Deep inside a forest of conifers. Gloomy autumn weather. Snow is falling. PEER is in shirt sleeves, felling trees in order to have wood for building.
PEER [chopping at a big pine tree with gnarled branches]:
Yes, you’re a tough ’un, old fellow, but there’s no help for it,
down you must fall, despite that strong coat of chain-mail you wear. It
will be riven by me, you’ll see, no matter how strong it’s become.
Yes, yes, and despite your shaking at me that crooked arm.
Indeed I can quite understand why you’re so angry, old friend.
And yet, as you know, you’ll be brought to your knees at the end.
[Breaks off abruptly.]
What lies I am weaving, what lies! It’s no corseleted veteran,
it’s a tree long past its best, a pine with cracked bark that I mourn.
Because of hard labour, felling these giants for timber,
I find I invent fables for fables I can’t remember.
It’s the very devil when you both hack and dream.
I must find a way through this soul-fog, fantasist that I am.
You’ve been outlawed, my lad, driven from the parish;
you must learn to fend for yourself or else perish.
[Works energetically for a time.]
Outlawed, yes. And you don’t have a mother at call,
spreading the tablecloth, readying your next meal.
Need to eat, my lad, off you must toddle to find,
secreted in forest and watercourse, things that will fend
off hunger a while, though raw, though they have to be skinned.
So then you chop small the resinous wood for kindling
and get a blaze going nicely with self-taught handling.
If you wish to be warmly clad you must hunt reindeer;
if your desire is a stone house, dressed stone does not simply appear.
For a house of wood you fell trees then chop trees into logs,
carry the logs on your back; you soon learn how weight drags,
stack the logs in the yard, and then – oh my word! –
[His axe-arm sinks to his side; he stares straight ahead.]
what a building that building will be: many-towered,
each tower with a weather-vane; a well-sealed ridge to the roof.
At the gable-end a splendid mermaid I’ll carve,
a mermaid formed like a fish from the navel down.
Brass there shall be on doorlock and weathervane.
And glass, yes glass – I must somehow obtain that –
glass a-plenty for passing strangers to marvel at:
‘Whose is that fine house afar-off shining on the hill?’
[Laughs angrily at himself.]
Lies, lies, straight out of hell! My mind is a-whirl.
You’re an outlaw, Peer lad, for that I’m ready to vouch.
[Hacks away violently at the tree.]
It’s a cabin you need, roofed with tight shingles of birch,
that will keep out rainstorms and the soundless bite of frost.
[Looks up through the branches of the tree.]
Well, he’s standing and swaying, just about ready at last.
A kick should do the trick. And over he goes!
A shudder passes through the forest’s tribe of young trees.
[Begins to strip the branches. He stops abruptly and listens, his axe raised.]
Somebody’s coming! So here comes an enemy –
Old Man Hæggstad, still on my trail. Has he seen me?
[Ducks down behind the tree and peers around.]
Well, that’s not old Hæggstad; it’s nobody but a lad;
he’s looking here, there, everywhere, and he seems afraid.
What’s that he’s carrying, hidden under his short coat?
It looks like a pruning knife; he stops now, still looks around,
spreads out his right hand on a fence-post. Great heavens, he’s cut
off a finger, the whole finger! Blood’s gushing from the wound
like when you castrate a bull-calf. He’s wrapped his fist in a cloth
and now he staggers away, he’s gone. What a thing to do!
A queer kind of pluck, that; to maim yourself so.
Nobody forced him to do it. Now I remember though!
Conscription – that’s it! The army wanted to claim him;
he didn’t want – and I can’t say that I blame him.
But to maim yourself like that! It fairly took my breath
just to see him do it, and that’s the truth.
Shakes his head, then resumes work.
A room down at AASE’s farm. Everything is in disarray. Chests are standing open; clothes are lying scattered around. There is a cat on the bed. AASE and KARI, a crofter’s wife, are busily at work, packing things up and sorting things out.
AASE [running to one side of the room]:
Listen, Kari!
KARI: Listen to what?
AASE [running to the room’s other side]:
Listen! Oh, where
did I put it? – where is it? – what am I looking for?
I think I’m going mad – where’s the key to the chest?
KARI: In the lock of the chest.
AASE: What’s that rumbling?
KARI: The last
load on its way to Hæggstad.
AASE [weeping]:
I’d be happier if ’twere me
driven off in a black coffin for all to see.
Oh, what I’ve had to suffer, had to endure,
the good Lord only knows! And now, my house stripped bare.
What old Hæggstad didn’t want, the bailiff made off with,
even the clothes from my back he’s been paid off with.
Shame on all, I say, who have put me through it!
[Sits on the edge of the bed.]
The farmhouse and the land are both forfeit.
Old Man Hæggstad was brutal but the courts were more so,
there was no help whatever and there was no mercy;
Peer nowhere to be found, no neighbours gathered round …
KARI: Well, you can stay on here until you die.
AASE: The cat and me living off charity – ay.
KARI: God keep you, good lady! He did you a bad turn,
he surely did, did your good-for-nothing son.
AASE: Nay, woman, you’re wrong there. Why blame Peer?
Ingrid got back safely to Hæggstad, I hear.
They should have made an outlaw of Old Nick: he’d
more to do with those goings-on than my son had.
KARI: Perhaps, good Mother Gynt, we should send for the pastor.
Things are, I believe, past your poor strength to restore.
AASE: The pastor? Why, yes, I think that perhaps we should.
[Getting abruptly to her feet]
But, dear God, I can’t; I’m the lad’s closest kin.
I’m plighted to give him aid when all have let him down.
They’ve thrown him this old jacket and I must darn it.
And here’s a sheepskin; do I dare to purloin it?
Where are the trousers?
KARI: There, with the rest
of the castaway remnants.
AASE [rooting around in the rags and other junk]:
Well I’m blest!
Look what’s here, Kari; it’s that old casting-ladle
my husband had; that he taught Peer how to handle.
He – young Peer, that is – pretended he was a button-
moulder: melting, then shaping, then stamping the pattern.
One day, in the thick of a feast, the lad comes in
and asks his dad for some pewter to melt down.
‘Not pewter,’ says Jon, ‘but silver, King Christian’s coin!’
God forgive him, my Jon, but it all melted away –
pewter, and silver, and gold, in his drunken sway.
Here are the trousers – agh – there’s less cloth than air;
they must be patched, Kari.
KARI: Ay, they could stand repair.
AASE: And when that’s done I must repair to my bed.
I’m all done in and as weak as a kitten.
[Cries out in joyful excitement.]
Two woollen shirts, Kari, that they’ve forgotten!
Kind fortune be thanked! Put one to one side;
no, hear me, Kari: best both of ’em are hid.
KARI: God save us, Mother Aase, theft is a mortal sin!
AASE: So I’ve heard tell; but you know the pastor preaches
forgiveness for worse sins than stealing shirts and breeches.
Outside a newly built cabin in the forest. Reindeer horns over the door. High-piled snow. Dusk. PEER standing at the door, nailing a large wooden latch into place.
PEER [breaks into laughter but stops abruptly]:
Locks there must be; locks that can withstand
battering by troll-fiends or the odd brutal human kind.
Locks there must be, locks that withstand the creatures
of darkness, in darkness, aggressive weird natures.
They sidle like shadows; they stand and they batter:
‘Let us in, Peer Gynt, we have come for a merry natter.
Under your bed we rustle. With fear you shall awaken.
We disturb the ashes; in the stove-pipe act the fire-draken.
Hee-hee, Peer Gynt, do you yet trust nails and planking
to keep out of your thoughts thoughts that the trolls are thinking?’
SOLVEIG is seen approaching, on skis, across the heath. She has a large shawl wrapped around her head and carries a bundle in her hand.
SOLVEIG: God’s blessing upon your labour. You must not turn me away.
You sent for me to come; I have come through the short day.
PEER: Solveig? It can’t be …? Yes, it is you! You’re not still afraid
of my nearness?
SOLVEIG: She told me – Helga – what you had said;
and there were other messages – from wind and silence,
from your mother chatterboxing her cares for the nonce;
words half-caught on the wing as dreams drifted past;
nights heavy, days empty, and then your summons at last.
Back there in the village it seemed that life was suspended;
I could not laugh or cry as if I minded;
I, minding only your moods, knowing the moods that had been;
sure only of one purpose. I now have no kin.
I have been set at variance, as that gospel tells,
with father and mother; am alone in the world’s toils.
PEER: Solveig, my fair, my fair one, you have come away
to find me, to be mine alone: is that what you say?
SOLVEIG: To be alone with you and to be yours alone,
my friend, my comforter; other friends have I none.
[Weeping]
To leave my little sister, that was the worst part;
no, to wound my father was the worst thrust; and the last,
surely, was to leave her at whose heart
I had long since been carried. The supreme woe
was the grief on all three faces as I turned to go.
PEER: Have you heard the court’s sentence that was passed this spring?
It strips me of farm, inheritance, everything.
SOLVEIG: Do you think it was for property and inheritance
that I cut myself off from the life I had loved once?
PEER: And do you know the village? Once out of this forest
I am liable to citizen’s arrest
by anyone whom I may see, but who sees me first.
SOLVEIG: I have journeyed on skis, I have asked, I have lost, my way.
When questioned I replied ‘I am going home today.’
PEER: So, off with the nailed boards!
No reason to dread more those elvish lords.
Since you dare enter the cave of the hunter
great blessings will be bestowed on him and his.
Solveig! Ah, let me look at you – not too close! –
simply behold: how fair and delicate you are.
Let me lift you: how slight and how light you are.
And if I carry you, Solveig, I shall never grow weary;
I’ll not sully you with my folly; with outstretched arms
shall part you from my baseness, as from all harms.
Beneficent lovely creature – every feature –
oh, who would have thought that I could so have brought,
even with the magnetic force of my longing,
night and day, for what you are now bringing,
your divine grace to this place so meanly wrought!
This hut of logs, my love, it is ugly and poor.
I shall raze and rebuild it worthy of your …
SOLVEIG: Poor it may be; it is everything I desire.
The wind that roars in the trees is a free air.
Back in the village everything was constrained;
I had to be free of that, free in my own mind –
it is partly that which has brought me – the tall trees
soughing by day and night – what song, what stillnesses!
Here is my true home.
PEER: Art thou so sure,
my lass? For the length of thy days?
SOLVEIG: This path I have made to your door
can never be unmade.
PEER: And so I have you! Enter!
I will set you by my hearth; I will fetch resinous wood
for the burning; I will make all good.
Snug you shall be. And mine. And all will shine.
You shall take your ease and never shall you freeze.
[He opens the door; SOLVEIG enters. He waits a moment; then, laughing, gleeful, he leaps and shouts.]
My king’s daughter! Now at last I have caught her!
My palace fit for a king – rebuilt, it will be a grand thing!
He takes up the axe and begins to leave; at the same moment an ELDERLY WOMAN wearing a ragged green skirt emerges from the copse. An UGLY CHILD carrying a wooden ale bowl limps after her, clutching at her skirt.
WOMAN: Evening, my lightfoot lad!
PEER: Who’s there? What’s up?
WOMAN: We’re friends, Peer,
old friends, you could say; we’re neighbours. My hut is very near.
PEER: That’s news to me.
WOMAN: While your hut was a-building mine
was a-building too.
PEER [restless]:
I’m in haste to be gone.
WOMAN: You always were, you always are, in a great hurry, my lad.
I’ll trudge along after you; meet you at the end of the road.
PEER: You’re in error, old dame.
WOMAN: I was greatly mistaken before:
that time you promised me wonders by the score.
PEER: I promised you? You? What are you on about,
you old witch?
WOMAN: You’ve forgotten, then, the evening that
you drank with my father? How could you possibly forget?
PEER: How can you remind me of what was never in my mind?
Thou’rt out of thine, granny! So, when did we meet last?
WOMAN: We met last when we met first.
Offer your father a drink, child; I’m sure he has a thirst.
PEER: ‘Your father’?
WOMAN: Yes. You can surely tell a pig by its hide.
You’ve eyes, haven’t you? Can’t you see he has crippled shanks
as you have a crippled mind?
PEER: You tell me that warped kid
is some brat of mine?
WOMAN: He has grown quickly.
PEER: Vile snout of oinks,
you dare blame me for him?
WOMAN: Why not, you get, you goat?
You suit well.
[Weeping]
Is it my fault I’m not the girl you met
among the meadows and hills, when I was virgin yet,
and made your victim? When I gave birth last fall
old Katten rubbed my back; small wonder I am foul.
If you desire me fair, fair as I was before,
it’s time you showed that wench in there the door.
Put her out of mind as you remove her from sight.
Do it, my dear love, and my face will look right!
PEER: Get thee far hence, thou troll-witch!
WOMAN: See me do it.
PEER: I’ll split thy skull to shivers!
WOMAN: Do that, you’ll rue it.
Ho-ho, Peer Gynt, I’m proof against any dunt
of blows you might rain down. Each single day
I’ll nudge your door and leer at your content:
you in your tender dalliance and play,
playful tenderness mounting to full desire.
I’ll lie between you and demand my share;
or she and I will share; you’ll lie between us.
Briefly, farewell; tomorrow we shall be wed.
PEER: Out of my sight, thou damned obsceneness!
WOMAN: Wait! I almost forgot: this child is yours to raise,
light-footed one! Devil’s imp, greet your dad.
CHILD [spitting at him]:
Pfff! See me set my axe to him instead.
WOMAN [kissing the child]:
What a wise head there is on that small body.
When grown he’ll be the spitting image of daddy.
PEER [stamping his foot in wild vexation]:
I wish – I wish – you were as far …
WOMAN: As we now are near?
PEER [wringing his hands]:
And this …
WOMAN: … is born of idleness and vanity and lust.
I pity you, Peer.
PEER: Better you pity her. Solveig! my best,
my clearest, purest gold!
WOMAN: Ah, yes, as Old Nick says,
it is the innocent who are hurt the most.
His mother beat him for his father’s drunken ways.
The CHILD throws his ale bowl at PEER. Then the WOMAN IN GREEN takes him abruptly by the hand and walks with him into the copse.
PEER [after a protracted silence]:
Best go round and about, the Boyg said. I need to do that here.
My great house has toppled with an almighty din.
I had enclosed her – her to whom I simply wished to be near,
suddenly making desire ugly, turning joy into an old pain.
Go around, make a detour. There is no straight path from you to her.
Straight path? Strait gate? Isn’t there something given
in the great Book concerning seventy times seven,
something else about the direct route to heaven?
But what – what does it say? I long ago lost the book,
have forgotten most of it; nor can I look
for any counsel here in this bleak yonder.
Repentance? Doesn’t that take too much of your precious time
with all to hazard: a meagre life of self-harm,
breaking to fragments all those precious things –
the delicate, the lovely, the calm – to which one clings,
only to piece together what one has put asunder,
mostly in vain. It’s as fragile as a clock:
no matter what tinkering the thing won’t work.
In order to let grow the plants you’ve sown
be very careful not to tread them down.
But what lies were expelled via that witch’s snout!
Even though the abomination is no longer about,
out of sight, alas, does not mean out of mind.
Ugly thoughts have a way of hanging around:
Ingrid, for one; and the three randy girls
with whom I had a fine time on the hills.
Will they also, with a kind of laughing anger,
claim, like her, that they still belong here,
here, in my embrace, to be lifted as one would lift a child
with arms outstretched, so innocent, so fulfilled?
Ah, Peer, if your arms were the length of a tree’s height –
pine, spruce – you would still hold her too close, too tight,
to let her go again without the taint of your lust!
Somehow or other this must be sidled past
without illicit gains but also without shipwreck.
One must push certain things away; contrive they don’t creep back.
[Takes a few steps towards the cabin, then stops.]
Go back to her after all this? So ugly, so utterly ruined?
Go back to her now, with that troll-pack so close behind?
To speak to her yet be silent, still nursing the unconfessed …
[He lets the axe drop.]
And this the eve of the holy day! Trysting with Christ
in my present state would be a mortal sin.
SOLVEIG [appearing at the open half-door]:
All finished there? Are you coming in?
PEER [sotto voce]:
Say rather, coming around.
SOLVEIG: What’s that …?
PEER: I said, stay where you are.
It’s dark; and there’s something heavy out here.
SOLVEIG: Then let me help. For that, two are better than one.
PEER: Solveig, stay there. This burden I must bear alone.
SOLVEIG: Then don’t stray too far …
PEER: Be patient, my own girl;
far or near you must wait a fair while.
SOLVEIG: I shall.
PEER walks away, following the wilderness path. SOLVEIG remains standing at the open half-door.
AASE’s cabin at evening. A log fire is burning on the hearth, the only light in the room. The cat sits on a chair at the foot of the bed. AASE is lying in the bed, her hands moving restlessly on the bedcover.
AASE: Is he not coming, Lord?
For I am tired of waiting.
No one to take him word;
I with no power of writing.
Tell him to hasten, Lord.
So suddenly I’ve been stricken!
Ah, was I then too hard
when the child wouldn’t hearken?
PEER enters.
PEER: Mother!
AASE: My son! May God
in His great goodness bless you!
You’ve not come by the road?
You’re dead if some foe sees you!
PEER: My life – who cares about that
now we’re together
AASE: Well, Kari has words to eat.
I must go far, and farther;
like Simeon depart in peace.
PEER: Mother, what are you saying?
What kind of journey is this?
AASE: Peer, dear son, I am dying.
We have but a short time.
PEER [draws away from her, moves a little distance apart]:
I can bear no one’s burden.
I thought, why not go home?
Guilt will not so bear down.
I was wrong. Are your hands cold,
and your feet?
AASE: All will be over
soon. When my eyes grow dulled
My coffin also, see to my
coffin; and let all be splendid.
What am I saying?
PEER: There’ll be time
to reconsider.
AASE: Look what those men did!
They left me so little.
PEER [pulling brusquely away yet again]:
My fault –
I’ve no need of reminders!
AASE: Son, let us lay the guilt:
’twas drink, wherein all founders.
Yes, you were drunk, way back,
and not in right possession
of your senses. You rode that buck
in your brain. It stands to reason.
PEER: Just as you say. We’ll forget –
as you say – the whole sorry story.
Such heaviness we’ll set
aside for another day.
[He sits down on the edge of the bed.]
Just about homely things
let us talk together;
forgetful of past wrongs,
a son with his mother.
And, see here, the old cat
is alive still and thriving.
AASE: It yowls something dreadful at night.
’Tis a sign of …
PEER [quickly changing the subject]:
Village behaving,
I take it?
AASE [smiles faintly]:
They say there’s a lass –
no names – who pines for the mountain.
PEER [hastily]:
Mads Moen, how is he these days?
He’s no wife to maintain.
AASE: And she turns a deaf ear
to her old folks, they tell me.
Perhaps you should visit her;
it might cure her melancholy.
PEER: Aslak the smith: what’s become
of Aslak?
AASE: That dirty no-good!
I’d rather tell you the name
of one who should be wooed.
PEER: We’ve said that we’ll forget –
as you say – the sorry story.
Such heaviness we’ll set
aside for a later day.
Are you thirsty? Would you like a drink?
Lie straight, can you? The bed should be longer.
Good heavens, well here’s a thing!
This was my bed as a youngster!
So often you sat on the edge here,
and sang those improvised verses,
and spread my sheepskin with care –
and your goodnight kisses …
AASE: So you remember, dear lad!
And how we played at sledding.
We journeyed far on this bed,
vast distances, riding and riding …
PEER: Always when he was away,
my father, such wonderful stories.
And the pinnacle of our play,
Mother, those wondrous horses!
AASE: As if I could ever forget them.
Kari’s cat was our accomplice
in a contented dream.
PEER: My bedroom, for us, became ice-
castles west of the moon,
east of where the sun rises,
and that castle of enchanted stone
with its gilded trellises:
BOTH: Soria Moria!14
a stick for a whip-handle.
AASE: And you in your travelling cloak –
the sheepskin …
PEER: Distances dwindle!
And yet you took such care
of me then; and as we journeyed,
your whip-hand and rein-hand so sure,
‘Not cold, Peer?’ gently inquired.
God bless you, then, after all,
you old fright; you were loving
when all is said, and loved well.
In pain? Do you need moving?
AASE: My back, son; it’s this hard board.
PEER: Stretch out, I’ll support you.
There, now, is it less hard?
Does anything still hurt you?
AASE: I have to be on my way,
son Peer; I long to be taken.
PEER: A foolish thing to say,
Ma; wrap yourself in the sheepskin.
I’ll stay with you, sit here
on the bedside. More make-believe
is what’s called for.
AASE: No, Peer,
it’s that sermon book I must have,
my mind’s so troubled yet.
PEER: ‘In Soria Moria Castle
there is a great feast set.’
In the big sled-rug nestle
(we’re racing over the heath)
and the velvet cushions.
AASE: But am I invited?
PEER: We both,
Mother, are important persons.
[He hitches a rope to the chair on which the cat is lying, takes a stick in his hand and sits at the foot of the bed.]
Giddy-up, giddy-up, giddy-up!
Say you’re not too cold, Mother.
My word! Grane can skip –
famed steed of the dragon-slayer!
AASE: My son, what is it now
that I hear ringing?
PEER: ‘The harness bells, I trow.’
AASE: It is a more hollow song.
PEER: Why, now we’re crossing a fjord …
AASE: It roars, and I’m still frightened.
PEER: ‘Spruce trees chanting, for hard
blows the wind over the heathland.’
Lie still.
AASE: That welcome light,
from where does it shine so bravely?
PEER: ‘From that fine castle upon the height.’
Music and dancing. Are they not lovely?
AASE: They are indeed.
PEER: St Peter
stands outside that portal.
He says, ‘I must soon meet her,
that fine lady of whom I hear tell.’
AASE: So he greets us kindly?
PEER: He does, and with great honour.
The best wine to be found he
sets aside for your dinner.
AASE: D’you think they have cakes too?
PEER: Cakes? Why, cakes a-plenty.
The archdeacon’s wife says so:
high tea awaiting your entry.
AASE: What? You and me both
to be welcomed there together
by that fine lady of worth?
PEER: Indeed we are, Mother.
AASE: Well, well, such a joyful throng,
such a joyous welcome,
and for me, such a poor thing.
PEER [cracks the whip]:
Giddy-up, Grane, we’ll soon be home!
AASE: Is it the right road we are on?
PEER [once more cracking the whip]:
Yes, and it is famed widely,
‘The Broad Highway’, as it is known.
AASE: Must you drive quite so speedily?
It does things to my poor head.
PEER: But see, the castle’s nearer;
it’s almost over, our ride.
AASE: I’ll close my eyes for a while, dear.
I’m in good hands, I know.
PEER: Come on Grane, move your haunches!
Towards the castle the great throngs go,
like reversed avalanches.
Hey! You who block our way,
Gynt and Co. seek entry!
Herr St Peter, what do you say?
Mother’s a relict of the old gentry;
and honest as they come. I won’t
sing you my own praises.
I won’t be staying; content
as I am to have been of service.
Pour me a drink, I’ll gulp it.
If not, not. I hand lies down
like Old Nick from the pulpit,
jovially, in his black gown.
I called my mother an old hen
– such brooding and pecking.
Now I need you to take her in
with nice etiquetting.
There’s none better en route
from the old neighbourhood,
I can tell you that strong and hot.
Bravo! Here’s kind old Father God.
He’ll tell you what’s what, St Peter:
[Adopting a deep and solemn voice]
‘That’s quite enough of that’ – you’ll see! –
‘I’m telling you straight, Herr Janitor,
Mother Aase’s to be let in free!’
[Laughs uproariously and turns to speak to his MOTHER.]
Isn’t that what I prophesied –
a progressive suggestion?
[Suddenly afraid.]
Why are your eyes so dead,
Mother? Answer my question …
[Goes to the head of the bed.]
Speak, Mother: it’s Peer, your son!
Don’t just lie there staring.
[Gently lays his hand on her forehead; places the rope back on the chair; says, in a hushed voice.]
Well, Grane, you can return
to your ancient careering.
[He leans over and closes AASE’s eyes.]
My thanks, then, for those long games,
the thrashings, the lullabies.
You’re to thank me betimes
for the nice ride.
[Presses his cheek against her mouth.]
That will suffice.
KARI [enters]:
Peer? You here? You keep well
your heavy vigil. Sorrow and need
become our kind. But I can’t tell
whether she sleeps …
PEER: She sleeps. Aase is dead.
KARI begins to weep over AASE’s body. PEER walks to and fro in the room for some considerable time. He stops beside the bed.
PEER: I’ll try my luck, slip away.
Please give my mother decent burial.
KARI: Shall you travel far?
PEER: First to the sea.
KARI: That far?
PEER: And from there further still.
He leaves.