Cixous - Voile Noire Voile Blanche-Black Sail White Sail

Voile Noire Voile Blanche/Black Sail White Sail
Hélène Cixous; Catherine A. F. MacGillivray
New Literary History, Vol. 25, No. 2, Writers on Writers. (Spring, 1994), pp. 222-354.
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Thu May 17 02:53:14 2007
Voile Noire Voile Blanche
Hklkne Cixous
Cette piice est dkdike a Alexandre Mnouchkine,

qui m'a guidke d a m les lieux qui furent les siem,
et 04je n'ai jamais itti sinon en r b e .
Personnages:
Anna Andreievna Akhmatova
Nadejda Jakovlevna Mandelstam, amie
Lydia Korneevna Tchoukovskaia, amie
Pauline, dite Polonius, la voisine
Nina Radlova, Secrktaire de 1'Union des Ecrivains de Leningrad
Une Babouchka, 2 la gare de Moscou
Les absents-presents:
Ossip Mandelstam, mort en deportation en 1938
Lev Goumilev (Liova), arrCtk et dkportk depuis 1937
Nicolas Goumilev, son pere, premier mari d'ilkhmatova, fusillk en 1921
Les prQents-absents
Boris Pasternak
Entre Leningrad, Moscou et les environs de ces deux villes: for&&,
fleuves, villkgiatures.
Entre 1953 et 1960.
Staline est mort le 5 Mars 1953.
Elles s'adressent les unes aux autres en utilisant les innombrables petits
diminutifs russes: Nadia, Nadinka, Lida, Lidinka, Anouchka, etc. . . . Les
actrices en useront partout oB elles en eprouveront la nkcessite.
Les paysages sont vastes, ils s'etendent tres loin, tres haut. Plutbt qu'un
decor, un espace oB les actrices auraient 2 leur disposition ce qui leur est
indispensable. Rien de plus.
New Lileraty H z s l q , 1994, 25: 222-354

VOILE NOIRE VOILE BLANCHE / BLACK SAIL WHITE SAIL
Black Sail White Sail

H6lSne Cixous
This play is dedicakd to Alexandre Mnouchkim,

who guided me in the places that were once his,
and where I have never been except in dreams.
Characters
Anna Andreyevna Akhmatova
Nadezhda Yakovlevna Mandelstam,' a friend
Lydia Korneyevna Chukov~kaya,~ a friend
Pauline, called Polonius, a neighbor
Nina Radlova, Secretary of the Union of Leningrad Writers
A Baboushka, at the Moscow train station
The Absent-Presences
Osip Mandelstam, died in deportation in 1938
Lev Gumilev (Liova), arrested and deported for the first time in 1937
Nikolai G u m i l e ~his
, ~ father, Akhmatova's first husband, killed by firing
squad in 1921
The Present-Absences
Boris Pasternak
Between Leningrad, Moscow, and the surrounding areas of these two
cities: forests, rivers, holidays in the country.
Between 1953 and 1960.
Stalin died on March 5, 1953.4
They address each other using countless little Russian nicknames:
Nadia, Nadinka, Lida, Lidinka, Anouchka, etc. . . . The actresses will use
these whenever they feel the need.
The landscapes are vast, they stretch very far, very high. Rather than a
set, a space where the actresses will have at their disposal whatever is
indispensable to them. Nothing more.
224 NEW LITERARY HISTORY
La chambre d'Akhmatova: I'univers dans une coquille de noix
desordonnee. Elle avait un fauteuil 2 trois pieds. Le quatrieme etait
remplack par un objet quelconque.
Elle perd tout, elle cherche tout.
Elle est vctue de choses qui furent elegantes, mais qui sont dimodees,
usies, et-ce qui n'est pas dictC par 116poque mais par sa royale
indiff6rence46chirkes. Elle ne coud pas et ne recoud pas. Peignoir de
soie d6cousu. Fameux chsles dont elle se drape selon les circonstances.
Elle a le sens du vctement approprie 2 la grandeur ou 2 la decadence.
Le sac d'Akhmatova: il est son coffre-fort, son secretaire, son grenier, sa
pharmacie, son boudoir, sa tente de nomade.
Les lunettes de Nadejda: Akhmatova les lui emprunte sans cesse.
TABLEAU 1
(Uneforlt d diver aux environs de Leningrad. Entrent Akhmatova et

Nadqda Mand.elstam.)
Akhmatoua
C'est encore loin?
Nadqda
Accrochez-vous 2 moi Anna Andreievna. Apres ce bouquet de bouleaux
12-bas, nous verrons la Neva, j'en suis sure. I1 n'y a plus que cette mare 2
traverser.
Akhmatova
Alors je m'arrcte. Non, n'insistez pas! Je ne peux pas traverser.
Nadejda
Mais je n'insiste pas!
Akhmatoua
Je vais tomber, si vous insistezje tombe, etje me casse lajambe droite ici
m6me. Etjustement notre dernierjour 2 Leningrad. Outre le cancer de
la peau, j'ai ditj2 la tuberculose, un rhumatisme universel, et une
insuffisance cardiaque. Et j'irai en sus me briser les os en pleine forct
pour suivre Nadejda Mandelstam encore une fois audel2 des limites
humaines!
VOILE NOIRE VOILE BLANCHE / BLACK SAIL WHITE SAIL 225
Akhmatova's room: the universe in a disorderly nutshell. She has a
three-legged chair. The fourth leg has been replaced by any old thing.
She loses everything, she looks for everything.
She is dressed in things that were elegant, but are out of fashion, used,
and-something dictated not by the period but by her royal indiffer-
ence-torn. She doesn't sew or mend. Undone silk dressing gown.
Famous shawls with which she drapes herself, according to the circum-
stances. She has a sense of clothing appropriate to greatness or
decadence.
Akhmatova's purse: it is her safe, her secretary, her attic, her drugstore,
her boudoir, her nomad's tent.
Nadezhda's glasses: Akhmatova borrows them from her constantly.
TABLEAU I
( A winter forest on the outskirts of Leningrad. Enter Akhmatova and

Nadahda Mandelstam.)
Akhmatova
Is it still far?
Nadahda
Hang on to me Anna Andreyevna. After that cluster of birch trees over
there, we'll see the Neva? I'm sure of it. There's only this pond left to
cross.
Akhmatova
Then I'm stopping. No, don't insist! I can't cross it.
Nadahda
But I'm not insisting!
Akhmatova
I'm going to fall, if you insist I shall fall and break my right leg right
here. And on our last day in Leningrad. Besides skin cancer, I've already
got tuberculosis, rheumatism all over, and a heart condition. And in
addition I'm going to break my bones in the middle of the forest so as to
follow Nadezhda Mandelstam one more time beyond human limits!
NEW LITERARY HISTORY
Nadgda
Les limites humaines! Une mare glacCe.
Akhmatova
I1 y a trente ans que je le dis 5 1'Univers:je ne veux pas ramper a quatre
pattes comme une chienne ou 2 plat ventre comme un ver. Vous m'aviez
dit: une petite promenade, nous ramassons du bois et nous rentrons. J'ai
fait mon devoir. Je veux rentrer.
Nadejda
Je vous en prie. La Neva est si prks. Nous irons doucement, nous nous
tiendrons l'une l'autre.
Akhmatova
Toute notre vie 2 pas tremblants, deux bkquilles portant la poCsie. Et
traverser, glisser, perdre l'kquilibre, fr6ler la mort, se ramasser. Tout
pour simplement survivre. Ne me poussez pas, Nadinka. Et de meme:
traduire. Au lieu d'kcrire: traduire. Pour gagner sa pitance Akhmatova
se tue 2 traduire des poetes Ctrangers.
Nadejda
Allons-y maintenant.
Akhmatova
Donnez-moi une minute. Etje ne sais pas traduire. Vous vous souvenez
comme Mandelstam se plaignait: le chceur des Cditeurs aboyait sur ses
talons: traduisez! traduisez! Ne faites pas du Mandelstam! Faites-nous du
Verlaine. I1 en gCmissait.
Nadgda
C'est vrai que pour Ossip, traduire c'ktait donner le cerveau de
Mandelstam en pature aux invitCs.
Akhmatova
Et pour moi c'est pareil. Et traverser cette mare c'est pareil. C'est peut-
itre la mort. Et une mort inutile.
Nadqda
Un tout petit effort. Et nous verrons le fleuve Ctincelant dans son coffret
de glace. Non?
Nadezhda
Human limits! An ice-covered pond.
Akhmatoua
For thirty years I've been telling the universe: I don't want to crawl on
my hands and knees like a dog or on my belly like a worm. You told me:
a short walk, we'll collect some wood and then go home. I've done my
duty. I want to go home.
Nadezhda
I beg of you. The Neva is so close. We'll go slowly, we'll hold on to each
other.
Akhmatoua
All our life taking shaky steps, two crutches carrylng poetry. And
crossing, slipping, losing our balance, nearly dying, picking ourselves up
again. Everything so as to simply survive. Don't push me, Nadinka. And
likewise: translating. Rather than writing: translating. To earn her
pittance Akhmatova kills herself translating foreign poets.
Nadahda
Let's go now.
Akhmatoua
Give me a minute. And I don't know how to translate. You remember
how Mandelstam used to complain: the chorus of editors barking at his
heels: translate! translate! Don't do Mandelstam! Do some Verlaine for
us. It used to make him groan.
Nadahda
It's true that for Osip, translating was offering up Mandelstam's brain as
feed for the guests.
Akhmatoua
And for me it's the same thing. And crossing this pond is the same thing.
Maybe it will mean death. And a useless death.
Nadahda
A very small effort. And we'll see the shimmering stream in its icy casket.
All right?
Akhmatoua
Non. Pas de petit effort. Mon histoire toute entiere n'est qu'un immense
effort de survie. Je peux vivre sans fleuve mais pas sans corps. Je sunivrai
ici. Continuez sans moi.
Na4da
Je peux?
Akhmatoua
Je vous attends. Pour attendre j'atteins l'excellence, je n'ai pas de
limites. Allez, vous me retrouverez ici mtme, au soleil, Akhmatova,
comme une pierre humaine gelCe parmi mes sceurs les pierres terrestres.
Allez-y.
(Nadgda sort. Akhmatova s'installe sur u n tronc, ou sur u n roche?:
Au public, aux nuages, au monde.)
Pierres, nuages, hivernaux conifkres, et vous esprits des morts et des
vivants qui circulez B cheval sur notre sombre vent russe, vous me
trouvez changee cette annie, n'est-ce pas? Moi aussi. Tenez, le matin
quand je me coiffe, je vois deux Akhmatova, l'une dans le miroir, une
vieille paysanne skculaire et entttCe. . . . Etjuste B c6tC sur le mur voici
l'autre, la cClPbre beaut6 saisie par Modigliani, la reine de toutes les
Russies, ce visage qui a lance dans notre langue des centaines de
poPmes. J'itais elle. Le siPcle a cruellement accoutrC nos jeunesses en
vieillesses. Seuls nos jeunes Cpoux morts assassines restentjeunes. Voyez
les mains, les fines mains d'enfants d'ou s'envolaient tant d'images-
toutes boursouflCes d'angoisse et de sterilitk. D'ailleurs, B peine avions-
nous 35 ans Ossip et moi que nous Mmes appelks vieillards par la horde
officielle. On nous poussait vers la sortie. Allez vite, les poetes, dehors,
quittez ce siecle. Maisje reste. Assise sur une souche, du haut de 1'annCe
1953, je contemple notre siPcle CcrouC dans les glaces. AnnCe aprPs
annCe, la mtme scene sur la place, les mtmes personnages: des corps en
impermkables de morgue et des chapeaux sans visage emmenent la
Russie a l'interrogatoire. La mode ne change pas. Cependant nous
prenons un matin trente ans de chagrin. Je sais bien, le bruit a couru
dans 1'Univers que le GCorpen aux moustaches visqueuses comme des
asticots, comme disait Mandelstam, avait fini sa course nlonstrueuse il y
a quelque semaines. Vous y croyez? Moi non. Mon fils Liova ne git-il pas
toujours au fond du Leviathan?
Et cependant les lointains sont toujours aussi beaux. C'est le plus beau
pays du monde. La neige sent la pomme et la cour de l'kcole.
Peut-on imaginer paysage plus prometteur et plus transparent? Ah!
C'est trop beau! Plus ensorceleur? C'est trop beau! C'est un crime d'ttre
ici!
Akhmatova
No. No small effort. My entire history is nothing but an enormous effort
to survive. I can live without a stream but not without a body. I'll survive
here. Go on ahead without me.
Nadezhda
May I?
Akhmatoua
I'll wait for you. At waiting I attain excellence. I know no limits. Go on,
you'll find me right here, in the sun, Akhmatova, like an icy human
stone amongst my sisters, the stones of the earth. Go on.
( N a d a h d a exits. Akhmatoua settles herself o n a tree trunk, or o n a
rock. To the audience, the clouds, the world.)
Stones, clouds, wintry conifers, and you spirits of the dead and of the
living who circulate astride our somber Russian wind, you find me
changed this year, don't you? Me too. Listen, in the morning when I fix
my hair, I see two Akhmatova's: the one in the mirror, a century-old,
stubborn peasant woman. . . . And right next to her on the wall is the
other one, the celebrated beauty captured by Modigliani,"ueen of all
the Russias, this face that has launched into our language hundreds of
poems. I was she. This century has cruelly costumed our youth in old-
age. Only our young dead assassinated husbands stay young. See my
hands, fine hands like a child's from which so many images have flown-
all swollen with anxiety and sterility, By the way, we were barely thirty-five
years old Osip and I when we were called old folks by the official horde.
They were pushing us toward the exit. Go on quickly, poets, out, leave
this century. But I'm staying. Seated on a stump, from the top of the year
1953, I contemplate our century incarcerated in the ice. Year after year,
the same scene on the square, the same characters: bodies in morgue
raincoats and faceless hats take Russia away to be interrogated. Fashion
doesn't change. Yet one morning we put on thirty years of sorrow. I
know, in the Universe rumor has it that the Georgian with the mus-
taches, viscous like maggots as Mandelstam used to say, finished his
monstrous race a few weeks ago. Do you believe it? I don't. Isn't my son
Liova still lying at the bottom of Leviathan?
And yet the distances are still as beautiful. It is the most beautiful
country in the world. The snow smells like apples and the school
playground.
Can one imagine a more promising and more transparent landscape?
Oh! It's too beautiful! More bewitching? It's too beautiful! Being here is
a crime!
En ce moment-mPme, avec la complicitC des bouleaux aux branches

belles comme des bras de femme, une minute entiere j'oublie de joie
rnon fils embarbelC, et chacun des amants que l'on m'a fusillts. Etre
quatre ou cinq fois veuve, et cependant sentirjaillir dans tout rnon corps
le chant rythmC, c'est rnon crime, mais c'est la faute de la forPt. I1 faut
rentrer, Nadejda!
(On entend comme u n bruit de tonnerre: c'est Ze craquement des glaces
qui, en fondant, s 'entrechoquent sur la Neva.)
Vous avez entendu? Le premier tonnerre du dCgel. DCja! Tiens (elk joue
auec Zes branchages) la croix me suit. Une croix de branches pour rnon
mari Goumilev, une croix pour rnon mari Pounine, une croix de
branches pour Ossip, rnon unique ami, une croix pour moi, une croix
pour Nadejda. Nous ne savons mEme pas oh sont couchCs nos morts,
dans quelle terre, ils s'emiettent en phosphores~ant,si c'est au sud ou
bien au nord.
Nous dormons et nous survivons parmi nos morts, nous les buvons
avec le vin, avec l'air CpicC nous les respirons. La main posCe lPgPre sur
rnon Cpaule, Mandelstam mort lit avec moi le livre de la terre.
Qui garde qui, je ne sais pas. Nos poPmes, interdits de livres, errent
dans les rues comme des ombres sans lyre. Certains leur donnent asile.
Certains les vouent l'exil.
Voyez, la croix me suit. Elle me fait signe. Elle n'oublie pas les dates.
Aujourd'hui 1 1 Mars. C'est l'affreux anniversaire. I1 y a 15 ans a l'aube
que j'ai appris l'arrestation de Liova. Depuis, la lueur vide de cette aube
bx%le en moi sa veilleuse de deuil. Mon chemin de croix a commencC ce
jour-la: ces visages sans traits, le mien est le numiro 300 dans la queue,
ces lGvres bleuPtres, ces colis soudain terriblement refuses, et pour
esperance ces guichets.
Liova + Akhmatova, depuis 1938 l'un par l'autre nous agonisons. A
genoux j'avance courbke, encore combien de vies?
( T o n m .)
Vous avez entendu? Le printemps se presse cette annee! Quel innocent!
(APPek.1
Nadgda
Anna Andreievna! Anna Andreievna! Vous avez entendu? Ca commence!
Akhmatoua
Oui!
Nadqda
Vous ne voulez vraiment pas venir? On voit la N k a ressusciter.
VOILE NOIRE VOILE BLANCHE / BLACK SAIL WHITE SAIL 23 1
In this very moment, with the complicity of the birch trees, their
branches beautiful like a woman's arms, for one whole minute I forget
from joy my caged-in son, and each of my lovers that they have shot. To
be a widow four or five times over, and yet feel the rhythmic song
gushing inside my whole body, this is my crime, but it's the forest's fault.
We must go home, Nadezhda!
(We hear what sounds like a thunderbolt: it is the melting ice cracking
and colliding with itself on the Neva.)
Did you hear that? The first thunder of the thaw. Already! (Sheplays with
the branches.) Look, the cross is following me. A cross of branches for my
husband Gumilev, a cross for my husband Puniq7 a cross of branches for
Osip, my only friend, a cross for me, a cross for Nadezhda. We don't
even know where our dead are laid to rest, in what earth they crumble,
phosphorating, if it's in the south or in the north.
We sleep and we survive among our dead, we drink them with the
wine, with the spicy air we breathe them. His hand resting lightly on my
shoulder, Mandelstam dead reads with me the book of the earth.
Who keeps whom, I do not know. Our poems, forbidden from books,
wander in the streets like shadows without a lyre. Some give them
asylum. Some doom them to exile.
You see, the cross is following me. It's motioning to me. It doesn't
forget dates. Today is March 11. It is the horrible anniversary. Fifteen
years ago at dawn I learned of Liova's arrest. Ever since, the empty glow
of this dawn burns within me its dim mourning light. My way of the cross
began on that day: those featureless faces, mine in line was number 300,
those bluish lips, those packages suddenly, terribly refused, and for hope
those prison gates.
Liova + Akhmatova, since 1938 one by the other we are on the verge
of dying. I move forward bent and on my knees, how many more
lifetimes?
(Thundm)
Did you hear that? Spring is in a hurry this year! What innocence!
(Calling.)
Nadezhda
Anna Andreyevna! Anna Andreyevna! Did you hear that? It's starting!
Akhmatoua
Yes!
Nadezhda
Are you sure you don't want to come? You can see the Neva returning to
life.
Akhmatoua
Non. Et le ciel?
Nadejda
Fou d'oiseaux! Vous devriez venir. Les grebes enivrees tracent des
milliers de lettres dans le ciel agite. Je vous emmene.
Akhmatoua
Non! non! Pas besoin de voir! J'entends, Ca me suffit! Retournez,
Nadinka. Vous me raconterez! C'est etrange! Comme si elle etait
devenue elle-meme Ossip, Nadejda mange la vie pour deux.
(Nadejda reuient.)
D'ailleurs, pourquoi verrais-je le degel? Ce n'est pas mon destin. Verrai-
je jamais une seule des heures, u n seul des visages, que je desire voir une
seule fois avant ma mort? Verrai-je jamais mon Liova delivri me sourire?
Et mon livre? "Poemes d'Anna Akhmatova." Non: "Anna Akhmatova,
CEuvres compli.tes." Verrai-je jamais son visage? Non. Que dit mon amie
Esperanza? Que je dois esperer?
Nadejda
C'est u n devoir. Oui. Pour moi. C'est une mission. Rester en Russie e t e n
vie jusqu'a ce que remontent de l'abime les poemes de Mandelstam.
Akhmatoua
Et moi, d'ici, comme les oiseaux de proie et comme les morts, je vois
notre avenir. Et je puis vous le dire, demain ressemble a aujourd'hui
comme u n mauvais jumeau. Pas de publication. Eh! Mais je vois aussi 15-
bas . . . notre Lydia Korneevna! Voile noire ou voile blanche? Levez-moi
donc le nez! Elle a peur de tomber elle aussi. Vous voyez? Non, bien str.
Je suis entouree de myopes!
Nadgda
Vous voyez quelqu'un? (Au public.) Vous voyez quelque chose, vous?
Akhmatoua
Tandis que moi je vois tout avant tout le monde. Meme Ossip au regard
epervier, lorsque nous prenions 5 Leningrad le A ou le B, je le battais. A
2000 metres d u tram, je voyais la lettre. Ah! Elle arrive. Elle nous voit.
Nadejda
Alors? Voile noire ou voile blanche, Anna Andreievna?
(Entre Lydia.)
Akhmatoua
No. And the sky?
Nadezhda
Crazy with birds! You should come. The drunken ducks are tracing
thousands of letters in the wild sky. I'll take you.
Akhmatoua
No! no! No need to see! I can hear, that's enough for me! Go on back,
Nadinka. You'll tell me about it! It's strange! As though she had herself
become Osip, Nadezhda eats life for two.
(Nadahda returns.)
Anyway, why should I see the thaw? That's not my destiny. Will I ever see
one single one of the hours, one single one of the faces I want to see one
single time before I die? Will I ever see my liberated Liova smile at me?
And my book? "Poems by Anna Akhmatova." No: "Anna Akhmatova,
Complete Works." Will I ever see their faces? No. What does my friend
Esperanza say? That I must hope?
Nadezhda
It's a duty. Yes. For me. It's a mission. To remain in Russia and alive until
Mandelstam's poems return from the abyss.
Akhmatoua
And I, from here, like birds of prey and like the dead, I see our future.
And I can tell you, tomorrow resembles today like a bad twin. No
publication. Hey! But I also see over there . . . our Lydia Korneyevna!
Black sail or white sail? Look up! She's afraid of falling too. Do you see?
No, of course not. I'm surrounded by near-sighted people!
Nadahda
Do you see someone? (To the audience.) And you, do you see anything?
Akhmatoua
Whereas 1-1 see everything before everyone else. Even hawk-eyed Osip,
whenever we took the A or the B in Leningrad, I'd beat him. From 2000
meters away I could see the letter. Ah! She's almost here. She sees us.
Nadezhda
So? Black sail or white sail, Anna Andreyevna?
(Enter Lydia.)
Lydia
Faut-il que je vous aime Anna Andreievna . . . ! Vous allez Etre si
heureuse. Le livre! On le publie. Ca y est. Je vous le jure! J'ai enfin 6t6
recue 2 1'Union des Ecrivains, moi-meme. J'ai vu Fadeev lui-meme, Moi-
mEme. Croyez-moi. J'ai sa parole. On publie.
Akhmatova
"Po6mes d'Anna Akhmatova"?
Lydia
Poemes d'Anna Akhmatova. I1 l'a promis. I1 suffit d'aller le voir. I1 vous
recevra aussit6t.
Akhmatova
Tout d'un coup, apr6s trente ans de m6pris. Et que va-t-il demander en
echange?
Lydia
Mais rien, je vous assure. I1 vous admire. I1 a enfin la force de le dire. Ce
sera un 6v6nement pour la Russie. C'est le bonheur.
Akhmatova
Qu'est-ce qu'ils vont interdire? Requiem?
Lydia
Pour Requiem, je ne sais pas. Evidemment . . . I1 n'est pas impossible que
les deux poemes sur Mandelstam . . .
Akhmatova
Ah! ca non. C'est impossible. Je ne peux pas. Non vraiment, Lida, je ne
peux pas.
Lydia
I1 faut commencer, Anna Andreievna. C'est un combat. I1 est long mais
nous regagnerons chaque page. Refuser serait un pech6. Chaque mot,
chaque accent doit retentir. Votre voix doit sortir de la tombe.
Akhmatoua
Nadejda, qu'auriez-vous dit 2 Ossip?
Nadgda
Je lui aurais dit de publier. Mais je ne sais pas ce qu'il aurait fait.
Lydia
I must love you, Anna Andreyevna . . . ! You're going to be so happy. The
book! They're publishing it. It's all settled. I swear to you! I was finally
received by the Union of writer^,^ myself. I saw Fadeyev himself. Myself.
Believe me. I have his word. They're publishing.
Akhmatova
"Poems by Anna Akhmatova"?
Lydia
Poems by Anna Akhmatova. He promised. You've just got to go and see
him. He'll receive you at once.
Akhmatoua
All of a sudden, after thirty years of disdain. And what will he ask for in
exchange?
Lydia
Nothing, I assure you. He admires you. He finally has the strength to say
it. This will be an event for Russia. What happiness.
Akhmatoua
What are they going to forbid? Requiem?
Lydia
As for Requiem, I don't know. Of course . . . It's not out of the question
that the two poems on Mandelstam . . .
Akhmatoua
Ah! not that. That's impossible. I cannot. No really, Lida, I cannot.
Lydia
You have to start, Anna Andreyevna. It's a struggle. It is long, but we will
win back every page. To refuse would be a sin. Every word, every arrent
must ring out. Your voice must emerge from the tomb.
Akhmatoua
Nadezhda, what would you have said to Osip?
Nadezhda
I would have told him to publish. But I don't know what he would have
done.
Akhmatoua
Je vais rkflkchir. Je vais consulter . . . les oiseaux et les morts.
Lydia
Je ne suis pas d'accord. C'est a nous, les vivants, d'Ctre vos augures.
Akhmatoua
Trente ans . . . Je vais rkflkchir. Lydia Korneevna, il va falloir que vous
m'aidiez. La moiti6 de mes vers est dans votre mkmoire. L'autre notee
dans la mienne. Peut-Ctre quelques-uns sur le papier. I1 faut au moins
que je voie ce que j'ai. Allons, vite, rentrons. J'ai tout a Moscou. Moscou
. . . Nadejda, tenez-moi.
Lydia
Alors, vous publierez? Vous Ctes d'accord?
Akhmatoua
Nous verrons 5 Moscou. D'abord, Lida, un stylo, du papier. J'en ai fait de
si beaux. Je vais vous les dire. Je vais vous les dicter. Ensuite je dkciderai.
Mais que dirait Ossip? Attention a mes galoches. Je ne suis pas preneuse
d'une joie 2 tout prix.
(Lydia rattache les lacets.)
Dites-moi, Nadejda, de quelle couleur etaient les eaux de la Neva?
Quand en pleine mutation elle se chevauche elle-mCme je lui ai connu
des roses grimpCs sur des gris et les brisant. Racontez-moi. Vous m'avez
dit le ciel. Vous ne m'avez rien dit sur la rivikre.
Nadgda
Si vous me laissez dire je vous dirai.
(Tonnerre.)
Akhmatoua
Alors?
Nadgda
Dans le miroir brisk, les conifkres cherchaient encore, perdaient leurs
reflets.
Akhmatoua
Ainsi ce Fadeev a commencC a fondre. J'ai bien cru que l'hiver ne
finirait jamais. Alors?
Akhmatoua
I'm going to think about it. I'm going to consult. . . the birds and the
dead.
Lydia
I don't agree. It's up to us, the living, to be your omens.
Akhmatova
Thirty years . . . I'm going to think about it. Lydia Korneyevna, you'll
have to help me. Half of my verse is in your memory. The other half is
noted in mine. Perhaps a few on paper. I ought to at least see what I've
got. Let's go, quickly, let's go home. I have everything in Moscow.
Moscow. . . Nadezhda, hold me.
Lydia
So, you'll publish? You agree?
Akhmatova
We'll see in Moscow. First, Lida, a pen, some paper. I've made some very
beautiful ones. I shall tell them to you. I shall dictate them to you. Then
I'll decide. But what would Osip say? Careful of my galoshes. I'm not
interested in joy at any price.
(Lydia reties the laces.)
Tell me, Nadezhda, what color were the waters of the Neva? When in the
middle of her mutation she sits astride herself, I have known her to be
pinks climbing grays and breaking them. Tell me. You told me the sky.
You've told me nothing of the river.
Nadezhda
If you let me tell you I'll tell you.
Akhmatoua
Well?
Nadezhda
In the broken mirror, the conifers were still seeking, losing their
reflections.
Akhmatoua
In just this way Fadeyevq began to melt. I rather thought winter would
never end. Well?
Nadqda
Et dire qu'Ossip vous appelait I'ange noir sur la neige!
Akhmatoua
I1 aimait m'inventer. Moi ce que j'aime c'est la mer, c'est nager.
Avan~ons.Non, nous ne sommes pas trois veuves courbCes sous la
fatalitk. Qui nous verrait filer sur Leningrad verrait trois voiles courir
sous le vent en direction de 1'CternitC.
(Elks sortent. Tonnerre.)
Lydia
Hiver, brise-toi et laisse 2 nouveau rCsonner le chant des rivicres! Vous
verrez: quand sera publiCe l'euvre d'Akhmatova, ses poemes comme
des larmes brillantes tomberont sur vos poitrines glades et ce sera la fin
de l'hiver dans vos pensCes. Nous recommencerons a dCsirer, a rire . . .
Ah, je rCve plus vite que la rCalitC! Je voudrais tant voir ce printemps
avant de mourir. Le verrons-nous?
TABLEAU 2
(Akhmatova et Nadejda am'uent duns la chambre de Akhmatova,

a Moscou.)
Akhmatoua
Mon cahier! On a touche 2 mes poi.mes! Les mCci.nes sont venus!
Voyez! Le cheveu n'y est plus.
Nadqda
Le cheveu?
Akhmatoua
Je l'avais glissC ici, dans mon cahier, i cette page. Non, un blanc. I1 n'y
est plus. 11s ont fouille! Ah! Je l'avais pressenti.
Nadejda
Mais non, ils ne sont pas venus. Je les connais. S'ils Ctaient venus, croyez-
vous qu'ils auraient tout laiss6 en place exactement?
Nadezhda
And to think that Osip used to call you the black angel on the snow!
Akhmatova
He loved to invent me. As for me, what I love is the sea, is swimming.
Let's go forward. No, we are not three widows bent beneath fatality.
Whoever saw us rushing off to Leningrad would see three sails running
beneath the wind in the direction of eternity.
( T h q exit. Thundm)
Lydia
Winter, break and let the rivers' song resound anew! You'll see: when
Akhmatova's work is published, her poems like burning tears will fall
upon your icy breasts, and that will be the end of winter in your
thoughts. We'll begin again to desire, to laugh . . . Ah, I dream faster
than reality! I would so like to see this spring before I die. Will we see it?
TABLEAU 2
(Akhmatova and Nadezhda enter Akhmatoua's room in Moscow.)
Akhmatova
My notebook! Someone has tampered with my poems! The "poetry
lovers" have been here. Look! The hair is gone.
Nadezhda
The hair?
Akhmatoua
I slipped it in here, in my notebook, at this page. No, a white one. It's
gone. They've rummaged! Ah! I had a hunch.
Nadezhda
No, they haven't been here. I know them. If they'd been here, do you
think they'd have left everything exactly in its place?
Akhmatoua
Sauf le cheveu.
Nadgda
Un cheveu, ce n'est pas une preuve. 11s auraient laissk des mkgots dans
le cendrier. 11s signent quand ils viennent, ils salissent, ils froissent. Non.
Akhmatoua
Je vous demande pardon, les-mC-cenes-sont-ve-nus.Je sais ce que je dis.
Je le savais hier. Quand il y a eu ce coup de tklkphone. J'ai tout de suite
compris.
Nadgda
Un coup de tCliphone?
Akhmatoua
Une voix de femme, une voix de folle: "Anna Andreievna? Comme je
suis kmue. Je vous parle au nom de toutes vos admiratrices." "Oui," dis-
je (j'avais compris). "Euh, quand on vous lit, on ne peut plus rien dire."
"Ah?"-"Merci pour tous vos poPmes. Je crois que je vous dCrange?"-
"Nan."-"Et surtout pour l'un deux."-"Pour l'un d'eux?, dis-je. Lequel?"
(T'ai tout de suite compris. La ruse ktait trop grosse.)-"Le dernier," me
dit-el1e.-"Le dernier? Quel dernier?"-"Vous savez. Celui sur les abeilles."
"Ah, vous vous trompez de poPte," dis-je, "les abeilles ce n'est pas ici.
C'est chez Boris Pasternak." Et clac, je raccroche.
On veut savoir ou je suis. On veut m'inquikter.
Nadqda
Mais il y a quand mCme des abeilles chez vous aussi.
Akhmatoua
I1 y en a. Mais non publikes. D'ailleurs des abeilles il y en a partout. Chez
Ossip aussi. Les plus belles. Mais la, je vous le dis, c'etait de fausses
abeilles e t une fausse admiratrice. Une mouche. O n veut m'intimider!
M'emptcher de publier!
Nadejda
Mais non, ce n'est pas possible.
Akhmatova
Je les connais, les itudiantes bessarabiennes qui viennent 2 vous
diguisies en agneau perdu. Elles bClent 2 votre porte. Elles collent. La
Akhmatova
Except the hair.
Nadahda
One hair, that's no proof. They'd have left cigarette butts in the ashtray.
They sign their name when they come, they soil, they muss up.Io No.
Akhmatova
I beg your pardon the-po-e-try-lo-vers-have-been-here.I know what I'm
talking about. I knew it yesterday. When there was that telephone call. I
caught on immediately.
Nadahda
Telephone call?
Akhmatova
A woman's voice, a madwoman's voice: "Anna Andreyevna? I'm so
moved. I'm speaking to you on behalf of all your admirersen-'Yes,'' I
said (I'd caught on). "Uh, when one reads you, one is left speechless."
"Oh?"-"Thank you for all your poems. I fear I'm disturbing you?"-
"No."- "And especially for one of them."-"For one of them?" I said,
"Which one?" (I caught on immediately. The trick was too obvious.)-
"The last one," she says to me.-"The last one? What last one?"-'You
know. The one about the bees."-"Ah, you're addressing the wrong
poet," I said, "the bees aren't here. They're at Boris Pasternak's." And
click, I hang up.
They want to know where I am. They want to worry me.
Nadezhda
All the same, there are bees in your work as well.
Akhmatova
There are. But not published. For that matter, there are bees all over the
place. In Osip's work as well. The most beautiful. But in this case, I'm
telling you, they were fake bees and a fake admirer. A pigeon. They want
to intimidate me! Stop me from publishing!
Nadezhda
No, that's not possible.
Akhmatova
I know them, the female students from Bessarabia who come to you
disguised as lost lambs. They bleat at your door. They cling. At night they
nuit elles dorment, semble-t-il, au pied de votre lit. Et au matin, je me

riveille avec le bras croqui jusqu'i l'kpaule.
Alors clac! J'ai raccrochk.
Nadqda
Mais si c'est une mouche, pourquoi?
Akhmatova
Pourquoi? Vous, vous me demandez pourquoi? Est-ce qu'il y a une
raison dans leur folie? Pourquoi avait-on arrEtk Ossip? Pour pokme.
Pour I'arrEter. Est-ce qu'il y a des rkponses dans notre pays? Non!
Regardez cette ville. Dieu se moque de nous avec ses jardins et ses nuits
dilicates. En haut les plus belles ktoiles du monde, en bas des essaims de
mouchards. Et c'est comme Ca.
Nadejda, j'ai commenci a noter mes souvenirs d'Ossip.
Nadgda
Enfin! I1 va ttre content!
Akhmatova
Vingt ans ne comptent pas pour un mort! Ossip n'aimait pas du tout
mes vers.
Nadejda
C'est faux.
Akhmatoua
Mais qu'importe, moi j'adorais les siens. I1 est le plus grand pokte. Et il
avait en moi une confiance d'enfant. I1 venait me montrer chaque
nouvel amour comme des billes d'agate. Des billes seulement, Nadinka.
I1 faisait tout fait la diffirence. Vous vous itiez son c e u r de quartz. Je
vais vous lire mes notes. (Elk cherche.) Son minerai magique, l'axe de sa
terre. Eh bien, voila ce que les mkcknes m'ont voli: mes notes sur
Mandelstam. Alors le cheveu!? Vous pensiez: elle est folle. Et regardez la
Bible. 11s lui ont fendu le dos.
Nadqda
Ma Bible! Dieu est infini, idiots. On n'en finira pas de fendre Dieu en
deux!
Akhmatoua
Et vous voulez me faire croire que Staline est mort? Mais (au public) il ne
nous a pas quittk. Son sperme empoisonni a pour dix gknirations
ensemenck notre eau. notre air . . .
sleep, so it seems, at the foot of your bed. And in the morning, I awake
with my arm scrunched up to my shoulder.
So click! I hung up.
Nadahda
But if it was a pigeon, why?
Akhmatova
Why? You of all people, you're asking me why? Is there a rhyme or
reason to their madness? Why did they arrest Osip? For poem. To arrest
him. Are there answers in our country? No!" Look at this city. God is
making fun of us with his gardens and his delicate nights. Up above, the
most beautiful stars in the world, down below, swarms of stool pigeons.
And that's how it is.
Nadezhda, I've started to jot down my memories of Osip.
iVadahda
Finally! He'll be pleased!
Akhmatova
Twenty years don't count for a dead man! Osip didn't like my verse at all.
Nadahda
That's not true.
Akhmatova
But what does it matter, I adored his. He is the greatest poet. And he
trusted me like a child. He used to come and show me each new love,
like agates. Just marbles, Nadinka. He knew exactly what the difference
was. You, you were his heart of quartz. I'm going to read you my notes.
(She searches.) His magic ore, his earth's axis. Well, just look what the
"poetry lovers" have stolen from me: my notes on Mandelstam. So, the
hair!? You thought: she's crazy. And look at the Bible. They've split its
back.
Nadezhda
My Bible! God is infinite, idiots. You'll never finish splitting God in two!
Akhmatova
And you expect me to believe that Stalin is dead? (To the audience.) But
he hasn't left us. For ten generations his poisonous sperm has sowed our
water, our air . . .
Nadgda
(Elk montre "le rideau" qui sipare la chambre de celle de la voisine.)
Le rideau . . . Anna Andreievna, quand j'ai dit Dieu . . . le rideau.
Akhmatoua
C'est Polonius. (Elk ovre le rideau.) Entrez! Ou plut6t sortez! Mme
Pauline, c'est vous qui avez touche 5 mes affaires, ma voisine?
Pauline
Lesquelles? Moi j'ai seulement lave que vos tasses, pour vous faire plaisir.
E t j e ne m'appelle pas Mme Pauline.
Akhmatoua
Ecoutez-moi bien, citoyenne camarade. Si jamais vous essayez encore
une fois de me faire plaisir d'une maniere ou d'une autre, je vous
denonce 5 la police.
Pauline
A la police? Vous?
Akhmatova
A la police, parfaitement. A la mienne. Ah! Ah! Vous croyez qu'il n'y e n
a qu'une et que c'est la v6tre. Comme elles sont na'ives et confiantes les
femmes russes! Une seule police! Mais il y en a dix, camarade voisine,
que dis-je, il y en a toujours une de plus. Est-ce qu'il ne faut pas toujours
une police pour surveiller la police? I1 y en a toute une echelle depuis la
cave jusque L5-Haut, 5 la Grande Maison. Savez-vous seulement 5 quel
echelon de l'kchelle vous etes perchke? Alors moi, Akhmatova, j'irai 5
ma milice, et croyez-moi j'aurai bien des choses 5 raconter.
Pauline
Vous? Vous n'irez pas! Elle n'ira pas?
Akhmatova
J'irai. Par exemple: ma voisine a appele son sale cabot Iossip Staline.
Pauline
Moi? Ce n'est pas vrai!
Akhmatoua
Je jure que je vous ai entendue. Couch6 Staline! Croyez-moi, ils me
croiront. A la niche Staline!
Nadezhda
(She shows "the curtain" that separates the room
from the neighboring one.)
The curtain .. . Anna Andreyevna, when I said God . . . the curtain.
Akhmatova
It's Polonius. (She opens the curtain.) Come in! O r rather, come out!
Madame Pauline, are you the one who tampered with my things,
neighbor?
Pauline
Which ones? I only washed but your cups, to please you. And my name
is not Madame Pauline.
Akhmatoua
Listen to me closely, comrade citizen. If you ever try again in any way to
please me, I'll denounce you to the police.
Pauline
To the police? You?
Akhmatova
To the police, absolutely. To mine. Ha! Ha! You think there's only one
and that it's yours. How naive and trusting Russian women are! Only one
police force! But there are ten, comrade neighbor, what am I saying,
there is always one more. Don't we always need one police force to oversee
the police? There's a whole ladder of them, going from the cellar to Up
There, to the Big House. Do you even know on which rung of the ladder
you are perched? Whereas I, Akhmatova, I will go to my secret police,
and believe me, I'll have lots of things to tell.
Pauline
You? You won't go! Will she go?
Akhmatoua
I will go. For example: my neighbor named her dirty pooch Joseph
Stalin.
Pauline
Me? It's not true!
Akhmatova
I swear I've heard you. Sit Stalin! Believe me, they'll believe me. Go lie
down Stalin!
Pauline
Vous ne le ferez pas. Elle ne le fera pas?
Akhmatova
Farce que je suis nee pour donner le sein, et laver les eclats
de sang sur le front des enfants,
Parce que j'aime la musique de Mozart et de Chostakovitch
e t que je hais l'antisimite,
Vous croyez que je n'oserai pas mentir comme tout le
monde?
Detrompez-vous, camarade. Je peux faire tout ce que je veux. Allez,
reculez, reculez et disparaissez. (Pauline disparaz^t.) La! Cette fois-ci, la
mouche, Ccrasie, aplatie, CcrabouillCe, aplatie, hein?
Nadgda
Je me demande comment vous avez pu!
Akhmatova
Moi aussi! Mais une telle force s'est emparee de moi que si Iossip
QuivousavC avait it6 devant moi, je crois que j'aurais pu, de mes propres
doigts, lui dkraciner les moustaches, tel un Titan deracinant l'Olympe
d'une main!
iVadgda
Pauvre Pauline. Sans m t m e nous hai'r elle nous jetterait en Enfer.
Akhmatova
Pauvre Pauline nous tuera tous. En milliards de vermine elle grouille sur
toute la Russie car elle est elle-mEme tout Staline multiplie.
Nadejda, si jamais je vais a 1'Union des Ecrivains, vous m'accom-
pagnerez?
Nadgda
Moi? Jamais de la vie. D'abord mon permis de sejour s'arrtte aprPs-
demain. Et puis vous savez bien que je n'aurai pas la force de voir me
regarder la face de ces assass . . . (rideau) astygmates. Avec ma myopie,
non. Le tklephone?
(Elle met un c o u s i n dessus.)
Akhmatova
Jusqu'au coin de la rue, Nadinka. Sinon je n'y arriverai jamais. Tous ces
escaliers. Et ensuite traverser sans vous le Boulevard Gorki. Les Russes
qui conduisent comme si le Diable leur courait aprPs. Et le tram.
Prendre le tram et mourir CtouffCe. Sans vous, non.
Pauline
You won't d o it. Will she do it?
Akhmatova
Because I was born to give suck, and to wash the bursts of
blood on children's foreheads,
Because I love the music of Mozart and of Shostakovich and
I hate the anti-Semite,
You think I wouldn't dare to lie like everyone else?
Don't kid yourself, comrade. I can do anything I want. Go on, back up,
get out of here and disappear. (Pauline disappears.) There! This time, the
pigeon, squashed, flattened, squished, flattened, huh?
Nadahda
I wonder how you could have!
Akhmatoua
So do I! Such a strength came over me that if Joseph Youknowho had
been before me, I think I could have, with my own fingers, uprooted his
mustaches like a Titan uprooting Olympus with one hand!
Nadahda
Poor Pauline. Without even hating us she would throw us into Hell.
Akhmatova
Poor Pauline will kill us all. Like billions of vermin she swarms over all of
Russia, for she is herself all of Stalin multiplied.
Nadezhda, if I ever go to the Union of Writers, will you come with me?
Nadahda
I? Not in a million years. First of all, my visitor's permit ends the day after
tomorrow. And then you know very well I wouldn't have the strength to
see those assass . . . (curtain) astigrnatics look me in the face. With my
nearsightedness, no. The telephone?
(She puts a cushion on it.) I2
Akhmatova
Just to the corner of the street, Nadinka. Otherwise I'll never make it. All
those stairs. And afterwards crossing Gorki Boulevard without you.
Russians who drive as though they were being chased by the Devil. And
the tram. Taking the tram and dying of suffocation. Not without you.
iVadejda
Vous avez decide d'y aller?
Akhmatova
Non, non, pas encore. Je m'exerce seulement i essayer d'imagner
Akhmatova se rendant I$-bas. Et je ne m'y vois pas. Vous me direz: mon
livre ne vaut-il pas une petite abjuration? Une seule petite fois, en trente
ans, coasser avec les grenouilles, ce n'est pas une tragidie?
Nadejda
Ce n'est pas une tragidie.
Akhmatova
Ce qui me retient c'est Ossip, c'est qu'il soit parti sans avoir abjuri. Et
qu'il ait os6 affronter Goliath arm6 seulement d'un poeme. J'aurais pu
l'empecher d'icrire ce pokme. Mais je ne l'ai pas fait.
iVadqda
Je jure que Staline n'Ctait pas humain. I1 Ctait l'avatar velu d'un vampire.
Sinon comment expliquer qu'apr6s sa mort il nous persecute encore?
Akhmatova
Le rideau . . . Et dans les pays capitalistes alors?
(Entre Pauline.)
Nadqda
11s manquent de tout. A Paris pas de harengs. A Londres pas de sucre. Et
pour les permis de sCjour dans les grandes villes on attend des annkes.
Moi au moins j'en obtiens un chaque annie. Et pour un mois entier!
Pauline
Tandis que nous, on nous donne l'essentiel.
Akhmatova
I1 faut lui offrir du the. La camarade travaille beaucoup ces jours-ci.
Pauline
Ne vous dkrangez pas, je passais seulement.
(Elk sort.)
Nadahda
Have you decided to go?
Akhmatova
No, no, not yet. I'm just trying to imagine Akhmatova going there. And
I can't see myself. You'll say to me: isn't my book worth a little
renunciation?Just one little time, in thirty years, to croak with the frogs,
is that a tragedy?
Nadezhda
It's not a tragedy.
Akhmatova
What holds me back is Osip, is the fact that he left without ever having
renounced. And that he dared confront Goliath armed withjust a poem.
I could have stopped him from writing that poem.I3 But I didn't do it.
Nadahda
I swear Stalin wasn't human. He was the hairy avatar of a vampire.
Otherwise, how do you explain the fact that even after his death, he's
still persecuting us?
Akhmatova
The curtain . . . And what about in capitalist countries?
(Pauline enters.)
Nadezhda
They lack everything. In Paris no herring. In London no sugar. And for
visitors' permits in the big cities one waits years. I at least get one every
year. And for a whole month!14
Pauline
Whereas we-we're given the essentials.
Akhmatoua
We must offer her some tea. Our comrade is working a lot these days.Is
Pauline
Don't trouble yourselves, I was just passing through.
(She exits.)
Nadgda
Vous savez, s'il avait vecu, je crois qu'Ossip . . .je ne crois pas le trahir en
disant qu'il aurait publii. Oui.
Akhmatova
En supprimant les poemes d'Akhmatova?
Nadqda
Oui. AprCs un hiver de trente hivers qui refuserait au rosier une chance
de repousser? En ce moment-mCme, tout ripandu qu'il est parmi les
soufres bleus et les feldspaths striis, je suis sOre qu'il nous entend et
qu'il rCve avec vous de l'iterniti du papier. N'hisitez pas.
Akhmatova
Si vous pensez qu'Ossip . . . Alors, je demanderai a Lydia Korneevna de
m'escorter.
(Entre Lydia.)
Lydia
Voile noire! Fadeev s'est suicide.
Nadejda
Tiens! Cela ne m'itonne pas. Une derniere 15chete.
Lydia
Vous Ctes dure!
Akhmatova
Suicide! Le dimon! Fuir le tribunal des 2mes! Et sans payer!
Nadqda
Que je hais ces hommes qui se donnent la mort aprCs avoir vole celle des
autres. I1 aurait pu recevoir Akhmatova. Publier son livre. Et ensuite au
revoir!
Akhmatova
E t publier les oeuvres de Mandelstam. Puisqu'il allait se suicider! Mais
non! On sait pourtant depuis Pouchkine qu'un poete doit se faire tuer!
Honte sur toi, Fadeev, faux poCte, faux vivant et faux mort.
Nadahda
You know, if he had lived, I believe that Osip . . . I don't think I'm
betraying him by saying he would have published. Yes.
Akhmatoua
By omitting Akhmatova's poems?
Nadahda
Yes. After a winter of thirty winters, who would deny the rosebush a
chance to grow anew? In this very moment, all spread out as he is among
blue sulfur and striated feldspath, I'm sure he hears us and he dreams
with you about the eternity of paper. Don't hesitate.
Akhmatoua
If you think that Osip . . . Well then, I'll ask Lydia Korneyevna to escort
me.
(Enter Lydia.)
Lydia
Black sail! Fadeyev has committed suicide.
Nadahda
Well! That doesn't surprise me. A last cowardice.
Lydia
You're so hard!
Akhmatoua
Suicide! The demon! To run away from the tribunal of souls! And
without paying!
Nadahda
How I hate these men who offer themselves up to death after stealing
the death of others. He could have received Akhmatova. Published her
book. And then good-bye!
A khmatoua
And published the works of Mandelstam. Since he was going to kill
himself! But no! Yet we know since Pushkin that a poet ought to get
himself killed! Shame on you, Fadeyev, fake poet, fake live man and fake
dead man.
Nadqda
Qu'il aille au diable, et qu'il demeure en Enfer rue Akhmatova.
Akhmatoua
Rue Akhmatova en enfer! Ah, non.
Nadqda
Alors, rue Mandelstam! Et qui succi.de 5 Fadeev?
Lydia
Sourkova. Une bonne amie de mon pkre.
Nadejda
Donc tout n'est pas perdu?
Lydia
Tout est P recommencer. J'irai.
Akhmatoua
Brave capitaine!
Nadejda
Espirons qu'elle tiendra, la Sourkova.
Akhmatoua
L'iime russe a perdu la mort, la douce mort. Nous ne mourons pas de
mort. Nous mourons de meurtre et de remords.
Et personne pour dicrire cela. Toute la force de Shakespeare lui-
mcme, avec tous ses assassins, ses rois assassins et ses assassins de rois, ses
traitres stupifiants, ses iblouissants parricides, ne suffirait pas P dkcrire
notre drame. I1 ne nous avait pas privus.
Notre Dante est mort avec Ossip. L'unique violon de nos nouveaux
enfers git maintenant brisi sous un iboulement glace.
Nadqda
A vous, Anna Andreievna, disormais de recueillir nos larmes pitrifiies.
Akhmatoua
Un jour de 1937, devant les prisons de Leningrad, je faisais la queue
devant la prison de . . .
Nadezhda
May he go to the devil, and in Hell may he reside on Akhmatova Street.
Akhmatova
Akhmatova Street in hell! Please, no.
Nadezhda
Mandelstam Street then! And who will succeed Fadeyev?
Lydia
Surkova. A good friend of my father's.
Nadezhda
So all is not lost?
Lydia
All must be started anew. I'll go.
Akhmatova
Brave capitaine!
Nadezhda
Let's hope that Surkova will survive.
Akhmatova
The Russian soul has lost its death, the gentle death. We don't die of
death. We die of murder and remorse.
And no one to describe this. All the strength of Shakespeare himself,
with all his assassins, his assassin kings and his assassins of kings, his
amazing traitors, his dazzling parricides, wouldn't be enough to describe
our drama. He didn't foresee us.
Our Dante died with Osip. The sole violin from our new hells lies
broken now beneath an icy avalanche.
Nadezhda
It's up to you, Anna Andreyevna, to collect our petrified tears from now
on.
Akhmatova
One day in 1937, in front of the Leningrad prisons, I was standing in line
in front of the prison at . . .
Nadqda
Rideau! Tch ...
Akhmatova
Polonius est dichaini aujourd'hui! Fuyons. Le banc du square sera
notre radeau. (Elks s 'apprttent pour sortiz) Je faisais la queue devant "les
grands magasins." Une femme aux lkvres bleuAtres me murmure i
lloreille.-Cela vous pourriez le decrire? Et je ripondis: oui. J'itais
glorieuse alors.
Eh bien, je ne l'ai pas fait. Decrire les grands magasins je n'ai pas pu
le faire. Je ne sais pas maudire. (Elles sortent.) Non, il n'y aura pas de
chant i notre gloire. L'Histoire nous a coupe le cou.
(Elks sont sorties. Paulim rentre et commence a fouillm
Elle se drape duns le chrile d'ilkhmatova, jlaire les bouteilles
de parfum vides, etc.)
TABLEAU 3
(Sur u n banc du Parc Gorki. Akhmatova assise. Am'vent Nadqda et

Lydia. Printemps.)
Akhmatova
Vous ttes en retard! J'adore regarder la naissance des roses, mais quand
mtme!
Nadqda
Vous nous aviez dit le cinquikme banc. Et nous aussi nous regardions les
roses maisquand-mtme!
Akhmatova
Le cinquieme, moi? J'ai dit le septieme. Vous savez bien: pour moi
jamais le chiffre 5! Ni 5. Ni Mars. Jamais. Bon. Asseyez-vous. Lev Kvitko
est rihabiliti. L'ami de Liova. A titre posthume. Meyerhold: rihabiliti.
A titre posthume.
Nadqda
Alors les morts peuvent espirer! Tu entends, Ossip, ma taupe sublime?
Akhmatova
I1 entend. Et pas seulement les morts. On m'a fait savoir que pour Liova,
c'est le moment de refaire les demarches. Ma trks there Lida, il faut
icrire deux lettres tout de suite. Je vous explique . . .
Nadahda
Curtain! Shhh ...
Akhmatova
Polonius is raging today! Let's beat a retreat. The bench in the square
will be our raft. (They get ready to go out.) I was waiting in line in front of
"the department stores." A blue-lipped woman murmured in my ear-
Could you describe this? And I answered: yes. I was glorious then.
Well, I didn't do it. Describe the department stores, I couldn't do it. I
don't know how to curse. (They exit.) No, there will be no canto to our
glory. History has cut our throats.
(They are gone. Pauline enters and starts to rummage. She drapes
herself i n Akhmatova 's shawl, sniffs the empty perfume bottles, etc. )
TABLEAU 3
(On a bench in Gorki Park. Akhmatova seated. Nadahda and Lydia

am've. Springtim.)
Akhmatova
You're late! I love to watch the roses' birth, but still!
Nadahda
You said the fifth bench. And we were looking at the roses as well but-
still!
Akhmatova
The fifth, I? I said the seventh. You know very well: I would never choose
the number five! Neither 5. Nor March. Never. Well. Sit down. Lev
Kvitko has been rehabilitated. Liova's friend. Posthumously. Meyerhold:
rehabilitated. Posthumously.
Nadahda
So the dead can hope! Do you hear, Osip, my sublime mole?
Akhmatova
He hears. And notjust the dead. They let me know it's time to take steps
again for Liova. My very dear Lida, we must write two letters at once. I'll
explain to you . . .
Lydia
Mais pourquoi moi ...?
Akhmatoua
Vous ne voulez pas que ce soit moi?!Je ne pourrai jamais. Les formules,
le ton, non. C'est vous.
Nadejda
Et la ponctuation.
Akhmatoua
Et la ponctuation. Alors, je vais vous donner l'adresse trks prkcieuse du
destinataire . . . qu'on m'a donnie . . . Si quelqu'un a les clis du destin
de Liova, c'est bien lui . . . Et son nom . . . (Elk cherche duns son sac, sort
tout sur les genoux de Nadejda et Lydia.) Non, Ca c'est une ordonnance-
lecteur-lecteur-lectrice-un pokme, etc.-c'ktait une feuille plike . . .
Tout 8 l'heure. Dans l'autobus. Les jeunes gens. Malgrk mon Sge ils me
serraient d'itrangement pr6s. 11s n'ont pas pris l'argent! . . .
Nadgda
11s n'ont quand mtme pas pris seulement cette feuille-18justement?
Akhmatoua
Silrement pas . . . Ma carte d'identiti! 11s ont pris ma carte d'identiti!
Nadejda
La carte d'identitk, et pas l'argent? Pour quoi faire?
Akhmatoua
Pour quoi faire? Avoir la carte d'identiti d'hhmatova. Non. 11s ne
savent pas qui est Akhmatova. Ce n'est donc mtme pas pour avoir ma
photo et ma signature. Par mkchancetk alors.
Nadqda
Vous l'avez peut-ttre laisske 8 la maison?
Akhmatoua
Je ne suis pas folle. Ces jeunes gens ont pris ma carte dlidentitC et
maintenant me voili livrie sans nom parmi la foule et le troupeau.
Lydia
But why me ...?
Akhmatoua
You don't expect me to do it?! I could never. The turns of phrase, the
tone, no. It's you.
Nadahda
And the punctuation.
Akhmatoua
And the punctuation. Well then, I shall give you the very precious
address of the recipient. . . that they gave me . . . If anyone has the keys
to Liova's destiny, it's clearly him . . . And his name . . . (She searches in her
purse, dumps everything out onto Lydia and Nadahda's knees.) No, that's a
prescription-reader-reader-reader-a poem, etc.-it was a folded
piece of paper. . . Just now. In the bus. The youngsters. Despite my age,
they were crowding me strangely close. They didn't take my money! . . .
Nadahda
They didn't just take precisely that piece of paper?
Akhmatoua
Surely not . . . My identity card! They took my identity card!
Nadahda
Your identity card, but no money? What for?
Akhmatoua
What for? To have Akhmatova's identity card. No. They don't know who
Akhmatova is. Then it's not even so as to have my photo and my
signature. Well then, out of maliciousness.
Nadahda
Maybe you left it at home?
Akhmatoua
I'm not crazy. Those youngsters took my identity card and now here I
am, offered nameless up to the crowd and the herd.
Lydia
En tout cas si vous n'avez pas vos papiers, il est inutile d'icrire ces lettres
aujourd'hui. D'abord la carte.
Akhmatova
Est-ce qu'il faudra aller 2 Leningrad pour en faire faire une, croyez-vous?
Lydia
Peut-Ctre. Mais cela je ne pourrai le faire pour vous. Je vais d'abord aller
porter plainte au dCp6t des trams.
(Elk sort.)
Akhmatova
J'avais bien dit le septieme banc, n'est-ce pas? Et vous vous m'attendiez
au cinquikme. Je ne suis pas superstitieuse, mais quand mCme.
Vous vous souvenez de mon poeme: "Une Larme"?
Nadqda
Non.
Akhmatova
"C'itait comme si j'ktais suspendue 5 mes propres cils, et mfirissant et
grossissant . . ." Vous vous souvenez?
Nadejda
"Etjouant tous les r6les de la piece, jusqu'5 ce que l'on m'icrase." Je me
souviens trcs bien de ce poeme. Mais il n'est pas de vous, il est d'Ossip.
Akhmatova
D'Ossip! "Une Larme"!? Mais non, pardonnez-moi, il est de moi, Anna
Akhmatova, 1934.
Nadqda
Ossip Mandelstam, 1934. I1 est d'Ossip. J'itais 12 quand il l'a riciti.
C'Ctait 5 Voroneje, rue LinCnai'a. Nous avions tire les rideaux, pour faire
une nuit.
Akhmatova
Parfaitement. J'Ctais 15, debout, ligerement appuyee au mur, les Cpaules
enveloppies dans mon chPle de soie mauve.
Lydia
In any case if you haven't got your papers, it's useless to write these
letters today. First the card.
Akhmatoua
Do you think I'll have to go to Leningrad to have one made?
Lydia
Perhaps. But that I couldn't do for you. First I'm going to file a
complaint at the tram depot.
(She exits.)
Akhmatoua
I distinctly said the seventh bench, didn't I? And you were waiting for me
on the fifth. I'm not superstitious, but still.
Do you remember my poem: "A Tear"?
Nadahda
No.
Akhmatoua
"It was as if I were suspended on my own eyelashes, and ripening and
growing . . ." Do you remember?
Nadahda
"And acting all the parts in the play, until they crush me." I remember
that poem very well. But it's not yours, it's Osip's.
Akhmatoua
Osip's! "A Tear"!? No, pardon me, it's mine, Anna Akhmatova, 1934.
Nadahda
Osip Mandelstam, 1934. It's Osip's. I was there when he recited it. It was
in Voronezh, Linenaya Street. We had drawn the curtains, to make it
night.
Akhmatoua
Precisely. I was there, standing, slightly leaning against the wall, my
shoulders wrapped in my mauve silk shawl.
Nadgda
Vous itiez 12, debout, tr~nsfigurke,les ailes P demie ouvertes, vous
ecoutiez Ossip reciter ses vers, la tCte rejetee en arrikre comme pour
recevoir sur les lkres le souffle du genie, comme d'habitude. I1 etait
visit6 . . .
Akhmatova
Par mon poeme. Nu1 ne rkcitait mieux que moi mes poemes sinon Ossip.
Nadgda
Son poeme.
Akhmatova
Pardonnez-moi, there Nadejda, mais ce poeme c'est moi qui l'ai crei.
Trois mois entiers, apres la premiere arrestation de Liova, il a voletC
dans ma chambre d'insomnie, comme s'il etait encore trop faible pour
se faire entendre distinctement. J'ecoutais, j'kcoutais. I1 venait de si loin.
C'est moi qui ai luttk pour le recueillir. Vous pouvez l'ignorer. Vous
n'Ctes pas sa mere. Sa mere c'est la mere epouvantie de Liova, c'est moi.
Nadejda
Sa mere c'est Ossip. Ou plut6t non. Ossip est son p e r e Et sa mere c'est
moi. Oui, moi-mZme. Cette larme, c'est la mienne. Celle que je n'ai pas
verske d'ailleurs. C'est la traduction humide de ma peine. I1 avait eu ces
affreuses syncopes. Je l'avais cru mourir. Au retour, dans mes yeux . . .
Akhmatova
Assez. Moi aussi j'ai eu des syncopes. Est-ce que je peux savoir pourquoi
vous avez besoin de me prendre "Larme"? Depuis le premier jour,
depuis 1934,je vous donne tout. La moitik de mon pain, la moitik de ma
vie. En 1935, pourquoi 6taisje 2 me geler P Voroneje? Pour allPger le
desertique exil de mes amis. Qui d'autre vint vous voir?
Nadqda
Personne.
Akhmatova
Lorsque Moscou vous ferma chacune de ces portes, moi je vous
attendais comme on attend, pour lui faire fCte, la chair de sa chair.
C'etait en 1937. A moi seule je fus tous vos amies et toute votre ville. Y a-
t-il une pensee que je n'aie pas tournee vers vous? MZme ma paire de
souliers de Tachkent, l'unique, n'aije pas eu envie et besoin de vous la
donner P vous, Nadejda, afin que vous sautiez l'hiver 41 d'un pied
Nadezhda
You were there, standing, transfigured, your wings half open, you were
listening to Osip recite his verse, your head thrown back as though to
receive the breath of genius on your lips, as usual. He was visited . . .
Akhmatoua
By my poem. None recited my poems better than I except Osip.
Nadezhda
His poem.
Akhmatoua
Pardon me, dear Nadezhda, but I'm the one who created this poem.
Three whole months, after Liova's first arrest, it fluttered around my
sleepless room, as though it were still too weak to make itself distinctly
heard. I would listen, I would listen. It was coming from so far away. I'm
the one who fought to collect it. You may be unaware of this. You're not
its mother. Its mother is the terrified mother of Liova, it's me.
Nadezhda
Its mother is Osip. Or rather no. Osip is its father. And its mother is me.
Yes, myself. This tear is mine. The one I never shed by the way. It's the
moist translation of my sorrow. He had had those terrible fainting spells.
I thought he was dying. Upon returning, in my eyes . . .
Akhmatoua
Enough. I too have had fainting spells. May I know why you need to take
"Tear" away from me? Since the first day, since 1934, I have given you
everything. Half of my bread, half of my life. In 1935, why did I go to
freeze in Voronezh? To alleviate my friends' desertlike exile. Who else
came to see you?
Nadahda
No one.
Akhmatoua
When Moscow closed to you each one of its doors, I was waiting for you,
as one awaits, to f6te it, the flesh of one's flesh. That was in 1937. I alone
was all of your friends and your entire city. Is there a thought I haven't
turned toward you? Even my pair of shoes from Tashkent, the only ones,
didn't I want and need to gtve them to you, you Nadezhda, so you could
leap over the winter of 41 with magtc feet?16The ones my admirer the
shoemaker made for me. In 1938, the last February, the one of the
magique? Celle que m'avait confectionn6e un admirateur cordonnier.

En 1938, le dernier fevrier, celui de l'Apocalypse, n'ai-je pas 6t6 le seul et
le dernier regard P accompagner par amour vos visages qui s'en allaient?
Et je vous signale que c'est le 18 f6vrier 1938 que j'ai k i t 6 P
Mandelstam le pokme que je lui avais didi6. Son dernier pokme.
Et depuis, j'abrite pour vous les poemes de Mandelstam, j'ai fait place
B son 5me dans ma mkmoire,je suis une maison ouverte P chacun de ses
mots.
Et vous voulez me prendre "Larme"? Je sais bien qu'Ossip ne peut
plus vous murmurer de nouvelles chansons etj'imagine votre souffrance
car elle est un peu la mienne. Nous sommes lourdes de tant d'absence et
de tant d'enfants morts. Que de po6mes non 6crits par Mandelstam.
Mais celui-ci est mien.
Nadqda
Je vous laisse battre l'air vide avec vos paroles. Oui, vous avez donn6
comme nulle autre, oui vous avez 6t6 notre seule et loyale contemporaine.
Ce n'est pas une raison pour que je vous laisse emporter, m6me par
mkgarde, une seule parcelle d'Ossia. Plutbt mourir.
Akhmatoua
Sije vousjure sur la tPte de mon Liova que c'est moi qui ai cr66 "Larme,"
et ensuite dit et chant6 P Ossip qui me le r6p6tait, vous me croirez? Je
vousjure . . .
Nadejda
Non! Je vous en prie, ne jurez pas! Je vous le donne. Oui, gardez-le et ne
jurez pas. Ah! C'est idiot, mais sijamais ce Dieu qui n'existe pas existait.
Pauvre Liova. Non. Vous me rendez folle. Allons, c'est dit, c'est vous qui
Ptes la m6re. D'accord! N'en parlons plus. Pardonne-moi, Ossip. Et
pardonne P Akhmatova. Et pour tout le reste de ton oeuvre, pour chaque
fragment de chaque vers, je monte la garde comme un dragon.
Akhmatoua
Mais je ne veux pas.
Nadqda
Mais n'en parlons plus. Plus de "Larme"! Plus jamais. Sinon, comme
vous dites, une telle force pourrait s'emparer de moi . . . D'accord?
Akhmatoua
D'accord. Je cede.
Apocalypse, wasn't I the only and the last look to accompany, out of love,
your departing faces? And allow me to point out to you that it was the
18th of February, 1938, that I recited to Mandelstam the poem I had
dedicated to him. His last poem.
And ever since, I've sheltered Mandelstam's poems for you, I've made
room for his soul in my memory, I'm an open house for each one of his
words.
And you want to take "Tear" away from me? I know very well that Osip
can no longer murmur new cantos to you, and I imagtne your suffering
for it is mine a little too. We are heavy with so much absence and so
many dead children. Such a lot of unwritten poems by Mandelstam. But
this one is mine.
Nadezhda
I'm letting you strike the empty air with your words. Yes, you have given
like no one else, yes you have been our only and loyal contemporary.
That isn't a reason for me to let you take away, even inadvertently, a
single particle of Osia. Rather die.
Akhmatoua
If I swear to you on my Liova's head that it is I who created "Tear," and
then told and sang it to Osip who repeated it to me, will you believe me?
I swear to you . . .
Nadezhda
No! I beg of you, don't swear! I'll give it to you. Yes, keep it and don't
swear. Ah! It's stupid, but if ever that God who doesn't exist existed. Poor
Liova. No. You're driving me mad. Fine, it's said and done, you're the
mother. Agreed! Let's not talk about it anymore. Forgive me, Osip. And
forgive Akhmatova. And as for all the rest of your work, for each
fragment of each verse, I'll guard it like a dragon.
Akhmatoua
But I don't want to.
Nadezhda
Let's not talk about it anymore! No more "Tear"! Never again. Other-
wise, as you say, such a strength might come over me . . . Agreed?
Akhmatoua
Agreed. I give up.
Nadejda
Elle ci.de! Quelle souffrance. Devenir folles. Au point de voler l'enfant.
De tuer l'enfant. Le plus cher de soi-mime. Nous avons si faim et si
froid. Nous mangeons l'enfant et la m6moire.
Akhmatoua
Vous vous souvenez d'ugolino dans 1'EnIkr au chant XXXIII? Peut-itre
sommes-nous en train de devenir des Ugolini? Emmur6s vivants dans
des tours de silence, nous nous dkvorons nous-mimes. Je me ronge. Je
ronge mes mains . . .
Nadejda
Je me souviens. Et vous vous souvenez, je l'espi.re, que c'est Ossip qui
vous en a parl6. I1 venait d'apprendre l'italien pour suivre Dante de
cercle en cercle. I1 en etait devenu florentin.
Akhmatoua
I1 connaissait 1'Enfer par cceur. Comme mes vers. Et moi un jour je lui
lisais avec ma voix le chant XXX du Purgatoire. Soudain je le vois qui
pleure,
Nadejda
Si vous recommencez ...
Akhmatoua
Je m'arrite.
Nadejda
C'est quand m i m e un peu fort. Est-ce qu'elle n'a pas assez d'elle-mime?
Pas assez de voix et de chemins? Pas assez de corps? I1 faut aussi qu'elle
s'approprie les ossements des morts?
(Un temps.)
Akhmatoua
Nadejda . . . vous croyez vraiment que . . . "Larme" est d'Ossip? Dites.
Nadejda
J'ai tout dit.
Akhmatoua
Et pourtantje me souviens de chaque vers perlant dans chacune de mes
veines. Et elle ne serait pas surgie de ma poitrine? Est-ce que c'est
possible? Oui? C'est possible. Ma m6moire . . . n'est plus ma mkmoire?
Nadezhda
She gives up! What suffering. We're going mad. To the point of stealing
the child. Of killing the child. The dearest part of oneself. We are so
hungry and so cold. We're eating the child and the memory.
Akhmatoua
Do you remember Ugolino in canto XXXIII of The Inferno? Perhaps
we're in the process of becoming Ugolini? Walled alive inside towers of
silence, we're devouring ourselves. I'm gnawing myself. I'm gnawing my
hands. . .
Nadezhda
I remember. And you remember, I hope, that it's Osip who told you
about this. He had just learned Italian so as to be able to follow Dante
from circle to circle. It had turned him into a Florentine.
Akhmatoua
He knew Hell by heart. Like my poetry. And I-one day I was reading
canto XXX from Purgatorio to him with my voice. Suddenly I see he is
weeping,"
Nadezhda
If you start that again ...
Akhmatoua
I'll stop.
Nadezhda
All the same it's a bit much. Doesn't she have enough of her self? Not
enough voices and paths? Not enough body? Does she need besides to
appropriate the bones of the dead?
( A time pmses. )
Akhmatoua
Nadezhda . . . do you truly believe that . . . "Tear" is Osip's? Tell me.
Nadezhda
I've told you everything.
Akhmatoua
And yet I remember each line beading in each one of my veins. And yet
it might not have sprung from my breast? Is that possible? Yes? It's
possible. My memory . . . is no longer my memory?
Nadqda
C'est possible.
Akhmatoua
Je serais folle alors? Je suis atteinte de folie? Dites.
Nadejda
De folie, non. C'est peut-Ctre de l'amour qui dkborde. Tenez. VoilP
Lydia Korneevna.
Lydia
Vous avez pleurk? Alors rkjouissez-vous! Votre carte d'identitk. Je l'ai
retrouvke au dkp6t. Vous l'aviez sans doute laisske glisser. Un jeune
homme l'a remise au chef du dkp6t.
Akhmatoua
J'ai fait cela, moi?!
Nadqda
vous.
Akhmatoua
Mes amies, pardonnez-moi. Et ne m'abandonnez jamais! Je perds mon
identiti. Je crois que j'ai kcrit un po6me de Mandelstam. I1 ne me reste
plus qu'un fragment de c e u r pour finir cette invivable annke. Je sens
que je vais mourir le mois prochain, au plus tard, en juin. Dites, vous
m'aimez quand mCme, malgrk tous mes dkfauts?
Nadqda
Malgr6, avec tous vos dkfauts.
Akhmatoua
Merci.
Lydia
Et moi je vous adore. Je suis nourrie de vous. Plus que vous ne
l'imaginez. Je serai toujours 1%pour vous, Anna Andreievna. Autant que
vous voudrez. Allons-nous-en. I1 faut vite kcrire ces lettres pour Liova,
maintenant.
Nadqda
Et ensuite reprendre les dkmarches pour la publication de vos po6mes.
Nadezhda
It's possible.
Akhmatova
Am I mad then? Am I touched with madness? Tell me.
Nadezhda
Not with madness, no. Maybe it's love that's overflowing. Look. Here's
Lydia Korneyevna.
Lydia
Have you been crying? Well then rejoice! Your identity card. I found it at
the depot. You must have dropped it. A young man turned it in to the
stationmaster.
Akhmatova
I did that-I?!
Nadezhda
You.
Akhmatova
My friends, forgive me. And don't ever abandon me! I'm losing my
identity. I think I wrote one of Mandelstam's poems. I only have a part of
heart left for finishing out this unlivable year. I sense I'm going to die
next month, in June at the latest. Tell me, do you love me anyway, in
spite of all my faults?
Nadezhda
In spite of, with all your faults.
Akhmatova
Thank you.
Lydia
And 1-1 adore you. You nourish me. More than you can imagine. I'll
always be there for you, Anna Andreyevna. As much as you'd like. Let's
leave here. We must write those letters for Liova quickly, now.
Nadezhda
And then take steps again toward the publication of your poems.
2 68 NEW LITERARY HISTORY
Akhmatoua
Oui, oui. Drapee dans mon plus beau chile, celui aux dragons d'argent,
parfumee, d6cor6e par mes soins, j'irai voir en personne qui vous
voudrez. Ma barque glissera sur le fleuve cadenck de cent rames. A la
barre Tchoukovskaia.
Lydia
Sourkova, je lui ai d6ji par16 au telephone longuement.
Akhmatova
Et?
Lydia
Elle n'a rien dit. Mais je l'ai sentie kcouter trks fort.
Nadejda
11s ne disent jamais rien de peur qu'on les entende. Tapis derrikre un
rideau de pierre, ils regardent par une infime fente le visage humain de
qui entre.
Lydia
Elle ecoutait. J'ai entendu sa respiration. Elle a eu un soupir
Nadejda
Un soupir? Ca, c'est bonl
Akhmatoua
Derrikre le rideau de pierre, peut-ttre reste-t-il le souffle d'une femme.
On attend dix-sept ans, la &re dans la maison dCserte, et puis vient une
annee, le temps bouillonne, promet. O cette annee, qui pourrait la
vivre? Non, on l'agonise. Elle nous a r6veillCs Liova et moi pour nous
torturer d'espoir. Retrouverai-je mon enfant . . . ?
Nadejda
Anna Andreievna, pour "Larme" . . . qui sait lorsqu'un pokme arrive aux
lkvres frkmissantes combien de pays combien d'airs et de l a n p e s il vient
de traverser? Qui sait, "Larme" est peut-Ctre un peu nke de vous avec
Ossip. Une mtme douleur vous parlait avec le mkme accent.
Akhmatoua
Vous croyez? Mais vous savez, mon propre Requiem il me semble parfois
que sont ces compagnes aux l6vres bleues qui me l'ont 6pelC pas 2 pas
sous les murailles du Kremlin.
Akhmatova
Yes, yes. Draped in my most beautiful shawl, the one with the silver
dragons, scented, decorated with care by my own hand, I'll go in person
to see whomever you'd like. My boat will glide on the river measured by
the rhythm of a hundred oars. Chukovskaya at the helm.
Lydia
I've already spoken to Surkova at length on the phone.
Akhmatova
And?
Lydia
She didn't say anything. But I heard her listening very hard.
Nadezhda
They never say anything, for fear they'll be heard. Lurking behind a
stone curtain, they peer through a minute crack at the human face of
whoever enters.
Lydia
She was listening. I heard her breathing. She sighed
hTadahda
A sigh? That's good!
Akhmatova
Behind the stone curtain, maybe a woman's breath remains. One waits
seventeen years, mother in the deserted house, and then comes a year,
time bubbles up, promises. 0 this year, who could live it? No, one dies it.
It woke us up, Liova and me, so as to torture us with hope. Will I find my
child again . . . ?
Nadezhda
Anna Andreyevna, about "Tear" . . . who knows, when a poem shows up
on trembling lips, how many countries how many airs and tongues it's
just traversed? Who knows, "Tear" is perhaps a little bit born of you with
Osip. A same sorrow spoke to you with the same accent.
Akhmatova
Do you think so? Well you know, sometimes it seems to me that my own
Requiem was spelled out to me by those blue-lipped companions, step by
step below the walls of the Kremlin.
Nadqda
Mais regardez donc qui passe lB! C'est Pauline? Mais comment?
Akhmatoua
Elle nous a suivies. Quand je ne suis pas 12, de l'autre c6tk du rideau, elle
s'ennuie. MCme 2 distance il faut que je lui tienne compagnie.
Lydia
Mais vous l'aviez m e ?
Akhmatoua
Tout B fait. J'ai l'habitude. Elle ktait assise sur le sixieme banc.
Nadqda
Et vous n'avez rien dit?
Lydia
Mais elle vous cherche quand mCme, il me semble.
Akhmatoua
Ah! Ca ce n'est pas comme d'habitude. Allo! Hola! Approchez, Polonius.
Le grand air l'intimide.
Pauline
Je ne voulais pas vous dkranger plus t6t. Et puis c'est mon congk, mais je
prkfkre vous dire qu'il y a zakosnoie pismo pour vous.
Akhmatoua
Un recommandk?! I1 me faut aller B la Poste, alors?
Lydia
Je vous accompagne, Anna Andreievna.
Akhmatoua
J'ai peur. Aodt a toujours 6tk le mois cruel dans ma vie. Nadejda, vous
me rkciterez un poeme d'Ossip en chemin?
Nadqda
Je vous rkciterai: "Ah non! Ni lamentation, ni supplication! Tshush. Ni
gemissement . . ."
Nadahda
Well look who's walking by over there! Isn't that Pauline? But how
ever.. . ?
Akhmatova
She followed us. When I'm not there, on the other side of the curtain,
she gets bored. Even at a distance I have to keep her company.
Lydia
So you'd already seen her?
Akhmatova
Absolutely. I'm used to it. She was sitting on the sixth bench.
Nadahda
And you didn't say anything?
Lydia
All the same she's looking for you, it seems to me.
Akhmatova
Oh! That's unusual. Hello! Hello there! Approach, Polonius. The great
outdoors intimidates her.
Pauline
I didn't want to disturb you before. And then it's my day off, but I
thought it best to tell you that there's zakosnoi'epismo for you.
Akhmatova
A registered letter?! Must I go to the Post Office then?
Lydia
I'll go with you, Anna Andreyevna.
Akhmatova
I'm frightened. August has always been the cruel month in my life.
Nadezhda, you'll recite one of Osip's poems to me on the way?
Nadahda
I'll recite to you: "Oh no! Neither lamentation, nor supplication! Hush.
Nor moaning. . ."
Akhmatoua
"Malgrk les ombres effrayantes" . . . A la poste, cette enveloppe, c'est
peut-etre une voile blanche?
(Elks sortent.)
Pauline
Ca ne pense qu'aux mots. Comment voulez-vous que Ca vive, des veuves
comme ~ a ?
(Elle sort.)
TABLEAU 4
(Entre Akhmatoua appuyie sur Nadejda. Chez Akhmatoua.)
Nadejda
Si vous ne me laissez pas appeler un mkdecin je fais mon sac etje rentre
dans ma province. Elle s'est i moitiC kvanouie dans l'escalier. Et en plus
elle est devenue muette et sourde. Vous croyez qu'elle me rkpondrait?
Akhmatoua
J'ai rkpondu: non. Pas de mkdecin. Non: pas de publication. Je-ne-
publie-plus.
Nadejda
C'est de l'kgoisme. C'est de l'orgueil. C'est un caprice infernal. Ne
publiez pas. Ossip ne vous pardonnera pas. Vous ne publiez pas?
Akhmatoua
Vous savez ce que c'est que le malheur? Oui, je sais vous savez.
Nadejda
Et vous? Liova n'est-il pas toujours vivant?
Akhmatoua
Mais le fin fond du malheur vous ne savez pas. Non. Ecoutez-moi. Je
recois une lettre de mon fils. La premikre lettre depuis six mois. Une
joie? Un coup de poignard. Le chagrin que me cause sa dkportation
n'est qu'une kgratignure a c6tk de mon nouveau malheur.
Cette lettre, tenez (elk cherche duns son grand sac), c'est un brasier
allumk autour de la croix, c'est . . . Oti est-elle?
Akhmatova
"Despite the scary shadows. . ." This envelope at the Post Office, perhaps
it's a white sail?
( T h q exit.)
Pauline
All those three there think about is words. How do you expect them to
live, widows like that?
(She exits.)
TABLEAU 4
(Enter Akhmatoua, leaning on Nadezhda. At Akhmatoua 5.)
Nadezhda
If you don't let me call a doctor I'll pack my bag and return to my
province. She half fainted in the stairway. And moreover she's gone deaf
and dumb. Do you think she'd answer me?
Akhmatova
I have answered: no. No doctor. No: no publication. I-will-not-publish-
anymore.
Nadezhda
That's selfishness. That's pride. That's an infernal caprice. Don't pub-
lish. Osip will not forgive you. You won't publish?
Akhmatoua
Do you know what unhappiness is? Yes, I know you know.
Nadezhda
And you? Isn't Liova still alive?
Akhmatova
But you don't know the very heart of unhappiness. No. Listen to me. I
receive a letter from my son. The first letter in six months. A joy? A
dagger's blow. The grief his deportation causes me is a mere scratch next
to my new unhappiness.
(She searches in her bigpurse.) This letter, here . . . is a blaze lit 'round the
cross, it's . . . Where is it?
Nadgda
Mais que dit-il?
Akhmatova
I1 dit: "Mgre, le soir je tombe B terre comme un cadavre. A l'aube sous
les cris des fouets je me hisse en pleurant hors de mon sarcophage."
Nadejda
Pauvre Liova. Pauvres hommes.
Akhmatoua
J'ai pleurk, mais ce n'est rien. Ecoutez. VoilB ce qu'il me dit: "je ne suis
plus qu'un caillou vttu d'un haillon. Un ver de terre sanguinolent sans
langue, sans mgre. Pourquoi ne me sauves-tu pas?" Je ne fais que lui
nuire et I'enfoncer en terre. I1 me reproche d'avoir Ccrit une lettre
arrogante B Cholokhov. D'avoir refuse par un orgueil Cpouvantable
d'entrer B 1'Union des Ecrivains. Moi! Est-ce que j'ai kcrit B ce Cholokhov?
Est-ce qu'on ne m'a pas jetCe expulde fichue dehors et crachCe de
1'Union des Ecrivains? Vous etes tCmoin.
Nadqda
Je suis tCmoin.
Akhmatoua
Et il me dit: "et maintenant il parait que tu vas publier. Encore te faire
remarquer. J'en ai assez de payer pour toi! Tu aimes mieux tes poemes
que ton fils."
Nadqda
C'est injuste! C'est faux!
Akhmatova
Mais c'est vrai que je ne le sauve pas. Et qu'il peut croire, &bas, derriere
les barbel&, que c'est moi l'auteur aveugle de sa croix.
Nadejda
Et vous croyez que ne pas publier va le sauver? Tout le contraire. 25 ans
de silence ne l'ont pas dklivrk. Nous allons publier. I1 faut que I'on
entende toutes vos voix, votre voix de victoire, votre voix prophktique et
pas seulement votre voix qui tremble aux porches de fer.
Abdahda
Well what does he say?
Akhmatoua
He says: "Mother, in the evenings I fall down on the ground like a
corpse. At dawn beneath the cries of the whips, I hoist myself, weeping,
out of my sarcophagus."
Nadahda
Poor Liova. Poor men.
Akhmatoua
I wept, but that's nothing. Listen. Look what he says to me: "I'm nothing
but a pebble dressed in rags. A blood-tinged earthworm without a
tongue, without a mother. Why don't you save me?" All I do is cause him
harm and drive him into the earth. He reproaches me for having written
an arrogant letter to Sholokh~v.'~ For having refused out of appalling
pridefulness to join the Union of Writers. I! Did I write to this Sholo-
khov? Did they not throw me expulsed kicked and spit out of the Union
of Writers? You are a witness.
Nadahda
I am a witness.
Akhmatoua
And he says to me: "and now it appears you're going to publish. Draw
attention to yourself again. I'm sick of paying for you! You love your
poems better than your son."
Nadahda
That's unfair! That's not true!
Akhmatoua
But it's true I haven't saved him. And that he can believe, there, behind
the barbed-wire, that it is I who am the blind author of his cross.
Nadahda
And you think not publishing will save him? On the contrary. 25 years of
silence haven't freed him. We're going to publish. All your voices must
be heard, your victory voice, your prophetic voice, and not just your
voice that trembles before the iron gates.
Akhmatoua
Non. C'est fini,je me tais. I1 vaut mieux que je fasse la morte. A l'agonie
mon fils adore me maudit. "Mkre tu ne vois pas que je brGle!" Et moi je
ne sais pas ce feu comment l'kteindre! Je vous le dis, je ne verrai pas le
dkgel, je ne verrai pas la fin du supplice. C'est mon destin. Pas de livre.
Nadejda
Eh bien, ne publiez pas! Vous verrez! On vous oubliera.
Akhmatoua
On m'oubliera? Vous croyez m'etonner? On m'a oublike cent fois.
(Entre Lydia.)
Nadejda
Elle ne publie plus. On l'oublie. Et je m'en vais.
Akhmatoua
Vous avez entendu?
Lydia
Oui.
Akhmatoua
Je sais que je vous fais de la peine, Lida. Ce livre vous devait le jour
Lydia
A vrai dire hier j'aurais kt6 dksesperke. Mais aujourd'hui je suis presque
soulagee.
Nadejda
Quoi! Encore un suicide?
Lydia
Un changement d'avis.
Nadejda
Ah! un "changement-d'avis."
Akhmatova
Qu'est-ce que je vous disais? Les po&teset les enfants s'eteignent comme
les bougies. Les Jdanov, les moustaches, les asticots repoussent 5 chaque
pluie comme les gueules de l'hydre. Et pourquoi aurais-je eu le droit a
Akhmatova
No. It's over, I'm shutting up. I'm better off playing dead. With his last
gasp my adored son is cursing me. "Mother don't you see I'm burning!"
And 1-1 don't know how to put this fire out! I'm telling you, I won't see
the thaw, I won't see the torture's end. That's my destiny. No book.
Nadezhda
Well then, don't publish! You'll see! You'll be forgotten.
Akhmatova
I'll be forgotten? Do you think you astound me? I've been forgotten a
hundred times.
(Enter Lydia.)
Nadezhda
She's not publishing anymore. She'll be forgotten. And I'm leaving,
Akhmatoua
Did you hear?
Lydia
Yes.
Akhmatoua
I know I'm hurting you, Lida. This book owed you its life.
Lydia
To tell the truth, yesterday I would have despaired. But today I'm almost
relieved.
Nadezhda
What! Another suicide?
Lydia
A change of heart.
Nadezhda
Oh! a "change-of-heart."
Akhmatoua
What did I tell you? Poets and children go out like candles. The
Zhdanov,lg the mustaches, the maggots grow back with each rain like the
une joie dans le monde qui a piPtinC Mandelstam et adore Iago et ses
Iagodas?
Nadqda
Ah, maintenant vous la regrettez cettejoie!?
Akhmatoua
C'est vrai. Pourquoi aurais-je refuse de publier? Quelle naive, quelle
folle tu fais, reveuse d'autrefois! Comme s'ils n'allaient pas m'arreter de
tous c8tes. A toutes jambes, les bouchers me poursuivent avec la hache,
et moi je vais bCtement tendre le cou au divin sacrifice.
Liova mon fils, tu veux que je tombe 5 quatre pattes et que j'aboie et
que j'entre en ballant la queue comme une chienne pute parmi les
loups, mais Ca ne servirait 5 rien. 11s ne me pardonneront pas d'avoir it6
jadis Akhmatova.
Nadqda
I1 faut sauver ce livre. Lida, rkflCchissez. Vous ne connaissez pas
quelqu'un d'autre . . . ?
Lydia
Radlova. La nouvelle secrktaire du nouveau SecrCtaire de Leningrad.
Elle a kt6 l'eleve de mon pere.
Nadqda
Demandez-lui tout de suite un rendez-vous.
Lydia
Une mauvaise eleve. Mais quand meme. Par mon pere, je vais essayer.
(Le tiliphone sonne.)
Akhmatoua
Repondez, Nadinka. Dites que je suis mourante.
Nadqda
Non, Boris, Nadejda Mandelstam au tPl6phone. C'est Boris. I1 parle sans
arrEt.
Akhmatoua
I1 ne demande pas de mes nouvelles? Non. Lui, quand il telephone c'est
pour se plaindre. I1 se plaint?
hydra's heads. And why would I have had the right to joy in the world
that trampled Mandelstam and adored Iago and his Y a g ~ d a s ? ~ ~
Nadahda
Oh, so now you regret this joy!?
Akhmatoua
It's true. Why should I refuse to publish? What a fool, what a madwoman
you are, dreamer from another time! As if they weren't going to stop me
from all sides. As fast as they can, the butchers pursue me with an ax,
and 1-1 go off stupidly to offer up my neck to the divine sacrifice.
Liova my son, you want me to fall on my hands and knees and bark,
and enter dangling my tail like a whorish dog among the wolves, but that
would serve no purpose. They won't forgive me for having once been
Akhmatova.
Nadahda
We must save this book. Lida, think. Don't you know anyone else . . . ?
Lydia
Radlova. The new secretary of the new Secretary of Leningrad. She was
my father's student.
Nadezhda
Ask her for an appointment at once.
Lydia
A poor student. But still. I'm going to try, through my father.
(The telephone rings.)
Akhmatoua
Answer, Nadinka. Say I'm dying.
Nadahda
No, Boris, it's Nadezhda Mandelstam. It's Boris. He's talking non-stop.
Akhmatoua
Doesn't he ask after me? No. Whenever he calls it's to complain. Is he
complaining?
Nadqda
(~coutantet comentant.) Comme d'habitude. Sa datcha. Trop de visiteurs.
I1 craint d'avoir le prix Nobel. Que faire?
Akhmatoua
Qu'il s'en empare comme d'une CpCe et qu'il le brandisse comme
l'archange.
Nadejda
(Au tiliphone.)Je lui dirai. (Elleraccroche.)La gloire est un fardeau Ctrange
pour un ancien cheval sauvage.
Lydia
Boris pourrait peut-etre nous aider? I1 ne pourrait vous refuser une
lettre, qu'en dites-vous? Elle ne nous icoute plus. . . .
Akhmatoua
Chut! Ecoutez: un pokme. "On m'oubliera? Vous croyez m'itonner? On
m'a oubliCe cent fois,
Cent fois dCj2 je gisais dans la tombe,
-0u peut-6tre je suis encore. . . ."
Ou peut-6tre je suis encore. Lida! Vous avez bien entendu?
Lydia
"On m'oubliera? Vous croyez m'Ctonner? On m'a oubliCe cent fois,
Cent fois dCj2 je gsais dans la tombe,
-Oh peut-6tre je suis encore. . . ."
Nadqda
C'est tres beau! Qu'est-ce qu'un pokte? La douleur lui arrache des
larmes d'or. Lii ou nous ne voyons qu'ordure, purulence et dCchets de
vie, il voit scintiller minuscule la graine de la graine. Avec de la terre
plein les dents, et les os dk6tus de leur chandail de chair, Ossip tout
descendu qu'il soit sous le plancher du temps, germe encore tel un
grain magique, j'en suis stire quand je vous entends.
Akhmatoua
Dans la tombe, oh peut-6tre je suis encore. . . .
Pour renaitre . . . Ah! I1 s'est CloignC. C'est ce rideau qui l'a chassC.
Rideau?
Nadezhda
(Listening and commenting.) As usual. His dacha. Too many visitors. He
fears getting the Nobel Prize. What to do?
Akhmatoua
May he seize it like a sword and brandish it like an archangel.
Nadezhda
(On the telephone.) I'll tell her. (She hangs up.) Glory is a strange burden
for a wild horse of old.
Lydia
Perhaps Boris could help us? He couldn't refuse you a letter, what do
you say? She's not listening to us anymore. . . .
Akhmatoua
Shhh! Listen: a poem. "I'll be forgotten? Do you think you astound me?
I've been forgotten a hundred times,
A hundred times already I've lain in the tomb,
-Where perhaps I am still. . . ."
Where perhaps I am still. Lida! Did you get that?
Lydia
"I'll be forgotten? Do you think you astound me? I've been forgotten a
hundred times,
A hundred times already I've lain in the tomb,
-Where perhaps I am still. . . ."
Nadahda
It's very beautiful! What is a poet? Sorrow wrenches golden tears from
her. There where we see only filth, purulence, and chaff of life, she sees
the minuscule seed of the seed sparkling. With his teeth full of earth,
and his bones bared of their vest of flesh, Osip, wholly descended
though he be below the floor of time, still sprouts like a magic grain, I'm
certain of it when I hear you.
Akhmatoua
In the tomb, where perhaps I am still. . . .
To be reborn . . . Ah! It's gone. That curtain has chased it away.
Curtain?
Pauline
Du t h i noir d'Arminie, Ca vous dit? Ca remonterait un mort.
Akhmatoua
C'est l'heure de la realite. Non, attendez, c'est moi qui vais faire le the.
Je me Eve, je suis guCrie. Lidinka, surtout n'oubliez pas mes vers. Je
continuerai. (Au samovar.) Allons, Karapet, sois gentil, bous mon joli,
bous. C'est mon samovar d'ArmCnie. I1 faut savoir lui parler. I1 ne
marche que quand il veut. Nous sommes tous pareils, la sonnette,
Karapet, les toilettes, les poetes. Chacun ne fait q u ' i sa tete.
Pauline
( A Nadejda.) Alors vous ne partez pas, vous?
Nadqda
Si vous le permettez, je me repose.
Pauline
Oui, c'est Ca, reposons-nous, reposons-nous.
Akhmatoua
Vous n'oubliez rien, n'est-ce pas, Lida?
Lydia
Pas un gramme de sucre. Mais pourquoi ne pas noter vos pokmes?
Akhmatoua
Confier mes enfants i des berceaux de papier pour que les mCcknes
viennent me les voler? Non. Vous etes 12 pour les garder.
Lydia
Mais si je disparaissais?
Pauline
S a peut arriver i tout le monde.
Akhmatoua
N'y comptez pas. Du sucre, du the, de la memoire, nous avons de quoi
traverser le Purgatoire. Allons, Karapet, tu dors?
Pauline
Black Armenian tea, would you like some? It would wake the dead.
Akhmatova
It's the moment of reality. No, wait, it's I who shall make the tea. I'm
getting up, I'm cured. Lidinka, above all, don't forget my verse. I'll go
on. (To thesamovar.) Come on, Karapet, be nice, boil my pretty, boil. This
is my Armenian samovar. You have to know how to talk to him. He only
works when he wants to. We're all the same, the doorbell, Karapet, the
toilet, poets. We all do exactly as we please.
Pauline
(To Nadezhda.) So, you're not leaving?
Nadezhda
I'll just rest a bit if you don't mind.
Pauline
Yes, that's it, let's rest, let's rest.
Akhmatova
You're not forgetting anything, are you Lida?
Lydia
Not a gram of sugar. But why notjot down your poems?
Akhmatova
Entrust my children to paper cradles so the "poetry lovers" can come
and steal them from me? No. You're there to keep them.
Lydia
But what if I were to disappear?
Pauline
That could happen to anyone.
Akhmatova
Don't count on it. Sugar, tea, memory, we have everything we need for
crossing Purgatorio. Come on, Karapet, are you asleep?
Pauline
Vous n'ktes pas la seule. Moi aussi on m'a convoque mon homme. Moi
aussi le calvaire je le bois jusqu'5 la lie. Et moi qui me console? Qui me
mouche?
Akhmatova
Savez-vous ce que c'est que le veritable Enfer? Moi non. Vous non plus.
Ici nous sommes seulement dans l'antichambre de 1'Enfer.
L'Enfer proprement dit n'est pas ici. D'apres les voyageurs, il serait en
Afrique du Sud. (Au samovar.) Tu ne veux pas bouillir? Mes amies me
tancent, mon pays tente de m'oublier, mon samovar se fait prier. S'il y
avait un train pour la generation suivante,je me precipiterais 5 la gare.
Pauline
Ecoutez, vous feriez mieux de venir chez moi. Mon the noir d'Armenie,
aux moments difficiles de la vie, comme un ressort, il vous redresse le
moral.
( A Nadejda et Lydia.)
Et vous aussi, pour vous faire plaisir, je vous invite.
Akhmatova
J'accepte. Je vous revaudrai cela, camarade.
Nadqda
Ce the, oh l'avez vous trouve?
Pauline
Ca, je ne vous dirai pas!
(Elks sortent.)
TABLEAU 5
(Chez Akhmatova. Lydia et Akhmatova se prt;parent pour

la visite de Radlova.)
Lydia
( A u rideau.) Alors, avant son arrivee, que je vous dise vite: Nina Radlova
est aussi la niece de notre bien aim6 Secretaire du Parti, elle entre
comme elle veut au Palais du Sultan. Et elle a bien voulu se deranger.
Que ne ferait-on pas pour la grande Akhmatova, m'a-t-elle dit.
(Sonnette.)
Pauline
You're not the only one. They summoned my man too. I drink calvary
down to the dregs too. As for me, who consoles me? Who blows my nose?
Akhmatova
Do you know what real Hell is? I don't. You don't either. Here we're
merely in the vestibule of Hell.
Actual Hell isn't here. According to those who travel, it's in South
Africa. (To the samova7:) You don't want to boil? My friends scold me, my
country attempts to forget me, my samovar wants to be begged. If there
were a train bound for the next generation, I would rush to the station.
Pauline
Listen, you'd be better off coming to my place. My black Armenian tea
is like a spring, it really lifts your spirits in life's hard times.
(To Nadezhda and Lydia.)
And you as well, to please you, you're invited.
Akhmatova
I accept. I'll do as much for you someday, comrade.
Nadezhda
Where did you find this tea?
Pauline
That I won't tell you!
(They exit.)
TABLEAU 5
(At Akhmatova's. Lydia and Akhmatoua prepare themselvesfor

Radlova's visit.)
Lydia
(To the curtain.) So, before her arrival, let me tell you quickly: Nina
Radlova is also the niece of our beloved Party Secretary, she comes and
goes as she pleases from the Sultan's Palace. And she was willing to go
out of her way. What wouldn't we do for the great Akhmatova, she told
me.
(Doorbell.)
Ralliez-vous 2 mon panache blanc et tout ira bien.

(Elk ua ouuri?:Elk mient auec Radloua. Politesses.)
Radloua
On m'a dit que vous aviez recommencC ii Ccrire?
Akhmatoua
Recommence? Je n'ai jamais cessC d'Ccrire. Mais pour diverses raisons
cela ne paraissait peut-Etre pas. J'ai pu avoir l'air d'un long hiver. Mais ce
n'est qu'une apparence.
Radloua
Et sur quoi Ccrivez-vous ces temps-ci?
Akhmatoua
Sur . . . les rivieres.
Radloua
Sur les rivikres? Comment cela?
Akhmatoua
Comment cela, comment cela? En vers. Oui. Classiquement. Sur les
rivieres-rivikres qui coulentjusqu'ii la mer. Noire. Et aussi sur les noyes.
Et tout cela en vers.
Radloua
Sur les noyCs? Pourquoi pas sur les barrages?
Akhmatoua
Sur les barrages? Mais pourquoi . . .
Lydia
Anna Andreievna n'a pas encore eu l'occasion d'ecrire sur les barrages,
mais . . .
Akhmatoua
S'il me vient un barrage dans le silence de la nuit, et s'il me vient suivi de
murmures et de signaux sonores . . .
Lydia
Pourquoi pas?
1'11be your Henri IV.Just follow me and my white plume, and everything
will be fine.21
(She goes to open the door She returns with Radloua. Greetings.)
Radloua
They told me you'd started writing again?
Akhmatoua
Started again? I've never stopped writing. But for various reasons this
might not have been clear. I might've given the impression of a long
winter. But it's just an appearance.
Radloua
And what are you writing on these days?
Akhmatoua
On . . . rivers.
Radloua
On rivers? How is that?
Akhmatoua
How is that, how is that? In verse. Yes. Classically. On rivers-rivers that
flow to the sea. Black. And also on the drowned. And all of this in verse.
Radloua
On the drowned? Why not on dams?
Akhmatoua
On dams? But why. ..
Lydia
Anna Andreyevna has not yet had the occasion to write on dams, but ...
Akhmatoua
If a dam comes to me in the silence of the night, and if it comes to me
followed by murmurs and sonorous signals . . .
Lydia
Why not?
Radlova
Quoi yu'il en soit ce sera un honneur pour les Editions de Leningrad
que de publier un petit recueil des poemes de la grande Akhmatova.
Nous ne voulons pas effacer notre pass6 recent. I1 faudra faire un choix,
naturellement.
Akhmatova
Lida, vous le ferez. Je n'ai jamais su choisir.
Lydia
Avec joie. Et avec regret. Tout est si beau.
Radloua
I1 faudra faire aux po6mes les plus anciens une part importante. Et dire
que vous ecriviez dij5 avant la RCvolution! C'est emouvant.
Akhmatova
Je suis un monument bien rare. Mais tout le monde sait que je vivais
jadis. I1 est temps qu'on apprenne que j'ktais tout aussi vivante dans les
annees cinquante.
Radlova
Moi-meme,j'aime beaucoup vos po6mes d'antan. Certains sont vraiment
tres jolis.
Akhmatova
Vous trouvez?
Radlova
Sincerement oui. I1 y aurait beaucoup 5 en dire, oui beaucoup.
Akhmatova
Vous etes de mes admiratrices, si je comprends bien?
Lydia
Evidemment. Qui ne l'est pas? Ralliez-vous 5 mon panache, Anna
Andreievna.
Akhmatova
Vous me comblez. Mais vous n'avez pas tout lu. Celui sur les abeilles?
. . . Non?
Radlova
Be that as it may, it will be an honor for the Leningrad Editions to
publish a small collection of poems by the great Akhmatova. We don't
want to wipe out our recent past. It will be necessary to choose, naturally.
Akhmatoua
Lida, you'll do it. I've never known how to choose.
Lydia
With joy. And with regret. It's all so beautiful.
Radlova
It will be necessary to accord an important place to the oldest poems.
And to think you were already writing before the Revolution! How
moving.
Akhmatoua
I'm a very rare monument. But everyone knows I was alive long ago. It's
time they learn I was just as alive during the 50's.
Radlova
Myself, I very much like your poems of yesteryear. Certain among them
are really very lovely.
Akhmatoua
Do you think so?
Radlova
Sincerely yes. There would be a lot to say about them, yes a lot.
Akhmatoua
You're one of my admirers, if I understand correctly?
Lydia
Obviously. Who isn't? Follow my plume, Anna Andreyevna.
Akhmatoua
You gratify me. But you haven't read everything. The one about the
bees? . . . No?
Radlova
Non, mais ce sera fait, je vous l'assure. Et dites-moi quels sont vos
tcrivains sovi&tiquesfavoris?
Lydia
Anna Andreievna a une passion pour tellement de poetes.
Akhmatova
Et les vbtres?
Radlova
Eh bien moi, je mets audessus de tout Cholokhov.
Akhmatova
Moi aussi.
Radlova
Ensuite Demian Bedny.
Akhmatoua
Demian Bedny? Moi aussi. Et Biesymenski, non?
Radlova
Et Biesyrnenski, oui. Et ...
Akhmatova
Moi aussi. Voil2.
Radloua
Donc, nous sommes d'accord? J'avoue que .. .
Akhmatoua
Tout P fait d'accord. Je mets P part Mandelstam, car il n'est pas de ce
temps-ci. Mais audessus de notre temps, je vois nettement briller toute
votre pltiade de premiere categorie.
Radlova
Eh bien, je m'en rejouis. Mais pour l'appartement, je crains de ne
pouvoir vous faire plaisir. Vraiment en ce moment, il n'y a pas de place.
Akhmatova
L'appartement? Quel appartement? Qui a demand&un appartement?
Radloua
No, but I shall, I assure you. And tell me, who are your favorite Soviet
writers?
Lydia
Anna Andreyevna has a passion for so many poets.
Akhmatoua
And yours?
Radlova
Well myself, I place Sholokhov above all others.
Akhmatoua
As do I.
Radloua
Then Demian Bedny."
Akhmatoua
Demian Bedny? As do I. And B e ~ y m e n s k ino?
,~~
Radloua
And Bezymenski, yes. And .. .
Akhmatoua
As do I. There.
Radlova
So, we agree? I confess that ...
Akhmatoua
Utter agreement. I place Mandelstam apart, for he is not of this time.
But above our time, I see shining brightly your entire Pleiad of the first
order.
Radloua
Well, I'm delighted. But as for the apartment, I fear I can't accomme
date you. Truly, right now there's no room.
Akhmatoua
The apartment? What apartment? Who asked for an apartment?
Rideau
Vous avez demand6 un appartement?
Akhmatova
Couch6 Polonius! Lydia Korneevna, c'est vous?
Lydia
Mais pas du tout! ...
Akhmatova
Comment! O n me fait la grice de publier un petit recueil de mes vers,
apr?s quinze ans de cachot-parfaitement-on me rend l'air entier de
toutes les Russies, et moi je demanderais en plus, un appartement? Mais
je ne voudrais pour rien au monde priver qui que ce soit et surtout pas un
de nos kcrivains, de la moindre place, du moindre legitime confort, de
la salle de bains meride, jamais!
Radlova
Anna Andreievna, je vous en prie ne le prenez pas comme cela. En
general on me demande . . .
Akhmatoua
En general! Mais vous semblez oublier qui je suis! Mais j'ai le monde
entier pour demeure. Un mois je vis sur le Fujiyama. Rien de plus beau.
Ecoutez: "en 6t6, pour toute viture, le ciel et la terre." Une ann6e je
demeure aux rives d'Arm6nie. Je peux changer d'etage, de saison, de
siecle, comme de langue. Je suis consciente des immenses efforts que
1'Union des Ecrivains a dii faire e n ma faveur. Surmonter des montagnes
de silence . . . Le petit recueil, pour une vieille femme, n'est-ce donc pas
assez?
Lydia
Je vous e n prie Anna Andreievna, ne criez pas! J'ai peur pour votre
cceur.
Akhmatova
(Elk crie.) Mais je ne crie pas! Je me fais comprendre!
J'ajoute que je vous suis reconnaissante sans r6serve et sans limite,
Nina Radlova, et que vous Etes a jamais inscrite sur mes tablettes.
Radloua
Je m'occuperai en tout cas personnellement de votre dossier, Anna
Andreievna.
Curtain
You asked for an apartment?
Akhmatova
Lie down, Polonius! Lydia Korneyevna, was it you?
Lydia
Certainly not ...!
Akhrnatova
What! They do me the favor of publishing a small collection of my verse,
after fifteen years in the dungeon-quite so-they give me back all the
air of all the Russias, and 1-1 would ask for an apartment too? But I
wouldn't want for anything in the world to deprive anyone at all, and above
all not one of our writers, of the slightest room, of the slightest
legitimate comfort, of the well-deserved bathroom, never!
Radloua
Anna Andreyevna, I beg of you, don't take it that way. Generally, I am
asked.. .
Akhmatova
Generally! But you seem to forget who I am! I have the entire world for
an abode. One month I live on the Fujiyama. Nothing more beautiful.
Listen: "in summer, for all garment, the earth and the sky." One year I
reside on the banks of Armenia. I can change floors, seasons, centuries,
like languages. I am aware of the immense efforts the Union of Writers
must have made in my favor. Surmounting mountains of silence . . . A
small collection, for an old woman, isn't that enough?
Lydia
I beg of you Anna Andreyevna, don't shout! I'm afraid for your heart.
Akhmatoua
(She shouts.) I'm not shouting! I'm making myself understood!
Allow me to add that I am grateful to you without reserve and without
limits, Nina Radlova, and that you are forever inscribed on my tablets.
Radloua
I'll see to your dossier personally in any case, Anna Andreyevna.
Akhmatoua
Vous avez ma confiance, toute ma confiance.
Radloua
Je vous attends 5 Leningrad dans trois mois. Nous vous signerons un
contrat.
Akhmatova
Dans trois mois 5 Leningrad! Votre jour sera le mien! Je prends mon
porte-plume! Et pan! Je signe!
Lydia
Je vous raccompagne.
Akhmatoua
Ces femmes-12, si ce sont des femmes on devrait leur interdire de croitre
et se multiplier. Je rencontre mes ennemis. Mes amis desires je les fuis.
L2-bas il y a un pays oh vivent ceux qui me font battre le cceur, les
po6mes non-icrits, les ponts non-traverses, les livres non-publiks, les
amours non-embrassks. Je n'y suis jamais allee.
( h i e n t Lydia. Suiuie de Nadqda.)
Akhmatoua
Regardez-moi? Ai-je perdu mon ombre? L'ai-je vendue au diable? Dites-
moi la vkritk. N'aurais-je pas d t hurler?
Lydia
Vous avez kt6 royale et r u s k . Quant 2 hurler vous l'avez presque fait.
Akhmatoua
Je me suis retenue. J'aurais d t hurler. Mais j'imitais Ulysse aujourd'hui.
J'ai passe la douane cachee sous un mouton. Bee bee. Mais j'aurais d t
hurler.
Nadqda
Alors le livre?
Akhmatova
Ce sera un petit recueil. Un oiseau sans ailes, sans pattes, rien que le bec.
Mais j'aurais d t hurler.
Savez-vous que je suis nee la m&meannee que Hitler? Ne vous affolez
pas. Chaplin aussi est n& cette annee-12. A nous deux, Charlot et moi,
nous faisons tourner le globe terrestre sous le bout de nos doigts.
Akhmatoua
You have my confidence, my full confidence.
Radloua
I'll expect you in Leningrad in three months. We will sign a contract for
you.
Akhmatoua
In three months in Leningrad! Your day will be my day! I'll take my pen!
And puff! I'll sign!
Lydia
I'll see you out.
Akhmatoua
Women like that, if they are women, should be forbidden to grow and
multiply. I meet my enemies. I flee my desired friends. Over there is a
country where live those who cause my heart to beat, the unwritten
poems, the uncrossed bridges, the unpublished books, the unlussed
lovers. I have never been there.
(Lydia returns. Followed by Nadahda.)
Akhmatoua
Look at me? Have I lost my shadow? Have I sold it to the devil? Tell me
the truth. Shouldn't I have screamed?
Lydia
You were royal and cunning. As for screaming, you almost did.
Akhmatoua
I held myself back. I should have screamed. But I was imitating Ulysses
today. I passed through customs hidden under a sheep. Baaah baaah.
But I should have screamed.
Nadahda
So. the book?
Akhmatoua
It will be a small collection. A bird without wings, without feet, nothing
but a beak.
But I should have screamed.
Did you know I was born the same year as Hitler? Don't panic.
Chaplin was born that year as well. Between the two of us, Charlie and I,
we make the terrestrial globe turn beneath our fingertips.
Mais quand meme, dites, on reconnaitra ma voix? La voix de mes

semblables les bagnardes, les veuves, les m6res muettes des Liovas?
Ma chambre s'est durcie et assombrie comme un tombeau. Ne restons
pas ici mes amies. Allons parler ensemble sous un toit de tilleuls. Nous
Cchangerons nos exils et nos haines. Je veux pouvoir sangloter librement.
(Elks sortent.)
Pauline
Un recueil sans ailes, sans pattes, est-ce que Ca existe cet oiseau-l2?
Cette femme, quand elle s'en va avec sa voix, il entre dans la chambre
un tel silence qu'on a froid.
TABLEAU 6
(Akhmatoua et Lydia arriuent chargies et emmitoujlies

chez Anna Andreievna.)
Akhmatoua
En panne! Tout au bout du Faubourg. La boue. Ah! Je suis CpuisCe! En
trois jours j'ai decide d'aller en Siberie pour essayer de voir oii est Liova.
Ensuite j'ai decide de ne pas aller en SibCrie. Ensuite vous decidez que
je dois vous suivre 2 la campagne. Et pour finir 12-dessus, vous nous
tombez en panne. La boue! Talon casse! Je suis 2 bout!
Lydia
Pardonnez-moi. Je voulais seulement vous faire plaisir. "Je ne veux pas
mourir sans avoir pu revoir Zagorsk et ses divins mystkres," ce sont vos
mots, tant de fois repetes. Et moi pendant un moisje sillonne Moscou et
tire cent sonnettesjusqu'5 ce que je trouve enfin, chez le cousin d'un ex-
ami haut fonctionnaire avec lequel pour l'occasion j'ai renouk, une
voiture pour accomplir vos veux. Et vous ktiez ravie ce matin.
Akhmatoua
Et ce soir je suis d e ~ u eje
, n'ai pas vu Zagorsk et je suis epuisee. Une
voiture presque neuve, me dit-elle. Mais regardez un peu mes jambes!
Vous n'avez pas honte? Ceux qui savent combien il m'est difficile de
marcher devraient tout faire pour m'kviter ces peines inutiles.
But still, tell me, will they recognize my voice? The voice of my sister-
creatures the female prisoners, the widows, the mute mothers of Liovas?
My room has turned hard and dark like a tomb. Let's not stay here my
friends. Let's go talk together beneath a roof of lime-trees. We'll
exchange our exiles and our hatreds. I want to be able to sob freely.
(They exit.)
Pauline
A collection without wings, without feet, does such a bird exist?
That woman, whenever she and her voice leave, such a silence comes
into the room, a person feels cold.
TABLEAU 6
(Akhmatova and Lydia arrive at Anna Andrqmna k,

loaded down and mufJled up.)
Akhmatova
Broke down! At the far end of the suburbs! The mud. Oh! I'm
exhausted! In three days' time I decided to go to Siberia to try to see
where Liova is. Then I decided not to go to Siberia. Then you decide I
must follow you to the country. And to top it all off, you break down on
us. The mud! A broken heel! I'm at the end of my strength!
Lydia
Forgive me. I only wanted to please you. "I don't want to die without
having seen Zagorsk2"nd its divine mysteries again," those are your
words, so oft repeated. And I, for a month I scour Moscow, ringing a
hundred doorbells until I finally find, at the cousin's of an ex-gentleman
friend, a highly placed functionary with whom I renewed ties for the
occasion, a car with which to accomplish your wishes. And you were
overjoyed this morning.
Akhmatova
And this evening I'm disappointed, I didn't see Zagorsk and I'm
exhausted. A nearly brand-new car, she tells me. But take a look at my
legs! Aren't you ashamed? Those who know how difficult it is for me to
walk should do everything possible to spare me these useless sufferings.
Lydia
(Au public.) J'ai honte, votre Majestk.
( A Akhmatoua.) Je suis au dksespoir. Vous ne prendrez plus jamais une
voiture presque neuve avec moi. Plus jamais.
Akhmatoua
Plus jamais. Et je ne reverrai jamais Zagorsk.
Lydia
Plus jamais je ne ferai l'impossible. Chercher l'unique insecte dans la
botte d e foin, sans souci de mon temps et de ma dignitk. Cela ne valait
pas la peine.
Akhmatoua
N'en parlons plus.
Et si c'etait arrive en pleine campagne? Comment serais-je rentrCe?
Morte. Je serais rentrke morte.
Lydia
Je vous en prie Anna Andreievna, puisque par bonheur nous sommes
tombkes en panne presque tout de suite et que nous sommes rentrkes.
Akhmatoua
Ah, quel bonheur! Et quelle imprudence. Sur qui compter? Aucune
rkponse pour Liova. Vos lettres n'ont eu aucun effet. Toujours pas de
nouvelles de la Radlova. Elle m'avait dit: dans trois mois.
Lydia
Et ca c'est aussi ma faute?
Akhmatoua
Allons, cessons de nous tourmenter. Oublions.
Lydia
Oublions!
Akhmatoua
Montrez-moi donc ces pommes de terre. C'est pour moi? Ou avez-vous
trouvk fa? Elles sont gelCes.
Lydia
GelCes! Elles m'ont coiitC deux heures de queue. Elles sont peut-ttre
gelCes. Mais il n'y avait pas mieux.
Lydia
(To the audience.) I'm ashamed, your Majesty.
(To Akhmatoua.) I'm in despair. You'll never again go out in a nearly
brand-new car with me. Never again.
Akhmatoua
Never again. And I'll never see Zagorsk again.
Lydia
Never again will I do the impossible. Look for the lone insect in a truss
of hay, without a care for my time and my dignity. It wasn't worth it.
Akhmatoua
Let's not discuss it further.
And if it had happened in the middle of the countryside? How would
I have made it back? Dead. I would have come back dead.
Lydia
I beg of you, Anna Andreyevna, since fortunately we broke down almost
immediately and we did make it back.
Akhmatoua
Oh, what good fortune! And what imprudence. Whom to count on? No
answer whatsoever for Liova. Your letters have had no effect whatsoever.
Still no news from that Radlova. She told me: in three months.
Lydia
And that too is my fault?
Akhmatoua
Come on, let's stop tormenting each other. Let's forget.
Lydia
Let's forget!
Akhmatoua
Well then, show me those potatoes. Are they for me? Where did you find
them? They're frozen.
Lydia
Frozen! They cost me two hours in the line. Maybe they are frozen. But
there were none better.
Akhmatoua
O n vous a roulee, Lydia Korneevna. Et vous vous Etes laissee faire. Vous
auriez dii faire un scandale.
Lydia
Vous auriez d 6 faire la queue 5 ma place. Je suis siire qu'elles n'auraient
pas osk geler, les pommes de terre. La voiture, les pommes de terre et
quoi encore!
Akhmatoua
Et vous avez trouve des betteraves, aussi!
Lydia
Oui. Des betteraves. Gelees aussi.
Akhmatoua
Ca ne fait rien. Vous avez fait de votre mieux. Tout est bien.
Lydia
Tout est bien?
Akhmatoua
Tenez, prenez ce couteau. I1 est moins mauvais. Regardez, la maison est
vide. C'est excellent! C'est si rare: La Pauline est siirement a ses affaires
clandestines. Profitons-en! Depuis longtemps je desirais ce jour paisible.
Etre seule avec vous et mes poemes. Pas un souffle dans le rideau.
Voyez-vous, je me fais du souci pour les p o h e s de Requiem dont vous
Etes gardienne. Si jamais on les publiait quand meme? Oh en sont-ils?
J'aimerais verifier. Faites-moi la grice de me les reciter.
Lydia
Maintenant? Avec les pommes de terre? Demain, je le ferai demain.
Akhmatoua
Maintenant. Pour moi le Requiem contient mes poemes les plus necessaires
mais les plus fragiles. Ce sont des riens qui frappent et qui font mal. Des
battements de cceur. S'ils s1arr6taient . . . Ce serait la mkmoire entierr
qui s'iteindrait. Croyez-vous qu'ils resteront?
Lydia
Mais bien stir.
Akhmatoua
You were swindled, Lydia Korneyevna. And you let it happen. You
should have caused a scandal.
Lydia
You should have stood in line instead of me. I'm sure the potatoes
wouldn't have dared to freeze. The car, the potatoes, and what else!
Akhmatoua
And you found some beets as well!
Lydia
Yes. Beets. Frozen as well.
Akhmatoua
No matter. You did your best. Everything's fine.
Lydia
Everything's fine?
Akhmatoua
Here, take this knife. It's not as bad. Look, the house is empty. That's
excellent! It's so rare: That Pauline is surely busy with her clandestine
affairs. Let's take advantage of the situation! I've been wishing for this
peaceful day for a long time. To be alone with you and my poems. Not a
breath in the curtain.
Look, I'm worried about the Requiem poems whose guardian you are.
What if they published them after all? What state are they in? I'd like to
verify. Do me the favor of reciting them to me.
Lydia
Now? With the potatoes? Tomorrow, I'll do it tomorrow.
Akhmatoua
Now. To my mind, Requiem contains my most necessary but my most
fragile poems. They're nothings that strike and hurt. Heartbeats. If they
stopped . . . all memory would be extinguished. Do you think they'll
stay?
Lydia
Of course.
Akhmatoua
J'aimerais les entendre un 2 un. Ensuite nous dinerons. Je crois que j'ai
du the. Faites cela pour moi. A titre tout a fait exceptionnel. Je suis si
fatiguCe. Depuis trois mois je traduis ces poetes corkens (qui ne me
disent rien) et je n'arrCte que pour traduire Victor Hugo. Je me sens
vieux, barbu, pompeux et de plus exile de moi-mCme dans un monde
sans rimes 06 je pietine et je suis pittinee. RCcitez-moi mon Requiem,
Lydia Korneevna, et rendez-moi une vie.
Lydia
Je ne peux pas, je ne peux pas.
Akhmatoua
Mais si. Attendez. Je lance Karapet. Et puis je vous Ccoute. Allez,
Karapet, bous, ma bCte.
(Elk allum k samouax)
Lydia
(Au public.) Et elle m'ecoute! Non! Elle s'tcoute en moi. Moi, elle ne
m'entend pas. Pauvre laquais, pauvre tiers-Ctat, moins qu'un arbre,
moins qu'une chaise. Je sais bien que je n'tcris pas, et que ma bouche
endolorie n'est pas une fnntaine pour la foule assoiffee. Mais quand
mCme dans mon coin, j'ai besoin d'une vie, moi aussi.
( A Akhmatova.) Mais moi, Victor Hugo je l'adore.
Akhmatoua
Mais moi aussi, parfois. Voila. RCcitez-moi d'abord "Verdict,"vous voulez
bien. I1 s'eloigne de moi ces temps-ci. Comme si le silence qui monte de
Liova redoublait la distance. "Depuis longtemps . . ."
Lydia
"Depuis longtemps j'ai pressenti.
Le dernier jour et la derniere demeure."
Akhmatoua
La derniere demeure? Ou la maison dCserte?
Lydia
La derniere fois c'Ctait la derniere demeure.
Akhmatoua
La derniere demeure? Oui, peut-Ctre. Continuons.
Akhmatoua
I'd like to hear them one by one. Then we'll dine. I think I've got some
tea. Do this for me. Just this once. I'm so tired. For three months I've
been translating those Korean poets (who don't mean a thing to me)
and I only stop to translate Victor Hugo. I feel old, bearded, pompous,
and moreover exiled from myself in a rhymeless world where I trample
and am trampled on. Recite my Requiem for me, Lydia Korneyevna, and
give me back a life.
Lydia
I can't, I can't.
Akhmatoua
Yes, you can. Wait. I'll launch Karapet. And then I'll listen to you. Come
on, Karapet, boil, my pet.
(She lights the samovar)
Lydia
(To the audience.) And she'll listen to me! No! She'll listen to herself in
me. Me, she doesn't hear. Poor lackey, poor third estate, less than a tree,
less than a chair. I know I don't write, and that my aching mouth is not
a fountain for the thirsty crowd. But still, in my corner, I need a life too.
(To Akhmatoua.) Well I adore Victor Hugo.
Akhmatoua
Well so do I, sometimes. There. Recite "Verdict" to me first, if you will.
It's been moving away from me lately. As though the silence rising up
from Liova were redoubling the distance. "For a long time . . ."
Lydia
"For a long time I'd had a feeling.
The last day and the last dwelling."
Akhmatoua
The last dwelling? Or the deserted house?
Lydia
Last time it was the last dwelling.
Akhmatoua
The last dwelling? Yes, perhaps. Let's continue.
Lydia
Ce sont les derniers vers.
Akhmatova
Ah, oui, bien sGr. Pardonnez-moi. Voyez comme tout est fragile. Alors les
premiers vers?
Lydia
Anna Andreievna, je ne sais pas ce qui m'arrive. Les premiers vers
m'Cchappent a l'instant. Vous vous souvenez: "La memoire est une dr6le
d'h6tesse. Elle nous berne, elle donne elle retient"?
Et vous ne vous en souvenez pas non plus?
Akhmatova
Vous voyez! I1 y a si longtemps que vous ne me les aviez pas recites!
Lydza
11s reviendront. Laissez-moi seulement me calmer.
Akhmatova
C'est ainsi: nous attendons toujours qu'ils reviennent . . . nous attendons.
Attention, vous avez laisse les yeux.
(Elk "reprend" les pommes de terre de Lydia.)
Vous ne pourriez pas me dire au moins de quoi il est question dans ces
deux premiers vers?
Lydia
Pas P l'instant. Je vous e n prie. Changeons. I1 suffira que nous tournions
le dos pour qu'ils reviennent comme des oiseaux.
Akhmatova
Vous avez raison. Raison: est-ce que ce n'est pas dans le deuxitme vers?
Non. Alors, rCcitez-moi "Depuis dix-sept mois," je vous prie.
Lydia
Depuis dix-sept ans que je crie, Reviens, je t'appelle 2 la maison.
Akhmatova
Dix-sept mois. Depuis dix-sept mois.
Lydia
Non, c'ktait dix-sept am.
Lydia
Those are the last lines.
Akhmatoua
Oh, yes, of course. Forgive me. See how all is fragile. Well then, the first
lines?
Lydia
Anna Andreyevna, I don't know what's happening to me. The first lines
escape me at the moment. You remember: "Memory is a funny hostess.
She fools us, she gives she withholds"?
And you don't recall them either?
Akhmatoua
You see! You haven't recited them to me in such a long time!
Lydia
They'll be back. Just let me compose myself.
Akhmatoua
That's how it is: we're always waiting for them to return . . . we're waiting.
Be careful, you've left the eyes.
(She "takes back " Lydia's potatoes.)
You couldn't at least tell me what the first two lines are about?
Lydia
Not at the moment. I beg of you. Let's change-all we've got to do is
turn our backs and they'll return like birds.
Akhmatoua
You're right. Right: isn't that in the second line? No. Well then, recite
"For seventeen months" to me, I beg you.
Lydia
For seventeen years I've been shouting, Come back, I'm calling you
home.
Akhmatoua
Seventeen months. For seventeen months.
Lydia
No, it was seventeen years.
Akhmatoua
Vous ttes sure?
Lydia
Mais comment voulez-vous que je recite vos poemes si 2 chaque souffle
vous m'arrttez et vous me dementez!
Dix-sept ans, j'en suis sfire.
Akhmatoua
Dix-sept ans? J'aurais jurC 17 mois, mais elle a sfirement raison. Liova
m'avait CtC pris depuis trois ans quand j'ai Ccrit ceci. Et dCj2 je devais
pressentir la longueur de mon martyr. Dix-sept ans!
Etre enceinte depuis 17 ans d'un fils fantbme, voil2 pourquoi je suis si
grosse. Et ensuite, si Dieu veut, il va me naitre un homme aigri, vieilli,
ride, vide et qui ne m'aimera plus.
Lydia
Comment pouvez-vous dire cela!?
Akhmatoua
Parce que c'est la vCrit6. Parce que la separation separe. Parce que les
mains coup6es ne repoussent jamais. Que croyez-vous que serait votre
Cpoux devenu si au lieu d'avoir disparu 5 l'angle de 1'annCe 1938 il avait
depuis lors continu6 2 souffrir et pourrir au camp de Tchita?
Lydia
Arritez. Je vous ai deja dit que je ne veux pas que l'on touche 2 Mitia. Si
vous prenez ce chemin de ronces empoisonnees je vous laisse. Rien ne
pouvait nous &parer Mitia et moi.
Akhmatoua
Dix-sept ans, et ce n'est plus le mEme. Pourquoi craindre la verite? Elle
est notre seule richesse.
Lydia
Assez, vous dis-je.
Akhmatoua
Tous sont partis, personne ne reviendra. Et plus tard, quand l'epoque
remontera 2 la surface du temps, comme le cadavre d'un noye au
printemps, l'amant ne reconnaitra pas l'amante. En 1940 dej2 j'ecrivais
cela. Vous vous souvenez de ce pokme?
Akhmatoua
Are you sure?
Lydia
Well how do you expect me to recite your poems if at each breath you
stop me and you contradict me!
Seventeen years, I'm sure of it.
Akhmatova
Seventeen years? I could have sworn 17 months, but she must be right.
Liova had been taken from me for three years when I wrote that. And
already I must have had a hunch about the length of my martyrdom.
Seventeen years!
To be pregnant for seventeen years with a phantom son, see why I'm
so fat. And then, God willing, I'll give birth to an embittered, aged,
wrinkled, emptied man, who'll no longer love me.
Lydia
How can you say that!?
Akhmatova
Because it's the truth. Because separation separates. Because severed
hands never grow back. What do you think would have become of your
husband if, instead of having disappeared at the corner of the year 1938,
he had continued to suffer and rot in the camp at Chita?'5
Lydia
Stop it. I've already told you I want no allusions to Mitia. If you take that
path of poisoned brambles I shall leave you. Nothing could separate us,
Mitia and me.
A khmatoua
Seventeen years, and he's not the same anymore. Why fear the truth? It's
our only treasure.
Lydia
Enough, I tell you.
Akhmatova
They're all gone, no one will return. And later on, when the epoch
comes back up to the surface of time like the corpse of a drowned man
in springtime, the lover will not recognize her beloved. Already in 1940
I wrote that. Do you remember that poem?
Lydia
Non.
Akhmatoua
Non?
Lydia
Non. Et vous, il y a 35 ans que je vous porte et que vous me tourmentez.
Vous Etes un g6nie. Vous Etes un h6ros. Mais vous Etes aussi 1'Impiratrice
de Chine et vous tyrannisez vos modestes sujets. Moi aussi je suis vieille
et j'ai les jambes enflCes. Moi aussi on m'a pris mon bien-aim6 et jet6e
dans la nuit 6ternelle. Ecrivez vos poPmes, Anna Andreievna, je vous en
prie. Notez-les et dilivrez-moi. Je veux vivre sans trembler pour vos vers
plus que pour ma propre fille. Et sans user mes yeux a relire vos
traductions quandje n'ai pas fini les miennes. Et laissez-moi pleurer mes
morts avec mes propres mots.
(Elk se lkue.)
Akhmatoua
Vous m'abandonnez, capitaine? Vous abandonnez la vieille Akhmatova.
Cette femme est bien seule. A cause de ses poPmes on la prend pour un
dieu, pour un pPre, pour le soleil. En viriti elle n'est qu'un vieux panier
qui contient de beaux fruits.
Lydia
Je dois partir. Je m'en vais.
Akhmatoua
Vous m'aviez dit: je serai toujours 12 pour vous.
Lydia
J'ai change d'avis.
Akhmatoua
Et qui protegera mes poemes si vous me laissez tomber? Vous 6tiez mon
seul bouclier.
Lydia
Demandez a Nadejda Mandelstam.
Akhmatoua
Elle ne peut pas. Elle n'a plus de permis de skjour. Et puis elle a deja son
Ossip 2 garder.
Lydia
No.
Akhmatoua
No?
Lydia
No. And you, I've been carrying you and you've been tormenting me for
35 years. You're a genius. You're a hero. But you're also the Empress of
China and you tyrannize your humble subjects. I too am old and have
swollen legs. They took my beloved too and threw me into eternal night.
Write down your poems, Anna Andreyevna, I beg of you. Jot them down
and liberate me. I want to live without trembling for your verse more
than for my own daughter. And without wearing out my eyes rereading
your translations when I haven't finished my own. And allow me to weep
for my dead in my own words.
(She stands up.)
Akhmatoua
You're abandoning me, capitaine?You're abandoning the old Akhmatova.
This woman is utterly alone. Because of her poems she's taken for a god,
for a father, for the sun. In truth she's but an old basket containing a few
beautiful fruits.
Lydia
I've got to go. I'm leaving.
Akhmatoua
You told me: I'll always be there for you.
Lydia
I've had a change of heart.
Akhmatoua
And who will protect my poems if you let me down? You were my only
shield.
Lydia
Ask Nadezhda Mandelstam.
Akhmatova
She can't. She doesn't have a visitor's permit anymore. And besides, she
already has her Osip to keep.
Lydia
Ecrivez. Publiez.
(Elk s 'en va.)
Akhmatova
Est-ce que je les ecris sur des feuilles skparkes? Ou bien en ordre?
Lydia
(Elk sort.)
Akhmatova
"Je suis ce que je suis, e t j e vous en souhaite une autre meilleure."
Une qui ne vous appelle pas, une qui sait traverser toute seule la
perspective Nevski, une qui n'a ni faim ni froid, ni larmes ni memoire.
Qu'est-ce que je leur ai fait? Qu'est-ce que j'aurais dti faire?
Je ne peux quand m6me pas tout faire. La cuisine. Le courrier et les
poZmes aussi. Est-ce que moi je vous demande de m'arracher des larmes
avec vos paroles?
Est-ce que je me plains que vous manquiez de musique?
(Entre Pauline.)
Pauline
Comment! C'est vous qui faites la cuisine?
Akhmatova
Non, ce n'est pas moi, c'est mon double qui tient le couteau et les
pommes de terre, et qui sue en silence dans la nuit soviktique. Moi
cependant, m6lee aux vents et au roseaux, je r6ve que je suis jeune et
que l'an est nouveau.
Pauline
Qu'est-ce que vous dites? Ca ne va pas? Ou c'est encore un poZme?
Allez, je vais vous aider.
Akhmatova
Je vous remercie, ce n'est pas la peine.
Pauline
Si, si. Elles sont affreuses vos pommes de terre. Je vais vous en faire des
bijoux moi. J'ai trouvk des joints, Ca vous interesse?
Lydia
Write. Publish.
(She leaves.)
Akhmatova
Shall I write them on separate pages? Or rather in order?
Lydia
Separate!
(She exits.)
Akhmatova
"I am as I am, and I wish you another better."26
One who doesn't call you, one who knows how to cross Nevski
Prospect2' all alone, one who is neither hungry nor cold, who has
neither tears nor memory.
What did I do to them? What should I have done?
All the same I can't do everything. The cooking. The mail and the
poems as well. Do I ask you to wrench tears from me with your words?
Do I complain that you're lacking music?
(Enter Paulim.)
Pauline
What! You're doing the cooking?
Akhmatova
No, this isn't me, my double holds the knife and potatoes, and sweats in
silence in the Soviet night. I, meanwhile, mingled with the winds and
reeds, I dream I am young and the year is new.
Pauline
What are you talking about? Are you ill? Or is it another poem? Come
on, I'll help you.
Akhmatova
I thank you-it's not worth the trouble.
Pauline
Yes it is. Your potatoes are dreadful. I'm going to make them gems for
you, yes I am. I found some screw-joints, are you interested?
Akhmatova
Des joints?
Pauline
L'ami de ma nikce, son camarade, il en connait un d u chantier. I1 y a
longtemps que j'attendais Ca. Les joints, c'est ce qu'il y a de plus
important aujourd'hui, parce que c'est introuvable.
Akhmatoua
C'est vrai, on a toujours besoin de joints. Mais moi, ce qui m'inthesse le
plus, camarade, ce serait un costume d'homme.
Pauline
Si jamais je trouve un pantalon, pour commencer? Vous me l'avancez
d'avance? 100 roubles?
Akhmatoua
Vous m'avez regardke? Pour l'ombre d'un pantalon mon double vous
paiera en ombres d e cent roubles.
Pauline
Alors vous, vous Etes forte!
Akhmatova
On peut toujours la dkposer. O n ne lui enlkvera pas sa couronne
d'kpines rouillkes.
Camarade citoyenne, aujourd'hui vous avez failli me manquer. I1 y
avait dans la maison un air pesant de dksertion. Immobile le rideau
pendait semblable 2 un linceul debout devant 1'Histoire.
Pauline
J'ai une chemise aussi. Une vraie chemise d'ange. Venez. Je vais vous
montrer mes tresors.
(Elks sortent.)
Akhmatoua
Screw-joints!
Pauline
My niece's boyfriend, her comrade, he knows someone from the
lumber-yard. I've been waiting for this for a long time. Screw-joints,
they're what're most important today, because you can't get them.
Akhmatoua
It's true, one always needs screw-joints. As for me, what would interest
me the most, comrade, is a man's suit.
Pauline
What if I were to find a pair of trousers, to start? Will you advance me the
money beforehand? 100 rubles?
Akhmatoua
What do you take me for? For the shadow of a pair of trousers my double
will pay you in shadows of 100 rubles.
Pauline
Well now, aren't we clever!
Akhmatoua
You can always depose her. You won't remove her crown of rusty thorns.
Comrade citizen, today I almost missed you. There was a heavy air of
desertion in the house. Motionless the curtain hung like a shroud
standing before History.
Pauline
I've got a shirt too. A real angel's shirt. Come on. I'll show you my
treasures.
(They exit.)
TABLEAU 7
( A la gare de Moscou-Leningrad. Bruits. Fum'es.

E n t e une uieilb paysanne.)
Babouchka
Vous avez vu le train 15-bas qui est seul et tout dorC comme une
cathedrale. C'est la Flcche Rouge. I1 parait que dedans tout est en or et
parfume. Rien qu'5 vous voir, on vous sert des butterbrod au caviar. Tu
n'as mEme pas besoin de demander. Moi j'aimerais bien voir comment
c'est fait, mais pour le voir il faut etre &ranger. I1 est interdit aux Russes,
et peut-Etre mEme aux communistes. Cette Fleche Rouge quand elle
quitte notre gare, je me demande dans quel pays elle arrive, comment
est la gare de l'etranger.
(Entrent Nadqda et Akhmatova.)
Akhmatova
C'est moi qui m'en vais toute seule affronter le minotaure et c'est vous
qui tremblez?
Nadqda
Pardonnez-moi, c'est cette gare qui pour moi n'est pas une gare, mais
l'entree rauque et enfumee par laquelle nous tombgmes dans l'exil d ' o ~
jamais ne revint Mandelstam. Qu'est-ce que je vous apporte?
Akhmatova
Une eau minerale. Du Barjum s'il vous plait.
(Nadqda sort.)
I1 est vrai. Nos joyeuses gares russes sont devenues maintenant les livres
de nos separations.
Babouchka
( A Akhmatova.) Ecoutez, venez ici, asseyez-vous.Je vous ai tout de suite
reconnue.
Akhmatova
Reconnue? Babouchka?
(Elk s 'assied.)
Babouchka
Les cheveux blancs, les joues tannkes, on les a bien mCritCs. A force et 5
peine on se resemble. Moi j'Ctais le no 217. Moi aussi vous savez,je vais
TABLEAU 7
(At the Moscow-Leningrad train station. Noise.

Smoke. Enter an old peasant woman.)
Baboushka
You've seen the train over there, the one that's by itself and golden all
over like a cathedral. That's the Red Arrow. They say that inside
everything is made of gold and scented. The minute they see you, they
serve you butterbrod with caviar. You don't even have to ask. Me, I'd like
to see how it's done up, but to see it you must be a foreigner. It's
forbidden to Russians, and maybe even to communists. That Red Arrow,
when it leaves our station, I wonder what country it will come to, what
the foreign station will be like.
(Enter Nahzhda and Akhmatoua.)
Akhmatoua
I'm the one who's leaving all alone to confront the minotaur and you're
the one who's trembling?
Nadezhda
Forgive me, it's this station that for me is not a station, but the hoarse,
smoky entry we fell through into the exile from which Mandelstam
never returned. What shall I bring you?
Akhmatova
A mineral water. Some Barjum please.
(Exit Nadezhda.)
It's true. Our joyous Russian train stations have now become the books
of our separations.
Baboushka
(To Akhmatova.) Listen, come here, sit down. I recognized you straight
away.
Akhmatoua
Recognized? Baboushka?
(She sits down.)
Baboushka
Our white hair, our tanned cheeks, we've really earned them. Through
constraint and pain we resemble each other. Me, I was number 217. Me
5 Tatagrad. Son nom maudit a Tatagrad je ne le dis jamais. Les souliers

sont troues. Et quel iige avons-nous? Dites-moi.
Akhmatova
C'est difficile, Babouchka.
Babouchka
Donnez-moi 80 c'est bien ce que je fais, enlevez la vingtaine et vous
m'avez. Et vous aussi? Ne vous inquiktez pas pour le train. DZs que je le
prends il a deux heures de retard. Mon fils je n'en avais qu'un. Je lui ai
dit: mon fils tu veux tout survivre? Oublie la mZre, la terre, le foin. Et
apprends le communisme. Tu auras tout. La voiture. L'habit.
L'appartement. I1 faut que tout le monde te redoute. Tes amis, n'en aie
pas. Ce que tu penses? Dis le contraire. D'ailleurs ne dis rien, ne fais pas
confiance. C'etait du bon conseil? Eh bien, il a eu quinze ans. Vous
comprenez Ca, vous?
Akhmatoua
I1 a dG dire sa penske, Babouchka.
Babouchka
Pensez donc. Et votre enfant?
Akhmatoua
Babouchka, je ne lui donnais pas de conseil.
Babouchka
Vous avez bien fait. Qu'est-ce que Ca aurait change? I1 y a dix ansje priais
pour que l'autre la-haut, la dent pourrie, Dieu nous l'arrache. Maintenant
il y a le Vieux. Le ma1 n'a plus de fin chez nous. Le blanc est tout comme
noir. Le noir est tout comme blanc. Qu'est-ce que vous en pensez?
Akhmatoua
Je ne sais pas, Babouchka! Si je savais! Si je pouvais imaginer un jour
avec mon fils. MEme si c'etait le dernier de ma vie sur cette terre. Un
seul!
Babouchka
Le malheur Ca ne vous trahit pas. Ca vous aime trop ce chien-la. Moi
pour le voyage j'ai du saucisson. Et vous?
Akhmatoua
Des butterbrod. Des concombres.
too you know, I'm going to Blankety-Blankgrad. I never say the accursed
name of Blankety-Blankgrad. My shoes are worn. And how old are we?
Tell me.
Akhmatoua
It's hard to say, Baboushka.
Babowhka
Let's say 80 for me, that's really how old I look, take off twenty or so and
you've got me. And you too? Don't worry about the train. Whenever I
take it it's two hours late. My son-I only had one. I told him: son, do
you want to survive everything? Forget the mother, the earth, the hay.
And learn communism. You'll have everything. The car. The clothes.
The apartment. Everyone must fear you. Your friends-don't have any.
What you think? Say the opposite. For that matter, don't say anything,
don't trust. Was that good advice? Well, he got fifteen years. Now do you
understand that?
Akhmatowa
He must have said what he thought, Baboushka.
Baboushka
Don't you believe it. And your child?
Akhmatowa
Baboushka, I didn't give him any advice.
Baboushka
You did well. What would that have changed? Ten years ago I prayed that
God would pull out the other one up there, the rotten tooth. Now we
have the Old Man. Evil has no end in our home anymore. White is just
like black. Black is just like white. What do you think?
Akhmatowa
I don't know, Baboushka! If I knew! If I could imagine one day with my
son. Even if it were the last one of my life on this earth. Just one!
Baboushka
Misfortune doesn't betray you. That hound loves you way too much. I've
got some sausage for the trip. And you?
Akhmatoua
Some butterbrod. Some cucumber.
Babouchka
Pas d'oignon? Je vous en donnerai.
(On entend u n appel de train.)
C'est pour nous? Qu'est-ce qu'il a dit? Vous venez? Ecoutez, n'ayez-pas
peur. Accrochez-vous i moi.
(Elks sortent. Lydia arrive a la gare et y rencontre
Nadqda qui arrive auec son eau.)
Lydia
Oii est-elle?
Nadqda
Elle a dii monter dans le wagon. Vous venez lui dire au revoir quand
mtme? Elle va ttre contente.
Lydia
Non, non. Puisque vous ttes 12,j'aime mieux ne pas la voir. Encore une
fois voile noire. La Direction des Editions veut supprimer le cycle du
Cahier Br616. Qu'est-ce que je fais? C'est i cause de ce mot "briile." Vous
comprenez?
Nadqda
Briile, ah oui! Evidemment. Voili un mot louche! I1 a une odeur
inquietante. I1 leur faut des poemes sans eau sans feu, sans odeur et sans
air aussi, et demain ce sera sans musique et sans vers et puis finalement
sans mot. BrGli, dehors! Dieu, dehors! Rivikre, dehors!
Lydia
Mais qu'est-ce que je fais? Je ne peux pas enlever "bfile." "Le cycle du
cahier." Ca ne voudrait rien dire.
Nadqda
On ne peut pas briiler "br616." I1 vaudrait mieux en parler i l'auteur.
Lydia
Ah non, je ne tiens pas i ttre responsable d'un deuxigme infarctus.
Nadqda
On ne peut pas la laisser partir i Leningrad signer ce contrat sans l'avoir
prhenue.
Baboushka
No onion? I'll give you a bit.
( A call for a train is heard.)
Is that us? What did he say? Are you coming? Listen, don't be afraid.
Hang on to me.
(They exit. Lydia arriues at the train station and runs into Nadahda
there, who arriues with her watm)
Lydia
Where is she?
Nadezhda
She must have boarded the train. You've come to say good-bye to her
after all? She'll be pleased.
Lydia
No, no. Since you're here, I'd rather not see her. Yet another black sail.
The Editorship wants to suppress the Burned Notebook cycle.28What
shall I do? It's because of the word "burned." Do you understand?
Nadahda
Burned, ah yes! Of course. There's a fishy word! It has a worrisome odor.
They need poems without water without fire, without odor and without
air as well, and tomorrow it will be without music and without verse and
then finally without words. Burned, out! God, out! River, out!
Lydia
But what shall I do? I can't remove "burned." "The notebook cycle."
That doesn't mean anything.
Nadezhda
Burns can't be "burned." We'd better discuss it with the author.
Lydia
Oh no, I don't relish causing a second stroke.
Nadahda
We can't let her leave for Leningrad to sign that contract without having
warned her.
Lydia
Et si on appelait le cycle "LEglantierenJeurs." Vous vous souvenez: "Je ne
rtpkterai plus / Des paroles non dites / Mais en souvenir de cette
rencontre manquee / Je planterai un eglantier."
Nadejda
"Cette rencontre manquie," vous croyez que Ca passera, "manquke"?
Lydia
Ah Ca, je l'exigerai! Je me battrai. Alors pour le titre? Vous lui direz,
vous?
Nadejda
Non, ne disons rien. D'ailleurs pendant le temps du voyage ils auront
encore changt d'avis et de cible. Essayons de passer entre les dents.
Meme mutilee, mtme amputee, la potsie peut encore nous faire pleurer
de joie.
Lydia
J'aurais d 6 partir avec elle. Mais je me suis jur6. J e ne peux plus, vous
comprenez? Avec elle tout mZne B la querelle.
Nadqda
Je comprends. Ma vie avec Ossip n'ktait qu'une querelle, mais chaque
querelle, quelle joie.
Lydia
Vous vous disputiez?!
Nadejda
Beaucoup, de facon memeilleuse. La derniZre dispute, c'ttait peut-ttre
B la gare justement. Puis sur le pont de Kalinine. La derniZre fois que
nous avions kt6 nous faufiler B Moscou, bien qu'elle nous ffit une des
douze cites interdites. Seule la fenetre d ' h n a Andreievna etait ouverte
pour nos deux ombres effraykes.
La dispute a commencC dans le train. I1 s'agissait du fiacre. Ossia
voulait le prendre moi je ne voulais pas. Pour un fiacre on avait de quoi
vivre 2 jours. Par un fiacre tout peut arriver, la haine, la guerre, la
repudiation.
Lydia
La vie, quoi.
Lydia
What if we were to call the cycle "The Eglantine in Flower." You
remember: "I'll no longer repeat / Unspoken words / But in memory of
this failed encounter / I'll plant an eglantine."
Nadahda
"This failed encounter," do you think that will pass, "failed"?
Lydia
Well really, I'll insist on it! I'll fight! So about the title? You'll tell her?
Nadahda
No, let's not say anything. Besides, during the time it takes to make the
trip they'll have changed their minds and their target again. Let's try to
pass between their teeth. Even mutilated, even amputated, poetry can
still cause us to weep with joy.
Lydia
I should have gone with her. But I swore to myself. I can't anymore, do
you understand? With her, everything leads to quarreling.
Nadahda
I understand. My life with Osip was nothing but a quarrel, but each
quarrel, what a joy.
Lydia
You argued?!
Nadahda
h lot, in a marvelous way. The last argument, it might have been at the
train station actually. 'Then on the KalininZ9bridge. The last time we
came to sneak into Moscow, even though for us it was one of a dozen
forbidden cities. Only Anna Andreyevna's window was open to our two
frightened shadows.
The argument began in the train. It was about a hansom cab. Osia
wanted to take it I didn't want to. For a cab we had what to live on for 2
days. Because of a cab, anything can happen, hatred, war, repudiation.
Lydia
Life, in other words.
Nadgda
Nous nous regardions 5 travers le fiacre comme 5 la loupe. Chaque
defaut grossi. Et nous nous traitions d'epithetes russes! Et va au diable.
Et pas sans toi. A la gare il n'y avait pas de fiacre. Le pont etait
interminable. Je laissais Ossip avancer d'un pas faussement assure
fendant faiblement l'air froid qui fouette le visage, et j'itais sans pitie.
Dans le vent la querelle continuait muette 5 profirer ses ipithetes. La
Volga, sous le pont, nous etait bien egale. Nous n'avions d'yeux que
pour la scene du combat.
Quel pont! Un pont pour jouer 5 se ditester, un pont pour se faire
sentir tous les luxes de la fureur, et le gofit trop sale de la solitude. Tout
ce qu'on se permet lorsqu'on est tellement sfir que la vie resiste 5 toutes
les blessures. Comme nous etions heureux sur le dernier pont, siparks
par la colcre, le froid, l'usure, le fiacre, le pont, et tout ce qui nous
siparait nous unissait fortement, le malheur etait seulement une joie de
travers puisque nous itions encore tous les deux du c8ti des vivants.
Lydia
Je n'ai jamais eu avec Mitia ce bonheur de travers. Rien n'est ce que
nous croyons. Et moi, je n'aurais pas ose.
Na4da
Je crois que le train va partir. Vous venez la saluer?J'y vais vite. J'ai peur
qu'elle se trompe de wagon.
(Elle sort.)
Lydia
Je ne peux pas, non, je ne peux pas. Le dipart inscrit son profil iternel
derriere la vitre du wagon. Je ne la vois pas s'en aller.
(Elle sort.)
TABLEAU 8
(De retour de voyage, entrent Akhmatowa et Nadqda, flanqw'es de

Pauline. Valise, etc.)
Akhmatova
Qui a encore vole les ampoules dans l'escalier?
Nadezhda
We looked at each other through the cab as if through a magnifying
glass. Each flaw enlarged. And we called each other Russian epithets!
And go to the devil. And not without you. At the station there was no
cab. The bridge was endless. I let Osip walk ahead with a feigned
firmness, feebly cleaving the cold air lashing our faces, and I was pitiless.
In the wind the quarrel continued mutely to proffer its epithets. The
Volga, beneath the bridge, didn't matter to us one bit. We only had eyes
for the scene of combat.
What a bridge! A bridge for playing at hating each other, a bridge for
making each other feel all the luxuries of fury, and the too salty taste of
solitude. Everything we permit ourselves when we're so very sure that life
will withstand all wounds. How happy we were on the last bridge,
separated by anger, the cold, attrition, the cab, the bridge, and all that
separated us united us strongly, the unhappiness was just a joy gone
awry, since we were both of us still on the side of the living.
Lydia
I never had that happiness gone awry with Mitia. Nothing is what we
think. And anyway, I wouldn't have dared.
Nadezhda
I think the train is about to leave. Are you coming to see her off? I'll go
quickly. I'm afraid she'll board the wrong car.
(She exits.)
Lydia
I can't, no, I can't. Departure inscribes her eternal profile behind the
train car window. I do not see her go.
(She exits.)
TABLEAU 8
(Returningfrom her trip, enter Akhmatowa and Nadezhda,

jlanked by Pauline. Suitcase, etc.)
Akhmatowa
Who stole the light bulbs in the stairway again?
Pauline
Comment qui? Est-ce que le voleur me laisse son adresse? Moi, pendant
votre absence j'ai trouvi des clous et des vis, si Ca vous intiresse.
Nadqda
Plus tard, on verra plus tard.
(Pauline sort.)
Alors, dites! Vous avez signi?
Akhmatoua
Signi quoi? Ma defiguration? Ma propre decheance? Tenez. Regardez.
Voil2 leur choix. 11s ont supprime tous les poemes qui chantent mon
amour pour la Russie. Ne parlons pas de Londres, ni de Paris. Je ne sais
pas ce qui se passe $ Tachkent, et encore moins en SibCrie. Qui suis-je?
La contemporaine de Narcisse. Le monde passe derriere mon dos etje
ne me retourne pas. Et il n'y avait pas un seul inidit. En 1940, prise d'un
etourdissement,je tombe dans mon miroir et disparais. Ainsi Akhmatova,
c'ktait Ca, diront les lecteurs degoutis! Cette hysterique, cette femme
couverte d'amants adulteres. Mais pourquoi me faire du souci? Le livre
ne paraitra pas, je l'ai bien vu dans leurs regards. 11s font semblant de
vouloir me publier et c'est pour mieux ne pas le faire.
iyadqda
Ainsi rien n'a change. C'est la mtme machine 2 mentir et 2 simuler qui
a rendu fou mon Ossip. Non. 11s ne mentent mtme plus. 11s ont si bien
cache la verite qu'eux-mGmes ne la retrouvent plus jamais.
Akhmatoua
Alors j'ai dit: Je ne me fais aucun souci pour ce livre. Je ne vous presse
mtme pas de le publier. Par contre, je vous demande un peu de justice
pour Nadejda Mandelstam, un permis de sijour, un logement, du
travail. Elle est la veuve d'un si grand poete. Vous vous souvenez de
Mandelstam, au moins?
iyadqda
Vous avez pris un risque. Mais qui sait peut-ttre le livre sortira-t-il tout
d'un coup, comme un ivadi?
Akhmatoua
AussitBt dans la pileur d'une aube on l'arrttera et on le fusillera le soir-
mCme. Comme on a efface de l'air russe la voix de Goumilev, mon
premier mari. Quand je suis entree dans la maison des Ecrivains, 2
Leningrad, j'ai entendu une femme dire: Tiens, Akhmatova est toujours
vivan te?
Pauline
What do you mean who? Does the robber leave me his address? I found
some nails and some screws while you were away, if you're interested.
Nadezh da
Later, we'll see about that later.
(Exit Pauline.)
So, tell! Did you sign?
Akhmatova
Sign what? My disfigurement? My own downfall? Take a look at this.
Here's their choice. They've suppressed all the poems that sing of my
love for Russia. Not to mention London, or Paris. I'm not cognizant of
what's going on in Tashkent, and in Siberia even less so. Who am I? The
contemporary of Narcissus. The world is passing by behind my back and
I do not turn around. And there wasn't a single unpublished poem. In
1940, seized with dizziness, I fall into my mirror and disappear. So that
was Akhmatova, my disgusted readers will say! That hysteric, that woman
covered with adulterous lovers. But why worry? The book won't be
published, I saw it clearly in their eyes. They pretend to want to publish
me, so as better not to.
Nadezhda
So nothing has changed. It's the same lying, simulating machine that
drove my Osip mad. No. They don't even lie anymore. They've hidden
the truth so well, they themselves no longer find it.
Akhmatova
So I said: I'm not at all worried about this book. I'm not even pressing
you to publish it. On the other hand, I'm asking you for a little justice
for Nadezhda Mandelstam, a visitor's permit, a lodging, some work.
She's the widow of such a great poet. You remember Mandelstam don't
you?
Nadezhda
You took a risk. But who knows, maybe the book will suddenly be out,
like an escapee?
Akhmatoua
Straight away in the pallor of a dawn they'll arrest it and they'll shoot it
the same night. Just as they effaced from Russian air the voice of
Gumilev, my first husband. When I entered the \Yriters' house, in
Leningrad, I heard a woman say: So, Akhmatova is still alive?
On veut que je meure?

Mais je vous previens, c'est la derniere fois que je me laisse abattre. Je
ne mourrai pas. M6me morte je ne lscherai ni ce pays ni ce temps.
Transfornee en poemes aux ailes enflammies,j'entrerai la nuit dans vos
rEves. Et je vous chanterai vos dksirs, vos trahisons, vos defaites.
Nadgda
Et Leningrad? Comment itait Leningrad la tant aimie d'Ossip?
"Petersbourg! Je ne veux pas encore mourir: tu as mes numeros de
telephone. Petersbourg. J'ai toujours tes adresses.
Akhmatova
Je peux aller sonner chez les morts.
Les voix des morts me ripondront."
Partout oh je sonnais, Ossip me ripondait. Nous avons tant ri et tant
rime dans ce berceau de granit. Jamais Petersbourg ne fut si belle.
Comme si elle s'itait couverte de fleurs pour mon enterrement, Le
Jardin d'Eti s'6tait ruin6 pour dix ans en roses et en pavots. Et derriere
moi dans les all6es s'6tirait un cortege d'ombres. C'etait tous nos amis
morts qui me faisaient une royale escorte. A Petersbourg je n'irai plus
jamais.
(Entre Pauline avec u n tikgramme.)
Pauline
Un t6ligramme. Vous le voulez?
Akhmatova
Qu'est-ce que c'est? Non. Prenez-le, Nadinka.
Pauline
C'est pour vous.
Akhmatova
Je ne sais pas lire les t6lCgrammes.
Nadqda
C'est Tvardovski! Novy Mir est pr2.t 5 publier le Po& sans H h s ! Brave
Tvardovski! Quel courage!
Akhmatova
Non! C'est vrai? Donnez-moi $a. ( A Nahjda.) Donnez-moi vos lunettes.
Do they want me to die?

But I warn you, that's the last time I let myself become disheartened.
I will not die. Even dead I will not let go of this country or of this time.
Transformed into poems with their wings aflame, I'll enter your dreams
during the night. And I'll sing to you your desires, your betrayals, your
defeats.
Nadezhda
And Leningrad? How was Leningrad, so beloved of Osip? "Petersburg! I
don't want to die yet: you have my telephone numbers. Petersburg. I still
have your addresses.
Akhmatova
I can go to ring at the house of the dead
The voices of the dead will answer me."
Everywhere I rang, Osip answered me. We laughed and rhymed so
much in that granite cradle. Petersburg was never so beautiful. As if she
had strewn herself with flowers for my burial, The Summer Garden had
ruined itself for ten years with roses and poppies. And behind me in the
garden paths stretched a procession of shadows. It was all our dead
friends acting as my royal escort. I'll never go to Petersburg again.
(Enter Pauline with a telegram.)
Pauline
A telegram. Do you want it?
Akhmatova
What is it? No. Take it, Nadinka.
Pauline
It's for you.
Akhmatova
I don't know how to read telegrams.
Nadezhda
It's T v a r d o ~ s k iNovy
! ~ ~ Mir is ready to publish the Poem without a Hero!31
Brave Tvardovski! What courage!
Akhnzatova
No! Is it true? Give me that. (To Nadezhda.) Give me your glasses.
Pauline
Alors on sait lire ou on ne sait pas lire?
Akhmatoua
I1 veut une postface de Pasternak. . . .
Nadqda
De Pasternak? I1 a raison! Pasternak escortant Akhmatova, voila qui
serait juste et magnifique.
Akhmatoua
Mais Boris ne m'a jamais lue!
Nadejda
Je vous en prie, Anna Andreievna, ne commencez pas!
Akhmatoua
Je vous le dis. Je lui avais envoy6 une copie manuscrite de P o h sans
Hh-os, dkdiie au Premier Pokte du XXc sikcle.
Nadejda
Au premier pokte! Vous avez mis cela a Pasternak?
Akhmatova
Mais laissez-moi finir. I1 me t6lCphone pour me remercier. Et vous savez
ce qu'il me dit? "J'aime surtout: 'Les immortelles ont une odeur scche"'!
Un pokme que j'ai 6crit en 1910! "Et le reste," dis-je, "vous l'avez lu?"
Nadqda
Au premier pokte ...
Akhmatoua
Et vous savez ce qu'il m'a dit?
iVadgda
Non. Mais l'important c'est que demain il vous accompagne. I1 faut aller
le voir 5 sa campagne.
Akhmatoua
Vous avez raison. I1 faut aller tout de suite chez Boris. Allons en avant!
Demain Peredelkino. L'an prochain Leningrad, mon ceuvre se l k e r a
sur la Russie comme un maternel soleil. Mais comment aller 5
Peredelkino?
Pauline
So do we know how to read or do we not know how to read?
Akhmatova
He wants an afterword by Pasternak. . . .
Nadezhda
By Pasternak? He's right! Pasternak escorting Akhmatova, that would be
just and magnificent.
Akhmatova
But Boris has never read me!
Nadezhda
I beg of you, Anna Andreyevna, don't start!
Akhmatova
I'm telling you. I sent him a manuscript copy of Poem without a Hero,
dedicated to the Foremost Poet of the twentieth century.
Nadezhda
To the foremost poet! You put that for Pasternak?
Akhmatoua
Let me finish. He telephones me to thank me. And you know what he
says to me? "I especially like: 'The immortals have a dry aroma'!" A poem
I wrote in 1910! "And the rest," I said, "did you read it?"
Nadezhda
To the foremost poet ...
Akhmatoua
And you know what he said to me?
Nadezhda
No. But the important thing is that tomorrow he accompany you. We
must go see him at his country home.
Akhmatova
You're right. We must go straight away to Boris's. Forward march!
Tomorrow P e r e d e l k i n ~Next
. ~ ~ year Leningrad, my work will rise up over
Russia like a maternal sun. But how to get to Peredelkino?
Nadejda
On pourrait demander i Lydia Korneevna? La datcha de son pPre est
juste i c6tC.
Akhmatoua
Lydia, ma chkre Lydia Korneevna. Bien stir! Elle va ttre si heureuse. Je
l'appelle!
(Elk tiliphone aussit6t a Lydia Korneeuna.)
Allo! Akhmatova 2 l'appareil. Lydia Korneevna, je sais bien que nous
sommes en froid. Se pourrait-il que vous consentiez quand m&me5 venir
tout de suite? A titre tout i fait exceptionnel? Je vous expliquerai . . .
Elle arrive. Elle nous attendra en bas.
Pauline
Vous repartez? Tout de suite?
(Akhmatoua et Nadgda se rhabilknt.)
Akhmatoua
Je finis mon histoire.
"Et le reste, vous l'avez lu?" dis-je. Eh bien, il n'avait plus mon Poime
sans Hbos. Je ne sais pas ce que j'en ai fait, me dit-il. Quelqu'un a dfi me
l'emprunter. Quelqu'un! Que dites-vous de cela?
Nadgda
Moi? Que c'est bien fait! Alors, c'est Pasternak le Premier PoPte de ce
sikcle? Non, ne me donnez pas d'explication. Descendons.
(Elks sortent. On les entend se querellm)
Akhmatoua
Je ne sais pas ce qui m'avait pris ce jour-li. Mais c'est quand m&me un
grand poPte.
Nadgda
TrPs grand. CZtait.
Pauline
(Crie.)Vous rentrez quand?
Nadgda
(Crie.) Dans une heure
Nadezhda
Could we ask Lydia Korneyevna? Her father's dacha is right next door.
Akhmatova
Lydia, my dear Lydia Korneyevna. Of course! She'll be so happy. I'll call
her!
(She immediately telephones Lydia Kornqrewna.)
Hello! Akhmatova speaking. Lydia Korneyevna, I know we're on chilly
terms. Might you consent all the same to come over right away?Just this
once? I'll explain to you . . .
She's coming. She'll wait for us downstairs.
Pauline
You're leaving again? Right away?
(Akhmatova and Nahzhda dress again to go out.)
Akhmatova
I'll finish my story.
"And the rest, did you read it?" I say. Well, he didn't have my Poem
Without a Hero anymore. I don't know what I did with it, he tells me.
Someone must have borrowed it from me. Someone! What do you say to
that?
Nadezhda
Me? All the worse for you! So, Pasternak is the Foremost Poet of this
century? No, don't gve me any explanations. Let's go downstairs.
(They exit. We hear them quarreling.)
Akhmatova
I don't know what came over me that day. But all the same he is a great
poet.
Nadezhda
Very great. Was.
Pauline
(Shouts.)When are you coming back?
Nadezhda
(Shouts.)In an hour
Pauline
Dans une heure?! Vous me prenez pour une demeuree? Dans une
heure! Pour Peredelkino, elles en ont bien pour la journke. Voyons.
(Qu'est-ce que je fais?)
(Elk va f o u i l k )
Qu'est-ce qu'elle a rapport6 de Leningrad? J'espkre qu'elle n ' a pas
trouv6 de souliers, parce que moi je viens d'en trouver. Du cahier.
Encore du cahier. Voyez, on ne mange pas, on ne boit pas, on ne
s'habille pas. Tout va dans le papier.
(Elk sort.)
(A Peredelkino. Dmant la datcha de Pasternak, dehors.

Autour, la forit.)
Akhmatova
C'est peut-Ctre la forCt de Peredelkino, c'est peut-6tre le jardin de la
maison de Pasternak, mais on dirait un cimetikre hant6 dans une
nouvelle d'Edgar Poe. Chaque bouleau, un vampire. Et dans chaque
buisson je vois un flic diguis6 en fourre. Vous avez peur vous aussi, Lydia
Korneevna.
Lydia
Pas d u tout. C'est seulement un frisson ...
Akhmatova
Un frisson de peur. Nous avons peur toutes les trois, n'est-ce pas
Nadinka? Ce bois desert est surpeuple d'impermeables. I1 est honnCte
d'avoir peur, Lydia Korneevna. Jeanne d'Arc elle-mCme n'a pas eu
honte d'avoir peur. On lui a dit: vous voyez ce bficher par la fenitre? Et
ce feu qui vient vous chercher? Eh bien, elle a eu peur et elle a abjur6!
Moi, je vois toutes ces feuilles bouger et j'ai peur. Et je suis prite 2
Nadgda
Que faisons-nous? Nous repartons?
Lydia
Boria va arriver. Attendons encore. I1 m'a dit que je pouvais venir 5
n'importe quelle heure. I1 est peut-&treall6 faire une course.
Pauline
In an hour?! Do you take me for an idiot? In an hour! To Peredelkino,
that'll take them the whole day. Let's see. (What shall I do?)
(She goes to rummage.)
What'd she bring back from Leningrad? I hope she didn't find any
shoes, because Ijust found some. Notebooks. More notebooks. Let's see,
she doesn't eat, she doesn't drink, she doesn't dress herself. Everything
goes for paper.
(She exits.)
TABLEAU 9
(At Peredelkino. In front of Pasternak's dacha, outside.

All around, the forest.)
Akhmatoua
Perhaps it's the Peredelkino forest, perhaps it's the garden of Pasternak's
house, but one would think it a haunted cemetery in a novella by Edgar
Allen Poe. Every birch, a vampire. And in every bush I see a cop hidden,
disguised as a shrub. You're frightened too, Lydia Korneyevna.
Lydia
Not at all. It's just a shiver ...
Akhmatoua
A shiver of fear. We're all frightened, all three of us, isn't that right
Nadinka? This deserted wood is overpopulated with raincoats. It's
honest to be afraid, Lydia Korneyevna. Jeanne d'Arc herself wasn't
ashamed to be afraid. They said to her: do you see that stake outside the
window? And that fire that's come to look for you? Well, she was afraid
and she recanted! As for me, I see all those leaves moving and I'm afraid.
And I'm ready to
Nadezhda
What shall we do? Shall we leave?
Lydia
Boria will be back. Let's wait a bit longer. He said I could come at any
time. Perhaps he went to run an errand.
Nadqda
Boris fait des courses maintenant?
Akhmatoua
Vous auriez dG preciser.
Lydia
J'aurais dG.
Nadqda
I1 y a une heure que nous sommes 1i.
Lydia
Justement. I1 ne peut plus beaucoup tarder. J'en suis sGre. Je le connais.
Akhmatoua
Attendons.
Nadqda
La derniere fois que je suis venue ici, c'etait avec Ossip. I1 y a bien
longtemps. Boris nous a d'abord invites i rester pour le the. Et puis il y
a eu "changement d'avis." Sa femme craignait la contagion. Pas de
gateau, pas de the. Nous nous sommes retrouvis tout seuls avec les
etoiles. Et affamCs d'humanite.
Lydia
Boris est si gentil. C'est sa femme.
Nadqda
Adorable. Et de plus en plus innocent en vieillissant. Vous savez
comment il a par16 de la grande Tsvetaeva dans son Autobiographie? I1
l'a enterree dans un chapitre intitule "Trois ombres." Mais qui est
l'ombre de l'autre aujourd'hui?
Akhmatoua
Boris n'ajamais rien compris aux femmes. Sa premiere Ctait une tortue.
Sa seconde, un dragon Ccumant. Sa troisikme une madame de chez
Monsieur Proust. I1 m'a fait des propositions 5 trois reprises. Je l'ai
envoy6 promener. Je ne voulais pas qu'il abime notre amitiC.
Nadqda
Vous m'avez dit mot pour mot la m&mechose pour Ossip.
Nadahda
Boris runs errands now?
Akhmatova
You should have given an exact time.
Lydia
I should have.
Nadahda
We've been here for an hour.
Lydia
Exactly. He can't be much longer. I'm sure of it. I know him.
Akhmatoua
Let's wait.
Nadahda
The last time I came here, it was with Osip. A very long time ago. At first
Boris invited us to stay for tea. And then there was "a change of heart."
His wife feared contagion. No cake, no tea. We found ourselves back to
being alone with the stars. And starving for humanity.
Lydia
Boris is so nice. It's his wife.
Nadahda
Adorable. And more and more innocent as he ages. Do you know how
he spoke of the great T~vetayeva~~in his Autobiography? He buried her
in a chapter entitled "Three Shadows." But who is whose shadow today?
Akhmatoua
Boris has never understood a thing about women. His first wife was a
tortoise. His second, a frothing dragon. His third, a lady out of Monsieur
Proust. He proposed to me on three different occasions. I gave him his
walking papers. I didn't want him to ruin our friendship.
Nadahda
You told me word for word the same thing about Osip.
Akhmatova
C'est que tous les hommes m'ont fait trois propositions. J'en ai CpousC
trois. Les autres je les ai envoyis promener. Les hommes ne savent
d'ailleurs pas nous aimer.
Tiens, la nuit derniere j'ai rev6 de vous, Nadejda. Nous etions seules
vous et moi dans le Palais de 1'Imperatrice oh je ne suis jamais allee.
Toutes ces salles illuminees de lune. J'aurais dd avoir peur. Pas du tout.
I1 regnait une grande douceur. Vous-meme vous itiez d'une douceur
dichirante. Dans mes bras, vous itiez vous-meme et Ossip inseparable-
ment. Et tous trois nous nous fondions ensemble, perdus dans un seul
ivanouissement soyeux. Les yeux fermks, nous . . . (Elle af e w ' les yeux, les
ouure et voit.) Ah! Regardez! Regardez! La! La! Vous ne voyez pas? A la
fenetre? Le rideau!
Nadejda
Un rideau? A quelle fenetre?
Lydia
Mais qu'est-ce que vous voyez, Anna Andreievna, mon dieu?
Akhmatova
Mais lui! La! Celle de gauche. I1 est la! I1 itait la tout 2 l'heure, vous dis-
je. A guetter a travers sept voiles. Se demandant quand nous allions lever
le camp.
Nadejda
Vous l'avez vu?
Akhmatova
Non. Je l'ai senti. Tout d'un coup, comme si j'etais moi-meme dans la
maison, j'ai eu une vision tellement claire. Son visage de cheval tout
enerve. Et son ;me obscure et tourmentie. Nous l'avons angoissi.
Nadejda
Vous Ctes sdre?
A khmatova
Absolument. Tenez, je sais qu'en ce moment meme, du fond de sa
propre nuit, il me regarde comme u n reve qu'il ne fera jamais.
(Elle crie.)
Habitants de la demeure du grand Pasternak, vous direz 5 votre maitre
qu'Akhmatova Ctait venue en personne le saluer.
Nous partons. Suivez-moi.
Akhmatova
That's because all men have proposed to me three times. I married
three of them. The others, I gave them their walking papers. Besides,
men don't know how to love us.
Say, last night I dreamt of you, Nadezhda. We were alone you and I in
the Empress's Palace, where I have never been. All those rooms lit up by
the moon. I should have been frightened. Not at all. A great sweetness
reigned. You yourself were heartrendingly sweet. In my arms, you were,
inseparably, both yourself and Osip. And all three of us were melting
together, lost in a single silky swoon. Our eyes closed, we . . . (She has
closed hereyes, opens them and sees.) Oh! Look! Look! There! There! Don't
you see? At the window? The curtain!
Nadezhda
A curtain? At what window?
Lydia
Well what d o you see, Anna Andreyevna, my god?
Akhmatova
Well him! There! The one on the left. He's there! He wasjust there, I tell
you. Keeping watch through seven veils. Wondering when we're going to
decamp.
Nadezhda
You saw him?
Akhmatoua
No. I felt him. All at once, as though I were myself in the house, I had
such a clear vision. His horse's face all enervated. And his soul obscure
and tormented. We've anguished him.
Nadezhda
Are you sure?
Akhmatoua
Absolutely. Listen, I know that in this very moment, from the bottom of
his own night, he's looking at me as at a dream that he will never have.
(She shouts.)
Inhabitants of the great Pasternak's abode, you'll tell your master that
Akhmatova came in person to greet him.
We're leaving. Follow me.
Pauvre Boris. Allons, adieu. La mort reunira les amis que la peur avait
sipares.
(Elks sortent.)
TABLEAU 10
(Chambre de Akhmatova, vide. Pauline entre.)
Pauline
(Seule, dichiffrant une page.)
"Un r k e " ?
"Mon escalier est noir. I1 manque au monde sa lune de 30 watts.
Je suis morte.
Je pense: quand j'etais vivante l'attente me rongeait les poumons. Je
suis morte et l'attente ronge le silence.
Mon escalier est noir. Un encrier sans encre. S'il venait 2 passer et ne
me trouvait pas?
Allumez, crik-je! C'est un r k e . Mais qui ne finit pas."
Je n'ai rien compris. C'est u n rCve $a?J'ai l'impression pourtant qu'il
me fait de la peine.
(Entre Lydia.)
Lydia
Comment, elle n'est pas 12? Elle est sortie?
Pauline
Comme une folle sans chapeau. Vous l'auriez vu courir. Ce n'etait pas
elle mCme.
Lydia
Elle n'a rien dit pour moi? Elle n'ktait pas malade au moins?
Pauline
Ne vous inquietez pas. C'est pour son fils qu'elle a file.
Lydia
Son fils? Mais elle n'avait rien dit.
Pauline
A moi non plus. Elle s'est levee. Elle a dit: Liova! Elle est partie. Et elle
m'a tout laisse.
Poor Boris. Let's go, farewell. Death will reunite the friends that fear
has separated.
(They exit.)
TABLEAU 10
(Akhmatova 's room, empty. Enter Pauline.)
Pauline
(Alone, deciphering a page.)
"A dream"?
"My stairway is dark. The world is missing its 30-watt moon.
I am dead.
I think: when I was alive waiting gnawed at my lungs. I am dead, and
waiting gnaws at the silence.
My stairway is dark. An inkwell without ink. What if he were to come
by and not find me in? Lights on, I cry! It's a dream. But that doesn't
end."
I don't understand a thing. That's a dream? Even so I have the feeling
it hurts me.
(Enter Lydia.)
Lydia
What, she's not here? She's gone out?
Pauline
Like a madwoman without a hat. You should have seen her run. She
wasn't her self.
Lydia
She didn't leave word for me? She wasn't ill was she?
Pauline
Don't worry. She hurried off for her son.
Lydia
Her son? But she didn't say anything.
Pauline
Nor to me. She got up. She said: Liova! She went out. And she left me
with everything.
(Rentrent Akhmatoua et Nadqda.)
Akhmatova
Pardonnez-moi! Tout d'un coup j'ai dG partir 2 la gare attendre Liova.
Lydia
I1 est . . . I1 n'est pas?
Akhmatova
Non. Je me suis trompie. I1 n'est pas arrive. C'Ctait une intuition si forte.
Un pressentiment. J'itais la, dans le fauteuil a 3 pieds. Tout d'un coup je
l'ai uu descendre sur le quai, trPs loin. Comme revenant des lointains du
passe, le sourcil fronce, me cherchant, m'esperant. Je me suis prkcipitee.
Vous comprenez?
Je n'ai plus de nouvelles. Je n'ai que des pressentiments. Et mes
pressentiments me bernent et me bercent d'illusions. I1 ne reviendra
pas.
Lydia
I1 reviendra. Nous ne sommes plus en 1938.Et en attendant son retour
votre livre nous aidera toutes 5 traverser l'abime.
Akhmatoua
Mon livre ne paraitra pas. Cela je l'avais pressenti et cela c'ktiiit vrai. Je
viens de l'apprendre. Je ne donne pas satisfaction au severe genie de la
Revolution, Lydia Korneevna. On l'a retire de la collection Orlov. On l'a
mis a la porte de Leningrad. I1 y a une porte a Moscou par oh je ne peux
pas passer. On enverra mon livre errer 5 VoronPje. Puis a Vladivostok.
Puis on l'adressera aux ours sur les banquises. Et 12 nous attendrons la
fonte de cette Ppoque. Non. Ce n'est pas sur cette terre qu'il paraitra, ni
du temps ou je respirais encore.
Et demain, j'accepte de traduire Lope de Vega. Puis j'enchainerai
avec Anatole France. I1 faut vivre n'est-ce pas, et pour vivre il faut se
suicider.
Lydia
I1 faut absolument aller voir Fedine.
Akhmatoua
C'est impossible. J'ai tout donne pour sauver la peau de mon livre. J'ai
jouC tous les r6les et toutes les comedies. J'ai fait la reine, la morte, la
mendiante, la b&te.Je ne joue plus. Je suis ruinee. J e n'ai plus la force de
faire des grimaces. Je suis allke voir Vinogradov. AprPs quoi j'ai eu un
(Akhmatova and Nadezhda return.)
Akhmatova
Forgive me! All of a sudden I had to go to the station to wait for Liova.
Lydia
He's . . . He's not?
Akhmatova
No. I was mistaken. He didn't come. It was such a strong intuition. A
hunch. I was there, in the three-legged armchair. All of a sudden I saw
him alight on the platform, very far away. Like returning from the far
away distances of the past, frowning, looking for me, hoping for me. I
rushed off. Do you understand?
I have no more news. All I have is hunches. And my hunches mock
and rock me with illusions. He won't be back.
Lydia
He'll be back. We're no longer living in 1938. And while we're waiting
for his return your book will help us all to cross the abyss.
Akhmatoua
My book won't be published. I had a hunch about this and I was right
about this. I just found out. I don't satisfy the severe genius of the
Revolution, Lydia Korneyevna. They took it out of the Orlov3*collection.
They showed it the door in Leningrad. There's a door in Moscow
through which I cannot pass. They'll send my book to wander in
Voronezh. Then in Vladivostok." Then they'll address it to the bears on
the ice-banks. And there we'll wait for this era to melt. No. It won't be
published on this earth, or in a time while I'm still breathing.
And tomorrow, I agree to translate Lope de Vega. Then I'll move on
to Anatole France. One must live mustn't one, and to live one must
commit suicide.
Lydia
We absolutely must go see Fedin.'6
Akhmatova
That's impossible. I gave everything I had to save my book's skin. I
played all the parts in all the farces. I played the queen, the dead
woman, the beggar woman, the fool. I'm not acting anymore. I'm
ruined. I've got no more strength for making faces. I went to see
V i n ~ g r a d o vAfter
. ~ ~ which I had a stroke. I went to see F u r t ~ e v aResult:
.~~
infarctus. Je suis allke voir Furtseva. Rksultat: coliques nkphrktiques. Je

n'ai plus la force de monter des etages qui menent Akhmatova 2 la porte
murke. Je n'ai plus la force d'enlever ma pelisse. Je n'ai plus la force de
retirer mes bottes.
Lydia
Moi non plus. De plus je perds la vue. Le jour viendra oh je ne pourrai
plus relire 2 votre place.
Akhmatowa
Et ce sera ma nuit. C'est vrai. Lida?
Pauline
Et pour moi c'est de l'asthme, c'est ce qu'on m'a expliquk.
Akhmatowa
Alors si tout le monde est egalement estropik, qui fera le marchk? Je
voudrais bien vous inviter 2 diner. Mais il n'y a jamais rien ni personne
dans cette maison.
Nadejda
Ce sera moi naturellement, puisque je n'ai plus personne 2 attendre, et
que je ne crains ni de mourir ni de ne pas mourir.
Akhmatowa
Vous savez, je veux vivre. J'ai besoin de nourrice, de sourire, de soin,
c'est tout.
Nadejda
J'y vais.
(Elk sort.)
Akhmatowa
Je vais vous dire: tout est de ma faute. 11s voulaient imprimer mes vers.
Tout ktait lu, trik, choisi, acceptk. L2-dessus, au lieu d'accepter, je ne sais
pas pourquoi, un tel regret s'empare de moi, j'ajoute le poeme que vous
savez, un cri, une vraie colPre, je le mets en prkface, j'ajoute 12-dessus
une dedicace pleine de larmes, de grincements de cles et de pas de
soldats sur les paves de bois. C'ktait plus fort que moi.
Lydia
Mais vous aviez le droit de le faire. Et puis on vous a demand6 de
nouveaux vers.
renal colic. I no longer have the strength to climb the stairs leading
Akhmatova to the walled-up door. I no longer have the strength to
remove my fur coat. I no longer have the strength to take off my boots.
Lydia
Nor do I. Moreover I'm losing my sight. The day will come when I won't
be able to reread for you anymore.
Akhmatoua
And that will be my night. Is it true, Lida?
Pauline
And for me it's asthma, that's how they explained it to me.
Akhmatoua
Well then, if everyone is equally crippled, who will do the shopping? I'd
like to invite you to dinner. But there's never anything or anyone in this
house.
Nadahda
I'll do it, naturally, since I don't have anyone to wait for anymore, and
I'm not afraid of dying or of not dying.
Akhmatoua
You know, I want to live. I need nurturing, a smile, some care, that's all.
Nadahda
I'm off.
(She exits.)
Akhmatoua
Let me tell you: it's all my fault. They wanted to print my poems.
Everything was read, sorted, chosen, accepted. Upon which, instead of
accepting, I don't know why, such a regret came over me, I add the
poem you know, a cry, a real rage, I put it as the preface, on top of which
I add a dedication full of tears, of the grating of keys and of soldiers'
footsteps on wooden paving-blocks. I couldn't help myself.
Lydia
But you had the right to do it. And besides, they asked you for some new
verse.
Akhmatoua
On m'avait demand6 de nouveaux vers anciens. Je le savais,je le savais.
Et si je n'avais pas fait cela, Liova serait ici. Ne discutez pas, je le sais.Je
n'ai pas pu renoncer a mon propre Requiem.
A l'instant meme ohj'essayai de m'introduire en fraude dans l'kternite,
j'avais pass6 la tete, je voyais d6ja le ciel des poetes, la-bas tout bruissant
d'envolkes, j'y ktais presque, je m'y voyais, j'ai senti une main, non,
c'ktait une patte familiere et velue, m'attrapper par la manche et me
retenir. Et voila qu'au lieu de ceder tout de suite et faire l'imbkcile,
j 'insiste.
Je vous le dis. Toute mon histoire, mon oeuvre, inon kpouvante, tout
est de la faute d'Akhmatova. Vous ne dites plus rien?
Lydia
Mais pour Novy Mir, ils ne vous publient pas et vous n'avez rien fait.
(Rentre Nadejda.)
Nadejda
Qu'est-ce que je vous apporte? Une bouteille du meilleur vin de
Georgie!
Pauline
Et moi? Une lettre de Sibkrie!
Akhmatoua
Donnez-moi qa! Une lettre de Liova!
Pauline
Alors il est encore la-bas? Vous avez de la chance. Le mien ne m'Ccrit
pas. Alors vous n'ouvrez pas?
Lydia
Voulez-vous que nous sortions, Anna Andreievna?
Akhmatoua
Non, non. Restez. J'aime mieux que vous restiez. Si la lettre est bonne
. . . nous boirons a Liova. Non. Ouvrons d'abord la bouteille. Qu'est-ce
que c'est? Un Gordjany blanc?
Nadgda
Un Tzinindaly. Nous l'avions dkcouvert Ossip et moi en 1931 dans un
village de montagne meweilleux. I1 y avait ce vin et puis ces habitants,
une race de paysans sauteurs.
Akhmatova
They asked me for some old new verse. I knew it, I knew it. And if I
hadn't done that, Liova would be here. Don't argue, I know it. I wasn't
able to renounce my own Requiem.
At the very instant I tried to fraudulently worm my way into eternity, I
had managed to get my head out, I could already see the poets' heaven
beyond me all rustling with flights, I was almost there, I could see myself
there, I felt a hand, no, it was a familiar, shaggy paw, grab me by the
sleeve and hold me back. And behold, instead of gving up at once and
playing the fool, I insist.
I'm telling you. My entire history, my work, my terror, everything is
Akhmatova's fault. Haven't you got anything more to say?
Lydia
But with Novy Mir, they won't publish you and you didn't do anything.
(Nadezhda returns.)
Nadezhda
What have I brought you? A bottle of the best Georgian wine!
Pauline
And me? A letter from Siberia!
Akhmatova
Give me that! A letter from Liova!
Pauline
So, he's still there? You're lucky. Mine doesn't write to me. So, aren't you
going to open it?
Lydia
Would you like us to leave, Anna Andreyevna?
Akhmatova
No, no. Stay. I'd rather you stayed. If the letter is good . . . we'll drink to
Liova. No. Let's open the bottle first. What is it? A GordyeniS9white?
Nadezhda
A Tzinindaly. We discovered it Osip and I in 1931 in a marvelous
mountain village. There was this wine and the inhabitants, a race of
peasant jumpers.
Akhmatoua
De paysans sauteurs?
Nadqda
Une secte. Une fois par generation les portes d u ciel s'ouvrent
brusquement pour tous ceux qui ont la force de sauter.
Akhmatoua
Est-ce qu'on est averti?
Nadqda
Non. I1 faut Etre prEt pour le ciel. Si vous Etes pr&tsle jour J vous n'avez
qu'a sauter a pieds joints.
Akhmatoua
I1 suffirait que les portes du ciel s'ouvrissent. Moi je sauterais.
Nadqda
I1 suffit de sauter. Et les portes s'ouvriront.
Pauline
Vous croyez?
Akhmatoua
Mais c'est vrai! Et dire que nous sommes la, depuis 40 ans, le nez en l'air
essayer de sauter au ciel, avec nos jambes enflees, nos memoires
lourdes, au ciel qui ne s'ouvre jamais. Alors que tout le ciel de ce sikcle
est ici juste sous nos pieds, entre nous, parmi nous. Regardez. Quelques
oiseaux. Le vin de l'amitie. Un toit qui s'appuie la-bas au ciel, c'est
l'echelle. D'un coup le vent tombe. Les cris de la tempEte ne nous
atteignent plus. Je baisse les yeux. C'est pour moi que la Moskova
s'echine scintiller et c'est pour vous. En cet instant une certaine joie
me porte dans ses bras.
Nadqda
Moi aussi, presque.
Lydia
Vous ne voulez pas ouvrir la lettre de Liova?
Akhmatoua
Tout 5 l'heure. Je vais l'ouvrir. J'ai si peur de tomber. Une minute
d'eternitk s'il vous plait. Allons, courage. Nadinka, les lunettes.
Akhmatova
Peasant jumpers?
Nadezhda
A sect. Once every generation, the doors of heaven are flung open for all
who have the strength to jump.
Akhmatova
Is one forewarned?
Nadezhda
No. You have to be ready for heaven. If you're ready on D day, all you
have to do is a standing jump.
Akhmatova
The doors of heaven would just have to open. Me, I'd jump.
Nadezhda
You just have to jump. And the doors will open.
Pauline
Do you think so?
Akhmatoua
But it's true! And to think we've been here for 40 years, our noses in the
air, trying to jump to heaven with our swollen legs, our heavy memories,
to a heaven that never opens. Whereas all of this century's heaven is
here right beneath our feet, between us, among us. Look. A few birds.
The wine of friendship. A roof leaning over there against the sky -that's
the ladder. Suddenly the wind dies down. The cries of the tempest no
longer reach us. I lower my eyes. It's for me that Moskova breaks its back
at glittering and it's for you. And in that instant a certain joy carries me
in its arms.
Nadezhda
Me too, nearly.
Lydia
You don't want to open Liova's letter?
Akhmatova
In a bit. I'll open it. I'm so afraid of falling. One minute of eternity
please. Come on, let's have some pluck. Nadinka, your glasses.
ueu des lunettes. Elle lit. Et elle referme.)
Nadqda
Alors, Anna Andreievna? Alors?
Akhmatoua
( A Pauline.) Ecoutez-moi, camarade citoyenne, vous m'aviez par16 d'un
costume d'homme pour 600 roubles, je crois?
Lydia
( A Nadejda.) Voile blanche.
Pauline
Moi? Jamais! Pour 800 roubles. Un costume d'homme presque correct.
Le pantalon, la veste, et la chemise en plus et tout de la mCme taille.
Akhmatoua
Oui, mais quelle taille?
Pauline
Ca d6pend. Pour 800 roubles je vous trouve la bonne. Alors c'est quelle
taille?
Akhmatoua
Eh bien, pour le moment comment savoir?
Lydia
Dix-sept ans, ce n'est plus le meme.
Akhmatoua
Je le saurai bienttit, je le saurai.
Pauline
Mais si vous tardez trop, ce sera 900, vous savez.
Akhmatoua
Ah, non. Ce sera 800, ou rien du tout. C'est compris?
Pauline
C'est compris.
Nadqda
Ecoutez. Chut.
(Shefiddles with the glasses. She reads. And she closes again.)
Nadezhda
Well, Anna Andreyevna? Well?
Akhmatova
(To Pauline.) Listen to me, comrade citizen, you told me about a man's
suit for 600 rubles, I believe?
Lydia
(To Nadezhda.) White sail.
Pauline
Me? Never! For 800 rubles. An almost proper man's suit. The trousers,
the jacket, and the shirt to boot, and all in the same size.
Akhrnatova
Yes, but what size?
Pauline
That depends. For 800 rubles I'll find you the right one. So, what size
will it be?
Akhmatova
Well, for the moment-how to know?
Lydia
Seventeen years, he's not the same anymore.
Akhmatova
I'll know soon, I'll know.
Pauline
But if you wait too long, it will be 900, you know.
Akhmatova
Oh, no. It will be 800, or nothing at all. Is that understood?
Pauline
Understood.
Nadezhda
Listen. Shhh.
Lydia
Qu'est-ce que c'est? Micro?
Nadqda
Les portes du ciel. I1 me semble qu'elles s'entrebaillent li-bas sur
l'extreme-orient. Tu entends, Ossip, ma taupe sublime, les entrailles du
temps craquer lCgPrement?
Akhmatoua
(Au public.) Vous qui vivez plus tard, avez-vous entendu parler d'Ossip et
de sa femme ici presente? Et d ' h n a Akhmatova?
J'aimerais tant le savoir. I1 faudrait mourir, sauter un siPcle, et revenir.
Nadgda
Ou recevoir un tilegramme de l'avenir: Poemes bien arrives. Signe: le
rivage du 21 siPcle.
Lydia
Anna Akhmatova: (Euvres complPtes.
Akhmatoua
Et dites-moi, vous qui vivez plus tard, savez-vous qui fut vraiment
Mandelstam? Akhmatova? Et Pasternak? Goumilev? Tabidze? Tsvetaeva?
Savez-vous qui d'entre nous fut loyal, qui fut trahi, qui fut traitre, qui
vit s'ouvrir les portes d'air? Cela se voit-il plus tard dans nos poemes?
L'Histoire de la VeritC a-t-elle commence?
~Vadgda
Quand comrnencera-t-elle?
FIN
Copyright O 1994 by HClPne Cixous

Lydia
What is it? Microphone?
Nadezhda
The doors of heaven. It seems to me they're opening a little, over there
in the far east. Can you hear, Osip, my sublime mole, time's entrails
slightly cracking?
Akhmatova
(To the audience.) You who live later, have you heard of Osip and of his
wife here present? And of Anna Akhmatova?
I'd so like to know. One would have to die, skip a century, and return.
Nadezhda
Or receive a telegram from the future: Poems arrived safely. Signed: the
shore of the 21st century.
Lydia
Anna Akhmatova: Complete Works.
Akhmatova
And tell me, you who live later, do you know who Mandelstam truly was?
Akhmatova? And Pasternak? Gumilev? T a b i d ~ e Tsvetayeva?
?~
Do you know who among us was loyal, who was betrayed, who was a
traitor, who saw the doors of air open? Is this clear later on in our
poems? Has the History of the Truth begun?
Nadezhda
When will it begin?
(Translated by Catherine A. E MacGillivray)

Copyright O 1994 by Catherine A. F. MacGillivray
TRANSLATOR'S NOTES
1 Writer, translator, English-language philologist, and wife of the Russian poet Osip
Mandelstam. Best known for her memoirs Hope Against Hope (tr. Max Hayward [New York,
19701, hereafter cited as HH), and Hope Abandoned (tr. Max Hayward [New York, 19741
hereafter cited as HA), in which she chronicles her life with Mandelstam. Nadezhda
Mandelstam was allowed to accompany her husband on his first exile from 1934-37. Exiled
alone the second time, Osip Mandelstam reportedly died in a camp on December 27,
1938. Nadezhda Mandelstam preserved her husband's banned poems in her memory and
on hidden scraps of paper until they could finally be published outside the Soviet Union
in the 1960s. After his death, Nadezhda Mandelstam continued her close friendship with
Akhmatova until the latter's death in 1966.
2 Devoted friend of Akhmatova's, who wrote a diary recording her almost daily
conversations with the poet from 1938 until her death. The first volume of these diaries
has been published in English translation as 7Xe Akhmatova Journals, Volume I, 193841, tr.
Milena Michalski and Sylva Rubashova; poetry tr. Peter Norman (New York, 1994).
3 Nikolai Stepanovich Gumilev was a poet and founder in 1911 of the Poets' Guild.
Gumilev was also founder of the literary movement called Acmeism, of which he,
Akhmatova, and Mandelstam were all prominent members. In 1921 he participated in an
anti-Bolshevik conspiracy that came to be known as the Tagantsev affair, and his proud
confession of his involvement led to his death by firing squad that same year (HH, p. 405).
4 Ironically, poetically, Akhmatova too died on March 5, in the year 1966.
5 The Neva is a Russian river that flows west to the Gulf of Finland, forming a delta
mouth at the port of St. Petersburg.
6 Akhmatova met Modigliani when she visited Paris for the second time in 1911. He drew
sixteen portraits of her. Only one sumived, and Akhmatova would hang it on the wall of
her room wherever she went. It eventually graced the cover of one of her books (see Max
Hayward, Introduction in Poem of Akhmatova, tr. Stanley Kunitz with Max Hayward
[Boston, 19731, p. 5 ) .
7 Nikolai Nikolayevich Punin, an art historian and critic, was Akhmatova's third and last
husband. He died in 1953 in a labor camp (HH, p. 412).
8 The Union of Soviet Writers was created by Stalin in 1932, when he ordered the
disbanding of previously existing literary groups and movements. This organization
continued to hold sway over Russian writers well into the 1980s (HH, p. 420).
9 Alexander Alexandrovich Fadeyev was a Soviet novelist. His novels The Rout and The
Young Guard were pointed to as models of socialist realism. He was Secretary General of
the Union of Soviet Writers from 1946 to 1953 and was also a leading member of RAPP,
the Russian Association of Proletarian Writers. He committed suicide in 1956 (HH, p.
404).
10 Nadezhda Mandelstam writes that when she and Akhmatova were living together in
Tashkent during the Second World War, "we often returned home to find our ashtrays
filled with someone's cigarette ends, a book, magazine or newspaper that had not been
there before, and once I discovered a lipstick (of a revoltingly loud shade) on the dining
table, together with a hand mirror that had been brought in from the next room. In the
desk drawers and suitcases there were often traces of a search too conspicuous not to be
noticed" (HH, p. 17).
11 Nadezhda Mandelstam reports that she and Akhmatova had "outlawed the question
'What was he arrested for?' 'What Jm? Akhmatova would cry indignantly whenever,
infected by the prevailing climate, anyone of our circle asked this question. 'What d o you
mean, what JmPIt's time you understood that people are arrested for nothing!"'(HH, p. 11).
12 In Hope Against Hope, Nadezhda Mandelstam describes how upon her return to
Moscow after the Second World War, "I found that everybody covered their telephones
with cushions, because it was rumored that they were equipped with recording devices,
and the most ordinary householders trembled with terror in the presence of the black
metal object listening in on their innermost thoughts" (HH, pp. 33-34).
13 Reference to Osip Mandelstam's satirical poem about Stalin that caused his first arrest
and deportation.
14 In Hope Against Hope, Nadezhda Mandelstam remembers "how in Kalinin the woman
next door . . . once said with a sigh: 'At least we get a little salted herring, or sugar, or
kerosene now and again. But what must it be like in the capitalist countries? I suppose you
can-just starve to death there.' . . . Once, when we were having a meal with Larisa . . . there
was a fierce argument about whether in large foreign towns like London or Paris they
would refuse to give a residence permit . . . I tried to explain that 'over there' you didn't
need a permit to reside in a city, but nobody would believe me" (HH, pp. 51-52).
15 This dialogue recalls an anecdote concerning Osip recounted by Nadezhda Mandelstam
in ~ o p e ~ ~ a i n s t ~"The
o p e second
: type of agent was the 'admirer3-generally a member of
the same profession, a colleague or a neighbor. . . . People like this would appear without
calling beforehand, just dropping in out of the blue. They would stay for a long time,
talking shop and attempting minor provocations. Whenever we were visited by one of
these, M. always asked me to serve tea: 'The man is working, he needs a cup of tea'" ( H H ,
p. 35).
16 Like many other artists and writers, Akhmatova was evacuated to Tashkent, the capital
of Uzbekistan, during the Second World War. There she shared a room with Nadezhda
Mandelstam from 1941-44.
17 In Hope Against Hope, Nadezhda Mandelstam tells the following story: "It so happens
that by sheer coincidence Akhmatova started reading Dante at the same time as M. When
he learned this, she recited to him a passage she had learned by heart: 'Donna m'a@arue
nello mnnto udo,' and M. was moved almost to tears at hearing these lines read in her voice,
which he loved so much" ( H H , p. 228).
18 Mikhail Alexandrovich Sholokhov, a "classic" writer of socialist realism; his most
famous work was Quiet F1ow.r the Don. In Hope Abandowd, Nadezhda Mandelstam tells how
she was criticized by Soviet "liberals" after the first volume of her memoirs, Hope Against
Hope, appeared, because in this work she makes no mention of writers such as Sholokhov
who, according to some, represented "the great forward march of literature" (HA, p. 154).
19 Andrei Alexandrovich Zhdanov was a close associate of Stalin's and served as his
minister for cultural affairs. He gave a speech at the first congress of the Union of Soviet
Writers in 1934 in which he outlined the precepts defining socialist realism as the party
line with regard to literature. In 1946 he issued what came to be known as the Zhdanov
decree, "that basic literary document of our times" (HA, p. 149). in which he denounced
Akhmatova, Pasternak, and others for their "vulgar" writings and their attempts to "poison
the minds" of Soviet youth. Zhdanov's attacks on Akhmatova were particularly vicious: he
called her a "half-nun, half-whore," and ordered her most recent publication, still packed
and ready for distribution, to be pulped. It was at this time as well that Akhmatova was
expulsed from the Union of Soviet Writers, and was henceforth followed everywhere by
two secret police agents (HH, pp. 400-401, 418, and HA, p. 375).
20 ~ e f e r e n c eto Shakespearev; Iago and to Genrikh Grigorievich Yagoda, head of the
Soviet secret police from 1934 to 1936 and then appointed Commissar of Communica-
tions. Arrested in 1937, he was tried with Bukharin and others in the last great show trial
and executed. It was he who signed the warrant for Mandelstam's arrest in 1934 ( H H , p.
417).
21 French school children learn in their history books the legend of Henri IV,who
would insist on leading his troops into battle himself with the cry "Rallia-vom a mon
pnniuhe blanc!"
22 Demian Bedny (Yefim A. Pridvorov) was a popular poet of the 1920s. He was an
ardent supporter of the Soviet regime. He fell into disfavor with Stalin in 1936, after having
written a libretto for an opera in which he mocked Russia for her past (HH, p. 401).
23 Alexander Ilyich Bezymenski, Soviet poet and leading member of RAPP. Noted for his
political conformism ( H H , p. 402).
24 Zagorsk is a town forty-five miles northeast of Moscow, the site of an early,
architecturally important Troitsko-Sergievskaya monastery, long venerated as a place of
pilgrimage.
25 Chita is a city on the Chita River, capital of the Chitinskaya Oblast, part of one of the
earliest settled regions of eastern Siberia.
26 In Hope Abandoned, Nadezhda Mandelstam reports that Akhmatova once said of
herself, "I am as I am, and wish you another" (HA, p. 428).
27 Nevski Prospect is one of the major boulevards traversing St. Petersburg. It is well
known in part because of Gogol's story by the same name.
28 In 1949, when her son Lev was re-arrested, Akhmatova burned a play she had written
entitled Prolobgw, as well as some of her notebooks of verse. In 1951 Akhmatova wrote the
poem referred to here about these previously burned writings. In H@P Abandoned
~ a d e z h d aMandelstam tells the following story about this poem: her volume of
poetry was being put together, Surkov winced at this title: what did she mean by hinting
that people had to bum their verse? For propriety's sake he suggested she change it to
'Notebook Lost in a Fire.' Akhmatova duly made the change in her own hand, saying:
'Very well, let people think I had a fireM'(HA,pp. 350, 359).
29 Named for Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin, who was titular Soviet head of state from 1919
to 1948. An early disciple of Lenin and one of the founders of Pravda, the communist party
newspaper, Kalinin became mayor of St. Petersburg when the Bolsheviks seized power in
1917.Astrong supporter ofJoseph Stalin, Kalinin was one of the few original Bolsheviks to
su~vivethe purges of the 1930s (HH, p. 406).
30 Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovski was editor of the progressive literary journal il'oq
Mir (New World) from 1949 to 1954 (HH, p. 416).
31 Cycle of poems by Akhmatova, which Nadezhda Mandelstam compares to Osip
Mandelstam's prose work The Noire nf Tim in her book Hope Abandoned. She points out
that both "are concerned with the remembrance of things past--seen as providing a key to
the present" (HA, p. 429).
32 A writers' colony near Moscow.
33 Marina Ivanovna Tsvetayeva, one of the greatest Russian poets of this century along
with her friends Akhmatova, Mandelstam, and Pastemak. She lived in Prague after the
revolution, from 1922 to 1925, and then in Paris from 1925 to 1939. In 1939 she returned
to Russia to find that her husband had been executed and their daughter confined to a
camp. In 1941 she hanged herself (HH, p. 416).
34 Vladimir Nikolayevich Orlov was a litera~yscholar and editor-in-chief of the Poets'
Library (HH, p. 411).
35 These two cities represent destinations for the deported. Indeed, Osip and Nadezhda
Mandelstam were exiled in Voronezh from 193437, and Osip Mandelstam purportedly
met his death in a camp in Vladivostok on December 27, 1938.
36 Konstantin Alexandrovich Fedin, writer and head of the Union of Soviet TVriters from
1959 through the 1970s. He was one of those who formed the largest group of
nondissident Soviet writers in the first decade after the revolution, called "Fellow
Travelers" by Trotski because of their tacit assent to the new regime (HH, pp. 404, 420).
37 Victor Wadimirovich Vinogradov was an eminent linguist, professor at Moscow
University, and member of the Academy of Sciences (HH, pp. 416).
38 Ekaterina Alexeyevna Furtseva was an important Soviet political figure and a favorite
of Khrushchev's. In 1960 he named her minister of culture, and she remained in that post
until her death in 1974.
39 The Gordyene is a mountainous region of ancient Armenia; its inhabitants were
probably the ancestors of the modern Kurds.
40 Titsian Yustinovich Tabidze was a Georgian poet who was executed in 1937

Cixous - Voile Noire Voile Blanche-Black Sail White Sail

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Voile Noire Voile Blanche/Black Sail White Sail

Hélène Cixous; Catherine A. F. MacGillivray

Cette piice est dkdike a Alexandre Mnouchkine,

Entre Leningrad, Moscou et les environs de ces deux villes: for&&,

Entre 1953 et 1960.

Staline est mort le 5 Mars 1953.

diminutifs russes: Nadia, Nadinka, Lida, Lidinka, Anouchka, etc. . . . Les

actrices en useront partout oB elles en eprouveront la nkcessite.

indispensable. Rien de plus.

New Lileraty H z s l q , 1994, 25: 222-354

Black Sail White Sail

This play is dedicakd to Alexandre Mnouchkim,

Between Leningrad, Moscow, and the surrounding areas of these two

cities: forests, rivers, holidays in the country.

Between 1953 and 1960.

Stalin died on March 5, 1953.4

They address each other using countless little Russian nicknames:

these whenever they feel the need.

indispensable to them. Nothing more.

224 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

La chambre d'Akhmatova: I'univers dans une coquille de noix

desordonnee. Elle avait un fauteuil 2 trois pieds. Le quatrieme etait

remplack par un objet quelconque.

Elle perd tout, elle cherche tout.

indiff6rence46chirkes. Elle ne coud pas et ne recoud pas. Peignoir de

Elle a le sens du vctement approprie 2 la grandeur ou 2 la decadence.

Le sac d'Akhmatova: il est son coffre-fort, son secretaire, son grenier, sa

pharmacie, son boudoir, sa tente de nomade.

Les lunettes de Nadejda: Akhmatova les lui emprunte sans cesse.

(Uneforlt d diver aux environs de Leningrad. Entrent Akhmatova et

Akhmatova's room: the universe in a disorderly nutshell. She has a

She loses everything, she looks for everything.

and-something dictated not by the period but by her royal indiffer-

ence-torn. She doesn't sew or mend. Undone silk dressing gown.

stances. She has a sense of clothing appropriate to greatness or

her boudoir, her nomad's tent.

Nadezhda's glasses: Akhmatova borrows them from her constantly.

( A winter forest on the outskirts of Leningrad. Enter Akhmatova and

En ce moment-mPme, avec la complicitC des bouleaux aux branches

(Akhmatova et Nadejda am'uent duns la chambre de Akhmatova,

(Akhmatova and Nadezhda enter Akhmatoua's room in Moscow.)

nuit elles dorment, semble-t-il, au pied de votre lit. Et au matin, je me

(Sur u n banc du Parc Gorki. Akhmatova assise. Am'vent Nadqda et

c'est le moment de refaire les demarches. Ma trks there Lida, il faut

icrire deux lettres tout de suite. Je vous explique . . .

VOILE NOIRE VOILE BLANCHE / BLACK SAIL WHITE SAIL

(On a bench in Gorki Park. Akhmatova seated. Nadahda and Lydia

magique? Celle que m'avait confectionn6e un admirateur cordonnier.

(Entre Akhmatoua appuyie sur Nadejda. Chez Akhmatoua.)

(Enter Akhmatoua, leaning on Nadezhda. At Akhmatoua 5.)

( A Nadejda.) Alors vous ne partez pas, vous?

(To Nadezhda.) So, you're not leaving?

(Chez Akhmatova. Lydia et Akhmatova se prt;parent pour

(At Akhmatova's. Lydia and Akhmatoua prepare themselvesfor

Ralliez-vous 2 mon panache blanc et tout ira bien.

Mais quand meme, dites, on reconnaitra ma voix? La voix de mes

(Akhmatoua et Lydia arriuent chargies et emmitoujlies

(Akhmatova and Lydia arrive at Anna Andrqmna k,

( A la gare de Moscou-Leningrad. Bruits. Fum'es.

(At the Moscow-Leningrad train station. Noise.

5 Tatagrad. Son nom maudit a Tatagrad je ne le dis jamais. Les souliers

(De retour de voyage, entrent Akhmatowa et Nadqda, flanqw'es de

(Returningfrom her trip, enter Akhmatowa and Nadezhda,

On veut que je meure?