Gogol The Government Inspector

1. Auflage 2014
ISBN: 978-1-78001-389-3
Verlag: Nick Hern Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 123 Seiten

Reihe: NHB Drama Classi

Drama Classics: The World's Great Plays at a Great Little Price A classic satire of provincial bureaucracy, which only saw the stage after the personal intervention of Tsar Nicholas I. A small, corrupt Russian town receives a letter informing them of the imminent visit of a government inspector travelling incognito. When a passing civil servant is mistaken for the inspector, panic soon sets in. This English version of Nikolai Gogol's play The Government Inspector, in the Nick Hern Books Drama Classics series, is translated and introduced by Stephen Mulrine.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Gogol, Nikolai

Weitere Mitwirkende

Mulrine, Stephen

Leseproben

Act One

A room in the MAYOR’s house. The MAYOR, CHARITIES WARDEN, SCHOOLS SUPERINTENDENT, JUDGE, PHYSICIAN, and two CONSTABLES.

MAYOR. Gentlemen, I have invited you here to inform you of some extremely unpleasant news: we are about to receive an Inspector.

JUDGE. An inspector?

WARDEN. What sort of inspector?

MAYOR. A Government Inspector from St. Petersburg, travelling incognito. With secret instructions, no less.

JUDGE. Oh dear!

WARDEN. That’s the last thing we need!

SUPERINTENDENT. Good Lord! Secret instructions!

MAYOR. You know, I had a premonition: the whole of last night I kept dreaming about two extraordinary rats. I tell you, I’ve never seen anything like it: huge, black things, monsters. They came up and started sniffing around, then cleared off. I’ll read you this letter, which I’ve just received from Andrei Ivanovich – I think you know him, Warden. Anyway, this is what he says: ‘My dear friend, godfather, and benefactor . . . ’ (Muttering under his breath as he scans the paper.) ‘ . . . to inform you that . . . ’ Ah, here it is: ‘Mean while, I hasten to inform you that an official has just arrived with orders to inspect the whole province, and in particular, our district . . . (Holds up a finger, meaningfully.) . . . I have this on the most reliable authority, although he is passing himself off as a private citizen. So, as I know you have your little vices like the rest of us, being a sensible chap, who never lets anything slip through his fingers . . . ’ (Stops.) Well, we’re among friends here . . . ‘ . . . I advise you to take precautions. He may arrive at any time, if indeed he hasn’t arrived already and is staying incognito somewhere . . . Yesterday afternoon I . . . ’ Ah, now he goes on to family business: ‘Cousin Anna paid us a visit with her husband; Cousin Ivan has got very stout, but can still play the fiddle . . . ’ et cetera, et cetera. So there we are, gentlemen, that’s the situation.

JUDGE. Yes, it’s a most unusual situation – most unusual. There’s something behind it.

SUPERINTENDENT. But why, Mister Mayor? What on earth for? And why us?

MAYOR. Why? It’s fate, obviously! (Sighs.) Until now, thanks be to God, they’ve poked around in other towns. Now it’s our turn.

JUDGE. Well, I fancy we’re seeing some quite subtle realpolitik here, Mister Mayor. I think it means that Russia . . . Yes, that’s it, we’re going to declare war, and the Government, you see, have sent out this official, to check for treason.

MAYOR. Oh, don’t be ridiculous! And you’re supposed to be clever? Treason, in this neck of the woods, really! It’s not as if we’re on the frontier, are we? Good God, you could gallop out of here for three years, and still not reach a foreign country!

JUDGE. No, seriously . . . You don’t know . . . I mean . . . They have some extremely shrewd ideas, the Government. Distance doesn’t come into it, they keep their eyes peeled just the same.

MAYOR. Well, eyes peeled or unpeeled, don’t say I haven’t warned you, gentlemen. As you’ll see, I’ve made certain arrangements in my own department, and I advise you to do likewise. Especially you, Warden! Beyond a shadow of a doubt, the first thing any visiting official will want to inspect is your charity institutions, so you’d better get them into decent order: clean night-caps, for a start. We don’t want the patients looking like coal-miners, the way they usually go about.

WARDEN. That’s all right. I dare say we can stick clean night-caps on them.

MAYOR. Good. Oh, and hang a notice in Latin or something above each bed – this is your department now, Doctor – the name of the illness, when they took sick, the day of the week and month . . . And it’s not a good idea letting patients smoke that foul tobacco, so you start coughing and spluttering the minute you go in there. Yes, and you’d better discharge a few: otherwise they’ll put it down to bad management or the Doctor’s incompetence.

WARDEN. Well, really! Dr Gibner and I have our own system, that’s all. As far as treatment’s concerned, the closer to Nature the better. That’s why we don’t bother with expensive medicines. Man is a simple creature: if he’s going to die, he’ll die; if he’s going to recover, he’ll recover. Actually, the Doctor would have trouble communicating with them anyway – he doesn’t speak a word of Russian.

The PHYSICIAN utters a sound, mid-way between ‘ee’ and ‘eh’.

MAYOR. And I’d advise you, Judge, to do something about that court-house of yours. The watchmen keep geese in the hall, where the clients are supposed to go, and the goslings are getting under people’s feet. All right, poultry-farming’s a thoroughly respectable business – why shouldn’t the watch men engage in it? But it’s not decent, in a courthouse. I ought to have mentioned that before, only it slipped my mind.

JUDGE. Fine, I’ll have the lot whipped off into the kitchen today. You can come to dinner, if you like.

MAYOR. What’s more, it isn’t very nice hanging all sorts of rubbish up to dry in the courtroom, and dumping your riding tackle on top of the document chest. I know you’re keen on hunting and all that, but you’d better keep it out of sight for a while. You can hang it back up again, once the Inspector’s moved on. And that clerk of yours . . . well, I dare say he knows his job, but he smells as if he’d emerged straight from a distillery – that’s not very nice, either. I’ve been meaning to have a word with you about that too, but I got sidetracked somehow, I don’t remember. Anyway, there’s surely something he can take for that, if, as he says, it’s just his natural odour. You should tell him to eat onions, or garlic, or something. In fact, the Doctor might be of use here, with those medicines of his.

The PHYSICIAN utters the same curious sound.

JUDGE. No, he can’t get rid of it. He says his nurse dropped him when he was a baby and he’s given off a slight whiff of vodka ever since.

MAYOR. Well, it was just a thought. As far as your internal arrangements go, and what Andrei Ivanovich calls our little vices, what can I say? You know, it’s a strange thing, but there’s nobody who hasn’t got some kind of sin to answer. After all, that’s how the good Lord made us, no matter what these freethinkers say.

JUDGE. And just exactly what do you mean by little vices, Mister Mayor? Surely there are vices and vices? I tell people quite openly that I accept bribes, but what sort of bribes, eh? Greyhound pups, that’s all.

MAYOR. It doesn’t matter if it’s pups or whatever, it’s still bribery.

JUDGE. No, not at all, Mister Mayor. For instance, if a certain person accepts a fur coat worth five hundred roubles, and his wife gets a shawl . . .

MAYOR. Yes, well, you needn’t think your greyhound pups’ll save you! You don’t believe in God, for a start. And you never go to church. At least I’ve still got my faith, and go to church every Sunday. Whereas you – you’ve only got to start talking about the Creation, and it’s enough to make a person’s hair stand on end.

JUDGE. Well, that’s the conclusion I’ve come to, thinking it out for myself.

MAYOR. You know, in some cases, too many brains can be worse than none. Anyway, I only mentioned the court-house in passing; I shouldn’t think anybody’ll want to look in there, frankly. You’re lucky with that place, it must be under the Lord’s special protection. Now, Superintendent, as overseer of our educational establishments, you’ll need to take particular care with the schoolteachers. Of course, they’re educated people, they’ve been trained at all sorts of colleges, but they’ve got some very strange ways – I suppose they acquire them along with their scholarly vocation. One of them, for instance, that one with the fat chops, I can’t remember his name – every time he’s up on the platform he pulls the most awful face, like this, (Grimaces.) and then starts smoothing out his beard, with his hand under his cravat. All right, let him make faces like that at the pupils, that’s neither here nor there. Maybe he can’t help it, I’m not in a position to say. But you just imagine, if he does that to a visitor, it could be disastrous. This Inspector or whoever might take it personally. And God only knows what might come of that.

SUPERINTENDENT. Yes, but what am I supposed to do with him? I’ve told him about it often enough. Just the other day, our Marshal happened to drop into his classroom, and he screwed up his face into the most terrifying grimace, like nothing I’ve ever seen in my life. He...