Orpheus Descending and Suddenly Last Summer

by Tennessee Williams

LADY: Then I’ll go up and git mine! And take this with me, just t’make sure you wait till I’m— [She moves back. He puts suitcase down.]

  VAL [advancing toward her]: Lady, what’re you—?

  LADY [entreating with guitar raised]: Don’t—!

  VAL: —Doing with—

  LADY: —Don’t!

  VAL: —my guitar!

  LADY: Holding it for security while I—

  VAL: Lady, you been a lunatic since this morning!

  LADY: Longer, longer than morning! I’m going to keep hold of your “life companion” while I pack! I am! I am goin’ to pack an’ go, if you go, where you go!

  [He makes a move toward her. She crosses below and around to counter.]

  You didn’t think so, you actually didn’t think so? What was I going to do, in your opinion? What, in your opinion, would I be doing? Stay on here in a store full of bottles and boxes while you go far, while you go fast and far, without me having your—forwarding address!—even?

  VAL: I’ll—give you a forwarding address. . . .

  LADY: Thanks, oh, thanks! Would I take your forwarding address back of that curtain? “Oh, dear forwarding address, hold me, kiss me, be faithful!” [Utters grotesque, stifled cry; presses fist to mouth.]

  [He advances cautiously, hand stretched toward the guitar. She retreats above to upstage right-center, biting lip, eyes flaring. Jabe knocks above.]

  Stay back! You want me to smash it!

  VAL [downstage center]: He’s—knocking for you. . . .

  LADY: I know! Death’s knocking for me! Don’t you think I hear him, knock, knock, knock? It sounds like what it is! Bones knocking bones. . . . Ask me how it felt to be coupled with death up there, and I can tell you. My skin crawled when he touched me. But I endured it. I guess my heart knew that somebody must be coming to take me out of this hell! You did. You came. Now look at me! I’m alive once more! [Convulsive sobbing controlled: continues more calmly and harshly.] —I won’t wither in dark! Got that through your skull? Now. Listen! Everything in this rotten store is yours, not just your pay, but everything Death’s scraped together down here!—but Death has got to die before we can go. . . . You got that memorized, now?—Then get into your white jacket! —Tonight is the gala opening— [Rushes through confectionery.] —of the confectionery— [Val runs and seizes her arm holding guitar. She breaks violently free.] Smash me against a rock and I’ll smash your guitar! I will, if you—

  [Rapid footsteps on stairs.]

  Oh, Miss Porter!

  [She motions Val back. He retreats into alcove. Lady puts guitar down beside juke box. Miss Porter is descending the stairs.]

  NURSE [descending watchfully]: You been out a long time.

  LADY [moving upstage right-center]: Yeah, well, I had lots of— [Her voice expires breathlessly. She stares fiercely, blindly, into the other’s hard face.]

  NURSE: —Of what?

  LADY: Things to—things to—take care of. . . . [Draws a deep, shuddering breath, clenched fist to her bosom.]

  NURSE: Didn’t I hear you shouting to someone just now?

  LADY: —Uh-huh. Some drunk tourist made a fuss because I wouldn’t sell him no—liquor. . . .

  NURSE [crossing to the door]: Oh. Mr. Torrance is sleeping under medication.

  LADY: That’s good. [She sits in shoe-fitting chair.]

  NURSE: I gave him a hypo at five.

  LADY: —Don’t all that morphine weaken the heart, Miss Porter?

  NURSE: Gradually, yes.

  LADY: How long does it usually take for them to let go?

  NURSE: It varies according to the age of the patient and the condition his heart’s in. Why?

  LADY: Miss Porter, don’t people sort of help them let go?

  NURSE: How do you mean, Mrs. Torrance?

  LADY: Shorten their suffering for them?

  NURSE: Oh, I see what you mean. [Snaps her purse shut.] —I see what you mean, Mrs. Torrance. But killing is killing, regardless of circumstances.

  LADY: Nobody said killing.

  NURSE: You said “shorten their suffering.”

  LADY: Yes, like merciful people shorten an animal’s suffering when he’s. . . .

  NURSE: A human being is not the same as an animal, Mrs. Torrance. And I don’t hold with what they call—

  LADY [overlapping]: Don’t give me a sermon, Miss Porter. I just wanted to know if—

  NURSE [overlapping]: I’m not giving a sermon. I just answered your question. If you want to get somebody to shorten your husband’s life—

  LADY [jumping up; overlapping]: Why, how dare you say that I—

  NURSE: I’ll be back at ten-thirty.

  LADY: Don’t!

  NURSE: What?

  LADY [crossing behind counter]: Don’t come back at ten-thirty, don’t come back.

  NURSE: I’m always discharged by the doctors on my cases.

  LADY: This time you’re being discharged by the patient’s wife.

  NURSE: That’s something we’ll have to discuss with Dr. Buchanan.

  LADY: I’ll call him myself about it. I don’t like you. I don’t think you belong in the nursing profession, you have cold eyes; I think you like to watch pain!

  NURSE: I know why you don’t like my eyes. [Snaps purse shut.] You don’t like my eyes because you know they see clear.

  LADY: Why are you staring at me?

  NURSE: I’m not staring at you, I’m staring at the curtain. There’s something burning in there, smoke’s coming out! [Starts toward alcove.] Oh.

  LADY: Oh, no, you don’t. [Seizes her arm.]

  NURSE [pushes her roughly aside and crosses to the curtain. Val rises from cot, opens the curtain and faces her coolly]: Oh, excuse me! [She turns to Lady.] —The moment I looked at you when I was called on this case last Friday morning I knew that you were pregnant.

  [Lady gasps.]

  I also knew the moment I looked at your husband it wasn’t by him. [She stalks to the door, Lady suddenly cries out:]

  LADY: Thank you for telling me what I hoped for is true.

  NURSE: You don’t seem to have any shame.

  LADY [exalted]: No. I don’t have shame. I have—great—joy!

  NURSE [venomously]: Then why don’t you get the calliope and the clown to make the announcement?

  LADY: You do it for me, save me the money! Make the announcement, all over!

  [Nurse goes out. Val crosses swiftly to the door and locks it. Then he advances toward her, saying:]

  VAL: Is it true what she said?

  [Lady moves as if stunned to the counter; the stunned look gradually turns to a look of wonder. On the counter is a heap of silver and gold paper hats and trumpets for the gala opening of the confectionery.]

  VAL [in a hoarse whisper]: Is it true or not true, what that woman told you?

  LADY: You sound like a scared little boy.

  VAL: She’s gone out to tell. [Pause.]

  LADY: You gotta go now—it’s dangerous for you to stay here. . . . Take your pay out of the cashbox, you can go. Go, go, take the keys to my car, cross the river into some other county. You’ve done what you came here to do. . . .

  VAL: —It’s true then, it’s—?

  LADY [sitting in chair of counter]: True as God’s word! I have life in my body, this dead tree, my body, has burst in flower! You’ve given me life, you can go!

  [He crouches down gravely opposite her, gently takes hold of her knotted fingers and draws them to his lips, breathing on them as if to warm them. She sits bolt upright, tense, blind as a clairvoyant.]

  VAL: —Why didn’t you tell me before?

  LADY: —When a woman’s been childless as long as I’ve been childless, it’s hard to believe that you’re still able to bear! —We used to have a little fig tree between the house and the orchard. It n
ever bore any fruit, they said it was barren. Time went by it, spring after useless spring, and it almost started to—die. . . . Then one day I discovered a small green fig on the tree they said wouldn’t bear! [She is clasping a gilt paper horn.] I ran through the orchard. I ran through the wine garden shouting, “Oh, Father, it’s going to bear, the fig tree is going to bear!”—It seemed such a wonderful thing, after those ten barren springs, for the little fig tree to bear, it called for a celebration—I ran to a closet, I opened a box that we kept Christmas ornaments in! —I took them out, glass bells, glass birds, tinsel, icicles, stars. . . . And I hung the little tree with them, I decorated the fig tree with glass bells and glass birds, and silver icicles and stars, because it won the battle and it would bear! [Rises, ecstatic.] Unpack the box! Unpack the box with the Christmas ornaments in it, put them on me, glass bells and glass birds and stars and tinsel and snow! [In a sort of delirium she thrusts the conical gilt paper hat on her head and runs to the foot of the stairs with the paper horn. She blows the horn over and over, grotesquely mounting the stairs, as Val tries to stop her. She breaks away from him and runs up to the landing, blowing the paper horn and crying out:] I’ve won, I’ve won, Mr. Death, I’m going to bear! [Then suddenly she falters, catches her breath in a shocked gasp and awkwardly retreats to the stairs. Then turns screaming and runs back down them, her cries dying out as she arrives at the floor level. She retreats haltingly as a blind person, a hand stretched out to Val, as slow, clumping footsteps and hoarse breathing are heard on the stairs. She moans:] —Oh, God, oh—God. . . . [Jabe appears on the landing, by the artificial palm tree in its dully lustrous green jardiniere, a stained purple robe hangs loosely about his wasted yellowed frame. He is Death’s self, and malignancy, as he peers, crouching, down into the store’s dimness to discover his quarry.]

  JABE: Buzzards! Buzzards! [Clutching the trunk of the false palm tree, he raises the other hand holding a revolver and fires down into the store, Lady screams and rushes to cover Val’s motionless figure with hers, Jabe scrambles down a few steps and fires again and the bullet strikes her, expelling her breath in a great “Hah!” He fires again; the great “Hah!” is repeated. She turns to face him, still covering Val with her body, her face with all the passions and secrets of life and death in it now, her fierce eyes blazing, knowing, defying and accepting. But the revolver is empty; it clicks impotently and Jabe hurls it toward them; he descends and passes them, shouting out hoarsely:] I’ll have you burned! I burned her father and I’ll have you burned! [He opens the door and rushes out onto the road, shouting hoarsely:] The clerk is robbing the store, he shot my wife, the clerk is robbing the store, he killed my wife!

  VAL: —Did it—?

  LADY: —Yes! —it did. . . .

  [A curious, almost formal, dignity appears in them both. She turns to him with the sort of smile that people offer in apology for an awkward speech, and he looks back at her gravely, raising one hand as if to stay her. But she shakes her head slightly and points to the ghostly radiance of her make-believe orchard and she begins to move a little unsteadily toward it. Music. Lady enters the confectionery and looks about it as people look for the last time at a loved place they are deserting.]

  The show is over. The monkey is dead . . .

  [Music rises to cover whatever sound Death makes in the confectionery. It halts abruptly. Figures appear through the great front window of the store, pocket-lamps stare through the glass and someone begins to force the front door open. Val cries out.]

  VAL: Which way!

  [He turns and runs through the dim radiance of the confectionery, out of our sight. Something slams. Something cracks open. Men are in the store and the dark is full of hoarse, shouting voices.]

  VOICES OF MEN [shouting]: —Keep to the walls! He’s armed!

  —Upstairs, Dog!

  —Jack, the confectionery!

  [Wild cry back of store.]

  —Got him. GOT HIM!

  —They got him!

  —Rope, git rope!

  —Git rope from th’ hardware section!

  —I got something better than rope!

  —What’ve you got?

  —What’s that, what’s he got?

  —A BLOWTORCH!

  —Christ. . . .

  [A momentary hush.]

  —Come on, what in hell are we waiting for?

  —Hold on a minute, I wanta see if it works!

  —Wait, wait!

  —LOOK here!

  [A jet of blue flame stabs the dark. It flickers on Carol’s figure in the confectionery. The men cry out together in hoarse passion crouching toward the fierce blue jet of fire, their faces lit by it like the faces of demons.]

  —Christ!

  —It works!

  [They rush out. Confused shouting behind. Motors start. Fade quickly. There is almost silence, a dog bays in the distance. Then—the Conjure Man appears with a bundle of garments which he examines, dropping them all except the snakeskin jacket, which he holds up with a toothless mumble of excitement.]

  CAROL [quietly, gently]: What have you got there, Uncle? Come here and let me see. [He crosses to her.] Oh yes, his snakeskin jacket. I’ll give you a gold ring for it. [She slowly twists ring off her finger. Somewhere there is a cry of anguish. She listens attentively till it fades out, then nods with understanding.] —Wild things leave skins behind them, they leave clean skins and teeth and white bones behind them, and these are tokens passed from one to another, so that the fugitive kind can always follow their kind. . . .

  [The cry is repeated more terribly than before. It expires again. She draws the jacket about her as if she were cold, nods to the old Negro, handing him the ring. Then she crosses toward the door, pausing halfway as Sheriff Talbott enters with his pocket-lamp.]

  TALBOTT: Don’t no one move, don’t move!

  [She crosses directly past him as if she no longer saw him, and out the door. He shouts furiously:]

  Stay here!

  [Her laughter rings outside. He follows the girl, shouting:]

  Stop! Stop!

  [Silence. The Negro looks up with a secret smile as the curtain falls slowly.]

  INTRODUCTION TO

  SUDDENLY LAST SUMMER

  Paul Bowles moved to Tangier in 1947. A respected composer, he had written the music for the original production of The Glass Menagerie in 1945, as well as incidental music for the Broadway productions of A Streetcar Named Desire in 1947 and Summer and Smoke in 1948. Once ensconced in Morocco he became an admired writer and translator of fiction. But more than anyone, he opened North Africa as an enticing and available garden of delights for the aesthetic homosexual community of his day. If you strip it down to the basics, he wasn’t in Tangier for the hummus. Tennessee Williams often visited him. Cabeza de Lobo, in Suddenly Last Summer, is a fictionalized version of the Moroccan seaside town Asilah, where Bowles had a house. It is in Cabeza de Lobo that the poet Sebastian Venable meets his grisly end. A generous description of Sebastian’s final journey might be “the quest of a highly civilized man for an anti-civilized truth.” Which, as it happens, was Norman Mailer’s assessment of Paul Bowles’s life. I don’t think Bowles was a precise model for Sebastian, but surely he and the aesthetes who followed him to Morocco are somewhere in the stew.

  Ah, Sebastian Venable. What a wonderful name. One of the most despicable characters Williams ever created, surely. One thinks of him as a character; it comes as a shock to remember he never actually appears in the play. But he comes blazingly alive in the monologues of his worshipping mother, Violet, and his distraught cousin, Catharine. Jerry Tallmer, the critic of the Village Voice when the play was first produced, called Suddenly Last Summer, in what was an unusually candid review for its day, “a wild, bold acknowledgment of homosexuality and a searing attempt to exorcise it and become ‘healthy.’ ” Williams had very publicly entered psychoanalysis sho
rtly before writing the play. In those days, many psychoanalysts believed that homosexuality was at best a dangerous neurosis, and none more so than Lawrence Kubie, Williams’s charismatic doctor. Kubie treated many prominent, albeit closeted, gay men in the arts; in essence, if not in actuality, he attempted to cure them, and according to Williams, suggested that he give up both gay sex and writing. A double cure, I suppose. Williams did neither. He wrote Suddenly Last Summer in the mornings and went to sessions with the good doctor in the afternoons. His attitude to what he was writing, and then what he was saying, must have been ambiguous and conflicted. Williams seems to mock Sebastian and pour contempt on him (which would have pleased Kubie), and yet might he not have admired him as well? What if Violet’s laudatory description of her son possessed some kind of truth?

  A minor poet travels the world accompanied by a woman. He is selfishly dedicated to his art and will exploit those around him to stay true to it. But, sadly, his creativity has run dry. He ends up, with his young companion, in a distant tropical hellhole. A partial description of Sebastian, certainly, but equally a description of Nonno in The Night Of the Iguana. This play, written only three years after Suddenly Last Summer, features a variation of the same character, sexual content aside, but this time Nonno (his real name, Jonathan Coffin—another gem), is as admirable as Sebastian is not. It would seem that there was something Williams could not get out of his system, something he had conflicting and changeable views about. It is often assumed that Williams, in recounting Sebastian’s “journey,” was writing about homosexuals as both devouring and being devoured, but it seems to me more likely that he was writing about artists in the same terms. Or perhaps, to him, the two were indistinguishable. Williams wasn’t baring his soul to Kubie because of contentment; he was plagued with guilt, fear, and insecurity, much of which revolved around both his writing and his sexuality, the latter being a matter of public disgrace and criminality in the fifties. Perhaps it explains Kubie’s suggestion to give up both.

  Suddenly Last Summer certainly perplexed Dr. Kubie, whose abhorrence of matters gay was tested to the limit by Sebastian’s fate. In a letter to Williams, after seeing the play, he confessed to being mystified by “the fantasy of eating and being eaten,” which is “pretty cloudy to me.” Poor Kubie. He was confused because the artist was confused. But as Williams was an extraordinary artist, the confusion seems not like confusion, but an enormous truth. But what truth?