The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde: 150+ Titles in One Edition. Oscar Wilde
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Название: The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde: 150+ Titles in One Edition

Автор: Oscar Wilde

Издательство: Bookwire

Жанр: Языкознание

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isbn: 9788027237197

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СКАЧАТЬ Neither the floods nor the great waters can quench my passion. I was a princess, and thou didst scorn me. I was a virgin, and thou didst take my virginity from me. I was chaste, and thou didst fill my veins with fire … . Ah! ah! wherefore didst thou not look at me? If thou hadst looked at me thou hadst loved me. Well I know that thou wouldst have loved me, and the mystery of Love is greater than the mystery of Death.

      HEROD

       She is monstrous, thy daughter; I tell thee she is monstrous. In truth, what she has done is a great crime. I am sure that it is a crime against some unknown God.

      HERODIAS

       I am well pleased with my daughter. She has done well. And I would stay here now.

      HEROD

       (Rising.)

       Ah! There speaks my brother’s wife! Come! I will not stay in this place. Come, I tell thee. Surely some terrible thing will befall. Manasseh, Issachar, Ozias, put out the torches. I will not look at things, I will not suffer things to look at me. Put out the torches! Hide the moon! Hide the stars! Let us hide ourselves in our palace, Herodias. I begin to be afraid.

       (The slaves put out the torches. The stars disappear. A great cloud crosses the moon and conceals it completely. The stage becomes quite dark. The Tetrarch begins to climb the staircase.)

      THE VOICE OF SALOMÉ

       Ah! I have kissed thy mouth, Iokanaan, I have kissed thy mouth. There was a bitter taste on thy lips. Was it the taste of blood? … Nay; but perchance it was the taste of love…They say that love hath a bitter taste. But what matter? what matter? I have kissed thy mouth, Iokanaan, I have kissed thy mouth.

       (A ray of moonlight falls on Salomé and illumines her.)

      HEROD

       (Turning round and seeing Salomé.)

       Kill that woman!

       (The soldiers rush forward and crush beneath their shields, Salomé, daughter of Herodias, Princess of Judæa.)

      (CURTAIN.)

      AN IDEAL HUSBAND

       Table of Contents

       AN IDEAL HUSBAND

       THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY

       ACT ONE

       SECOND ACT

       THIRD ACT

       FOURTH ACT

      AN IDEAL HUSBAND

      THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY

      THE EARL OF CAVERSHAM, K.G.

      VISCOUNT GORING, his Son SIR ROBERT CHILTERN, Bart., Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs VICOMTE DE NANJAC, Attaché at the French Embassy in London MR. MONTFORD

      MASON, Butler to Sir Robert Chiltern PHIPPS, Lord Goring’s Servant JAMES

      HAROLD Footmen LADY CHILTERN

      LADY MARKBY

      THE COUNTESS OF BASILDON

      MRS. MARCHMONT

      MISS MABEL CHILTERN, Sir Robert Chiltern’s Sister MRS. CHEVELEY

      Time: The Present

      Place: London.

      The action of the play is completed within twenty-four hours.

      ACT ONE

      The octagon room at Sir Robert Chiltern’s house in Grosvenor Square .

      [The room is brilliantly lighted and full of guests. At the top of the staircase stands LADY CHILTERN, a woman of grave Greek beauty, about twenty-seven years of age. She receives the guests as they come up. Over the well of the staircase hangs a great chandelier with wax lights, which illumine a large eighteenth-century French tapestry — representing the Triumph of Love, from a design by Boucher — that is stretched on the staircase wall. On the right is the entrance to the music-room. The sound of a string quartette is faintly heard. The entrance on the left leads to other reception-rooms. MRS. MARCHMONT and LADY BASILDON, two very pretty women, are seated together on a Louis Seize sofa. They are types of exquisite fragility. Their affectation of manner has a delicate charm. Watteau would have loved to paint them.]

      MRS. MARCHMONT. Going on to the Hartlocks’ tonight, Margaret?

      LADY BASILDON. I suppose so. Are you?

      MRS. MARCHMONT. Yes. Horribly tedious parties they give, don’t they?

      LADY BASILDON. Horribly tedious! Never know why I go. Never know why I go anywhere.

      MRS. MARCHMONT. I come here to be educated.

      LADY BASILDON. Ah! I hate being educated!

      MRS. MARCHMONT. So do I. It puts one almost on a level with the commercial classes, doesn’t it? But dear Gertrude Chiltern is always telling me that I should have some serious purpose in life. So I come here to try to find one.

      LADY BASILDON. [Looking round through her lorgnette.] I don’t see anybody here tonight whom one could possibly call a serious purpose. The man who took me in to dinner talked to me about his wife the whole time.

      MRS. MARCHMONT. How very trivial of him!

      LADY BASILDON. Terribly trivial! What did your man talk about?

      MRS. MARCHMONT. About myself.

      LADY BASILDON. [Languidly.] And were you interested?

      MRS. MARCHMONT. [Shaking her head.] Not in the smallest degree.

      LADY BASILDON. What martyrs we are, dear Margaret!

      MRS. MARCHMONT. [Rising.] And how well it becomes us, Olivia!

      [They rise and go towards the music-room. The VICOMTE DE NANJAC, a young attaché known for his neckties and his Anglomania, approaches with a low bow, and enters into conversation.]

      MASON. СКАЧАТЬ