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Peer Gynt
Act One, Scene One
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Excerpts from the
new translation of Peer Gynt
Peer Gynt: Act One, Scene One & Act Two Scene Six
Peer Gynt
ACT ONE, SCENE ONE
(A hillside with birch trees
near ÅSE'S farm. A river bubbles over the slope. On the other side
is an old mill shed. It is a hot day in summer.
PEER GYNT, a strongly-built boy of twenty, comes down the pathway. ÅSE,
his mother, is following him. She is angry and is scolding him)
ÅSE: Peer, you're lying.
PEER: I'm not lying
ÅSE Then let's hear you swear it's true.
PEER: Why should I swear?
ÅSE: You see, you dare not!
All you've said is a heap of rubbish.
PEER: (Halting) No, it's true, - every word I told you
ÅSE: (Confronts him)
Aren't you ashamed? And to your own mother!
First you go running off to the mountains,
Chasing reindeer the whole month long,
Just when I need you most at home here;
Then come back with your clothes in shreds,
Without your gun and no game to show for it.
And, on top of all, you stand there, the wide-eyed
Innocent, expecting me to swallow
Your pathetic pack of hunter's lies!
Let's hear, then! Where'd you meet this buck?
PEER: West of Gjendin.
ÅSE: (Laughs scornfully) Oh yes, naturally.
PEER: I was waiting there,
crouching in the icy wind;
And then, hidden behind a clump of alders,
There he was! - pawing at the snow
Looking for moss -
ÅSE (As before): Yes, of course!
PEER: I held my breath, kept
still, and listened;
- Could hear the scraping of his hoof,
Just glimpse one antler jutting out.
I duck between the boulders. On my belly,
Snaking forward so as not to be seen,
I catch full sight of this splendid buck,
Sleek and fat, the kind of quarry
Your eyes seldom get to feast on.
ÅSE: Oh yes, I bet!
PEER: Then bang! I fired.
Down the buck crumpled, to the ground.
The moment he fell I was on his back,
Grabbing his left ear with one hand,
Ready to drive the blade of my knife
Behind his skull, right into his neck,
When hey! - the brute lets out a bellow
And in one bound was back on his feet.
He jerks his head , and with one sharp blow,
Whams my knife and sheath out of reach.
Then he pins me down right at the waist;
And using his horns like a pair of tongs,
Jams my legs in a vice and lifts me,
As he leaps away, flying full speed
Across the sheer height of the Gjendin ridge!
ÅSE: (Involuntary) Oh my God!
PEER: Have you ever
Seen the Gjendin Ridge? It stretches
Nearly four miles long; way, way up high.
There it runs, sharp as a knife-edge,
Over glaciers, landslides, jutting ledges
And precipices dropping sheer beneath.
On either side you see, distant, deep
Pools of black water, in slumbering stillness,
More than a thousand yards below.
The pair of us raced across that ledge,
Cutting our way through the keen wind,
Launched on the wildest ride of my life!
As we sped on that frantic journey,
Suns seemed to flash between the peaks.
Brown backs of eagles veered and hovered
Below, in that dizzying stretch of space,
Halfway between us and the water;
Then dropped away like specks beneath us.
Ice floes down there cracked and shattered,
Yet their clamor never reached me.
All I sensed were shadows whirling,
Like manic dancers, circling, singing,
In a chaotic mix of sights and sounds!
ÅSE: (Giddy) God preserve us!
PEER: All at once,
We pitched on the ridge of a precipice.
Up from the rocks a ptarmigan flew
From its hiding place beneath the buck's hoof,
Flapping and squawking right into our faces,
Making the buck veer and leap wildly
Out over the abyss, the pair of us plunging!
(ÅSE sways and totters, gripping a tree-trunk. PEER continues)
Behind us, the black wall of the mountain,
Beneath us, dropped the bottomless chasm.
First, we fell into drifting fog-clouds,
Next, cleaved through a flock of gulls
That scattered wildly in all directions,
Filling the air with their angry screeching.
Down, down, we plunged without pausing,
Until, there below us, something flashed
White, just like a reindeer's belly!
Mother, it was our own reflection,
Hurtling up through the dark water
To the mirror-surface of the lake
As fast as we sped down to meet it!
ÅSE: (Gasping for breath) Peer! For God's sake - tell me quickly - !
PEER: Buck plunging down, buck
hurtling upward
Collide, horns tangling, in one instant;
A burst of foam cascades over us.
And there we were, splashing and swimming
For hours, imagine!, before we managed
At last, somehow, to struggle to the north shore.
