Prologue
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The closed curtain is illuminated by a kaleidoscope of lights in shrill colours from behind the stage. As the scene progresses, these form increasingly complex patterns in ever new combinations, from the explosive to the harmonic, in accordance to the patterns of the spoken text.
When Nurit appears, these patterns will have become very dense and the lights will have reached their greatest intensity, so the parting of the curtain at her second or third sentence will create the impression of a womb opening at birth.
Voice Display Izhak Rabin: Ani ma’amin she shtei ha ‘amim yekholim lihiyot be yahad ba shalom…
Voice Over in the manner of simultaneous translator: I believe that both peoples can live together in peace…
Voice Over Anti-government demonstration in Jerusalem, choir: Mavet la ‘Aravim! Mavet la ‘Aravim!
Voice Over Simultaneous Translator: Death to the Arabs! Death to the Arabs!
Voice Over Arab Israeli Citizen: Shu salam? Man hadhar-r-rajoul? Qatil awladna.
Voice Over Simultaneous Translator: What peace? Who is this man? The murderer of our children.
Voice Over Arab Israeli Citizen: They’ve stepped up their controls and security checks since the peace negotiations started. They’ve never been as heavy-handed as now. It’s a peace that leaves no doubt who is who.
Voice Over Woman from Gaza: We are hungry and we’ve got no clean water. What has changed since the peace accords have been signed? If it’s one thing at all, tell me what it is!
Voice Over Hamas Activist: Those who follow the fool of Ghaza have opted for their own destruction. The road to what he calls peace leads straight into the water. And we can’t swim. Swim is what you should learn first before plunging into the water head-first. But he doesn’t care. He’s going to make history. And we are going to drown in it.
Voice Over Jewish Settler: Rabin sells out the Holy Land to the heathens! He sells us! He is selling us! Selling!
Voice Over Anti-Government Demonstration: Izhak Rabin Rotzeah!
Voive Over Simultaneous Translator: Izhak Rabin is a murderer!
Voice Over Rabin: Ani ma’amin…-- (thoughtfully) Ma ani ma’amin be emet?
Voice Over Simultaneous Translator: What do I really believe?
A shoot rings out. A thousand voices break out into a scream.
Voice Over Israeli Citizens: Shalom Haver!
Voice Over Yigal Amir: It had to be done.
Voice Over Shin Bet Officer: Who was the one in charge?
Voice Over Second Shin Bet Officer: Wake up, general! It is time to act.
Voice Over Third Shin Bet Officer: Make the best of the worst. It is time to throw in some weight again and get rid of some trouble-makers, to straighten out some creases and make peace on our own terms, to curtail some liberties before it comes to the worst.
Voice Over Radio Reporter: The nations is crying.
Song Display Ester Ofarim: We as hu haya bahir ve kavoha ke semer…
Voice over Simultaneous Translator: And in those days he was radiant and high as the wheat…
Voice Over Simultaneous Translator, now commenting by himself: Wain as-Salam? Efo ha Shalom? Where is peace? And who ever wanted it?
ENTER NURIT SHAHARI.When the curtain is lifted, the stage set shows a projection of heaven and sea as a painting or a visual image.
Nurit is a girl of 19-20, a student at Haifa’s Carmelia.
The wind plays with her hair as she is speaking.
Nurit: If one would ask me who I am, I’d say this: I’m Nurit Shahari of Haifa, a grain of earth from the earth of this land. The heaven is part of me and also the sea. A bit future, a bit past. That is me. And it rhymes!
Ani Marokait; that’s what we say. I’m of Moroccan Jewish stock, born in Israel. It’s here that I grew up and it’s here I went to school. I’ve learnt this country’s songs and I’m part of her sweetness and a part of her bitterness too.
My parents came here in the fifties. They’re Moroccan Jews and one can’t talk with them.
Peculiar to think that their blood runs in my veins. Because I-- I spend my nights watching the stars. I’d like to be as lightful as they are and as boundless.
You’ll laugh, of course. But you shouldn’t. I get called an intellectual, a romantic and a dreamer, and this is why I’m standing here talking to you of these things, though I can’t see why. One should keep one’s thoughts to oneself. But I’m not ashamed of them.
Our world is cold, and its coldness is burning us. It covers up so much passion. We all walk around in uniforms in order to believe in our existence. And it seems to me that it’s the uniforms alone that make our world real.
We mustn’t be sentimental here.
And let me tell you one more thing: yesterday Lior spoke to me of his feelings, and these feelings involved me. So I looked into his eyes and I said: “Isn’t it time you gave your flat a thorough cleaning?” He said: “What?” And I: “It shall soon be spring.”
He’s a marvellous boy, to be sure, and nothing could leave me more indifferent than his affection. He’s got green eyes, which is so rare in boys, and he means nothing to me.
“Do you actually realise all this emptiness around us?” “No”, says he, with the bleak look of a green-eyed sheep: “All I realise is the emptiness in your heart.”
“I too”, said I, “I’m realising it. Mine is a heart as big and as empty as life.”
(Curtain.)
Nurit Shahari's Loneliness
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(Drama)
Muhammad A. Al Mahdi
Prologue.
