOUND: faint regular thumps, enough to suggest a beating heart
before human moaning starts.
JONAH O ... O! O! O, what happened? Where am I? Not
under water. Able to breathe, good, but oof, this place
stinks of fish. Feel ... around. Floor ... not hard, not soft,
not cold, not hot, not wet but not quite dry. How wide? ...
Floor bends up into wall ... into ceiling. No room to stand,
hardly room to move, but [rapidly] don’t panic don’t panic
I am alive with room to breathe good good good so think!
Think hard. [with deliberate slowness] I do not know where I
am but the only thing wrong with the place is a fishy stink.
And darkness. Faint sound like heart beats – submarine
engine? And I got in so there must be a way out. [sighs] I
wish I could see! Wait a minute, match box! Match box in
waterproof tobacco pouch. Good ... Good, it is still here.
So time to strike a light.
A mournful glutinous or bubbling voice with a slight echo is heard
clearly, but as if from a distance.
THE FISH Don’t dare do that.
JONAH Who are you? And why not?
THE FISH I am your host and I don’t want my guts singed.
JONAH You mean I’m inside a – O! O! O! [his moans start
mounting to a scream].
THE FISH Be quiet or I’ll digest you.
JONAH [after silence, sharply] Why don’t you digest me?
THE FISH He won’t let me.
JONAH Who is He?
THE FISH Him who feeds me better meals, usually.
JONAH And made you save me? O God my God!
In a glad voice he chants –
I am cast into the deep in the midst of the seas:
Your floods surround me, billows and waves pass over
the head
of me in dark waters deep under the roots of mountains!
with weeds wrapped around my head,
yet you have saved my life from corruption, yes!
19
A PUPPET
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