Robert Coover - Public Burning

I feel strongly that it is our sacred duty to expose the police-state methods that are being practiced!

Because we are fighting for a just cause our spirits are high, but at the same time our lives are in very great jeopardy!

Of course the storm is getting greater but I know we’ll ride through this storm in good shape!

JULIUS

ETHELTherefore, my sweet, I can’t help admiring you and telling you over and over again that you are a great noble woman — which in fact you are— and certainly a very charming person at that!

I guess it will not be amiss if I say I love you most dearly!

Therefore, my sweet, etc . Darling, my darling!

How truly I love you!

And how much I long to possess the remarkable qualities you attribute to me, and to be worthy of all that you are yourself!

Darling, my darling, etc .

JULIUS( Recit.: ) There is great danger in our land if now! The great difficulty is, that media of information, they are “brainwashing” the readers and the public is misinformed!

ETHEL

JULIUS

The lame attempts of the Justice Department to “brainwash” the public on an issue that has been the main burden of a sickening refrain for over two long years, brings to mind lago’s cynical assertion:

How big can the lie get and how much deceit are they capable of?

Events are happening at an increasing tempo and we must continue to look to each other to find the strength and courage to stand up to the terror!

“Bravery’s plain face

United in love and spirit

is never seen till used!”

we will be successful!

ETHEL

You must tell them, Julie: we are the first victims of American Fascism!

JULIUS

( addressing the audience ) ( Appassionato: ) The courts are mere appendages

to an autocratic police force!

The rights of defendants and the protection of the Constitution no longer operate!

These are the plain facts!

It is happening here!

Yesterday, the U.S. Marshals were up to serve us with papers setting down our executions for our fourteenth wedding anniversary, June 18, eleven p.m.

JULIUS

ETHELMy wife and I are to be horribly united in death on the very day of our greatest happiness, our wedding day!

When, oh when will our agony be over and how soon will we see some daylight? Seriously, this is political prosecution, shameless, blatant, cynical!

But it must not be a cause for pessimism!

It is the relentless struggle to live life that defeats death!

JULIUS

( tenderly )

Honey dear, the Sunday issue of The New York Times had an excellent editorial on the essence of June, with particular emphasis on the physical beauty of the lush green around us! This month was ours! Because then we were united as husband and wife and found the boundless joy of a flourishing beautiful relationship! Precious noble woman, even to the end, I am completely devoted to you!

ETHEL

My darling husband—!

( They move to embrace, but are separated by the prison officials. There is an anguished pause .)

JULIUS

( to the audience, with sudden intensity )

WHAT WILL BE THE ANSWER OF AMERICA TO ALL THIS?

( JULIUS and ETHELare led out through separate exits by the TURNKEY and the MATRON, respectively. The WARDEN studies the diagram a moment, then checks his watch by the clock on the wall. He exits, in fading lights, through a door with a sign above it. A lone spotlight lingers momentarily on this sign, which reads: SILENCE.)

CURTAIN

“Between the dark and the daylight,

When the night is beginning to lower,

Comes a pause in the day’s occupations,

That is known as the Children’s Hour…”

sing the multitudes massed in Times Square — they are enjoying an old-fashioned singalong, led by Oliver Allstorm and His Pentagon Patriots, a bit of commemorative showbiz hoopla to honor the setting and get the night’s entertainment under way. “I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,” cries Uncle Sam, peering out on the Sons of Light from backstage. “‘Tis grand! ’tis solemn! ’tis an education of itself to look upon!” The Patriots are decked out in bright star-spangled Yankee Doodle outfits, complete with macaroni and bloody bandages, reminiscent of the uniforms worn by Nelson Eddy in The Chocolate Soldier , by George Washington in the French and Indian Wars, and by Bojangles Robinson when he danced with Shirley Temple. A bit far out maybe, like the Patriots themselves, not the sort of gear the nation is accustomed to seeing in its nightclubs and churches — you’d never catch Percy Faith and His Orchestra rigged out with so much pomp and flash — but the crowd seems to enjoy it, seems to like the excitement the Patriots generate, and they all sing along with open-faced enthusiasm, full throated and glad hearted…

“There’s a building in Noo Yawk

That’s sixteen stories high,

And every story in that house

Is full of chicken pie…!”

The starred, barred, and booted Patriots bounce merrily about the electrocution-chamber mock-up with their fifes and drums like court minstrels for a king who’s not yet come to sit his throne, leading the jubilant citizenry through the good old songs of yesteryear, songs their mothers taught them, the hands of mem’ry weaving the blissful dreams of long ago. They recall heroes and hangings, grief and grace, traitors and liars and bloody battles, city lights and purple shadows. They are ecstatic, somewhat drunk as well. They haven’t forgotten the Phantom — indeed, rumors circulate even now of riots and uprisings around the world — but somehow the rest of the world is growing more distant, there’s the feeling that it’s all happening here, here in the street where the whole world meets, on the avenue I’m takin’ you to, Forty-second Street…

“In the middle,

In the heart of little old New York,

You’ll find the crowds all there!

In the middle,

It’s a part of little old New York,

Runs into old Times Square…!”

The sun has hunkered down behind the Paramount Building on its way to Hoboken, but though elsewhere shadows fall and trees whisper day is ending, here the day seems to reverse itself and brighten again toward high noon, so starry bright is the Great White Way. It’s a real Old Glory blowout! The stage where the Patriots work (they’ve drawn together now, barbershop-fashion, and along with all the others are crooning a set of gentle oldies…“Now Is The Hour”…“The Farmer Comes to Town”…“Let the Rest of the World Go By”…) is spotlit; the VIP area, empty still, is bright as a ballpark; newsmen’s flashguns pop like Fourth of July fireworks; multicolored electric arrows dart relentlessly at floodlit theaters and hotels; and vast neon spectaculars hawk everything from Planters Peanuts to patriotism, campaign quips to Kleenex: all direct and glaring evidence of the sheer power of Uncle Sam and his Legions of Light. The name of the Square itself is picked out in lights atop the Times Tower twice, once in Old English for the origins of the nation and once for its progress in modern sans-serif, and up and down all the streets as far as the eye can see, marquees and billboards glow with apothegms from the Prophets and the Fathers…