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One Virgin, Many Deaths
A Stageplay
By Geoff Adeleye (Nigeria)
Act 1, Scene 1
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Author’s note on production
One Virgin, Many Deaths is a simple play to act. Staging this drama will not be difficult to accomplish as its wording and construction seem. My ultimate fear (as I know that the drama may be staged outside Africa) lies in the ability or perhaps the possibility of obtaining the required costumes and other necessary materials outside Africa to enjoy its natural value and entertainment; and this is the main reason I avoid giving stage direction at the beginning each scene so that it can be performed casually without any serious hitch.
There must be compromise and flexibility in the production of the drama to allow the actors and actresses to feel free to develop and use their meaningful imaginations and gestures; otherwise it may end up a fiasco.
An experienced, skillful, smart and stern producer or director as the case may be is required who will be able to wedge unchallengeable authority over every actor and actress – I mean strict control of their entrances and exits, pace and timing, and so on. Stage discipline is highly imperative and must not be treated with levity. Besides, he is expected to have studied the drama very carefully, know the meaning of each hard word or phrase and their usage. To have a satisfactory casting, each of the actor or actress must be made to study very intensively their respective parts in the drama, (even learn few speeches) read them before, and explain their comprehension of the text to, the producer, who in turn assesses their proficiency or capability.
Coming to stage directions, I shall try to make each scene simple to avoid incurring unnecessary cost. Three distinct scenes are used throughout the drama: a room in Belaru’s house, the palace and a spot on the farm path – the last occurs once in the drama while each of the first two appear many times; and no change is effected each time. As for a room in Belaru’s house – a reception – it does not require many properties and materials to rid possibility of unduly cluttered scene. At the center stands an old table, a sofa by it, and two chairs – each at its adjacent sides, beside the back door stands a cupboard having their plates-basket on the top, and towards the front door to the left stands a cuboids-like platform, made of mud but its visible faces are cemented to accommodate more visitors or for resting, the spread on it is of two layers – mat beneath and cloth above. There are a few hangings of decorated broken and unbroken small gourds, and other imaginable things. The palace too is not complicated in setting. The wall is decorated with works of art paintings, divided vertically into three; the middle is left uncovered while the remaining parts are covered with mats of special straws. The throne stands on platform easily accessible by two steps attached to it; it is also covered with mats and likewise the remaining part of the floor. There is a seat beside the throne for the Queen alone and others sit on the mats whenever they come. And as for a spot along the farm path, not many things are required, just a cutlass for Badeja and a basket of yam tubers for Renate. Nothing more!
men
BADEDIRAN king of Betuda
BADERO Prince of Betuda
BELARU
BAWURA major chiefs
SOBADE
BOKUNLE son to Belaru
DERINDE father to Badeja
BADEJA son to Derinde
women
KEYISODE Queen of Betuda
YEMELU mother to Renate
RENATE daughter to Yemelu
Palace guards, palace maids, head of vigilante
ACT I
Scene I
Enter BELARU and RENATE
BELARU: Renate, you don’t look your old self any more.
Something must’ve gone awry with you.
RENATE: Really, father?
BELARU: Yes, I’m sure.
RENATE: Sir, how did you bring that up?
BELARU: I’m very percipient, you know.
RENATE: I could rebut your claim – I’m all right, sir!
BELARU: Oh no! You belie the state of your feelings!
RENATE: No, I don’t!
BELARU: Certainly, you aren’t on the level. Your waxen mien,
which you’ve just lit up with your bogus smile, testifies
you don’t. There’s no wit in silence when one’s heart is
heavy worries ; and no one does well nursing nerves.
RENATE: Your words are effecting and so drawing me out.
But…I’m afraid…you see…
BELARU: Look, must you remain sphinx-like? You aren’t
under duress to give out its recital – a brief account will
suffice, I suppose.
RENATE: Erh…you see…
BELARU: Why are you hanging back? It’s a matter of
relieving you of your burden. Be warned, you’ll be up the
creek should I get infuriated with you.
BELARU: I hate someone being equivocating. Please, hit the nail
on the head.
RENATE [Aside]: I think I shouldn’t declare my intent very
discernibly. But how do I open up? [resolved] Sir, I find it
tasking getting who I want to marry.
BELARU [smiles broadly]: Oh, no! It’s a simple thing!
RENATE: Smiling?
BEDARU: Yes! This is a moment of bliss! No upset!
1
ACT I SC I
RENATE: I don’t understand what you really mean.
BELARU: You see your trouble is self-provoking. He’s
flurried who undertakes anther person’s responsibility.
RENATE: Not my duty to fix on whom I’ll get married to –
did I make you out, father?
BELARU: This is one thing I like you for: you’ve a keen
brain. It’s not yours.
RENATE: I’m not sure you know what you’re saying.
BELARU: Don’t work yourself up into anxiety. It was your
mother’s father who married her to me. It’s a normal thing.
RENATE: Do you think this idea still fits into this opened
world!
BELARU: Not all that odd, daughter.
RENATE: It’s!
BELARU: No!
RENATE: This atavistic idea!
BELARU: It’s an established value. You’ve got to buy it
RENATE: Not I, father.
BELARU: Why?
RENATE: It’s senseless.
BELARU: Whether it’s or not, no way of escape, it’s I who must
marry you to a man I shall choose. Thank you for
reminding me, not knowing it’s time I exercise my
authority in performing my duty.
RENATE [protesting]: Absolutely infeasible!
BELARU: Look here, an okra plant can’t grow tall and be
taller than the father who planted it.
RENATE: That’s an okra plant, not I, please.
BELARU [irked]: Damned you for this inordinate
opposition. In this house, being the head of the family,
likewise a major chief in this kingdom, my ruling must be
supreme end conclusive: there’s no holding on me on this
matter.
RENATE: I disagree, sir!
BELARU: Stop crossing words with me. It’s I, your father,
who has the sole right to marry you off.
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ACT I SC I
RENATE: Sir, you’d rather lay off being a fumbling crank;
your idea, as geriatric as you’re, can’t thrive.
BELARU: [furious]: I Renate?
RENATE: Who else?
BELARU: From your mouth?
RENATE: Yes! [Exit RENATE
BELARU: [extremely annoyed, stands up]: Ah, I’m injured!
First of its kind in history a daughter walked out on her father!
[hacked off, whistles away, suddenly shouts] Renate! Renate!
RENATE [within]: Yes, father!
BELARU: What do you take me to be? Come out now if you
like yourself otherwise stay put.
Re-enter RENATE
It’s derogatory. You treated me as if we’re playmates.
RENATE: You irked me and I walked out – it’s just an
expression of feeling.
BELARU: You’re a bad girl!
RENATE: No one is bad; and if you think that someone is bad as a
result of their behaviour, it’s because they don’t know how to
express their feelings.
BELARU [wondered]: How did you get the temerity to talk
to me like this? Don’t you know I’m your father?
RENATE: Yes, I do.
BELARU: Why then this satanic insolence?
RENATE [kneels down]: With deep apology, I own up, sir!
BELARU: I’m happy; you still have some good custom.
Though your common sense returned to you, I’ m
astonished at this noxious barbarity, after all, you went
to white men school.
RENATE: Then let go my right.
BELARU [perplexed]: Back with reinforcement? I’m
afraid – you’ve struck out! Daughter you are no longer
your real self. I see anomie leaching out the fibre of
your character. Mind out!
RENATE: Father, don’t misconstrue me I’m not arguing
3
ACT I SC I
with you, but defending my inalienable right.
BELARU: Does a woman have a right while she is still under her father’s
roof?
RENATE: That’s ill perception, sir.
BELARU: Something is really wrong with you.
RENATE: I insist you can’t marry me off. [clenching her fists
BELARU [shocked ]: Mortal still! Daughter, will you lay into
me clenching your fists? How nuts you’re!
RENATE: It’s not my duty to always obey you but at times. Obeying
you now attract conditions.
BELARU: Oh, I regret sending you to school!
RENATE: It’s only when I’m trying to put you right you regret
sending me to school.
BELARU: I’d wasted my money on zilch! I’m not going to give you a
chance. I’ll show you up!
RENATE: But candidly, father, far passed when I could be besotted
as you’ve tampered with my susceptibilities; that is, I declare
myself invulnerable to your threat.
BELARU: Match on unrepentant rebel, your waterloo lays a few metres
ahead.
RENATE: Please, excuse my leaving; I’m bored witless of this
incongruous, duff idea.
BELARU: You’re mad! I wonder how you turned a zany, little
devil overnight.
RENATE: You’ll continue to wonder until you go where I went.
BELARU: Where did you go, stupid things? Will you melt out of
my sight?
RENATE: Far better, sir! [Exit RENATE
BELARU [wondering]: I never knew she’d in her such daring bellicosity;
notwithstanding, I think I still wedge clutches over her. She’s just given
a portent.
Enter SADALO
SADALO [ prostrates at full length and greets]: Good evening, sir!
BELARU: You’re welcome! Do young men still prostrate to greet elders?
I’m convinced you didn’t go to school – their factory of so-called
civilisation.
SADALO: No, I didn’t.
4
ACT I SC I
BELARU: No wonder! And those stupid things calling themselves
civilised people want to shake hands with elders. Imagine this
gross madness!
SADALO: Sir, I came here for a purpose.
BELARU: What’s it?
SADALO: I’ve fallen in love with Renate, your daughter.
BELARU: That’s, you want to marry her. Am I right?
SADALO: Yes’ sir!
BELARU: You see, I won’t undermine your personality because of your
appearance. I doubt if you’re qualified.
SADALO: I’m not badly off as you may be misled by my awkward look:
it’s the hard work and heat of the sun that made fair skin turned charred.
BELARU: May I ask you, do you live in a cover, or in other way
round, do you batten on friend?
SADALO: I think I’d answered you. I am not a poor man.
BELARU: Your qualification, please?
SADALO [shocked]: Qualification? It’s for those who’re seeking
employment in offices.
BELARU: Yes! I’m being forced to buy some modern idea. Look, if the
world is dynamic and our thought is static, truly, we won’t get along.
My daughter says she’s civilised and that I’m too ancient,
too conservative, and to counteract her I’m essaying to get modernised.
A modern man is normative; he acts through deductive reasoning. Son,
I can’t afford to remain conservative. I must acquire some
philosophies; that’s, independent thoughts.
SADALO: That’ll be too corrosive, sir.
BELARU: Oh, I don’t care! I’m just an old cargo in modern
luggage. Getting modernised is my hot end! I won’t allow my
daughter to keep calling me “Detritus of the Stone Age”. I hope
you’ve understood. [SADALO nods] Now what do you do to earn
a living?
SADALO: I’m just a farmer and hunter. And if you have a good
recollection, I’d done work for you gratis – all for a day as this.
BELARU: Are you that workaholic man?
SADALO [happy]: Good memory! Yes, I’m.
BELARU: But…but…I’m afraid! Can a farmer fit into a school woman?
All right! [shaking his head] I shall mend the incompatibility. You see,
I won’t require money from you. You’ve got to work on my farm. You
5
ACT I SC I
are qualified.
BADERO: Any form you want it.
BELARU: Good! There’s no problem. Just keep checking.
SADALO: Thanks. [Exit SADALO]
BELARU: This’s great fortune! Hugely wealthy I soon become, he shall
turn my forest into beautiful farms! [Exit BELARU]
Enter YEMELU, TODERO running after her
TODERO: Excuse my interrupting you, madam! [YEMELU hears but cuts
him dead] Madam! Madam!
YEMELU [turns back sharply]: Who are you?
TODERO [shocked]: Don’t you know me?
YEMELU: I can’t tell.
TODERO [confused]: Ah, madam, you know me very well! You
can’t deny acquaintance with me except for your debt.
YEMELU [frowns at him]: Which debt? Are you in your right mind?
TODERO: Oh, it’s eldritch! We know each other as we do money.
You an even identify me in a billion crowd if only the back of my
you see. Why this denial?
YEMELU: My heart cuts me – it’s singeing. I felt condemned! I think I
could make it big trying my hand on the new imported trick. I just want
to be civilised.
TODERO: You are getting the wrong end of it. Meanwhile, it wasn’t
the due that brought me here. Something else more significant
did hastily drag me in. I’ve fallen for your daughter; and I want to
get married to her.
YEMELU: You are a handsome man. No objection. One good
turn deserves another. You’ve been beating down prices for me
each time a make a purchase. It has come to remembrance
for reciprocity.
TODERO: Good response! Your debt is written off at once.
YEMELU: Do you mean it?
TODERO: Yes, just come around tomorrow to have better one free of
charge.
YEMELU [blissful]: Are you sure?
TODERO: Madam, it’s not my nature to cry off. I mean the business.
6
ACT I SC I
YEMELU [claps her hands and stands akimbo]: No one else! It’s you.
Whether she likes it or not, you get married to her.
TODERO [happy]: Thanks.
YEMELU: Bye!
TODERO [going]: I shall be expecting you tomorrow. [Exit TODERO]
YEMELU: Too nice a man I’ve ever seen. My daughter’s beauty coupled
with good clothes – oh, she rules the world! [Exit YEMELU]
Enter BOKUNLE and BADERO
BOKUNLE: Prince, having studied your newest selves, I discovered
that the composition of your whole being has been greatly
uttered; and this fact sticks out on your prosaic face. It’s impolitic and
disheartening for you of all people to go about with heavy heart; and
this necessitates my bringing you here if I could get it offset or at
least subsided. I beg you, don’t be too reticent to dissemble all your
minds. It’s only a problem ascertained could have solution proffered.
BADERO: Well, I agree with you. Indeed, I’m in a huff. I don’t think
there’s anything I can’t let on as far as you’re concerned..
BOKUNLE: What is it? I’m ready to lend a hand.
BADERO: I, even I…oh, I…. My heart is restive and moribund.
BOKUNLE: I think I rather let you wallow in your nerves. [releases
himself into the backrest]
BADERO: No you can’t just step out.
BOKUNLE: Isn’t it contradictory as you look cadaverous while you’re
wholesome? How deadly is the discomfiture by which you’re so foully
transmogrified! You’d trivialised your position as prince, and that is
what got you into this mess.
BADERO: You misjudge its circumstance.
BOKUNLE: You’re too puerile. Can’t you talk?
BADERO: You see how could a woman turn down my proposal so long
without repentance? I – Prince of Betuda? Oh, I felt embarrassed!
BOKUNLE: Who is she? She deserves serious beating.
BADERO [shocked]: Beating?
BOKUNLE: I’m ready to bash the cretin up beyond immediate
recognition.
BADERO: You can’t – it’s your younger sister.
BOKUNLE: Oh, no! You’re fraught with womanly traits – a haemorrhage
7
ACTI SCII
of your self-worth. You should have apprised me of such interest in her.
No wonder she couldn’t spare your feelings. Notwithstanding, her
impetuous deportment still deserves it.
BOKUNLE: Ah, if you do, you put me out.
BOKUNLE: Do I give a hoot?
BADERO: You’d make things difficult for me then.
BOKUNLE: No, it won’t pan out all that. Look, if we can’t employ
coercion it’ll cost the devil to pay.
BADERO: It’s imprudent to get forceful with her priming it through.
BOKUNLE: Oh, yes! You’re right! By degrees, between your palms you
can shell a palm kennel!
BADERO: Did you satirize me?
BOKUNLE: No, I’m just impugning your asinine tactics.
BADERO: A woman she’s, and so needs soft approaches.
BOKUNLE: Don’t mind me, the conviction is prepossessing, going
into orbit.
BADERO: Before your eyes, it’ll work wonder.
BOKUNLE: Yes, of course, the pits. [sniggers]
BADERO: You just have to be sanguine.
BOKUNLE: Why not, using open sesame.
BADERO: Cases of love are fragile, little things destroy them. Feeblest
things, at times, prove to he strongest.
BOKUNLE [bows]: That argues! What do I do?
BADERO: Just instil into her my obsession of her and what glory awaits
her prompt consonance to my proposal.
BOKUNLE: That’s not a task, I shall get it done soonest.
BADERO: Thanks. [Exeunt BADERO and BOKUNLE
Continued ...