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Title: A Thousand Years Ago
       A Romance of the Orient

Author: Percy MacKaye

Commentator: Clayton Hamilton

Release Date: July 21, 2019 [EBook #59965]

Language: English

Character set encoding: UTF-8

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A THOUSAND YEARS AGO
A ROMANCE OF THE ORIENT

BY

PERCY MACKAYE

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY

CLAYTON HAMILTON

“Here in China the world lies a-dream, like a thousand

Years ago, and the place of our dreams is eternal”

GARDEN CITY 1914 NEW YORK

DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY

Percy MacKaye, the author of this play, was born in New York City, March 16, 1875—a son of Steele MacKaye. He graduated from Harvard with the class of 1897 and shortly afterward spent two years in Italy and at the University of Leipzig. In 1904 he joined the Cornish (New Hampshire) Colony and has since devoted himself to literary and dramatic work. He is a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters.

Following is a list of his published works:

• The Canterbury Pilgrims: A Comedy.
• The Canterbury Tales of Chaucer.
• Fenris, the Wolf: A Tragedy.
• Jeanne D’Arc: A Tragedy.
• Sappho and Phaon: A Tragedy.
• The Scarecrow: A Tragedy of the Ludicrous.
• Lincoln Centenary Ode.
• Mater: An American Study in Comedy.
• The Playhouse and the Play. Essays.
• A Garland to Sylvia: A Comedy.
• Anti-Matrimony: A Satirical Comedy.
• Yankee Fantasies. Five One-Act Plays.
• To-Morrow. A Play in Three Acts.
• Poems.
• Uriel, and Other Poems.
• The Civic Theatre.
• Sanctuary: A Bird Masque.
• A Thousand Years Ago.

(The play is an original comedy, suggested by the Persian romance in “The Thousand and One Tales,” wherein is recited the adventures of Calaf, Prince of Astrakhan, and the beautiful Princess of China.)

The present play is an original comedy, of which certain elements in the plot have been suggested by the old Persian tale which is the theme of the eighteenth century Italian comedy “Turandotte,” by Carlo Gozzi, translated into German by Friedrich Schiller.

It is not a revision or rewriting of that work.

It is an entirely new play.

Since, however, some modern productions have recently been made in Germany, England and America, under the title of “Turandot,” it is fitting to make clear the relation which my play bears to those and to the older productions of Gozzi and Schiller.

In January, 1762, “Turandotte” by Carlo Gozzi was first acted by the Sacchi company of players at Venice. It was one of a number of “improvised comedies”—or Commedie dell’ Arte Improvisata—composed by Gozzi in his single-handed artistic war against the more naturalistic works of Goldoni, his contemporary.

xThe plots of these comedies, or Fiabe, were derived from nursery or folk-tales. They were acted by masked, or semi-masked players. Their technique was based on the old Italian form of scenari. This form is described by John Addington Symonds, in the Preface to his “Memories of Count Carlo Gozzi,” as follows:

“Comparative study of these scenari shows that the whole comedy was planned out, divided into acts and scenes, the parts of the several personages described in prose, their entrances and exits indicated, and what they had to do laid down in detail. The execution was left to the actors; and it is difficult to form a correct conception of the acted play from the dry bones of its ossatura. ‘Only one thing afflicts me,’ said our Marston in the Preface to his Malcontent: ‘to think that scenes invented merely to be spoken, should be inforcively published to be read.’ And again in his Preface to the Fawne: ‘Comedies are writ to be spoken, not read; remember the life of these things consists in action.’ If that was true of pieces composed in dialogue by an English playwright of the Elizabethan age, how far more true is it of the skeletons of comedies, which avowedly owed their force and spirit to extemporaneous xitalent! Reading them, we feel that we are viewing the machine of stakes and irons which a sculptor sets up before he begins to mould the figure of an athlete or a goddess in plastic clay.

“The scenario, like the plat described for us by Malone and Collier, was hung up behind the stage. Every actor referred to it while the play went forward, refreshing his memory with what he had to represent, and attending to his entrances.”

Written as scenari Gozzi’s acted Fiabe were eminently successful in their day, and established his works as models of a dramatic taste which, toward the last of the eighteenth century, it became the desire of cultivated Germans to introduce into their own country.

With this object in view, Goethe and Schiller selected “Turandotte” as a foreign comedy worthy to be translated and adapted for production at the Weimar Theatre. Accordingly Schiller recast in poetic form a German version of Gozzi’s play, made by Werthes, and produced it at Weimar, in honor of the birthday of the Grand Duchess, wife of Karl August, on January 30, 1804. In details of this recasting he was assisted by Goethe.

xiiThe attempt, however, thus to “elevate the taste of the German public” was not successful.

More than one hundred years later, Dr. Max Reinhardt produced in Berlin a play based on Schiller’s “Turandot” made by Karl Voellmueller. In 1912 an English translation of this version by Jethro Bithell was produced in America by the Shubert Theatrical Company, and after a brief run on the road was withdrawn from the stage. In January, 1913, it was also produced for a short run in London by Sir George Alexander.

Considering the version as it stood to be in need of changes for their purposes, the owners of the American rights requested me to suggest and make the changes. To this I replied that to make alterations or adaptations of the version did not appeal to me, but if the owners would like to give me entire freedom to write a new and original play on the theme of the Persian folk-tale used by Gozzi suitable to the scenic settings of Reinhardt’s production, I should be glad to do so. This freedom was courteously given, and the present play was written in the late spring and early summer of this year, and placed in rehearsal in October.

In writing my play, then, I have used for my own xiiipurposes the folk-tale material treated differently by Gozzi, and in so doing I have entirely reconceived the story and its situations, omitting many characters of the old tale, introducing and creating several new ones, and characterizing all from a fresh standpoint.^[1]

The chief male character of my play, for instance, Capocomico, is wholly new. The name is that which was given to the director or choregus of the old Italian troupes of the Commedia dell’ Arte, concerning which Symonds writes in his Preface before referred to:

“The Choregus was usually the Capo Comico, or the first actor and manager of the company. He impressed his comrades with a certain unity of tone, brought out the talents of promising comedians, enlarged one part, curtailed another, and squared the piece to be performed with the capacities he could control. ‘When a new play has to be given,’ says another writer on this subject, ‘the first actor calls the troupe together in the morning. He reads xivthem out the plot, and explains every detail of the intrigue. In short, he acts the whole piece before them, points out to each player what his special business requires, indicates the customary sallies of wit and traits of humor, and shows how the several parts and talents of the actors can be best combined into a striking work of scenic art.’”

The four “Maskers” of my play, followers of Capocomico, are, of course, my own renderings of the types familiar to the old Italian comedies.

For their dialogue in the introductory scene of this modern comedy in English, I have invented for them (or rather made use of, for the first time, for modern actors) a form of spoken verse suggestive perhaps of the voluble, capricious, unnaturalistic spirit of fantasy common to them: embodied especially in their leader and spokesman, Capocomico.

Needless to say, “A Thousand Years Ago” historically speaking, there were no disciples of the school of la Commedia dell’ Arte to invade old China, but fantasy and comedy are older (and younger) than the schools. As Capocomico himself remarks to Punchinello:

xvTo the stage production of the play Mr. J. C. Huffman has brought the admirable powers of his vital directorship.

The theatrical rights are owned and reserved by the Shubert Theatrical Company, of New York.

The author, in his preface, has explained the pedigree of “A Thousand Years Ago.” It is the chief advantage of long pedigrees that they allure us from the contemplation of the present to the investigation of the past; and, for students of dramatic literature, perhaps the most important feature of this present play is that the tracing of its ancestry leads us back to one of the most interesting periods in the history of the theatre.

In his quotations from John Addington Symonds, the great English authority on the Renaissance in Italy, Mr. MacKaye has already set before us the main features of the Commedia dell’ Arte Improvisata, which flourished in Italy for several centuries; but a few additional notes may be appended for the benefit of those who wish to extend their study of this type of drama. Two books upon the subject are readily accessible and may be strongly recommended. One of these is the “Histoire du Théatre Italien” by Louis Riccoboni, and the other is a volume entitled “Masques et Bouffons” by Maurice Sand, the son of xviiiGeorges Sand, the famous novelist. Both of these books contain interesting illustrations of the stock characters in Italian comedy; and the pictures in “Masques el Bouffons” are reproduced in colors.

The Commedia dell’ Arte attained its climax about the year 1600, but its career was extended well along into the eighteenth century by the interested activity of the very fertile and very popular playwright, Carlo Gozzi. The essential feature of this type of drama was that the lines were improvised by the actors as they worked their way through the scenes of an intrigue which had been carefully plotted in advance. Throughout the seventeenth century in Italy, the general public showed little patience with the Commedia Erudita (the phrase may be translated into contemporary slang as “High-brow drama”), in which the lines were written out by a man of letters and repeated by the actors parrotwise. Such plays, though they might have been composed by poets as eminent as Torquato Tasso, were condemned by the populace because they lacked what seemed the essential element of spontaneity. It will not be difficult for us to understand the attitude of the Italian public toward this distinction, if we apply a similar test to our own contemporary xixart of after-dinner speaking. We demand of our after-dinner speakers that they shall cull their phrases as they go along, and we respond with dulness to a speech that has been evidently written out and learned by rote. The president of one of our great American universities has been quoted as saying that any professor who writes and learns a lecture is merely insulting the printing-press; there can be no advantage in speaking on a subject unless the speaking be spontaneous: and this was the attitude of the old Italian public toward the actors that addressed it from the stage.

A single set sufficed for most of the improvised Italian comedies. This set represented a public square in an Italian town, a meeting-point of several streets; and the houses of the leading characters were solidly built with doors and windows fronting on the square. With the action set in such a public place, the playwright could experience no embarrassment in motivating his entrances and exits; any characters could meet at any time in the neutral ground of the stage; and the practicable doors and windows of the surrounding houses could be employed by acrobatic actors in the exhibition of exciting scenes of elopement or of robbery.

xxOne of the most definitive features of the Commedia dell’ Arte was the fact that, though the plays presented differed greatly from each other in subject-matter and in plot, they invariably employed the same set of characters. The individual actor appeared in many different plays, wearing always the same costume and the same mask. Harlequin made love to Columbine in play after play; the Doctor, from Bologna University, repeated the same sort of pedantries in plot after plot; and the Captain Spavento (a lineal descendant of the Miles Gloriosus of Plautus) swaggered through story after story. Individual actors became so completely identified with the stock characters they assumed upon the stage that they bore in private life the conventional names of their impersonations. A letter is extant which was sent by Henry Fourth of France (the gallant Henri Quatre of Navarre) to a famous actor of Italy inviting him to bring his company to Paris; and this letter is simply addressed to Harlequin, since the royal patron had no knowledge of the actor’s actual name. Similarly, the famous Scarramuccia from whom the immortal Molière learned the rudiments of his craft as a comedian—an actor described in a rhymed chronicle of the time as “le xxiroi des comédiens et le comédien de rois”—has come down to us in history under the title of Scaramouche, with no recollection of his parental name.

The modern stage exhibits many analogies to this identification of an actor with a single rôle. For instance, in the old days of the association of Weber and Fields, these comedians always appeared in precisely the same parts, regardless of any difference of subject-matter in the comic scenes that they presented. Mr. Weber invariably depicted a fat little man who was easily gullible; and the leaner and more strenuous Mr. Fields was forever getting the better of him and using him as a butt for ridiculous persecution. At the present time, Mr. William Collier approaches very nearly the method of the old Italian actors. Regardless of the particular points of any play in which he chooses to appear, he always represents precisely the same character—a perennial dramatization of his individual traits as a comedian; and he also habitually exercises the Italian actor’s license of improvisation in the presence of an assembled audience.

Five of these standard acting types of the Commedia dell’ Arte are revivified by Mr. MacKaye in his new play on Gozzi’s old theme. The most interesting xxiifigure is the Capocomico—the leader of the troupe, who devises the scenari of the plays which they present and rehearses the other actors in the business of their respective parts. This creation of the author’s is an evocation of a famous figure from a nigh-forgotten page of the storied past of the theatre, and may serve easily as a starting point for a series of very interesting researches undertaken by individual students of the history of the drama.

Though Mr. MacKaye’s play has been written appropriately in English verse, aptly varied in its forms to be spoken by the modern actor, the reader should remember that this drama is designed to appeal more emphatically to the eye than to the ear. It should be regarded as a modification of that type of Decorative Drama which was exhibited by Professor Reinhardt in his masterly production of the pantomime of “Sumurûn.” For his background, Mr. MacKaye has chosen an old tale of the Arabian Nights which is hung before the eye as a fantastic bit of oriental tapestry; and in the foreground he has exhibited in silhouette the sharper colors of the prancing figures of his group of Italian comedians.

More subtly, this play may be conceived as a xxiiiparabolic comment on a problem of the theatre at the present time. The histrionic disciples of Carlo Gozzi, the eighteenth century champion of traditional romance, are depicted as having lost their fight in Venice against the dramatist Goldoni, who, as a follower of Molière, was regarded at that time as the leader of the realistic movement; and, despairing of being accepted any longer in the country of their birth, these romantic outcasts have sought refuge in the distant orient, an orient to be considered in no sense as historic or realistic, but as purely fantastic. At the present time, our theatre has been conquered (for the moment) by sedulous recorders of the deeds of here and now; we find the drama in the throes of a new realism, more potent in its actuality than the tentative and groping realism of Goldoni; and our romantic playwrights, like these old adventurous and tattered histrions of Carlo Gozzi, have recently sought refuge in the fabulous and eye-enchanting orient. Hence the success, in recent seasons, of such romantic compositions as “Kismet” and “Sumurûn” and “The Yellow Jacket.” To escape from the obsession of Broadway and the Strand we now turn eagerly to the gorgeous east, just as these discarded comedians of Gozzi’s sought xxiva new success within the enchanting and alluring gates of the city of Pekin.

Furthermore, by restoring to our stage the old European tradition of masks in his group of “Maskers,” Mr. MacKaye flings a prophetic shaft in the age-long tourney between symbolism and naturalism in the arts of the theatre.

Outside a city gate, at Pekin.

Above the gate, in a row, severed heads of young men are impaled on stakes. On the wall, at one side, more heads of older men, with grizzled locks, stare down: among them, conspicuous, one with a white beard.

It is early morning; the sun just rising.

The gate is closed.

From behind is heard barbaric martial music.

Outside, from the right, drums roll, and Chinese soldiers enter, accompanied by a few beggars and peasants.

Pausing before the gate, they sound a trumpet.

The gate is opened and they pass within, followed by all, except two beggars, a young man and a middle aged.

The gate remains open.

The middle-aged beggar points upward at the head with the white beard.

The younger starts, and prostrates himself beneath it with a deep cry.

8Outside, on the left, a twanging of stringed instruments sounds faint but merry. It draws nearer, and quickly the players come running on—five tattered, motley vagabonds in masks: Scaramouche, Harlequin, Punchinello, Pantaloon and Capocomico.

The last, leading them with his baton, stops in the gateway, before which Harlequin executes a ballet-step dance, while Scaramouche, Pantaloon, and Punchinello play accompaniment on guitar, mandolin and zither.

Breaking off, Punchinello begins to improvise an imitation of Harlequin’s dance, but being beaten over his hump with a thwacking stick by Harlequin, retreats with grotesque pantomime.

At their merriment, the younger beggar, rising, draws away with the elder, making a tragic gesture toward the white-bearded head on the wall.

Perceiving them, Capocomico silences the musicians and approaches the younger beggar curiously.

Stepping between them, the older beggar salaams and asks alms.

Laughing, Capocomico turns his empty pouch wrong-side-out and bows obsequiously, extending his own palm.

The other Maskers do likewise, sticking out their tongues.

9Shrinking from them, the younger beggar draws the older away with him, and goes off, left.

[Waving them adieu]

[Turning to his troupe]

[Bowing to each]

[Pointing]

[Staring up at the heads]

[Striking their instruments and running through the gate, they all disappear within. As their tinklings die away, the two beggars reënter, from the left]

[Prostrating himself again before the white bearded head, rises with up-lifted arms]

[Furtively]

[Distractedly]

[Taking from his bosom a withered rose, he looks on it rapturously]

[Smiling]

[Rising]

[They draw toward the gate. Barak, starting fearfully, drags Calaf away left]

[On the edge of the scene, they crouch by the wall, like beggars. Through the gate enter Altoum amid Chinese courtiers, accompanied by Capocomico and followed by the other Maskers]

[To Capocomico]

[Pointing to the gate]

[To Calaf]

[He leads Capocomico away from the curtain, right. Calaf follows furtively, heedless of Barak’s gestures]

[Pointing at the wall]

[To Barak, who implores him to draw back]

[Drawing him away]

[They go within the gate]

[Looking at the gate]

[Distractedly]

[A deep bell sounds within the walls. Calaf reënters with Barak]

[To Calaf]

[To Capocomico]

[Nodding loftily]

[He extends his hand for Altoum’s crown. Altoum, startled, smiles, takes it off and hands it to him]

[Putting on the crown]

[Bows, laughing]

[Turning to the Chinese courtiers, he beckons them]

[Nodding affably]

[With murmurs of astonishment, prostrate themselves before Capocomico]

28[The courtiers salaam before Scaramouche, who puts his hand on his heart and blows them a kiss from his drawn sword-point]

[The courtiers repeat. Harlequin replies with a ballet-curtsy]

[The courtiers repeat. Pantaloon shuffles nervously]

[The courtiers repeat. Punchinello, tapping his nose, bows sagely. The four Maskers assume toploftical airs and gather about Capocomico]

[Quickly]

[Harlequin dances to the gate]

[Correctively]

[To Scaramouche]

[Gasping]

[To all]

[To the intermittent toll of the deep gong, soldiers enter with procession to slow, 30martial music. Amongst them, with regalia, a Headsman bears on a pike the head of a young man, which he places beside the others over the gate.

Finally, accompanied by female slaves, comes Turandot, dressed like her followers in garb of gloomy splendor.

In the crowd Calaf gazes at her passionately. With him is Barak.

The Chinese courtiers prostrate themselves.

The Maskers bow in European fashion]

[Speaks familiarly to the emperor]

[Looking with wonder at Capocomico and the Maskers]

[He points to the new head upon the wall]

32[Pointing to the Maskers]

[To her slaves]

[Turandot starts to return within the gate. Pushing through the crowd, Calaf 33prostrates himself before her, with a passionate cry]

[Reaching toward her, Calaf holds up the withered rose.

Gazing, Turandot pauses an instant, moves past, but, looking back, staggers, trembling]

[Swaying, she swoons in the arms of her slave, Zelima]

[Rushing toward her, with Altoum]

[Faintly, recovering]

34[To Capocomico]

[Taking it, astounded]

[She goes out]

[Going with her]

[All follow after, and at a gesture from Capocomico, pass out. Near the gate the Maskers pause and wait for Capocomico, who returns to Calaf]

[Calaf staggers to his feet]

35[Taking it, Calaf falls again to the ground. Barak comes to him.

Capocomico watches, and beckons, twinkling, to the Maskers]

[Surreptitiously, he takes from Calaf’s side a wallet. Then beckons the Maskers.]

[He departs with the Maskers]

[With solicitude]

[He raises him to a sitting posture]

[Dazedly]

[Rising]

[With suddenness]

[Pointing to the heads on the gate, he rushes into the city.]

[Following him]

Scene I: A Room in the Harem

On a low bench Zelima is sealed, sewing a gorgeously embroidered garment. About her are other female slaves.

At the back stands Chang, the chief Eunuch.

[Stops sewing and listens]

[Opening the door, left]

[He goes out, closing the door. Zelima sews for a moment; then rises, puts away her needle and spreads out the garment, surveying it.

From the right Turandot enters, splendidly arrayed.

She runs impetuously to Zelima and embraces her]

[Affectionately]

[Pressing her left side]

[Frightened]

[Laughing]

[Concernedly]

[With conscientious pause]

[Dubiously]

[Slapping Zelima’s arm]

[Helping her on with the embroidered garment]

[Chang enters, left, in perturbation. Turandot looks up inquiringly]

[Fidgetting]

[Appalled]

[Staring]

[Entering, left]

[To Zelima, who runs with the other slave girls toward the door, right]

[Dressed in robes of royal splendor, Capocomico stands smiling at them]

[To Chang]

[Chang pauses, dubious, but at a gesture from Capo, departs hastily. Zelima goes timorously to Turandot, whose eyes flash]

[Smiling]

[With sudden start]

[Faintly]

[Zelima goes out, right with the slave girls]

[He takes out Calafs wallet, and holds it toward her.]

[Starting]

[Slowly takes it, peering in]

[Reticent]

[No longer suppressing her feelings, she kisses the wallet passionately.]

[Passionately]

[Appalled]

[Detaining him by a swift gesture]

[Bows, smiling]

Why, that’s my specialty.

[Slowly, with desperation.]

On either side is a high tower, with entrance.

Down scene on the left stands the Emperor’s throne, opposite the throne of Turandot.

As the curtain rises, Scaramouche, Punchinello, Pantaloon, and Harlequin enter, dragging in Barak by four purple ropes attached to his neck.

Barak carries a ragged bundle.

At the centre he falls, prostrating himself before them.

The four Maskers are dressed sumptuously in Chinese garments, worn over their own tattered garbs of motley, which—at times, when they gesticulate or move abruptly,—are fantastically visible.

[Revolving himself fearfully]

[Harlequin thwacks Barak on the head with his flat-stick]

[Tightening his rope]

[As Harlequin bangs him again]

[Enter, left, Capocomico]

[Fearfully clutching his bundle]

[The four begin to drag him out with the ropes]

[Mocking him]

[Pulling]

[Crying aloud]

[They drag him out, left]

[Stands meditating]

[Hardly have they disappeared, when Calaf enters hastily, looking about him with a startled expression. He is dressed in princely regalia, and his face is shaved. Seeing Capo., he pauses abruptly, and makes obeisance]

[Embarrassed]

[With a flitting smile]

[Turning to leave]

[Pausing, with a faint start]

[With slow emphasis]

[Calmly]

[Fidgetting slightly]

[With a quick glance]

[Smiling, as they go out]

[Enter Altoum and Chang. They look after Capo as he departs]

[Obsequiously]

[Capo reënters, right]

[Salaaming to a gesture of dismissal from Altoum]

[Exit]

[Greets Capo cordially]

[Laughing]

[Eagerly]

[Kettledrums are sounded within]

[Attending him, left]

[They go out.

To the sound of kettledrums, tambourines and music outside, the scene is now for a moment empty. Then from both entrances two processions enter simultaneously.

From the right enter Eunuchs and female slaves of the harem; from the left Chinese soldiers and courtiers of the Emperor’s suite.

With ceremonial, salaaming and flare of music, the persons in the processions group themselves on either side about the thrones.

65Entering last in their separate processions come Turandot and Capocomico—the latter accompanied by Altoum, as a subordinate.

On the right throne Turandot sits, on the left—Capocomico.

All the others prostrate themselves, except Altoum, who stands beside a lesser seat, at the right of Capo’s throne.

Having taken their positions, at a signal from Capo, all are served with tea in little cups, which they sip simultaneously thrice, then resume their former obeisances.

To this gathering now enter three of the Maskers—Scaramouche, Punchinello and Pantaloon—bearing severally three golden platters, on which stand little jeweled boxes, closed.

Behind them follows Harlequin, who bears a great parchment roll, which—with bows and ballet-dancings—he lays before the throne of Capo; then takes his stand at Capo’s left.

Lastly Calaf enters, alone.

66Bowing to the throne, he remains in the centre, where he gazes rapt at Turandot.

Capo now rises, and Altoum seats himself]

[He sits. Harlequin, stepping forward with a flourish, presents the roll of parchment to Punchinello, who, exchanging with him his platter for the script, reads in a shrill voice]

[Harlequin receives back the roll from Punchinello, and resumes his place]

[Standing forward]

[In a low voice]

[His eyes meeting Turandot’s, who looks at him anxiously]

[Closing his eyes, he waits with a faint smile]

[Turandot gazes pityingly. Calaf speaks with closed eyes]

[Turandot starts suddenly from her throne and sinks back, whispering to Zelima. Capo despatches Harlequin to Turandot, who gives him tremblingly a key, which he carries to Scaramouche]

[As Harlequin unlocks the little box on his platter and presents to him a strip of parchment from within it, reads aloud]

[A murmur runs through the assembly]

[With a gesture for silence]

[With emotion]

[Her eyes flashing]

[To Zelima]

72[To Calaf]

[Calaf remains silent, pressing his closed eyes in thought. Altoum leans forward. The people mutter low. Turandot gazes disdainfully. Soon, letting his raised hands fall, Calaf speaks with tense calmness.]

[Cries out]

[Clutching Zelima’s arm]

[Harlequin unlocks the little box held by Punchinello, who reads aloud]

[A great murmur goes up from the assembly]

[Rising, fiercely]

[To Altoum]

[Smiling]

[Trembling with rage]

[Who has stood in utter calmness]

[In fury]

75[Clutching her throne, she speaks with voice quivering]

[A deep hush falls on the assembly. Calaf stands, silent, swaying.

Slowly he totters and falls on the steps of Capo’s Throne.

There, as Harlequin raises him, Capo whispers swiftly at his ear. Suddenly then, fixing his eyes on Turandot, who stands pale and rigid, Calaf speaks thrillingly.]

[With a low cry, holding her side]

[To Harlequin]

[Swiftly Harlequin unlocks the box held by Pantaloon, who reads aloud]

[Turning, desperately]

[Screaming]

[Snatching from Zelima a little dagger, she lifts it and strikes at her own breast. Leaping to the throne, Calaf intercepts her and turns the dagger against himself]

[Amid uproar, the four Maskers rush upon Calaf and wrest from him the dagger]

[With fierce disdain]

[Uplifting his hands to Capo]

[To Calaf]

[Scornfully to Capo]

[To Calaf]

[Trembling with rage]

[Descending swiftly from the throne]

[Flinging her sceptre at Capo’s feet, she rushes out]

[Rising]

[At his gesture, the four Maskers follow after. Amid loud murmur and commotion Calaf stands staring at the empty throne]

^[2]Scene I: An anteroom in the harem. Night.

In the centre of the columned room is a table, on which—softly illumined—stands a large crystal bowl, filled with swimming gold fishes.

Nearby, Turandot sits weeping, Zelima beside her. Outside, the shrill voice of Punchinello is heard singing to the twang of stringed instruments:

[Savagely]

[Singing together outside]

[Going to the door, puts her head out]

[She returns to Turandot. The twanging outside decreases, but still continues]

[Nodding]

[Sings outside to the instruments]

[Wildly]

[Opening the door]

[Outside]

[Pushing past Zelima, enter the room bearing bright Chinese lanterns, and singing in chorus]

[Joined by Harlequin, they pause together before Turandot and, pointing simultaneously their left toes, strike sharply their instruments with a sweeping bow]

[Harlequin draws back]

[Mysteriously]

Who’s found?

[Darkly]

[Chafing]

[In a loud whisper]

[Sepulchrally]

[Faintly]

[Speaks at her ear]

[Nodding]

[Who has entered behind them]

[Bitterly]

[Quietly]

[Glancing quickly]

[Indulgently]

[The four Maskers, bowing, withdraw to the background, where they are entertained by Zelima, whom they instruct to play upon their instruments with a low strumming]

[Capo takes from his sleeve a small vial and hands it to Turandot]

[After a pause, gives a sudden cry of joy]

[Searchingly]

[Calls, beckoning]

[Turandot looks puzzled, and then turns and stands back to back with Harlequin. Capo measures their heights with his flattened hand. They separate and Capo indicates Harlequin]

[With a questioning glance at Turandot]

[Growing suddenly radiant]

[Smiling]

[Ardently]

[She seizes Capo’s hand and kisses it. He laughs softly]

[Rising, he reaches his arms with a low cry]

[Entering in the dimness]

[Staring at him for a moment]

[Eagerly]

[Calaf moves out of the deeper shadow. Capo tips Calaf’s face upwards, examining it]

[Nods approvingly]

[He lies on the couch. A far chiming is heard]

[Capo steals out. Calaf closes his eyes and is still. The room is silent and dim. After a few moments, out of 99the darkness there emerges, scarlet and pied, the Figure of Harlequin, who tiptoes toward the couch. At a sigh from Calaf, the Figure starts back, returning more reticently. Again Calaf murmurs in his sleep:]

[Standing in a shaft of vague light, the Figure of Harlequin lifts cautiously a vial and, unstopping it, dances softly three times around the divan; then pauses close to Calaf, who murmurs once more]

[Chants in a low voice]

[Bending above the dreaming form of 100Calaf, the Figure sprinkles from the vial upon his lips; then draws back and listens]

[Murmurs louder in his sleep]

[Laughing silverly]

[Starting up on the divan]

[Lifting a mandolin strung from the shoulder, strikes a swift chord and bounds away toward the door]

[Leaping to the floor, and following]

101[The Figure pauses]

[The Figure takes a timid step forward, and stops]

[He springs toward the door. The Figure tries to pass him but, thwarted, leaps back]

102[At the door he turns the key and takes it]

[The Figure draws away. He strides toward it. It escapes]

[He starts again toward the Figure. It dances away from him, striking the strings of its mandolin. Round the great couch and about the shadowy room he pursues it, ever eluding him. Suddenly he pauses, and stares]

[Desperately, he throws himself down by 103the couch, burying his face against it. After a moment, the Figure approaches, cautious, surveys his prone form closely, bends as if to snatch at his robe, but draws back and stands hesitant; then with a gesture half frightened removes its mask, and speaks low]

[Turning, Calaf slowly staggers to his feet, gazing with awe on the face of Turandot]

[He kneels before her]

[Rising]

[Amazed]

[Struggling with herself]

[Holding out the key, gazes at her]

[Reaches for it, but pauses and turns back her hand, screening her face]

[In hushed triumph]

[Closing her eyes]

[Reaching his arms passionately, he kisses her]

[Starting back, with a cry]

[Giving her the key]

[She hastens toward the door. Grasping her arm, his eyes glow passionately]

[Inexorably he compels her. She sinks on the couch]

[Trembling]

[Shrinking from his gesture]

[Seizing her]

[With fearful appeal]

[Drawing back amazed]

[Clasping her]

[Repulsing him]

[She rushes into the dark. Calaf reaches—groping—with a wild cry.]

The scene is the same as the second act, scene second, except that the back of the great hall of the emperor’s Divan is now hidden by a decorated curtain. The assembly is gathered as before: Capocomico, Turandot and Altoum seated on their larger and lesser thrones.

Before them, Harlequin, Scaramouche, Punchinello and Pantaloon are performing a dance.

At its conclusion Capocomico rises, and addresses the Maskers.

[Dismissing them with a gesture, he turns toward Altoum]

[Rising from his lesser place]

[Pointing to his seat]

[As they pass each other to change places, Altoum speaks to Capo in lower voice]

[Bending from her throne]

[He goes to her side. She speaks to him low]

[Excitedly]

[Pointing toward the entrance, he goes to the lesser throne. With music of their stringed instruments, the four Maskers usher in Calaf, haggard and dishevelled. Turandot starts, with a cry and look of bewilderment at Capo. Capo addresses Altoum and the Divan]

[Stepping forward fiercely]

[Amid commotion]

[Startled]

[Rising, wrathful]

[Brokenly]

[Trying unsuccessfully to salaam]

[Behind his hand chiding them]

[Giving a sign to Harlequin, who runs out, he turns to Altoum]

[At his gesture, Punchinello and Pantaloon run to the curtain at back]

[Punchinello and Pantaloon draw the curtain, revealing an oriental altar, with idol, beside which stand two priests]

[Reënter Harlequin, bringing in Barak, who rushes to Calaf and embraces him]

[Overwhelmed]

[To Zelima]

[Before whom Harlequin presents three tokens]

[Leading Calaf bewildered before Turandot]

[Taking from Barak his old cloak]

[Calaf turns in wonder and kneels to her. She bends and embraces him. A great gong resounds]

[Presenting his crown to Altoum]

[Bowing Venetian]

[Giving it to him]

[Tossing his gorgeous emperor’s cloak to Harlequin, he springs away in his tattered motley]

[Calls after him]

[Kissing to her and Calaf the withered rose]

129In the acted performance of this play, the third act commences with a scene which sets forth, wholly in pantomime, a dream of Turandot, representing—by suggestions of mystic light and sound—the state of her distracted mind, trying to solve the riddle of Keedur Khan.

The pantomime takes place in two imaginative settings—a mountain top and an oriental street—blending the one into the other.

Out of darkness first appears the outline of the dark summit, against a blue-gray radiance of sky. Etched upon this Zelima enters, like a shadow-phantom, beckoning. Following her to strange music Turandot appears, unsubstantial as shadow, painted opaque on the glowing background, like some silhouetted, featureless figure on an ancient vase, imbued as by magic with motion and antique gesture.

Bowing in awe above the brink of darkness, the figure of Turandot is led downward (and forward) into obscuring mists, tinged with green lights and gules. Out of the mist, voices—shrill, bizarre, bell-toned, menacing, mysterious—echo the words: “Khan, Keedur Khan, Khan, Khan!”

While the female forms grope below, the figure of Capocomico now appears on the summit, beckoning to his four maskers, whose shadow-forms gesticulate weirdly toward Turandot.

Through the interpretive music, the teasing words of the riddle are chanted by the varied voices, amid strange hiatuses filled with mocking laughter.

130Lastly, alone, appears the shadow form of Calaf, who follows the Maskers downward into the mist, searching with arms outgroped toward Turandot.

There, as the unreal forms pass and disappear, the silhouette of Capocomico stands fluting on the mountain top, while below echoes the basso and falsetto laughter of the Maskers, and the low taunting cry: “Keedur Khan!”

As this tableau shuts in darkness, there comes vaguely to light in the foreground a street scene. Here, at a gateway, beggars with yokes are huddled; before the gate, a moving frieze of dream figures, noiseless, pass fantastically: Chinese soldiers, high stepping; Turandot again, downcast, gliding like a captive with Zelima; Calaf, swift searching in pursuit; the Maskers, lithe, grotesque, pointing after him; rearguarded by Capocomico—blithely dominant in gesture, triumphant with fantasy.

Last of the dream images he also fades in darkness, out of which rise the merry strains of a chorus:

and Turandot, sobbing beside Zelima on her bench in the harem, awakes from her haunting dream of Keedur Khan.

Zelima bends over her.

“Alas, my lady, what ails you? You cried in your swoon!”

The merry voices of the Maskers outside sing louder.

“Oh, I have dreamed, Zelima! Drive them away!”

Thus follows the first spoken scene of Act Third, as here printed.

As acted, the stage management and lighting of this pantomime have been movingly devised by Mr. J. C. Huffman.

Here in description its visionary quality can only be suggested.

131

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