WHEN
THE AUDIENCE ENTER, MEDEA IS PERCHED ON A ROCK, HUDDLED IN A
SHAWL.
JASON
IS WRAPPED IN A SHEET.
THE
SOUND OF THE SEA.
MEDEA
STIRS, THEN STANDS, UNCERTAIN WHERE SHE IS OR WHAT’S HAPPENING TO
HER.
SHE CONVULSES, AS THOUGH IN LABOUR OR AS IF SUMMONING SOMETHING
UP.
JASONS’
BODY IS WASHED UP FROM THE SEA.
JASON AND MEDEA SCREAM.
THE IMAGE OF THE BOYS APPEARS ON THE BACKCLOTH.
BOYS
Mother.
Mother.
Why
did you kill us mother?
Why did father leave us?
Don’t you love us mother?
Doesn’t father love us?
MEDEA
Children.
BOYS
We don’t understand mother.
You took away our lives.
We just wanted to live.
MEDEA
Children.
BOYS
We don’t understand.
Tell
us.
Tell us again.
Perhaps this time we’ll understand.
Tell us again.
MEDEA
I’ll tell you.
I’ll tell you again.
Listen.
Listen children
and
try to understand.
It is your father’s wedding day.
Not my wedding day,
not your mother’s wedding day.
Your father’s wedding day.
While
your father celebrates,
I am alone inside the house.
MEDEA
GESTURES A SCREAM OF AGONY.
You, my children,
You are with your teacher – the man who taught you.
He sailed with your father to
he sailed with your father in the Argo
to
win the Golden Fleece
but now that friendship is forgotten.
Your nurse
waits
for you
outside
the house.
You remember your nurse?
My old nurse.
Old and bent.
Waiting for you.
Outside the house.
Listen to what she has to say:
MEDEA BECOMES THE NURSE
NURSE
What is to come?
Oh children
what is to come?
Jason, your father, siezes the Golden Fleece;
Medea,
your mother, helps him win it;
for
love of Jason your mother flees her father and her
homeland;
for
love of Jason your mother kills Pelias, King of Iolcus;
for
love of Jason your mother joins him here in exile
here
in
The people of
an exotic princess from over the seas –
and Jason finds fame through his wife.
But now the marriage is broken.
Jason deserts his wife
deserts his children
takes to bed a new and younger bride,
the daughter of Kreon
King of
Medea cries to the gods how Jason wrongs her.
She takes no food;
she takes no comfort
she cries the names
of her father and homeland,
which she betrayed when she fled with the man
who in turn has betrayed and abused her.
I fear my mistress.
I
fear the violence in her soul,
I fear the workings of her mind.
I know my mistress.
I fear she’ll sharpen the knife
creep to the marriage bed
strike at the new-married bride
or the twice-married groom
and so bring misery to us all.
MEDEA
And then you are there
my children
outside the house
cared for by your teacher.
JASON BECOMES THE TUTOR
TUTOR
Hasn’t the crying finished?
NURSE
The crying has only just started.
TUTOR
There’s more cause for crying still to come.
NURSE
What do you mean old man?
TUTOR
Nothing. Nothing at
all.
NURSE
Don’t keep your news from me.
I’m one to trust.
TUTOR
In the market
where people gather
to talk of the deeds of the powerful
I heard a person say
that Kreon the king will
exile the children
and their mother
from
Whether this is true
I do not know.
I pray the rumour’s false.
NURSE
But Jason,
how could he allow his children
to suffer exile?
Though he’d be glad
to
see their mother sent away.
TUTOR
Old ties give way to new.
Jason cares nothing now for those he once loved.
The promises of a man who seeks power
are easily made
and
easily broken.
NURSE
[TO CHILDREN] Do you
hear?
Do you hear what kind of a father you have?
TUTOR
Keep quiet old woman.
This is not for our mistress to know.
NURSE
I wish Jason was dead.
No.
He’s still our master.
But how can he do this to his children?
Take them inside.
Keep them away from their mother.
I’ve seen her already
her
eyes on fire
as though she’d do them harm
and
nothing will quiet her rage
till
she has claimed a victim.
MEDEA HOWLS FROM THE HOUSE
TUTOR
You hear?
the anger grows in her heart
NURSE
The storm gathers.
Shelter them from the lightning-strike,
keep them from her sight.
THE TUTOR SHEPHERDS THE CHILDREN AWAY
What will she do?
A soul full of wrong
a heart full of pride
and a mind fixed to its purpose.
MEDEA HOWLS FROM THE HOUSE
I pity you, poor creature.
So much hate.
The anger of those in power
puts all of us in danger.
Used to being in control
who can control them?
The passions of the powerful
bring no profit to the people.
MEDEA
The people.
You are the women
the women of
Here is your spokes-woman.
JASON BECOMES THE WOMAN
CHORUS Tell
us, old woman, what has happened?
We hear the cry of the foreign princess.
We are sorry for the sorrows of this home.
NURSE
This is no home.
It is torn apart.
Her husband celebrates his royal wedding,
my mistress weeps in her room.
CHORUS The
cry we heard was a cry for death.
Why wish for death?
The final end comes fast enough.
Your husband plays
in a younger woman’s bed.
It’s a common story,
no cause to cry for death.
Will she come to us out here?
Listen to our words?
We want to help,
to comfort,
as only women can.
Speak gently to her,
bring her out of the house;
hurry
before she harms herself
or those that she loves most.
NURSE
I’ll try,
but I doubt I have the skill to soothe her.
If any come near
her eyes burn
like a lioness guarding her cubs.
Where’s the music to soothe the savage soul?
where’s the music to cure
the bitter grief of death and disaster?
Not in my words, I fear,
but, to please you, I’ll try.
MEDEA ASSUMES HER OWN PERSONA
MEDEA
Women of
I am here –
why am I here? –
in order to be understood.
Those who live quiet lives,
modest lives,
as I do,
may be thought of as distant
or proud.
A foreigner especially
must be careful to be understood.
And I would not wish through lack of care
to offend my neighbours.
But what has happened is so unexpected
it has broken my heart.
I am finished.
I want to die.
It was everything for me to love one man
and he,
my husband,
has turned out wholly vile.
This is your country.
Your family and friends are here.
I have no-one,
I am no-one –
a refugee,
thought of as nothing by my husband –
a prize won in a foreign land.
No mother, no brother, no relation
no refuge in this sea of woe.
So what do I ask?
This:
If I can find the way
to pay my husband back –
my husband,
the
girl he married
and
her father –
for what’s been done to me,
I beg your silence.
At other times women can be fearful,
acquiescent,
and shrink from the sight of the steel blade,
but once wronged in love
we women are allowed such thoughts of blood.
Give me your silence.
CHORUS This
we promise.
We understand, Medea.
You’re right to pay your husband back.
MEDEA
Look!
Kreon approaches,
CHORUS Our
King.
No doubt he has a matter of much importance
to announce.
MEDEA
You never met Kreon, children.
Your father didn’t think it useful
to introduce the sons
of his foreign wife.
JASON ADOPTS THE PERSONA OF KREON
KREON
Medea.
I order you to leave my lands
an exile
with your children.
And to do so straightaway.
I will not return to my home
till you are safe
beyond the borders of my country.
MEDEA
I am lost.
I bear now the full force
of the storm of your hate
and can find no harbour to shelter in.
But why?
Why Kreon?
Why will you banish me?
KREON
I fear you.
I am not ashamed to admit it.
I fear the harm you could do my daughter.
I have ample grounds for my fear.
You’re a clever woman,
well versed in the evil arts.
You’re angry at having lost
&