I mean, you’re trying to build a icon of Evil, and you sort of wonderwhythe same images evoke the same emotions.... "
" Captain Kirk, I invite you and your officers to join me.
But do not bring that one, the one with the pointed ears. He is much like Pan, and Pan always bored me. "
- Apollo
"And when Moses came down from the mount Sinai, he held the two tables of the testimony, and he knew not that his face was horned from the conversation of the Lord."
This was Jerome's effort to faithfully translate the difficult, original Hebrew Masoretic text, which uses the term, karan(based on the root, keren, which often means "horn"); the term is now interpreted to mean "shining" or "emitting rays" (somewhat like a horn).
Although some historians believe that Jerome made an outright error, Jerome himself appears to have seen kerenas a metaphor for "glorified", based on other commentaries he wrote, including one on Ezekiel, where he wrote that Moses' face had "become 'glorified', or as it says in the Hebrew, 'horned'."
The Greek Septuagint, which Jerome also had available, translated the verse as
"Moses knew not that the appearance of the skin of his face was glorified."
[ Radiation Burns ]
In general medieval theologians and scholars understood that Jerome had intended to express a glorification of Moses' face, by his use of the Latin word for "horned."
The understanding that the original Hebrew was difficult and was not likely to literally mean "horns" persisted into and through the Renaissance.
DOCTOR:
Jo, Captain Yates, would you mind drawing the curtains?
(The Doctor sits behind a slide projector.)
DOCTOR:
Come on, Jo, stir your stumps.
Now then. All right?
Now then, tell me. Who's that?
(A papyrus image of a ram's head with the solar disc between its horns.)
JO:
An Egyptian god, isn't it?
DOCTOR:
Top of the class, Jo, top of the class!
That's right, that's the Egyptian god Khnum, with horns.
There's another one, a Hindu demon.
ALL:
With horns.
DOCTOR:
Oh. Thank you very much.
And our old friend the Horned Beast.
YATES:
I don't get it.
DOCTOR:
Probably because I haven't finished, Captain Yates.
YATES:
Oh sorry, Doctor.
Miss HAWTHORNE:
Oh, you could go on all day and all night showing us pretty pictures. I mean, horns have been a symbol of power ever since...
DOCTOR:
Ever since man began?
Exactly. But why?
All right, Captain Yates, the curtains.
Now creatures like those have been seen over and over again throughout the history of man, and man has turned them into myths, gods or devils, but they're neither.
They are, in fact, creatures from another world.
BENTON:
Do you mean like the Axons and the Cybermen?
DOCTOR:
Precisely, only far, far older and immeasurably more dangerous.
JO:
And they came here in spaceships like that tiny one up at the barrow?
DOCTOR:
That's right.
They're Dæmons from the planet Dæmos, which is :-
JO:
Sixty thousand light years away on the other side of the galaxy.
DOCTOR:
And they first came to Earth nearly one hundred thousand years ago.
BILL MOYERS: The mesmerizing character for me is — is Darth Maul.
When I saw him, I thought of Satan and Lucifer in “Paradise Lost.” I thought of the Devil in “Dante’s Inferno.” I mean, you’ve really — have brought from — it seems to me — from way down in our unconsciousness this image of — of — of Evil, of The Other.
GEORGE LUCAS: Well, yeah. We were trying to find somebody who could compete with Darth Vader, who’s one of the most, you know, famous evil characters now. And so we went back into representations of Evil.
GEORGE LUCAS: Not only, the Christian, but also Hindu and Greek mythology and other religious icons and, obviously, then designed our own — our own character out of that.
BILL MOYERS: What did you find when you went back there in — in all of these representations? There’s something …
GEORGE LUCAS: A lot of — a lot of evil characters have horns. It’s very interesting. I mean, you’re trying to build a icon of Evil, and you sort of wonder why the same images evoke the same emotions.
BILL MOYERS: What emotion do you feel, George, when you look at Darth Maul?
GEORGE LUCAS: I think the first thing you’re supposed to react to is fear. You’re supposed to go, ‘Ooh.’ You — you wouldn’t want to meet him in a dark alley. And I’m not creating a monster. You know, that’s like — I — I didn’t want to create some ugly — you know, this — somebody ripped out their intestines and threw them all over their head — and it’s — you can’t watch it. This is something …
BILL MOYERS: It’s actually mesmerizing.
GEORGE LUCAS: This is something that is more — it works in a different emotional way. It’s not repulsive, it’s just — it’s — it’s something you should be afraid of.
" Oh, for my members and friends of the press, my self-appointed white critics, I was reading Mr. Bernard Shaw two days ago, and I came across a very important quote which I think is most apropos for you. He says,
"All criticism is a[n] autobiography."
Dig yourself. "
Stokely Carmichael
Dig Yourself.
" The controversy over who shot first, Greedo or Han Solo, in Episode IV, what I did was try to clean up the confusion, but obviously it upset people because they wanted Solo [who seemed to be the one who shot first in the original] to be a cold-blooded killer, but he actually isn’t.
It had been done in all close-ups and it was confusing about who did what to whom.
I put a little wider shot in there that made it clear that Greedo is the one who shot first, but everyone wanted to think that Han shot first, because they wanted to think that he actually just gunned him down. "
Only What You Take with You.
Dig Yourself.
Only What You Take with You.
Smoke That MF-er like it Ain't No Thang.
Dig Yourself.
So - Who Likes Lists..?
Dig Yourself.
BILL MOYERS:
A professor I know said that he recently asked his freshman class how many of them had seen all three of the trilogy, and everyone in the class raised his hand.
And he said to me,
‘I hope Lucas knows he’s mentoring an entire generation of — of — of young Americans.’
GEORGE LUCAS:
I — I have a philosophy that we all teach, and we all teach every day of our lives.
And it’s not necessarily what we lecture.
I’ve discovered kids don’t like lectures at all.
But it is really the way we live our lives.
And what we do with our lives and — and the way we conduct ourselves.
And once in a while they listen to the lectures.
So when I make the films, I’m very aware of the fact that I’m teaching on a much larger scale than I would just as a parent or somebody walking through life.
Because I have this megaphone.
Anybody in the media has a very large megaphone that they can reach a lot of different people, and so whatever they say, whatever they do, however they conduct themselves, whatever they produce has an influence and is teaching somebody something.
Nixon in China Libretto ACT ONE Scene 1: Nixon’s arrival (The airfield outside Peking. It is a very cold, clear, dry morning; Monday, February 21, 1972; the air is full of static electricity. No airplanes are arriving; there is the odd note of birdsong. Finally, from behind some buildings, come the sounds of troops marching. Contingents of army, navy and air force – 120 men of each service – circle the field and begin to sing "The Three Main Rules of Discipline and the Eight Points of Attention") CHORUS Soldiers of heaven hold the sky, the morning breaks and shadows fly. Follow the orders of the poor, your master is the laborer who rules the world with truth and grace. Deal with him justly, face to face, pay a fair price for all you buy, pay to replace what you destroy. Divide the landlord’s property, take nothing from the tenantry, do not mistreat the captive foe. Respect women, it is their due replace doors when you leave a house. Roll up straw matting after use. The people are the heroes now. Behemoth pulls the peasant’s plow. When we look up, the fields are white with harvest in the morning light and mountain ranges one by one rise red beneath the harvest moon. (A jet is heard approaching, touching down, and taxiing across the runway. As The Spirit of’76 comes into view, slowing to a stop, Premier Chou En-lai and a small group of officials stroll out to meet it, casting long shadows in the pale yellow light. A ramp is drawn up to the hatchway. After a pause the door opens and President Nixon stands in the opening for a instant, then begins to descend the ramp, closely followed by the First Lady in her scarlet coat. When the President reaches the middle of the ramp, Premier Chou begins to clap and the President stops short and returns the gesture, according to the Chinese custom. He reaches the bottom step and extends his right hand as he walks towards the Premier. They shake hands) CHOU Your flight was smooth, I hope? NIXON Oh yes, smoother than usual I guess. Yes, it was very pleasant. We stopped in Hawaii for a day and Guam, to catch up on the time. It’s easier that way. The Prime Minister knows about that. He is such a traveller. CHOU No, not I but as a traveller come home for good to China, one for whom all travel is a penance now. I am most proud to welcome you. (As the rest of the American party disembarks, the band strikes up. The Premier introduces the President to the Chinese official entourage, and together they review the massed ranks of the honor guard. All heads turn as they pass. While the introductions are beginning, the President begins to sing, and, as he sings, the joy of anticipated triumph becomes the terrible expectation of failure. The Chinese and American official parties in due course leave the stage. The brilliant sunshine dwindles to the light of incandescent lamps. A telephone rings twice offstage, is picked up offstage. In a moment Henry Kissinger interrupts the President to tell him that Chairman Mao wishes to meet with him) NIXON News has a kind of mystery: when I shook hands with Chou En-lai on this bare field outside Peking, just now, the world was listening. CHOU May I... NIXON Though we spoke quietly the eyes and ears of history caught every gesture... CHOU ... introduce... NIXON and every word, transforming us as we, transfixed... CHOU ... the Deputy Minister of Security. NIXON ... made history. ** Our shaking hands were shaping time. Each moments stands out sharp and clear. ** CHOU ** ... Army ** May I... NIXON On our flight over from Shangai CHOU The Minister... NIXON ... the countryside looked drab and grey. "Brueghel", Pat said. "We came in peace for all mankind" I said, and I was put in mind of our Apollo astronauts simply... CHOU ... of the United States NIXON ... achieving a great human dream. We live in an unsettled time. Who are our enemies? Who are our friends? The Eastern Hemisphere beckoned to us, and we have flown east of the sun, west of the moon across an ocean of distrust filled with the bodies of our lost; the earth’s Sea of Tranquillity. It’s prime time in the U.S.A. yesterday night. They watch us now; the three main networks’ colors glow livid through drapes onto the lawn. Dishes are washed and homework done, the dog and grandma fall asleep, a car roars past playing loud pop, is gone. As I look down the road I know America is good at heart. An old cold warrior piloting towards an unknown shore through shoals. The rats begin to chew the sheets. There’s murmuring bellow. Now there’s ingratitude! My hand is steady as a rock. A sound like mourning doves reaches my ears, nobody is a friend of ours. ** Let’s face it. If we don’t succeed on this summit, our name is mud. We’re not out of the woods, not yet. ** (To Chou) The nation’s heartland skips a beat as our hands shield the spinning globe from the flame throwers of the mob. We must press on. We know we want... What?... Oh yes... KISSINGER Mr. President... Scene 2: Meeting with Mao (The incandescent lamps are the lamps of Chairman Mao’s study. They are old-fashioned standard lamps with tasselled shades. Books lie open everywhere, face down or face up. The walls are filled with books, most of them stuffed with long paper bookmark. Chairman Mao Tse-tung is seated on one of several over-stuffed brown slip-covered armchairs arranged in a semi- circle. Several Chinese photographers slip into the room, then President Nixon, Premier Chou En-lai and Dr. Kissinger make their entrance. A girl secretary (one of three who will sit on straight chairs behind Mao and sing back-up) takes the Chairman’s arm and he hoists himself out of the chair and advances to shake hands) MAO I can’t talk very well. My throat... NIXON I’m nearly speechless with delight just to be here MAO We’re even then. That is the right way to begin. Our common old friend Chiang Kai-shek with all his virtues would not look too kindly on all this. We seem to be beneath the likes of him. You’ve seen his latest speech? NIXON You bet. It was a scorcher. Still, he’s spit into the wind before, and will again. That puts it into scale. You shouldn’t despise Chiang. MAO No fear of that. We’re followed his career for generations. There’s not much beneath our notice. CHOU We will touch On this in our communiqué. (They sit down, and the photographers who have snapped the handshakes continue to photograph them. The Chairman and the President sit next to one another at the center of the semi-circle while the Premier sits next to the Chairman and Dr. Kissinger sits next to the President, facing each other, at its ends. The secretaries take their seats behind the Chairman) MAO Ah, the philosopher! I see Paris can spare you then. KISSINGER The Chairman may be gratified to hear he’s read at Harvard. I assign all four volumes. MAO Those books of mine aren’t anything. Incorporate their words within a people’s thought as poor men’s common sense and try their strength on women’s nerves, then say they live. NIXON The Chairman’s book enthralled a nation, and have changed the world. MAO I could not change it. I’d be glad to think that in the neighborhood of Peking something will remain. NIXON Let us turn our talk towards Taiwan, Vietnam and the problems there, Japan... MAO Save that for the Premier. My business is philosophy. Now Doctor Kissinger... KISSINGER Who me? MAO ... has made his reputation in Foreign affairs. NIXON My right hand man. You’d never think to look at him that he’s James Bond. CHOU And all the time he’s doing undercover work. KISSINGER I had a cover. MAO In the dark all diplomats are gray. CHOU Or gris when their work takes them to Paris. KISSINGER I pull the wool over their... NIXON Stop! MAO He pulls the wool over their lap. NIXON He’s a consummate diplomat. Girls think he’s lukewarm when he’s hot. MAO You also dally with your girls? NIXON His girls, not mine. KISSINGER He never tells. CHOU And this is an election year. (The photographers have finished; Chou ushers them out into the hall. When he returns he sits a little straighter, as do the President and Dr. Kissinger. Only Chairman Mao continues to lean back, his arms over the chair’s arms, as the conversation moves on) MAO You know we’ll meet with your confrere the Democratic candidate if he should win. NIXON That is a fate we hope you won’t have to endure. I’d like to make another tour as President. MAO You’ve got my vote. I back the man who’s on the right. KISSINGER Who’s in the right you mean. MAO No, no. NIXON What they put forward we put through. MAO I like right-wingers: Nixon, Heath... NIXON De Gaulle. MAO No, not De Gaulle. I’m loath to file him in that pigeonhole. KISSINGER But Germany’s another tale. MAO We’ve more than once led the right wing forward while text-book cadres swung back into goose-step, home at last. How your most rigid theorist revises as he goes along! NIXON Now you’re referring to Wang Ming, Chiang, Chang Kuo-tao and Li Li-san. MAO I spoke generally. The line we take now is a paradox. Among the followers of Marx the extreme left, the doctrinaire, tend to be fascist. NIXON And the far right? MAO True Marxism is called that by the extreme left. Occasionally the true left calls a spade a spade and tells the left it’s right. CHOU You’ve said that there’s a certain well-known tree that grows from nothing in a day, lives only as a sapling, dies just at its prime, when good men raise it as their idol. NIXON Not the cross? MAO The Liberty Tree. Let it pass. I was a riddle, not a test. The revolution does not last. It is duration ... the regime survives in that, and not in time. While it is young in us it lives; we can save it, it never saves. KISSINGER And yours will last a thousand years. MAO Founders come first, then profiteers. NIXON Capitalist? MAO Fishers of men. An organized oblivion. NIXON The crane... MAO Let us not be misled. NIXON The Yellow Crane has flown abroad. Think of what we have lost and gained since forty-nine. CHOU The current trend suggests that China’s future might... NIXON Might break the Futures Market. MAO That would be a break. No doubt our plunge into the New York Stock Exchange will line some pockets here and there. Will these investments be secure? No. Not precisely. NIXON There’s the catch. You don’t want China to be rich. MAO You want to bring your boys back home. NIXON What if we do? Is that a crime? MAO Our armies do not go abroad. Why should they? We have all we need: new missionaries, businesslike, survey the field and the attack, promise to change our rice to bread, and wash us in our brothers’ blood, ** and give us beads ** and crucify us on a cross of usury. After them come the Green Berets, insuring their securities. NIXON Where it the Chinese people’s faith? MAO The people’s faith? Another myth to sell bonds. It’s worked well for you. The people are determined to divide the land to make it whole. Piecing the broken Golden Bowl the world to come has come, is theirs. We cried "Long live the Ancestors!", once, it’s "Long live the Living!" now. NIXON History holds her breath. MAO We know the great silent majority will bide its time. KISSINGER There you’ve got me. I’m lost. CHOU The Chairman means the dead. NIXON Confucius... MAO We no longer need Confucius. Let him rot... no curse... Words decompose to feed their source... Old leaves absorbed into the tree to grow again as branches. They sprang from the land, they are alike its food and dung. Upon a rock you may well build your tomb, but give us the earth, and we’ll dig a grave. A hundred years and ears may press hard to the ground to hear his voice. Platonic men freed from the caves of Pao An want to spend their lives in the daylight, to hear the sound of industry borne on the wind: the plow breaking the furrow, cloth pierced by the needle, giant earth movers and these men want to work, not turn back, dazzled, to the dark... Echoes, shadows and chains. Such men will drive away the Yellow Crane at last to harness the Yangtze. Another generation may turn up Confucius’ china guard waiting in bunkers for their lord. NIXON Like the Ming Tombs. I think this leap forward to light is the first step of all our youth, all nations’ youth; our duty is to show them both their future and our past, the fire and the noon glare. How they inspire our poor dry bones, put us in mind of our forgotten dreams! We send children on our crusades, we bring children our countries, right or wrong. Then we retire. Fathers and sons, let us join hands, make peace for once. History is our mother, we best do her honor in this way. MAO History is a dirty sow: if we by chance escape her maw she overlies us. NIXON That’s true, sure. And yet we still must seize the hour and seize the day. CHOU You overlook the fact that hands are raised to strike, hands are stretched out to seize their kill. Here where we stand, beyond the pale, Your outstretched hand, the Russian’s wave, appear ambiguous. Forgive my bluntness. ** NIXON There’s no reason why you should trust us. I’ll never say I’ll do something I cannot do, and I’ll do more then you can know. But since you do not know me, please don’t trust me. Wait. These may be lies. KISSINGER I can vouch for the President. ** (The Premier has been discreetly glancing at his watch for some time. Now he stands up, and the President and Dr. Kissinger follow his example. Chairman Mao is assisted by his secretaries as he hauls himself up. Walking slowly and talking, they take their leave) MAO I’m growing old and soft and won’t demand your overthrow. NIXON Your life is known to all. It’s a relief to think I may be spared. MAO I thought you might be overwhelmed! NIXON My feet are firmly planted on the ground, like yours, like you I take my stand among poor people. We can talk. MAO "Six Crises" isn’t a bad book. NIXON He reads too much. CHOU Ah, who can say? NIXON Has study given Chairman Mao an iron constitution? MAO No. (The Chairman sees his visitors offstage and shuffles back to his books) MAO Founders come first, then profiteers. SECRETARIES Founders come first, then profiteers. (They write it down) Scene 3: The great hall of the people (It is the evening of the first day. The Americans are being feted in the Great Hall of the People. Outside, the roof is outlined by strings of lights, inside there are tables set for nine hundred. Against the far wall a small dais supports a bank of microphones. The American and Chinese flags are pinned against that wall. The President and the First Lady sit on either side of the Premier, their backs to the flags, and gaze across a snowy field of table linen. There is their party, there the newsmen, there the important Chinese. In the distance the vision begins to blur. The atmosphere is convivial; in that huge hall the President feels strangely joyful and lightheaded, as if this were the evening of arrival in heaven. And so the conversation rises and falls throughout the courses of the banquet) NIXON The night is young. PAT A long, long trail unwinding towards my dreams, uphill right to the very last frontier, and then we’re home. I love you dear. NIXON You must be worn out. PAT No, I washed and rested, so I feel refreshed. But you... NIXON This air agrees with me. Wish we could send some to D.C. I’ve never felt so good. PAT I saw a snow moon on our way here. Snow! Snow over China! Think of that! It makes me shiver. NIXON Just you wait until the toasting starts. Between the booze and praise you’ll warm up then. PAT It may go to my head. NIXON It may, and I might be a Russian spy. PAT Seriously... NIXON You saw the moon in clouds and forecast snow. Go on. PAT Be a peacemaker, Premier Chou. CHOU All Mrs. Nixon says is true enough. The pressure’s falling fast. I feel it in my bones. NIXON At least this Great Hall of the People stands like a fortress against the winds whatever their direction. Yet the west wind heralds spring. CHOU I doubt that spring has come. PAT Take a deep breath and you can taste it. It’s the truth. Although there’s more snow still to fall, the spring’s as good as here. KISSINGER Meanwhile we sit together in the cold. CHOU Huddled for warmth you mean? But could we not take some encouragement from this appearance of détente? NIXON (To Chou) He can’t hear you. He’s miles away. A Frenchman once observed to me "At the edge of the Rubicon men don’t go fishing". I know one statesman who thinks a fishing trip will help him land the Great White Hope. CHOU Intelligence is no bad thing. NIXON It’s Henry’s trump card. This stuffs strong poison. CHOU A universal cure, or so we call it over here. (After the third course is finished, Premier Chou rises to toast his American guest) CHORUS Shh, shh. CHOU Ladies and gentlemen, comrades and friends, we have begun to celebrate the different ways that led us to this mountain pass, this summit where we stand. Look down and think what we have undergone. Future and past lie far below half-visible. We marvel now that we survived those battles, took those shifting paths, blasted that rock to lay those rails. Through the cold night, uncompromising lines of thought attempted to find common ground where their militias might contend, confident that the day would come for shadow-boxers to strike home. We saw by the first light of dawn the outlined cities of the plain, and see them still, surrounded by the pastures of their tenantry. On land we have not taken yet innumerable blades of wheat salute the sun. Our children race downhill unflustered into peace. We will not sow their fields with salt, or burn their standing crop. We built these terraces for them alone. The virtuous American and the Chinese make manifest their destinies in time. We toast that endless province whose frontier we occupy from hour to hour, holding in perpetuity the ground our people won today from vision to inheritance. All patriots were brothers once: let us drink to the time when they shall be brothers again. Gam bei! (President Nixon rises to respond) NIXON Mr. Premier, distinguished guests, I have attended many feasts but never have I so enjoyed a dinner, nor have I heard placed better the music that I love outside America. I move a vote of thanks to one and all whose efforts made this possible. No one who heard could but admire your eloquent remarks, Premier, and millions more hear what we say through satellite technology than ever heard a public speech before. No one is out of touch telecommunication has broadcast your message into space. Yet soon our words won’ t be recalled while what we do can change the world. We have at times been enemies, we still have differences, God knows. But let us, in these next five days, start a long march on new highways, in different lanes, but parallel and heading for a single goal. The world watches and listens. We must seize the hour and seize the day. (President Nixon and Premier Chou toast each other, then Mrs. Nixon. Caught up in the spirit of friendship, the banqueters go from table to table toasting one another while the band plays old favourites. The banquet has become something very like a square dance) NIXON This is the hour! CHOU Your health! PAT And yours! CHOU To Doctor Kissinger! NIXON Cheers! KISSINGER Cheers! New friends and present company! NIXON To Chairman Mao! CHOU The U.S.A.! PAT Have you forgotten Washington? CHOU Washington’s birthday! NIXON Everyone listen, just let me say one thing. I opposed China. I was wrong. KISSINGER Bottoms up, Mr. President. PAT What did you say, Sweetheart? I can’t catch every word in all this noise. 1 CHORUS We have at times been enemies. 2 CHORUS The Chinese people are renowned. NIXON Ideas we have entertained... PAT "America the Beautiful"! 1 CHORUS We must broadcast seeds of goodwill. 2 CHORUS Comrades and friends... NIXON ... in former years grow in a night to touch the stars. CHORUS Look down and think what the Chinese people have done to earn this praise KISSINGER You won’ t believe how moved I am. CHORUS We marvel now. NIXON It’s like a dream. ACT TWO Scene 1: Mrs. Nixon views China (It is morning of February 22, another cold day. Although it is snowing, the First Lady wears no protection for the blonde hair. She has gone off on her own for a sight-seeing trip. Anti-American posters have been torn off walls, market stalls are piled with goods, children in snowsuits wave the flag. Mrs. Nixon is "loving every minute of it". She has just shaken hands with many of the one hundred and fifteen kitchen workers at the Peking Hotel. Ahead on her schedule are the Evergreen People’s Commune, the Summer Palace and the Ming Tombs. In the evening there will bet the opera. The citizens of Peking, seconded from their factories to clear the streets, look up and smile as the knot of guides and reporters pauses in its progress) PAT I don’t daydream and don’t look back, in this world you can’t count on luck. I think what is to be will be in spite of us, I treat each day like Christmas. Never have I cared for trivialities. Good Lord! Trivial things are not for me, I come from a poor family. This little elephant in glass brings back so many memories. The symbol of our party, prize of our success, our sacred cow surrounded by blind Brahmins, slow Musclebound, well-dressed, half-awake, with Liberty upon her back. Tell me, is it one of a kind? CHORUS It has been carefully designed by workers at this factory. They can make hundreds every day. PAT Wonderful! CHORUS Look down at the earth, look down, look down; down from the north the snowstorm comes. Mile after mile on each side of the ice-locked wall vanishes. Far as you can see you cannot see the land or sky. A living current moves beneath rivers caught in the hand of death, serpentine mountains cross the plain to bask in an uncertain sun, and elephantine hills rejoice advancing towards a sky of ice. This country is so beautiful; one fine day you will see it all. (The tour moves away; it is time the First Lady saw the Evergreen People’s Commune and its model swine- rearing facilities, People’s Clinic, recreation building, and school) CHORUS This is the People’s Clinic. PAT Ouch! I think it’s sort of rude to watch. CHORUS "Do not distress yourself", she begs. She will get well. Come see the pigs. PAT I once raised a red-ribbon boar. CHORUS Do you think you could scratch his ear? Thank you. PAT And how was that? CHORUS Just fine. CHORUS Here are some children having fun. PAT The children in the U.S.A. all say hello. I used to be a teacher many years ago and now I’m here to learn from you. (Smiling and waving, Mrs. Nixon and her entourage leave the commune and proceed to the next stop on her tour: the Summer Palace where she is photographed strolling through the Hall of Benevolence and Longevity, the Hall of Happiness in Longevity, the Hall of Dispelling the Clouds, and the Pavilion of the Fragrance of Buddha. She pauses in the gate of Longevity and Good Will to sing) PAT This is prophetic! I foresee a time will come when luxury dissolves into the atmosphere like a perfume, and everywhere the simple virtues root and branch and leaf and flower. On that bench there we’ll relax and taste the fruit of all our actions. Why regret life which is so much like a dream? Let the eternal plan resume. In the bedroom communities let us be taken by surprise. Yes! Let the band play on and on, let the stand-up comedian finish his act, let Gypsy Rose kick off her high-heeled party shoes; let interested businessmen speculate further, let routine dull the edge of mortality. Let days grow imperceptibly longer, let the sun set in cloud; let lonely drivers on the road pull over for a bite to eat, let the farmer switch on the light over the porch, let passer by look in at the large family around the table, let them pass. Let the expression on the face of the Statue of Liberty change just a little, let her see what lies inland: across the plain one man is marching... the Unknown Soldier has risen from his tomb, let him be recognized at home. The Prodigal. Give him his share: the eagle nailed to the barn door. Let him be quick. The sirens wail as bride and groom kiss through the veil. Bless this union with all its might, let it remain inviolate. (There is some clapping, then the First Lady is ushered into the limousine for the ride to the Ming Tombs, where ancient Chinese emperors were laid to rest. It is about four o’clock in the afternoon and the warm- colored light which precedes sunset in the very early spring illuminates the limestone statues. Or are they sandstone? The First Lady pats the pockmarked leg of an archaic elephant. She has put on her mink hat during the drive. She revels in the quiet ... no traffic, no airplanes, no loudspeakers, only the sound of the human voice and the sound of footsteps on flagstones and new snow) PAT At last the weather’s warming up. Look! The skins clear now. CHORUS Watch your step. PAT I said it would, remember? CHORUS Please, Mrs. Nixon, watch... PAT Oh yes. And look! Another elephant! Why hello, Jumbo! I was meant to come here. What a lovely park! Time for a picnic? CHORUS 1 They could work stone in those days. CHORUS 2 Labor was cheap. CHORUS 1 Men dug their own graves. CHORUS 2 They rose up. Like statues covered in the dust of their creation. CHORUS 1 Communist elements! CHORUS 2 Men like these behold each revolution of the world. CHORUS 1 Swimming through space as fish swim through the sea. CHORUS 2 Resting in currents. CHORUS 1 Though they got two bowls of rice a day. CHORUS 2 The salt was black. CHORUS 1 They drank white tea. PAT It rounds like you remember them. CHORUS We should go back now. PAT What a shame! (The First Lady takes the arm of her interpreter... a friendly gesture... as the group turns back towards the limousine whose engine has been running for some time. The sun is setting, the west is red, and the moon is clearly visible. Mrs. Nixon may be supposed to be thinking about her bath and the outfit she will wear to the ballet) Scene 2: Opera of Pekin (The curtain rises to reveal an audience. Madame Mao, in a dark Sun Yatsen suit and black-rimmed men’s glasses, sits between the President and Mrs. Nixon, Mrs. Nixon, who has changed her scarlet costume for a pastel-colored one, has been exchanging small talk with the Premier, who sits on her other side. We have only a few seconds to grasp these details before another curtain rises onstage. Three beautiful young women are chained to posts. The First Lady sits forward a little, as, indeed, does the President. The young women wear rags ... and defiantly new ballet shoes. This is the opening of The Red Detachment of Women. The dancer in the center, the proudest one, the one most heavily laden with chains, is Wu Ching-hua, the heroine. We understand that they are in the lock-up of an estate on a tropical island. Two women step from their posts and begin a furious dance. Ching-hua stands stock-still. Three contraltos from the chorus sing) CHORUS Young as we are we expect fear, every year more of us bow beneath the shadow of the next blow. Down on all fours our grandfathers swallow abuse as if by choice the humble flesh kisses the lash, spit and polish, polish and spit blacken the boot and they submit, embrace the foot, cushion the kick: rabbit and snake dance cheek to cheek. we are awake, we know these matters, how the poor debtors still sell their daughters, how in the drought men still grow fat on the profit won grain by grain from other men caught in the famine who trade their oxen for a day’s ration; then the plow goes, then tools, then clothes, at last the land. Where is the bound, naked and stunned’ Hand over hand he drags his skin. Look at him grin he can’t complain. Look at that thing that was his tongue he won’t be long. (Lao Szu, the land lord’s factotum, enters, accompanied by a guard. Singing to himself, he fumbles with his keys and Ching-hua’s shackles) KISSINGER (as Lao Szu) Oh what a day! I thought I’d die! That luscious thigh that swelling breast scented and greased, a sacrifice running with juice at my caress. She was so hot I was hard-put to be polite when the first cut ... Come on you slut!... Scored her brown skin I started in, man upon hen! (Ching-hua embraces the other women. They dance while the women in the chorus sing) CHORUS (as Ching-hua) How thin you are! If every scar on this poor back could only speak, these walls would crack, this thick-walled heart cast in the dirt would raise the cry "Hate Tyranny!" (Suddenly she seizes the whip from Lao Szu’s hand, brandishes it, and kicks him to the ground. Just as the guard lays hands on her, the two women fling themselves on the guard and Lao Szu. Ching-hua escapes) CHORUS (as Ching-hua) The land outside this cell is red, running with blood, hot in the sun we have not seen not until now now let me through! PAT Doesn’t he look like you know who! (At once the scene changes to the coconut grove. Mercenaries in battle dress run, crouching slightly, through the clearing. Ching-hua enters, dancing. She is quick and wary and eludes the dispersing troops) CHORUS (as Ching-hua) Can’t find the path... Must find the path... (She collides with Lao Szu. They struggle. He torments her with the cane. The mercenaries re-enter) KISSINGER (as Lao Szu) Whip her to death! PAT They can’t do that! NIXON It’s just a play. She’ll get up afterwards, you’ll see. Easy there, Hon. KISSINGER (as Lao Szu) Whip her to death! PAT It’s terrible! I hare you both! Make them stop, make them stop! NIXON Sweetheart. Leave them alone, you might get hurt. (The First Lady rushes onstage. The president, who has reluctantly followed her, holds her by the shoulders as Ching-hua is beaten insensible. She has resisted to the last) KISSINGER (as Lao Szu) This is the fate of all who set small against great. Leave it to rot. (The sky looks ominous. Tyrant, factotum and mercenaries all retreat in the face of a tropical storm. Rain pelts down. The coconut palms bow like grass. The President and the First Lady stand onstage with the body of Ching-hua, the recumbent dancer. He is stunned, she is rapt, they are both soaked to the skin) ** NIXON There there, there there. Jesus it’s wet. What would I do without you, Pat? ** (As quickly as it rose the wind dies down and with in the rain. Party Representative Hung Chang-ching enters on a scouting mission. Together he and Mrs. Nixon raise Ching-hua to her feet) PAT Thank God you came. Just look at this! Poor thing! It’s simple barbarous! "Whip her to death!" he said. I’d like to give his God-Damned whip a crack! Oh Dick! You’re sopping! (Hung Chiang Ch'ing is filled with deep proletarian feelings for this peasant’s daughter who has suffered so bitterly. He offers her a glass of orange juice. It is the first act of kindness she has ever known. Trembling, she raises the glass with both hands and drinks. Then the clouds part, the sky is filled with a blaze of light, and the full detachment of the Red Women’s Militia enters in formation and unfurls its banners. Entry March of the Women’s Company. Hung Chiang Ch'ing points to the company and to the flags waving in the rain-washed air, inviting Ching-hua to join her fellow workers and peasants in the People’s Army. Everyone cheers as Hung presents her with a rifle and she joins her comrades in a spirited drill. Target Practice and Bayonet Dance) CHORUS Flesh rebels the body pulls those inflamed soul that mark its trials into the war. Arm this soldier! Rise up in arms! Tropical storms uproot the palms ending their sway. The Red Army showed us the way. From the scorched earth people step forth over dead wood and over the dead. Follow their lead. The hand grenade beats in the chest; let the heart burst, let the clenched first strike the first blow for Chairman Mao and overthrow the tyrant, and share out the land. Share out the land, unclench the first, let the heart burst and sow broadcast the dragon’s teeth your kin and kith seed of your seed your flesh and blood. (The scene changes to the courtyard of the tyrant’s mansion. Sleek Kuomintang officers, political bosses and well-fed farmers celebrate their host’s birthday. Waiters pour wine as the guards display their military training. Dance of the Mercenaries. Hung Chiang Ch'ing enters, dressed as a foreign merchant. He is accompanied by the President, who presents the doorman with a red-and-gilt card. Lao Szu rushes to greet these exotic guests) KISSINGER (as Lao Szu) I have my brief. I flatter myself. I know my man. The sine qua non the face on the coin. You see what I mean. The empire builder, the man with his shoulder against the roulette wheel: he stands like a stone wall and sticks of success. I’m here to liaise with the backroom boys who know how to live. And me, I contrive to catch a few crumbs... The ringleaders’ names The gist of their schemes... Loose change. NIXON Here friend, something for you. You’re talking like a real pro. (The President hands a few coins to Lao Szu and Hung Chiang Ch'ing tosses a handful of small change to the guards, who scramble on the ground and fight among themselves. Embarrassed, Lao Szu orders his men to fetch the entertainment. A number of serving girls enter, dressed mostly in flowers. They are members of the Red Women’s Militia. The guards compel them to dance. Grimly the girls begin to execute a colorful Li Nationality Dance. Only one of them allows her anger to break the surface. It is Ching-hua. Her eyes sweep the crowded courtyard, resting briefly on Lao Szu. Madame Mao has risen from her chair in the audience. She raises one hand and points to Ching- hua) CHORUS (as Ching-hua) It seems so strange to take revenge after so long to find the wrong can be undone. The silent gun warms in my hand salving the wound made by the men it will gun down all in good time I shall kill them. Yes, every one. Revenge is mine CHIANG CH’ING That is your cue. (Ching-hua produces an automatic pistol and fires two shorts. But it was not her cue. The company is stunned. PAT She’s started shooting, Dick NIXON I know. CHORUS Oh no! CHIANG CH’ING What are you gaping at? Forward Red Troupe! Annihilate this tyrant and his running dogs! NIXON Oh no! CHIANG CH’ING Throw off those stupid rags! Advance and fire! Fix bayonets! The worms are hungry! Must the fruits of victory rot on the vine? (Offering only a token resistance, the mercenaries break and scatter, throwing aside their weapons as they run. The red flag rises over the mansion. Peasants push through the broken gates, weeping for joy) ** PAT Is Henry okay? NIXON Christ he’s gone. ** (The granary has been opened. The President takes on the task of distributing grain to the hungry peasants. Meanwhile, the company, led by Hung Chiang Ch'ing severely rebukes Ching-hua and disarms her. She is deeply distressed. For a moment Madame Mao, standing in their midst, seems almost left out. Then she begins to sing) CHORUS Are you one of us? You are what you choose. Your paradise begins are ends in open wounds and self-abuse where your heart is. Your sacred heart Is rotten meat; Your little treasure, your precious flower, your sweet revenge. Nothing can change without discipline. Give me that gun. HUNG CHIANG CH’ING I am the wife of Mao Tse-tung who raised the weak above the strong. When I appear the people hang upon my words, and for his sake whose wreaths are heavy round my neck I speak according to the book. When did the Chinese people last expose its daughters? At the breast of history I sucked and pissed, thoughtless and heartless, red and blind, I cut my teeth upon the land and when I walked my feet were bound on revolution. Let me be a grain of sand in heaven’s eye and I shall taste eternal joy. (The people express their bitterness against counter-revolutionary elements) ACT THREE Scene 1: Last night in Pekin (It is the last night in Peking. The President is very, very tired: the lights do not flatter him. The First Lady looks fragile and heavily powdered. Madame Mao is smaller than they had remembered her. And Chou En- lai seems old and quite worn out. Only Chairman Mao appears at his best, full of the joy of youth and the hope of revolution in his picture on the wall. Dr. Kissinger is impatient. He scratches the back of his neck, his nose, and his ear) KISSINGER Some men you cannot satisfy. NIXON That’s what I tell them. KISSINGER They can’t say you didn’t tell them. NIXON It’s no good. All that I say is misconstrued. (To Pat) Your lipstick’s crooked. PAT Is it? Oh. There isn’t much that I can do, is there? Who’s seen my handkerchief? CHOU Please accept mine. HUNG CHIANG CH’ING I’ve heard enough. Who chose these numbers? KISSINGER All of us. Doesn’t she like the people’s choice? NIXON Now for a solo on the spoons! PAT I like it when they play our tunes. HUNG CHIANG CH’ING This should be better. Hit it, boys! PAT Oh! California! Hold me close. MAO I am no one. CHOU We fight, we die. And if we do not fight we die. KISSINGER That’s how it goes. MAO I am unknown. Give me a cigarette. HUNG CHIANG CH’ING Come down. Give me your hand, old man. MAO Why not? HUNG CHIANG CH’ING (To Mao) Let’s dance. MAO Give me a cigarette. (She takes his hand and he climbs out of the portraits’ background) CHOU And to what end? Tell me. KISSINGER Premier, Please, where’s the toilet? CHOU Through that door. KISSINGER Excuse me for one moment, please. (Kissinger exits at the double) CHOU We saw our parents’ nakedness; rivers of blood will be required to cover them. Rivers of blood. PAT I squeezed your pay check till it screamed, there was the rent, there were those damned slipcovers, and the groceries. NIXON You made that place a home. PAT That place was heaven next to this. (Mao and Chiang Ch’ing begin to dance) ** NIXON You should think positive. Try not to brood. PAT The trouble was, we moved too much. We should have stayed put, Dick. HUNG CHIANG CH’ING We’ll teach these motherfuckers how to dance! CHOU It makes me sick. ** MAO We did this once before HUNG CHIANG CH’ING Oh? When? MAO It was the time that tasty little starlet came to infiltrate my headquarters. HUNG CHIANG CH’ING Go on! PAT I thank my lucky stars I kept those letters that you wrote from the Pacific. Seems like that was the best time of all; you had my picture, and each night I read your mind. NIXON What an idealist. CHOU A bankrupt people repossessed the ciphers of its history and not one character could say whether the war was over yet or if they’d written off the debt. MAO What did she call herself? Lan P’ing? HUNG CHIANG CH’ING You named me. I was very young. NIXON There was so much I couldn’t tell. PAT Such as? MAO You were a little fool. HUNG CHIANG CH’ING And your best pupil. CHOU In Yenan we were just boys. MAO Revolution is a boys’ game. CHOU I have grown old and done no more work than a child. NIXON Sitting round the radio with the enlisted men, I knew my time had come. The signal cleared transmitting nothing like a word. There was a cross round one guy’s neck. I noticed that. PAT You told me, Dick. NIXON The corrugated metal roof shook in the rain. The men were safe. I said goodbye to you then, Pat. PAT Did you? NIXON Then I began to wait. The rain seeped in under the door. The lights went out. PAT You told me, dear. NIXON That was the time I should have died. MAO Let us examine what you did. we led a quiet life, we grew stronger, we walked behind the plow. And as we worked year after year the yellow dust that filled the air softened the Buddha’s well-known face and made him seem like one of us HUNG CHIANG CH’ING We ate wild apricots. CHOU The taste is in my mouth. Once we had roast and a light film of dust settled on each plate. Your few subjectivist mistakes ... HUNG CHIANG CH’ING Small lizards basked among the rocks, warm as your hand. MAO Only confirm mythology’s eternal charm; roused from a state of seeming rest its landscape offers up the ghost, an ancient tactical retreat, retrenched in the inanimate. These things were men. NIXON When I woke up I dimly realized the Jap bombers had given us a miss... ** It was the weather I suppose ** PAT Thank heaven for that. NIXON Then I went out already it was meeting hot, a cloud of steam rose from the base just like a Roman sacrifice. PAT I never doubted you’d come back. I always knew. NIXON I felt so weak with disappointment and relief everything seemed larger than life. CHOU I have no offspring. In my dreams the peasants with their hundred names, unnamed children and nameless wives deaden my footsteps like dead leaves; no one I killed, but those I saw starved to death. MAO Saved from our decay. Admire that perfect skeleton, those veins, that skin like cellophane. Take them and press them in a book. Dare we behave as if the meek will mark the places of the wise? HUNG CHIANG CH’ING The masses stride ahead of us. We follow. CHOU Only they can tell how the land lies, where the pitfall was excavated, the mines laid... MAO The instant before bombs explode intricate struggles coexist within an entity, embraced till they ignite. HUNG CHIANG CH’ING I can keep still, I can say footing for a while, while the sparks die high in the air the sun moves on. Nothing I fear has ever harmed me, why should you? Marshal your forces, I’ll lie low. The drought has made me thin and strong. When they took off their coasts and hung them over branches, and the pick scraped this eroded ground, I shook with pure excitement. NIXON After that... PAT A penny for your thoughts. NIXON The sweat had soaked my uniform, ** my hair dripped down my forehead... ** PAT Did it dear? You’ve always suffered terribly from nervous perspiration. NIXON I began to take in all the sights. Picture a thousand coconuts like mandrills’ heads or native masks, milk oozing from their broken husks, the flooded rib of a palm frond where several centipedes had drowned, unsanded wood that smelled like meat... Jesus, it grabbed you by the throat. PAT Wonder what I was doing then? Dressing up as if you’d walk in at any moment. Go on, dear. Don’t let me interrupt. NIXON The war was dislocated. Hold a shell up to your ear. Guadalcanal sounds distant, roughly like the sea. MAO As they advance we melt away into the underbrush; we strike while they’re asleep, a single spark sets them alight. Cast the net wide and draw it in. CHOU The east is red; as we ride eastwards to Peking preoccupied with our last long triumphant march, the early light embalms each soldier on the route ** MAO Well said! ** HUNG CHIANG CH’ING Peking watches the stars, Nanking slips naked. Murderers stretch out in doorways in Shanghai. Chungking’s old-fashioned armory lies undefended. Yenan rests like a wise virgin. All the coasts are clear, and all the oceans still as we ride eastwards. MAO We recoil from victory and all its works. What do you think of that, Karl Marx? Speak up! HUNG CHIANG CH’ING We should go underground. The revolution must not end. MAO As we ride eastwards to Peking I shut my eyes and, listening Hard, hear the old harmonium we left behind, I-I-I dream that shoals of small transparent fish race down a shallow river. ** HUNG CHIANG CH’ING Hush. ** PAT You won at poker. NIXON I sure did. I had a system. Five-card stud taught me a lot about mankind. Speak softly and don’t show your hand became my motto. PAT Tell me more. NIXON Well, the Pacific theater was not much to write home about. PAT Yes, dear. I think you told me that. I read it while I did my hair and put it in my stocking drawer with all the others. NIXON I was "Nick". I must have told you that. PAT Yes, Dick. NIXON Christ, it was beautiful. I swapped spam for hamburger meat and roped in a few men to rig a stand. They called it "Nick’s Snack Shack". I found the smell of burgers on the grill made strong men cry. Now, Bougainville was a refuelling stop... PAT I know. Each fighter pilot that came through got a free burger and a beer. NIXON Done to a turn: medium – rare, rare, medium, well-done, anything you say. The Customer is King. Sorry we’re low on relish. Drinks? This is my way of saying thanks. CHOU I am old and I cannot sleep forever, like the young, nor hope that death will be a novelty but endless wakefulness when I put down my work and go to bed. How much of what we did was good? Everything seems to move beyond our remedy. Come, heal this wound. At this hour nothing can be done. Just before dawn the birds begin, the warblers who prefer the dark, the cage-birds answering. To work! Outside this room the chill of grace lies heavy on the morning grass.