Books: Hassan: The Story of Hassan of Baghdad and How He Came to
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James Elroy Flecker >> Hassan: The Story of Hassan of Baghdad and How He Came to
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HASSAN
Yasmin! Yasmin! My head!
YASMIN
Begone, or I will cool thy head, thou wearisome old fool!
HASSAN
Yasmin! Yasmin! (Stands with his arms outstretched)
YASMIN
Take this, my bulbul, to quench thy aspiration.
(Pours a jug of water over him, and slams the shutters to.
HASSAN does not budge from his position.)
HASSAN
O thou villainous, unclean dog, Selim. O thou unutterable woman.
I will have you both whipped through the city and impaled in the
market-place, and your bodies flung to rot on a dung-heap.
O, my head aches! Ah, you foul swine! May you scream in hell for ever.
O, my head--my head. For ever. Thou and thy magic and thy Jew.
There is blood dripping from the wall. (Banging on the gate)
I will break the house in. I will kill you. Ya Allah,
I am splitting in twain. It is my own fault for having dreams
and believing magic. Ya Allah, I am dying. Oh, Yasmin,
so beautiful, so brutal. O burning bright; you have killed me!
Farewell, and the Salaam!
(Falls under the shadow of the fountain. Silence. A light appears
in the next house. Soft music starts; the first light of dawn
shines in the sky.)
(Enter the CALIPH HAROUN AR RASCHID, JAFAR, his Vizier, MASRUR (a
Negro), his Executioner, and ISHAK, a young man, his poet,
all attired as Merchants.)
CALIPH
Ishak, my heart is heavy and still the night drags on,
and still we wander in the crooked streets, and still
we find no entertainment, and still the white moon shines.
ISHAK
O Caliph of Islam, is there not vast entertainment for the wise
in the shining of the moon, in the dripping of that fountain,
and in the shape of that tall cypress that has leapt the wall
to shoot her arrow at the stars?
(The music which had stopped recommences.)
CALIPH
But I hear music, and see lights. Come on, come on, we will snatch
profit from this cursed night even yet, my friends,
even at the eleventh hour.
JAFAR
Master, the night is far advanced, and you have not slept.
It is a late hour to seek for entertainment.
CALIPH
Jafar you are as prudent as a shopkeeper.
ISHAK
There lies his merit, Haroun! For he keeps the great shop of state,
he sells the revenue of provinces, and buys in the lives of men.
CALIPH
Enough, enough. Call to them, Jafar, and see if they will let us in.
JAFAR
Oh, gentlefolk, in the name of Allah!
VOICE
(From window, the person invisible) Who calls?
JAFAR
Sir, we are four merchants who came yesterday night from Basra,
and on our arrival we met in the street a man of Basra settled in Bagdad,
who prayed us to dine with him. So we accepted and stayed late
talking the talk of Basra, and left him but an hour ago.
And since we were strangers to the city, we lost our way,
and have been wandering ever since in search of our Khan
and have not found it. And now a happy chance has taken us
to this street; for seeing lights and hearing music, indeed, sir,
we hope to taste the cup of thy kindness, being men of honour,
good companions and true believers.
VOICE
Then you are not of Bagdad?
JAFAR
No, sir, but of Basra.
VOICE
Had you been a Baghdad, you should not have entered for all the gold
in the Caliph's coffers.
CALIPH
Then we may enter, being of Basra?
VOICE
If you enter, you will be in my power. And if you annoy me,
I will punish you with death. But no one constraineth you to enter.
Go in peace, O men of Basra.
CALIPH
(Aside) A rare adventure. (Aloud) We take the risk of annoying you,
O host of terror, and are now looking for the door.
VOICE
Since when did a door of good reputation open on to this street,
my masters? Our door is far from here, and you are strangers and merry,
and will not find it. But I will contrive a means for your ascent.
CALIPH
Jafar, I never suspected there was a great house in this poor quarter
of the town. For from the outside it is a house like any other,
except that it has no door; but inside, if this is but the back of it,
it is of great extent and holds some secret. We shall make a discovery
tonight, O Jafar.
JAFAR
Master, we have been warned of danger!
(A basket comes down.)
CALIPH
Danger? What care I?
(Sits in the basket, and is drawn up.)
JAFAR
Eh, Masrur, I could sleep a little.
MASRUR
You would wake in paradise if the Caliph heard you, Jafar.
(MASRUR waves his sword dexterously near JAFAR's neck.)
JAFAR
(As he ascends into the basket, pointing to Masrur's sword)
The path to Paradise is narrow and shiny, O Masrur.
MASRUR
(With the grim motion of the sword) Ya, Jafar, it is a short cut.
(Jafar having ascended, MASRUR ascends, and the basket is let down
for Ishak.)
ISHAK
(Alone) Go on thy way without me, Commander of the Faithful.
I will follow you no further. Find one more adventure if you will.
For me the break of day is adventure enough--and water splashing
in the fountain. Find out, Haroun, the secret of the lights
and of the music, of a house that has no door, and a master
that will admit no citizen. Drag out the mystery of a man's love
or loss, then break your oath and publish his tale to all Bagdad,
then fling him gold, and fling him gold, and dream you have made a friend!
Those bags of gold you fling, O my generous master, to a mistress for night,
to a poet for a jest, to a rich friend for entertainment,
to a beggar for a whim, are they not the revenues of cities,
wrung by torture from the poor? But the sighs of your people, Haroun,
do not so much as stir the leaves in your palace garden!
And I--I have taken your gold, I, Ishak, who was born on the mountains
free of the woods and winds. I have made my home in your palace,
and almost forgot it was a prison. And for you I have strung glittering,
fulsome verses, a hundred rhyming to one rhyme, ingeniously woven,
my disgrace as a poet, my dishonour as a man. And I have forgotten
that there are men who dig and sow, and a hut on the hills
where I was born.
(Perceives Hassan.) Ah, there is a body, here in the shade.
Corpses of the poor are very common on the streets these days.
They die of poison or the knife, but most of hunger. Mashallah,
but you have not died of hunger, my friend, and there is that
on your face that I do not like to see. By his clothes
this was a common man, a grocer or a baker, his person ill-proportioned
and unseemly, but by his forehead not quite a common man. I think--
JAFAR
(From above) Ishak, are you coming up?
ISHAK
(Shouting back) Wait a minute, I will come.
(To himself) What has curved his mouth into that bitter line?
He is an ugly man, but I maintain there is grace in his countenance.
What? A lute? Take my hand, O brother. You loved music too,
and you could sing the songs of the people, which are better than mine--
the songs I learnt from the mother of my mother.
(Taking the broken lute mechanically) What was that one?
"The Green Boy came from over the mountains,
Joy of the morning, joy of his heart"?
I have forgotten it, and the lute is broken. Or that other:
"Come to the wells, the desert wells!
The caravan is marching down; I hear the camel bells."
(Resumes HASSAN's hand) Ah, brother, your hand is warm and your heart
beating, you are not dead.
(Bathing HASSAN's forehead with water from the fountain)
I shall know after all what has twisted your mouth awry.
CALIPH
Ishak, Ishak, we wait and wait.
ISHAK
May I not be free one hour, to breathe the dawn alone! Ah!...
(Takes HASSAN's body and drags it to the basket.) I come, my master!
(Puts HASSAN in the basket.) There, take my place, brother,
and find your destiny. I will be free to-night, free for one dawn
upon the hills!
(As HASSAN is drawn up in the basket, ISHAK walks rapidly away.)
CURTAIN
ACT II
SCENE I
A great room. To the left three arches lead out onto the balcony
where the personages CALIPH, JAFAR and HOST are collected.
The interior of the room is blazing with lights, but empty.
The architecture of the room is curious on account of the wide,
low arches which cut off a square in the centre. The furniture
of the room is in rich, rather vulgar Oriental taste.
CALIPH
Ishak, Ishak, we are waiting and waiting.
JAFAR
Ishak! Ishak! Perhaps he is faint.
CALIPH
Faint!
JAFAR
Let me go down and see what he is doing. I think I hear him talking.
CALIPH
He is talking to shadows. He has one of his evil fits tonight.
Do not trouble your head or mine about him. He presumes on our friendship,
and forgets the respect due to us. Am I to be kept waiting like a Jew
in a court of justice, I the Master...
JAFAR
(Quickly) We are not in Basra, Sir. But see, the rope has tightened.
(To MASRUR.) Haul, thou whose soul is white.
RAFI
(Helping with ropes to CALIPH who stands idle) God restore to you
the use of your arms, my brother from Basra.
(HASSAN rolls out of the basket, filthy and the inanimate.)
Yallah, Yallah, on what dunghill did this fowl die?
Is this your man of honour?
JAFAR
(Astonished) Host of the house, this is not our companion,
and we have never set eyes on him before.
RAFI
Then what is this?
CALIPH
Our friend has played a trick on us--may Allah separate him
from salvation!--and sent up this body in place of himself.
Come let us tip it out into the street.
RAFI
(Feeling HASSAN'S pulse) Wait; this man is by no means dead,
and the mill of his heart still grinds the flour of life.
Ho, Alder!
(Enter ALDER, a young and pretty page.)
ALDER
At his master's service.
RAFI
Ho, Willow!
WILLOW
(Younger still) At his lord's order.
RAFI
Juniper!
JUNIPER
At his Pasha's command.
RAFI
Tamarisk!
TAMARISK
(A little boy a with a squeaky voice) At his Sublimity's feet.
CALIPH
(Aside to JAFAR) Truly, this is charming:
an illustrious example of decorum and good taste.
RAFI
Transform this into a man, my slaves. Revive him, bathe, soap,
scent, comb him, clothe him with a ceremonial coat
and bring him back to us.
ALDER
We hear,
WILLOW
We honour,
JUNIPER
We tremble,
TAMARISK
and obey.
CALIPH
(Entering the great room of the house) Thy house is of grand proportions
and eccentric architecture, my Host; it is astonishing
that such a house should look out on to so mean a street.
RAFI
It is an old house where the Manichees (the devil roast all heretics!)
once held their meetings before they were all flayed alive.
It is called the house of the moving walls.
CALIPH
Why such a name?
RAFI
I do not know at all.
CALIPH
The merry noise of music that we heard is silent.
RAFI
I waited for your permission, my guests, before continuing
my meagre entertainment. Ho, music! Ho, dancers! (Claps his hands.)
(Music plays. The HOST enters the room and motions his GUESTS
to be seated in silence.)
CALIPH
Verily, after this prelude, and in this splendid palace,
we shall see dancing women worthy of Paradise.
JAFAR
God grant it, Master.
CALIPH
(To JAFAR) Hush, I hear the pattering of feet.
The wine of anticipation is dancing through my veins.
O Jafar, what incomparable houris will charm our eyes to-night?
What rosy breasts, what silver shoulders, what shapely legs,
what jasmine arms!
(In good order, marching to the music, there enter the most awful
selection of Eastern BEGGARS the eye could imagine, or the tongue describe.
They are headed by their CHIEF, a rather fine fellow,
in indescribable tatters. He leads the CHORUS with a song,
half intoned in the Oriental style.)
Fathers of two feet, advance,
Dot and go ones, hop along,
Two feet missing need not dance,
But will join us in the song.
CHORUS OF CULS-DE-JATTE:
But will join you in the song.
Show your most revolting scar;
People never weary of it.
The more nauseous you are--
More the pity and your profit.
CHORUS And your profit, profit, profit.
Cracked of lip and gapped of tooth,
Apoplectic, maim or mad,
Blind of one eye, blind of both,
Up, the beggars of Bagdad.
CHORUS Up, the beggars of Baghdad.
There is a cellar, I am told,
Where a little lamp is lit,
And that cellar's full of gold,
Sacks and sacks and sacks of it.
CHORUS (Hoarsely)
Sacks and sacks and sacks of it,
Stacks and stacks and stacks of it.
Open eyes and stiffen backs,
There are sacks and sacks and sacks;
And gold for him who lacks of it.
(The HOST lifts his hand. The BEGGARS all fall flat on their faces.
Dance music.)
(Enter right, a BAND of fair, left, a BAND of dusky beauties.)
THE DANCING GIRLS
Daughters of delight, advance,
Petals, petals, drift along;
Cypress, tremble! Firefly, dance!
Nightingale, your song, your song!
THE FAIR
We are pale
THE DARK
as dawn, with roses,
O the roses, O desire!
We are dark,
THE FAIR
(Curtsying)
but as the twilight
Shooting all the sky with fire.
CHORUS
Daughters of delight, advance,
Petals, petals, drift along,
Cypress, tremble! Firefly, dance!
Nightingale, your song, your song!
(They surround the BEGGARS, dancing, and point at them.)
LEADER OF THE FAIR
From what base tavern, of what street
Were dragged these dogs, that foul our feet?
LEADER OF THE DARK
O sisters, fly, we shall be hurt:
(The LEADER OF THE BEGGARS catches her.)
Leave go my ankle, son of dirt.
LEADER OF THE BEGGARS
Lady, if the dirt should gleam,
Feel, but do not show surprise:
Things that happen here would seem
(Rises to his feet, his rags drop off, and he shines in gold.)
Paradox in Paradise.
(The infirmities and rags of the whole BAND disappear as if by magic,
as they rise and shout in CHORUS.)
CHORUS
Paradox in Paradise
(RAFI raises his hand. ALL stand at attention.)
VOICES
Hush, the King speaks.
The King of the Beggars.
The King.
LEADER OF THE BEGGARS
The King of the Beggars, the Caliph of the Faithless. The Peacock
of the Silver Path, the Master of Bagdad!
(The BALLET line the room behind the arches.)
JAFAR
(Aside, astonished) King of the Beggars?
MASRUR
(Aside, astonished) Master of Bagdad?
CALIPH
(Aside, astonished) Caliph of the Faithless? Allah kerim,
this is a jest indeed!
RAFI
(Throwing off his outer garment and discovering himself superbly dressed
in a golden armour) Subjects and guests. Now that the night
before our day is ending, and the Wolf's Tail is already brushing
the eastern sky; now that our plot is ready, our conspiracy established,
our victory imminent, what is there left for me to tell you,
O faithful band? Shall I say, be brave? You are lions.
Be cunning? You are serpents. Be bloody? You are wolves.
See now, Bagdad is still in dreams that in a few minutes
shall be full of fire, and that fire redder than the dawn.
You have begged--you shall buy: you have fawned--you shall fight:
you have plotted--you shall plunder: you have cringed: you shall kill.
How loud they snore, those swine whose nostrils we shall slit to-day!
Copper they flung to us, and steel we shall give them back;
good steel of Damascus, that digs a narrow hole and deep.
But as for the Peacock of Peacocks, that sack of debauch,
that Caliph, alive in his coffin, I and none other will nail him down,
with his eyes staring into mine. His gardens, fountains, summer houses,
and palaces; his horses, mules, camels, and elephants,
his statues of Yoonistan, and his wines of Ferangistan, his eunuchs
of Egypt, and his carpets of Bokhara, and his great sealed boxes
bursting with unbeaten gold, and his beads of amethyst,
and his bracelets of sapphire, all this and all his women,
his chosen flower-like women, are yours for lust and loot and lechery,
my children--all save her of whom I warned you--a woman who was mine,
and who shall sit unveiled with me on the throne of all the Caliphs...
and when you see us sitting on that throne together, then you shall cry...
THE BEGGARS
(Taking up with a shout) The Caliph is dead! The Caliphate is over!
Long live the King!
JAFAR
(In indignation) These words are not holy, even in jest.
RAFI
O guests of an hour, I pray you put the tongue of discretion
into the cheek of propriety.
JAFAR
Propriety! The host's obligations are greater than the guests.
It is not good taste to speak thus before the invited.
We pray you only that we may withdraw at once.
RAFI
Then who will withdraw me, my masters, from the vengeance of the Caliph,
once you have talked a talk with the Captain of his Guard?
JAFAR
We give you our promise: we are men of honour.
RAFI
If you were thieves, as we are, I might trust you. But, if, as you say,
you are men of honour, honour will drive you panting to the Caliph's gate,
and honour will swiftly break a promise made to a this and a rebel,
under compulsion.
JAFAR
Sir, I pray you, no more of this, be it jest or earnest.
It will soon be morning: we must away: we have pressing business:
our clients await us.
RAFI
And give me their names, O my guests, and tonight I will fling
their gold and their carcasses together at your feet.
JAFAR
We insist that you let us go.
RAFI
O merchants, tell me but this one thing: Do you dwell in fine houses
in the port of Basra?
JAFAR
We have no mean abodes.
RAFI
Are your apartment spacious and well furnished?
JAFAR
Well enough.
RAFI
Then tell me further, have you soft carpets on the floors of those rooms?
JAFAR
There are carpets.
RAFI
Great, rich, soft carpets from Persia and Afghanistan?
JAFAR
Yes.
RAFI
It is a pity. Soft carpets make soft the sole of the foot.
And they who have soft feet should ever keep them on the road of meekness.
MASRUR
(Drawing his sword) Dost thou dare threaten us, bismillah!
RAFI
Truly, O most disgusting negro, comprehension and thou have been
separated since your youth. Shall I then drop needle of insinuation
and pick up the club of statement? Shall I tell you three guests of mine,
with the plainness of plainness and the openness of plainness,
that if you offer one threat more, propose one evasion more,
or ask one question more, I will thrash your lives head downwards
from your feet.
(Enter HASSAN finely dressed, and ushered in by the FOUR BOYS
through the rows of DANCERS.)
HASSAN
(Lamenting) Eywallah, eywallah, eywah, eywah, Mashallah! Istagfurallah!
RAFI
Why, here is the fourth guest!
ALDER
We have washed him: he needed it.
WILLOW
Combed him: it was necessary.
JUNIPER
Scented him: it was our duty.
TAMARISK
Clothed him: it was our delight.
HASSAN
(As before) Eywallah! Yallah Akbar! Y'allah kerim! Istagfurallah!
Eywallah! Hassan is ended! Hassan is no more! He is dead!
He is buried! He is a bone! Y'allah kerim!
RAFI
Eyyah Hassan, if that is your name, have my boys not treated you well?
If they have hurt you with their tricks, by the Great Name, I will...
HASSAN
I pray you, I pray you. Thrash no one's life out downwards
from their feet, O master, and above all, not mine.
RAFI
Ah, you heard me! Take courage. All that I require of my guests,
good Hassan, is genteel behaviour.
HASSAN
Ah! Who are all these terrible men?
RAFI
Beggars of Bagdad! Ten thousand more await my signal on the streets.
In a few minutes they will surprise the drowsy Palace Guards,
sack Bagdad, kill the Caliph and make me King.
HASSAN
(Stupefied) What has become of me this night! Just now I was in Hell,
with all the fountains raining fire and blood.
RAFI
Come, Hassan, you are only just in time; the cold dawn which ends
the revellers' dark day will soon be uncurtaining the blue.
One bowl to pledge me victory, O guests, for I must away and win it,
and you shall lie here to sleep away the destruction of Bagdad.
At least you shall say this of your host--he gave us splendid wine.
(The FOUR SLAVES hand round the bowl; the CALIPH refuses.)
(To CALIPH) Sir, you do not drink.
CALIPH
I obey the Prophet.
RAFI
What wine do they grow in the desert of Meccah, or on the sandhills
of Medina? Ah, had the Prophet tasted wine of Syria or the islands,
the book would have been shorter by that uncomfortable verse.
JAFAR
Come, host! I at all events will pledge you. There is ever fellowship
between those who have drunk wine together, be they murderers
or thieves or Christians.
MASRUR
Host, on the day when I shall spill your blood, I shall drink a little
in remembrance of this bowl of wine. Till then your health!
(Drinks.)
RAFI
(Sarcastically) Ye are three jolly fellows of amiable disposition.
(Drinks.)
I thank you, negro, I drink to yours.
HASSAN
I drink to forget a woman, but will this little cup suffice?
RAFI
Nor ten, nor ten thousand little cups like these, if you have loved.
Tonight I shall fill my bowl of the oblivion with the blood
of the Caliph of Bagdad. Brother, will that great cup suffice?
HASSAN
(In terror) Call me not brother, thou savage man, who dost talk
of shedding the holiest blood in Islam!
RAFI
When high office is polluted, when the holy is unholy, when justice
is a lie, when the people are starved, and the great fools
of the world are in high office, then dares a man talk of shedding
the holiest blood in Islam?
CALIPH
Also when one has a vengeance to wreak on the Caliph and a claim
on a lady of his household.
MASRUR
Why do you want to nail him in his coffin alive? Tell us the tale.
JAFAR
Tell us, if would not have us think you a mad man or a buffoon.
CALIPH
Tell us about the woman; what harm can do you
since we are in your power?
RAFI
(After hesitation) Yes, what harm can it do, if for my own sake,
to relieve the heaviness of my heart, I tell you something of my story?
My name is Rafi. I come from the hills beyond Mosul, where the men
walk free and the women go unveiled. There I was betrothed to Pervaneh,
a woman beautiful and wise. But the very day before our marriage
the Governor of Mosul remembered my country and invaded it
with a thousand men. And little enough plunder they got from our village,
but they caught Pervaneh walking alone among the pine woods
and carried her away. When I heard this I leapt on my horse
and galloped to Mosul, prepared to slay the Governor and all
the inhabitants thereof single-handed, if evil had come to Pervaneh.
But there I found she had already been sent with a raft full of slaves
down the Tigris to Bagdad. Whereupon I hired six men with shining muscles
to row me there. We arrived at Bagdad at the end of the third night's
rowing at the grey of dawn. I sprang out of the raft like a tiger,
and ran like a madman through the streets, crying "The Slave Market!
Tell me the way, O ye citizens! The Slave Market, O the Slave Market!"
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