From Pélléas and Mélisande; Alladine and Palomides; Home by Maurice Maeterlinck

All will be ready to-morrow. We cannot wait longer. He prowls like a madman through the corridors of the palace; I met him even now. He looked at me without a word. I passed; and as I turned, I saw him slyly laugh, shaking his keys. When he perceived that I was looking at him, he smiled at me, making signs of friendship. He must have some secret project, and we are in the hands of a master whose reason begins to totter.... To-morrow we shall be far away.... Yonder there are wonderful countries that resemble thine.... Astolaine has already provided for our flight and for my sisters'.... (ALLADINE: What has she said?) Nothing, nothing.... You will see everything about my father's castle,--after days of sea and days of forests--you will see lakes and mountains... not like these, under a sky that looks like the vault of a cave, with black trees that the storms destroy... but a sky beneath which there is nothing more to fear,--forests that are always awake, flowers that do not close.... (ALLADINE: She wept?) What are you asking?... There is something there of which we have no right to speak, do you understand?... There is a life there that does not belong to our poor life, and which love has no right to approach except in silence.... We are here, like two beggars in rags, when I think of it.... Go! go!... I could tell you things....

Palomides Monologue from Pélléas and Mélisande; Alladine and Palomides; Home

Rehearse Palomides's monologue