The New Tartuffe: or, The Guilty Mother by Pierre Beaumarchais (translated by David Coward).
Title: The New Tartuffe: or, The Guilty Mother.
Author: Pierre Beaumarchais (translated by David Coward).
Genre: Literature, fiction, plays, humour, satire, romance.
Country: France.
Language: French.
Publication Date: 1791.
Summary: Twenty years after the previous play, Count Almaviva has long suspected that his son, Léon, is not his, and after the death of his other son, becomes openly hostile and suspicious of his wife, the Countess. Meanwhile, he hides an ironically similar secret about a young woman who is his ward, Florestine. While Léon and Florestine dream of being together, and the evil Bégearss plots to marry Florestine himself with the help of some blackmail, it is once again up to Figaro and Suzanne, still in the employment of the Count, to untangle this complicated and ludicrous affair.
My rating: 7.5/10.
My review:
♥ SUZANNE. But I tell you everything he says.
FIGARO. What he says isn't always the same as what he means. Watch out for words that slip out when he's talking, those tiny gestures, the way he moves: it's the key to a man's character. There's something wicked afoot. It's obvious he believes nothing can stop him, because to me he seems... craftier, wilier, more smug-in fact he's like these imbeciles here in France who start cheering before the battle's been won! You must try and be as devious as he is: butter him up, tell him what he'd like to hear, and whatever he wants, don't say no.
♥ FIGARO [pretending to hit her]. Oh don't! Well take that, you brazen trollop!
SUZANNE [pretending to have been hit]. Ow! He hit me! And in her Ladyship's room too!
♥ BÉGEARSS. I shall report you to your employer. You forget yourself, sir!
FIGARO. Me, forget myself? I'd rather forget you!
♥ SUZANNE [angrily]. Men are such brutes! They deserve to be throttled, the lot of them!
♥ BÉGEARSS. Actually, it's a rather good idea. Expensive diamonds have a way of creating happy endings.
♥ SUZANNE. Unless your Lordship feels...
COUNT. Stop! You're not to say 'your Lordship'! Didn't I give orders, when I came to this country...
SUZANNE. To my mind, sir, your orders undermine our status.
COUNT. That's because you see things more in terms of vanity than of respect for self and others! If you decide to live in another country, you don't go against the way things are done there.
♥ COUNT. As long as my poor son was alive, I never thought about it. He was heir to my name, my public functions, my fortune... why should I spare that other creature a second thought? Icy indifference to him, a footling title, the Cross of Malta, an allowance-that should have been enough to settle my account with his mother and him! But can you imagine my despair when I lose the son I loved only to see a stranger who not only inherits his rank and titles but, to add insult to injury, turns up every morning and addresses me by the odious name of 'father'?
♥ COUNT. Ah, Rosine, you betrayed me! For despite my philandering, she is the only woman I ever... The other women were easy conquests. I know by how angry I feel, how much my contemptible affection... I hate myself for loving her!
♥ COUNT. So, instead of making arrangements for your imminent departure to frustrate the Turk in the Levant, and in so doing to serve your noble order, you go about making enemies? You have ideas, you write. It's all the rage nowadays. Soon nobody will be able to tell a gentleman from a bookworm.
LEON [diffidently]. But father, it will be easier to tell an ignoramus from an educated man, a free man from a slave.
COUNT. Spoken like a fanatic! I see which way your mind is working.
♥ COUNT [gets up and walks about]. These wretched women who let themselves be seduced have no idea what troubles they are storing up for us!... They just carry on and on... the betrayals accumulate... and the public, always unfair and superficial, lays the blame on the husband, who must nurse his sorrows in secret. He is accused of being heartless, of being deficient in feeling because he refuses to love the child born of his wife's culpable adultery!... Our philandering scarcely leaves a mark on them, nor does it strip them of the certain knowledge that they are the mothers of their children, nor deny them the incalculable gift of motherhood! Whereas their smallest whims, a passing fancy, a thoughtless lapse can destroy a man's happiness... the happiness on which his life is based: the certainty that he is a father. Ah, it is no accident that so much importance has always been given to the fidelity of wives! The good of society, and its ills too, are determined by how they behave. Whether a family is heaven or a living hell will always depend on the impression women give of themselves.
♥ FIGARO [setting the table with the breakfast cups]. Reptile! The gaze of Medusa, eh? You can measure me for size, you can look pure poison, but I'm the one with the eyes that kill!... But where does he collect his post? There's never anything for him among the letters that are delivered to the house. Was he alone when he slithered up from hell? There must be another fiend who writes to him... but I've no way of finding out...
♥ FIGARO. A foolish man and vanity go together like a horse and carriage. My scheming Major talks too much: he's blabbed. And he's blundered!
♥ FIGARO. Yes, but a moron is like a lantern: the light shines clean out of him.
♥ FIGARO. Ah, honourable and hypocritical, but not for much longer. A deity has put me on your tracks. [He closes his notebook] Chance, the hidden god! The Ancients used to call your destiny. Nowadays, we've got another name for you...
♥ LEON [in a rage]. Me, keep cool! All right, I'll be cool. But inside I'm incandescent! So he thinks he can take Florestine from me! Aha! Here he comes. I'll have it out with him... coolly.
FIGARO. Keeo a grip on your temper or you'll ruin everything.
♥ COUNT [to LEON] Go away and reflect on how deeply you have wronged your friend, my friend, the most decent man that ever was!
FIGARO [furious, to himself]. More like a pack of demons inside a coat and breeches!
♥ FIGARO [coolly]. I gave them to your notary, Monsieur Fal, for safekeeping.
BÉGEARSS. On whose instructions?
FUIGARO [loftily]. Mine. I always follow my own instructions.
♥ BÉGEARSS. Dear lady, I have no wish to cut short the rejoicing of a nature as good as yours. It is the heart that is sad, not the heart that is glad, that leads us into danger.
♥ FIGARO [aside to SUZANNE as they go off]. I can't see him wriggling out of this...
SUZANNE [aside]. He's trickier than a bag of monkeys.
♥ FIGARO. It'll have to wait till tomorrow, then. I can't see that anything disastrous will be happening tonight. Still, why waste time? Whenever I have in the past, I've always regretted it. [With sudden energy] No shilly-shallying: I'll go and plant the bomb. Then I'll sleep on it, see if I've come up with anything else in the morning, and tomorrow we'll see which of us, him or me, blows the other into small pieces!
♥ BÉGEARSS. And how much does our master plotter believe he stands to gain with those he is currently deploying?
FIGARO. Since I've not bet on the game, I' shall win the lot... provided I make sure my opponent loses.
BÉGEARSS [stung]. We shall have to see how you play your hand.
FIGARO. There won't be any brilliant moves, the sort that send the gallery wild. [Adopts a half-witted look] But as good King Solomon said: 'It's every man for himself and God for us all.'
BÉGEARSS [smiling]. Neatly put. But did he not also say: 'The sun shines for everyone'?
FIGARO [defiantly]. Yes, by lighting up the snake that's about to bite the unsuspecting hand that feeds it.
♥ BÉGEARSS. [He puts both hands to his chest] Damn this feeling of exultation! It's like a swelling, here. Control yourself!... It has a power of its own, and if I don't let it settle down while I'm alone here, it will either kill me or make me look a fool. Oh, they're so unworldly, so naive, they'd believe anything, such as a bridegroom who is going to hand over a huge dowry! Tonight I shall marry Florestine against her wishes!
♥ SUZANNE. I'll be honest, sir, I admire you. In the middle of the awful troubles you've stirred up here, you're the only one who stays calm and unruffled. It's as if one of those djinns had been let out of his bottle and was making everything move just as he pleases.
BÉGEARSS [very conceited]. My dear, there's nothing to it. To start with, there are just two things that make the world go round: morality and politics. Morality, a very footling thing, means being fair and honest. It is, so they say, the basis of a number of rather boring virtues...
SUZANNE. And politics?
BÉGEARSS [exalted]. Ah! Politics is the art of making things happen, of leading people and events by the nose: it's child's play. Its purpose is self-interest, its method intrigue. Always economical with the truth, it has boundless, dazzling possibilities which stand like a beacon and draw you on. As deep as Etna, it smoulders and rumbles for a long time before finally erupting into the light of day. By then nothing can stop it. It calls for superior talents and is threatened by only one thing: honest principles. [He laughs] That's the key to all the deals that are ever made!
SUZANNE. Morality may leave you cold, but on the other hand, you obviously find politics very exciting.
BÉGEARSS [suddenly wary, recovers]. POh, it's not politics, it was you, comparing me with djinns who make the worl turn as they please.
♥ COUNTESS [kneeling by her chair]. The Last Judgment cannot be more terrible than this moment of truth! The blood has almost stopped flowing in my veins!... Oh God! grant me the strength to reach into my husband's heart!
♥ LEON. By what definition of justice can a mistake paid for by twenty years of contrition be still considered a crime?
♥ FIGARO [to the COUNTESS]. ..One thing I've always said, and it fits him: a kindly man who is quick to anger is also quick to forgive.
♥ COUNT [quickly]. ..That's all I ask! He can keep all the rest!
FIGARO [quickly]. What, let him keep your children's inheritance out of pique? That's not being virtuous, I call that being feeble.
LEON [angrily]. Figaro!
FIGARO [louder]. I won't take my words back.
♥ BÉGEARSS [furious]. You young fool! You will pay for the rest of them. I challenge you to cross swords with me.
LEON [quickly]. I'm ready and willing!
..COUNT. Leon! I forbid it... [To BÉGEARSS] Since your conduct proves your are no gentleman, you have no honour to satisfy. That is not the way men like you can hope to end their lives.
[BÉGEARSS reacts with a fearsome gesture but does not speak
FIGARO [forcibly restraining LEON]. No you don't, my boy! You can't do it! Your father is right. Duelling is abhorrent, it's madness, and people's attitudes to it have changed. From now on, if men must fight, they can fight the enemies of France! Just leave him to choke on his own rage. And if he dares to attack you, defend yourself as you would if he were a common murderer. No one thinks it's wrong to put down a mad dog! But he won't dare try it! A man capable of doing as much wickedness as he has must be both despicable and a coward.
♥ FIGARO [jubilant]. Let him publish his allegations: slander is the last refuge of a coward!
♥ COUNT. Listen both of you: the time comes when people of good will forgive each other for the wrongs they did and the mistakes they once made! When kindness and affection replace the unruly emotions which once set them at odds!
♥ FIGARO [quickly]. Me, a reward, sir? Thank you, but no. If I've been of some use to you, I'd hate to spoil it all by bringing money into it. The only reward I want is to be allowed to live out my life under your roof. When I was a young man, I often knew failure; let's hope today will make up for all that! Now that I'm old, I can forgive my younger self: indeed, I take pride in the man I once was. In a single day our lives have been changed! No tyrant now to oppress us! No bare-faced hypocrite! We have all done our duty. Let's not worry too much if we've sometimes had our differences. Families are always well served when a troublemaker is shown the door.