by Tom Stoppard
ALEXANDER: Is there anything you can do?
DOCTOR: Certainly. (Producing a red pill box from the drawer.) Suck one of these every four hours.
ALEXANDER: But he’s a raving lunatic.
DOCTOR: Of course. The idea that all the people locked up in mental hospitals are sane while the people walking about outside are all mad is merely a literary conceit, put about by people who should be locked up. I assure you there’s not much in it. Taken as a whole, the sane are out there and the sick are in here. For example, you are here because you have delusions, that sane people are put in mental hospitals.
ALEXANDER: But I am in a mental hospital.
DOCTOR: That’s what I said. If you’re not prepared to discuss your case rationally, we’re going to go round in circles. Did you say you didn’t play a musical instrument, by the way?
ALEXANDER: No. Could I be put in a cell on my own?
DOCTOR: Look, let’s get this clear. This is what is called an Ordinary Psychiatric Hospital, that is to say a civil mental hospital coming under the Ministry of Heath, and we have wards. Cells is what they have in prisons, and also, possibly, in what are called Special Psychiatric Hospitals, which come under the Ministry of Internal Affairs and are for prisoners who represent a special danger to society. Or rather, patients. No, you didn’t say, or no you don’t play one?
ALEXANDER: Could I be put in a ward on my own?
DOCTOR: I’m afraid not. Colonel—or rather Doctor—Rozinsky, who has taken over your case, chose your cell- or rather ward-mate personally.
ALEXANDER: He might kill me.
DOCTOR: We have to assume that Rozinsky knows what’s best for you; though in my opinion you need a psychiatrist.
ALEXANDER: You mean he’s not really a doctor?
DOCTOR: Of course he’s a doctor and he is proud to serve the State in any capacity, but he was not actually trained in psychiatry as such.
ALEXANDER: What is his speciality?
DOCTOR: Semantics. He’s a Doctor of Philology, whatever that means. I’m told he’s a genius.
ALEXANDER: (Angrily) I won’t see him.
DOCTOR: It may not be necessary. It seems to me that the best answer is for you to go home. Would Thursday suit you?
ALEXANDER: Thursday?
DOCTOR: Why not? There is an Examining Commission on Wednesday. We shall aim at curing your schizophrenia by Tuesday night, if possible by seven o’clock because I have a concert. (He produces a large blue pill box.) Take one of these every four hours.
ALEXANDER: What are they?
DOCTOR: A mild laxative.
ALEXANDER: For schizophrenia?
DOCTOR: The layman often doesn’t realize that medicine advances in a series of imaginative leaps.
ALEXANDER: I see. Well, I suppose I’ll have to read War and Peace some other time.
DOCTOR: Yes. Incidentally, when you go before the Commission try not to make any remark which might confuse them. I shouldn’t mention War and Peace unless they mention it first. The sort of thing I’d stick to is ‘Yes’, if they ask you whether you agree you were mad; ‘No’, if they ask you whether you intend to persist in your slanders; ‘Definitely’, if they ask you whether your treatment has been satisfactory, and ‘Sorry’, if they ask you how you feel about it all, or if you didn’t catch the question.
ALEXANDER: I was never mad, and my treatment was barbaric.
DOCTOR: Stupidity is one thing I can’t cure. I have to show that I have treated you. You have to recant and show gratitude for the treatment. We have to act together.
ALEXANDER: The KGB broke my door and frightened my son and my mother-in-law. My madness consisted of writing to various people about a friend of mine who is in prison. This friend was twice put in mental hospitals for political reasons, and then they arrested him for saying that sane people were put in mental hospitals, and then they put him in prison because he was sane when he said this; and I said so, and they put me in a mental hospital. And you are quite right—in the Arsenal’naya they have cells. There are bars on the windows, peepholes in the doors, and the lights burn all night. It is run just like a gaol, with warders and trusties, but the regime is more strict, and the male nurses are convicted criminals serving terms for theft and violent crimes, and they beat and humiliate the patients and steal their food, and are protected by the doctors, some of whom wear KGB uniforms under their white coats. For the politicals, punishment and medical treatment are intimately related. I was given injections of aminazin, sulfazin, triftazin, haloperidol and insulin, which caused swellings, cramps, headaches, trembling, fever and the loss of various abilities including the ability to read, write, sleep, sit, stand, and button my trousers. When all this failed to improve my condition, I was stripped and bound head to foot with lengths of wet canvas. As the canvas dried it became tighter and tighter until I lost consciousness. They did this to me for ten days in a row, and still my condition did not improve.
Then I went on hunger strike. And when they saw I intended to die they lost their nerve. And now you think I’m going to crawl out of here, thanking them for curing me of my delusions? Oh no. They lost. And they will have to see that it is so. They have forgotten their mortality. Losing might be their first touch of it for a long time.
(DOCTOR picks up his violin.)
DOCTOR: What about your son? He is turning into a delinquent.
(DOCTOR plucks the violin EGBDF.)
He’s a good boy. He deserves a father.
(DOCTOR plucks the violin…)
SCHOOL
TEACHER: Things have changed since the bad old days. When I was a girl there were terrible excesses. A man accused like your father might well have been blameless. Now things are different. The Constitution guarantees freedom of conscience, freedom of the press, freedom of speech, of assembly, of worship, and many other freedoms. The Soviet Constitution has always been the most liberal in the world, ever since the first Constitution was written after the Revolution.
SACHA: Who wrote it?
TEACHER: (Hesitates) His name was Nikolai Bukharin.
SACHA: Can we ask Nikolai Bukharin about papa?
TEACHER: Unfortunately he was shot soon after he wrote the Constitution. Everything was different in those days. Terrible things happened.
CELL
ALEXANDER has just started to read ‘War and Peace’ and IVANOV looks over his shoulder.
IVANOV: ‘Well, prince, Genoa and Lucca are no more than the private estates of the Bonaparte family.’
(ALEXANDER is nervous, and IVANOV becomes hysterical but still reading.)
‘If you dare deny that this means war—’
(ALEXANDER jumps up slamming the book shut and the orchestra jumps into a few bars of the ‘1812’. IVANOV holds ALEXANDER by the shoulders and there is a moment of suspense and imminent violence, then IVANOV kisses ALEXANDER on both cheeks.)
Courage, mon brave!
Every member of the orchestra carries a baton in his knapsack! Your turn will come.
OFFICE
DOCTOR: Next!
(ALEXANDER goes into the OFFICE.)
Your behaviour is causing alarm. I’m beginning to think you’re off your head. Quite apart from being a paranoid schizophrenic. I have to consider seriously whether an Ordinary Hospital can deal with your symptoms.
ALEXANDER: I have no symptoms, I have opinions.
DOCTOR: Your opinions are your symptoms. Your disease is dissent. Your kind of schizophrenia does not presuppose changes of personality noticeable to others. I might compare your case to that of Pyotr Grigorenko of whom it has been stated by our leading psychiatrists at the Serbsky Institute, that his outwardly well adjusted behaviour and formally coherent utterances were indicative of a pathological development of the personality. Are you getting the message? I can’t help you. And furthermore your breath stinks of aeroplane glue or something—what have you been eating?
ALEXANDER: Nothing.
DOCTOR: And that’s something else—we have n
ever had a hunger strike here, except once and that was in protest against the food, which is psychologically coherent and it did wonders for the patients’ morale, though not for the food….
(Pause.)
You can choose your own drugs.
You don’t even have to take them.
Just say you took them.
(Pause.)
Well, what do you want?
ALEXANDER: (Flatly, not poetically)
I want to get back to the bad old times when a man got a sentence appropriate to his crimes—ten years’ hard for a word out of place, twenty-five years if they didn’t like your face, and no one pretended that you were off your head. In the good old Archipelago you’re either well or
dead—
And the—
DOCTOR: Stop it!
My God, how long can you go on like that?
ALEXANDER: In the Arsenal’naya I was not allowed writing materials, on medical grounds. If you want to remember things it helps if they rhyme.
DOCTOR: You gave me a dreadful shock. I thought I had discovered an entirely new form of mental disturbance. Immortality smiled upon me, one quick smile, and was gone.
ALEXANDER: Your name may not be entirely lost to history.
DOCTOR: What do you mean?—it’s not me! I’m told what to do.
Look, if you’ll eat something I’ll send for your son.
ALEXANDER: I don’t want him to come here.
DOCTOR: If you don’t eat something I’ll send for your son.
(Pause.)
You mustn’t be so rigid.
(ALEXANDER starts to leave.
Pause.)
Did the pills help at all?
ALEXANDER: I don’t know.
DOCTOR: Do you believe that sane people are put in mental hospitals?
ALEXANDER: Yes.
DOCTOR: They didn’t help.
ALEXANDER: I gave them to Ivanov. His name is also Ivanov.
DOCTOR: So it is. That’s why Colonel or rather Doctor Rozinsky insisted you shared his cell, or rather ward.
ALEXANDER: Because we have the same name?
DOCTOR: The man is a genius. The layman often doesn’t realize that medicine advances in—
ALEXANDER: I know. I have been giving Ivanov my rations. He needed a laxative. I gave him my pills.
(ALEXANDER leaves.)
DOCTOR: Next!
(IVANOV enters immediately, with his triangle, almost crossing
ALEXANDER.
IVANOV is transformed, triumphant, awe-struck.)
Hello, Ivanov. Did the pills help at all?
(IVANOV strikes his triangle.)
IVANOV: I have no orchestra!
(Silence.)
IVANOV indicates the silence with a raised finger. He strikes his triangle again.)
DOCTOR: (Suddenly) Wait a minute!—what day is it?
IVANOV: I have never had an orchestra!
(Silence.
The DOCTOR, however, has become preoccupied and misses the significance of this.)
DOCTOR: What day is it? Tuesday?
(IVANOV strikes the triangle.)
IVANOV: I do not want an orchestra!
(Silence.)
DOCTOR: (Horrified) What time is it? I’m going to be late for the orchestra!
(The DOCTOR grabs his violin case and starts to leave. IVANOV strikes his triangle.)
IVANOV: There is no orchestra!
DOCTOR: (Leaving) Of course there’s a bloody orchestra!
(Music—one chord. IVANOV hears it and is mortified. More chords. The DOCTOR has left.)
IVANOV: (Bewildered) I have an orchestra.
(Music.)
I’ve always had an orchestra.
(Music.)
I always knew I had an orchestra.
(Music.
ALEXANDER has gone to sit on his bed. IVANOV sits in the DOCTOR’s chair. The DOCTOR joins the violinists. SACHA moves across towards IVANOV.
The music continues and ends.)
IVANOV: Come in.
SACHA: Alexander Ivanov, sir.
IVANOV: Absolutely correct. Who are you?
SACHA: Alexander Ivanov, sir.
IVANOV: The boy’s a fool.
SACHA: They said to come, sir. Is it about my father?
IVANOV: What’s his name?
SACHA: Alexander Ivanov, sir.
IVANOV: This place is a madhouse.
SACHA: I know, sir.
Are you the doctor?
IVANOV: Ivanov! Of course. Sad case.
SACHA: What’s the matter with him?
IVANOV: Tone deaf. Are you musical at all?
SACHA: No, sir.
IVANOV: What is your instrument?
SACHA: Triangle, sir.
Is it about that that I’m here?
IVANOV: Certainly, what else?
SACHA: Drum, sir.
IVANOV: What?
SACHA: Don’t make me stay! I’ll go back in the orchestra!
IVANOV: You can be in mine.
SACHA: I can’t play anything, really.
IVANOV: Everyone is equal to the triangle. That is the first axiom of Euclid, the Greek musician.
SACHA: Yes, sir.
IVANOV: The second axiom! It is easier for a sick man to play the triangle than for a camel to play the triangle. The third axiom!—even a camel can play the triangle! The pons asinorum of Euclid! Anyone can play the triangle no matter how sick!
SACHA: Yes, sir— (Crying.)—please will you put me with Papa?
IVANOV: (Raving) The five postulates of Euclid!
A triangle with a bass is a combo!
Two triangles sharing the same bass is a trio!
SACHA: Are you the doctor?
IVANOV: A trombone is the longest distance between two points!
SACHA: You’re not the doctor.
IVANOV: A string has length but no point.
SACHA: (Cries) Papa!
IVANOV: What is the Golden Rule?
SACHA: Papa!
IVANOV: (Shouts) A line must be drawn!
SACHA runs out of IVANOV’s light and moves into the orchestra among the players. The next four of SACHA’s speeches, which are sung, come from different positions as he moves around the orchestra platform. There is music involved in the following scene.
SACHA: (Sings) Papa, where’ve they put you?
(ALEXANDER’s ‘poems’ are uttered rapidly on a single rhythm.)
ALEXANDER: Dear Sacha, don’t be sad,
it would have been ten times as bad
if we hadn’t had the time we had,
so think of that and please be glad.
I kiss you now, your loving dad.
Don’t let them tell you I was mad.
SACHA: (Sings) Papa, don’t be rigid!
Everything can be all right!
ALEXANDER: Dear Sacha, try to see
what they call their liberty
is just the freedom to agree
that one and one is sometimes three.
I kiss you now, remember me.
Don’t neglect your geometry.
SACHA: (Sings) Papa, don’t be rigid!
Everything can be all right!
ALEXANDER: Dear Sacha, when I’m dead,
I’ll be living in your head,
which is what your mama said,
keep her picture by your bed.
I kiss you now, and don’t forget,
if you’re brave the best is yet.
SACHA: (Sings) Papa, don’t be rigid!
Be brave and tell them lies!
CELL
SACHA: (Not singing) Tell them lies. Tell them they’ve cured you.
Tell them you’re grateful.
ALEXANDER: How can that be right?
SACHA: If they’re wicked how can it be wrong?
ALEXANDER: It helps them to go on being wicked. It helps people to think that perhaps they’re not so wicked after all.
SACHA: It doesn’t matter. I want you to come home.
> ALEXANDER: And what about all the other fathers? And mothers?
SACHA: (Shouts) It’s wicked to let yourself die!
(SACHA leaves.)
The DOCTOR moves from the orchestra to the SCHOOL.
DOCTOR: Ivanov!
ALEXANDER: Dear Sacha—
be glad of—
kiss Mama’s picture—
good-bye.
DOCTOR: Ivanov!
(IVANOV moves to CELL.)
Ivanov!
(SACHA moves towards the SCHOOL.)
ALEXANDER: (Rapidly as before)
Dear Sacha, I love you,
I hope you love me too.
To thine own self be true
one and one is always two.
I kiss you now, adieu.
There was nothing else to do.
SCHOOL
SACHA arrives at SCHOOL. DOCTOR is there.
TEACHER has remained near the desk.
TEACHER: Sacha. Did you persuade him?
SACHA: He’s going to die.
DOCTOR: I’m not allowed to let him die.
SACHA: Then let him go.
DOCTOR: I’m not allowed to let him go till he admits he’s cured.
SACHA: Then he’ll die.
DOCTOR: He’d rather die than admit he’s cured? This is madness, and it’s not allowed!
SACHA: Then you’ll have to let him go.
DOCTOR: I’m not allowed to—it’s a logical impasse. Did you tell him he mustn’t be so rigid?
SACHA: If you want to get rid of Papa, you must not be rigid!
DOCTOR: What shall I tell the Colonel? He’s a genius but he can’t do the impossible.
(Organ music. The COLONEL’s entrance is as impressive as possible. The organ accompanies his entrance.
The DOCTOR moves to meet him. The COLONEL ignores the DOCTOR. He stops in front of ALEXANDER and IVANOV. When the organ music stops the COLONEL speaks.)
CELL
COLONEL: Ivanov!
(ALEXANDER and IVANOV stand up.)
(To IVANOV.) Alexander Ivanov?
IVANOV: Yes.
COLONEL: Do you believe that sane people are put in mental hospitals?
DOCTOR: Excuse me, Doctor—
COLONEL: Shut up!—
(To IVANOV.) Well? Would a Soviet doctor put a sane man into a lunatic asylum, in your opinion?
IVANOV: (Baffled) I shouldn’t think so. Why?
COLONEL: (Briskly) Quite right! How do you feel?
IVANOV: Fit as a fiddle, thank you.
