by David Malouf
All were turning gravely in their dance,
only I was the prisoner of stone.
We meet only in distances.
And dreams are the distances that bring us close.
VOSS:
Your genius, Frank. That is your genius.
Every man has one, you know, if only he could discover it.
Is your genius here, in the mean streets of this city?
Or is it out there in the infinite?
I tell you, Frank, you will be burnt up in it.
You will have the flesh torn from your bones.
You will cut your own throat.
Possessed, Frank. Possessed.
Are you afraid of that?
LE MESURIER:
I am afraid of you.
VOSS:
But you will follow me?
LAURA:
I will follow you with my prayers.
MRS BONNER:
He is lost. Lost already. His eyes cannot see the way.
BELLE:
Lost? Who is lost? Ah, this country!
LE MESURIER:
What have I got to lose?
VOSS:
That, le Mesurier, is what we still have to discover. Let Harry take your things.
HARRY:
Harry Robarts, sir.
LE MESURIER:
Ah. What are you then?
HARRY:
I dunno what I am, sir.
That’s what I’m going to find out.
TOM:
He is mad. I saw that today.
LAURA:
You mean he does not intend to make his fortune out of this country.
BELLE:
Ah, this country!
LAURA:
He is obsessed with this country.
VOSS:
I’ve scarcely met a man here who does not suspect he will be unmade by Australia. Instead of affirming that he can make of it what he will.
LE MESURIER:
It’s no country of mine.
HARRY:
There’s nothing wrong with this country. Since
the day I landed here I’ve had a full belly.
Nothing wrong with that.
LE MESURIER:
So all is well with Harry. Who sees
with his belly’s eyes.
HARRY:
It’ll do me. It’s my country now.
VOSS:
And mine, Harry. I will venture
to make it mine. I will make it mine.
MRS BONNER:
He is lost. Lost already.
TOM:
He is mad. I saw that today.
LAURA:
But he is not afraid.
TOM:
Who is afraid?
BELLE:
I am afraid.
(VOSS calls up TOPP who begins to play his flute)
I am afraid of deserts
and stones and blacks and skeletons.
VOSS:
Play to us, Topp, play to us, my dear fellow. If I had managed the art of music I would set myself to create a symphony in which all the various instruments would represent the moral characters of men in conflict with one another. (He laughs at his own vision of disorder)
TOM:
He is mad. I saw that today.
TOPP:
My flute sings of sublimity. Of perfection.
In great sweeps of pure sound,
a clear sunlit country of the open heart.
(He plays again, accompanied by the onstage piano)
BELLE:
I am afraid. I am afraid of deserts.
TOM:
But Laura is not afraid, she is our Voss.
You are not afraid are you, Laura?
LAURA:
I have been afraid. Just now,
looking at the drumstick on the plate,
I thought of bones I saw once
in a churchyard, disturbed by a fox.
It is death that frightens me. Not its bones.
VOSS:
But to sing of perfection we must discover it. Besides, it would be so monotonous. The eternal oneness of God.
(PALFREYMAN steps out of the shadows. He wears a cloak and hat, carries his folders and painting materials)
PALFREYMAN:
You have contempt for God because he is not in your own image.
VOSS:
Ah, Mr Palfreyman, you too.
Now our party is complete.
PALFREYMAN:
God is with us also. He too
has joined our party, Voss, whether
you call him or not. He is with us.
VOSS:
(laughs) Come then, Harry, le Mesurier, Palfreyman –
and your God too if He is there
in that sack of yours. Play, Topp,
play us out of town. Call up a sidedrum,
and a trumpet if there is one.
Let us make a show of it.
THE DEPARTURE
(‘Doctor Leichhardt’s March’ by his friend S. H. Marsh)
(CHORUS in daytime wear, cloaks, parasols, etc, flags)
VOSS:
March, my fellows, this is only the beginning,
there’s a thousand miles before us.
I didn’t choose you. I’d prefer to go alone.
But if you choose me I take you.
CHORUS:
Voss. Voss. Voss,
he’s called, some sort of German.
Means to cross
the country, looking for gold.
Voss, Voss. Looking
for an inland sea, looking
for gold. Some sort of German.
BONNER:
They will find an inland sea. They will uncover
the secrets of this land, open
its great heart to us. March, March, you fellows.
Open its great heart to us.
March, March, you fellows.
BELLE:
Who is this man, this Voss, this German
who comes to bring us news?
Brings us news of all that we fear,
news of deserts, stones and blacks?
MRS BONNER:
They are going to the unknown
without maps, without hope. What awaits them out there
is their true selves. All alone,
alone each man will face it.
VOSS:
March, my fellows, this is only the beginning.
March. March.
I will take you all the way to the other
side of Australia. All the way to Hell
if that’s where we’re going. Marschieren.
March, my fellows, this is only the beginning.
March. March. There’s a thousand miles before us.
CHORUS:
Voss, Voss, etc.
HARRY, LE MESURIER, PALFREYMAN:
We will cross this country, this Australia
from east to west, we’ll find
the inland sea, we’ll open
its great heart, day by day,
as we march into its deserts,
we will find its lakes, its green places,
its gardens. Over that ridge,
beyond that desert,
the sea, the inland sea, flashing gold
in the sun, the place all rivers
enter the sea, the sea, another shore.
MR BONNER:
Bring back gold, and we will forge a nation
with it. Bring back maps,
and we shall honour you. Bring back news
of lakes and gardens, etc.
VOSS:
And you, Laura, are you there? Will you follow me?
Laura? Laura?
LAURA:
I will follow, I will follow, I will follow
you with my prayers. Voss, Johann, Ulrich.
VOSS:
Marschieren. Let’s make a show.
CHORUS:
Voss. Voss. Voss, he’s called.
Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye.
&nbs
p; Sydney. Our golden city.
Sydney. Our gracious home.
VOSS:
March, my fellows, this is only the beginning,
we’ve a thousand miles before us.
I will take you all the way to the other
side of Australia. All the way to Hell
if that’s where we’re going. March. Keep step
there. Marschieren. Marschieren.
MRS BONNER:
I who have eyes to see all this that they
do not see, would rather be blind than suffer
what I know.
He is lost, lost already.
His eyes cannot see their way.
He is so thin. And lost. Lost already.
TOM:
He is mad.
I saw that today.
But mad men are also part of it.
BELLE:
I’m afraid. Take my hand, Tom.
TOM:
There, feel
its sureness. Reach out
in whatever dark, across whatever space,
whatever silence.
HARRY, LE MESURIER, PALFREYMAN:
We will cross this country, this Australia
from east to west, we’ll find
the inland sea, we’ll open
its great heart, its lakes,
its green places, its gardens.
VOSS:
And you, Laura, are you there? Will you follow me? Laura? Laura?
LAURA:
I will follow, I will follow, I will follow you
Voss, Johann, Ulrich,
with my prayers.
MRS BONNER:
He is lost, lost already.
His eyes cannot see their way.
BELLE:
I am afraid, Tom. Take my hand.
CHORUS:
Voss, Voss. Some sort of German.
LAURA:
Always. Always.
ACT II
The stage is set to provide an open space that is sometimes Sydney, sometimes the desert, sometimes both at the same time. After the prelude Voss appears on his donkey, a tall frockcoated figure in a battered hat, his legs dangling over the animal’s sides.
ORCHESTRAL PRELUDE
VOSS FINDS JUDD
VOSS:
Eine blosse Seele ritt hinaus
Dem Blau’ entgegen.
Sein Rock flog frei.
Sein Schimmel mit den Wolken
Um die Ehre rann.
Nur der edle Rock zu Schaden kam,
Die Fetzen fielen,
Den Himmel entlang.
Eine blosse Seele ritt hinaus
Dem Blau’ent –*
(VOSS comes upon MRS JUDD, who is kneeling beside a stream. She has a large washing basket)
VOSS:
I am in search of a Mr Judd.
MRS JUDD:
This is the place.
VOSS:
You are his wife, perhaps?
MRS JUDD:
He is to go on a great expedition.
To find an inland sea – or is it gold?
He is a man and wants to know more.
He has got a telescope to look at stars,
and would tell you about them
if you asked him. He is a quiet one.
But deep. And makes things.
He can put a clock together
or a gun; only the clock is broken
for good now. It was no fault
of his. Something
essential is missing,
so we watch the sun.
There is no man
in all the world more fitted
to lead this expedition.
VOSS:
And when your husband goes?
MRS JUDD:
I will stay here. It is my place.
But do you
have a part in this expedition?
VOSS:
Yes. I am Voss.
And here, I do believe,
is the leader himself.
(JUDD appears, flanked by DUGALD and JACKY. JUDD is stripped to the waist, his hands bloody, his body streaked with blood. DUGALD wears an old frockcoat, tattered, and a loincloth. They are coming to the spring where JUDD is to wash)
VOSS:
They tell me you’re Judd.
JUDD:
That’s right, I’m Judd. Ex-convict,
escapee, survivor.
And these are me blacks,
Dugald and Jacky.
VOSS:
They tell me you know this country,
that you have no fear of it,
that you have been into its depths
and come back again.
They tell me you know the stars
and how to travel by them,
and how to travel by the sun.
JUDD:
All men have their gift.
Whether it’s shootin’ the wicks
off candles or catchin’ rats
or findin’ springs. I know this land
like the back of me hand. This land
is all I ever had, except for
a gold chain that was stolen from me.
We had nothing
when we came here. Nothing. Only an axe,
a bag of flour, shovels.
Then here it was, this spring.
(He kneels, preparing to wash. His wife waits with a towel from the basket)
We found it. Pure water
to wash in, to drink, to sit and dream beside
on the long summer evenings.
A secret place, among ferns.
VOSS:
And are you willing
to leave all that you have found,
all that you have made
for the possibility – of nothing?
JUDD:
It isn’t mine. Any more
than that chain was. And when they took
the cat to me
this flesh wasn’t mine, nor these bones.
I have nothing. Nothing to lose.
VOSS:
You will come then?
JUDD:
Your party needs a leader.
VOSS:
I am the leader.
There are men back there in Sydney
who think we need a guide.
JUDD:
Then Judd’s your man.
I’ve lived off this land,
and I’ve lived with it. I know
it as I know myself.
VOSS:
And these others? Dugald? Jacky?
JUDD:
They know it because it is theirs.
Like all blacks they will blow
with the wind or turn into lizards
when they are bored with their present shapes.
(DUGALD and JACKY mime)
But they are the wind,
they are lizards,
they speak with the lizard’s tongue,
the land’s tongue.
They know it because it is theirs.
VOSS:
Men can speak
without the use of tongues. Eh, Dugald?
(MRS JUDD has taken a clean shirt from the basket. She hands it to him – the arming of a hero, JUDD pulls it over his head. Meanwhile, VOSS presents DUGALD with a button. He turns it in the air above him and dances)
VOSS:
By skin and by silence,
Worter haben keine Bedeutung.*
Nonsense. Irrsinn.**
Do you understand that?
(DUGALD nods and laughs, indicates JACKY, who stands waiting. VOSS, after a moment’s thought, takes out his knife and gives it to JACKY who dances a few steps. They all laugh and VOSS takes up his song, as DUGALD, JACKY and JUDD fall in behind him. MRS JUDD moves off in the opposite direction)
VOSS:
Eine blosse, seele ritt hinaus
Dem Blau’ entgegen, etc …
NIGHTWATCH
Double scene. On one side of the stage LAURA and ROSE, sewing; on the other, PALFREYMAN with a la
ntern, his drawing materials and the waterlily he is sketching. Behind him, at a distance, VOSS.
ROSE:
Ah, I cannot understand that man,
that Voss. It is his speech.
No more can I understand his eyes.
You should know a man
by his eyes, if no other way.
(She rises, obviously pregnant, and stretches. Then spreads her hands over her belly)
LAURA:
I understand, if not with my reason.
Even when I do not agree with him
in my heart I understand.
Come, Rose, you must rest.
You are not our servant now
but the bearer
of our most precious message,
our child, Rose, our child.
(ROSE comes to her. LAURA takes her in her arms and begins to sing a wordless lullaby)
PALFREYMAN:
It’s a lily. We have come to the end
of the waterponds. We may never see it again
this lily, in its freshness,
with its pale flesh afloat
on the stream, and its other self
reflected there, the two
together, afloat in air
and water. How beautiful,
the one and then the other.
We may never see
its like again, this lily
with its pale flesh, this lily.
VOSS:
Words are lilies, spirits
afloat together,
water, leaves
and the pale flesh hovering
above itself. Together,
so close, their bodies joined,
their mouths, in the same lovestream.
Not yet. Not yet. Oh nie, nie, niemals.*
(VOSS approaches, prepares his blanket for sleeping. PALFREYMAN lays aside his drawing and puts away his tools)
LAURA:
Rest now. You are the bearer
of our most precious message,
flesh and flesh together,
our child, Rose, our child.
Sleep now, sleep.
VOSS:
Palfreyman, we must sleep.
We start early tomorrow.
(PALFREYMAN puts out his lantern and rolls up his blanket close to VOSS)
PALFREYMAN:
It is a lily. We may never see it again.
VOSS:
It may be common.
PALFREYMAN:
It may be.
VOSS:
Tell me, Palfreyman,
will your faith survive
till we come to Paradise?
PALFREYMAN:
Paradise may prove a mirage.
I believe, but there is much to take on trust.
In the end it will be proved.
VOSS:
So my wife speaks.
PALFREYMAN:
You have a wife?
VOSS:
No. I mean, so she would speak.
I acquire a wife by the simple
shifting of a tense.
LAURA:
Sleep now, sleep …
