Free Faustus by David Mamet Page B

word to that emotion.
    FAUSTUS: You find it an unworthy pastime?
    FRIEND: Who am I to balk another of his freak? I knew a villain, said he lived to count the stars. Each darkness found him, with his pen and ledger, out of the house, happy as a grig.
    FAUSTUS: … it pleased him.
    FRIEND: He called it his life’s work.
    FAUSTUS: To number the stars.
    FRIEND: So he said. Until that day he wandered out of bounds into a neighbor’s copse, and was killed by the gamekeeper.
    FAUSTUS: The gamekeeper mistook the fellow’s errand.
    FRIEND: Oh no, he reckoned it aright.
    FAUSTUS: How so?
    FRIEND: Each night, my friend took up his ledger and trod out, it was in fact to lie with the gamekeeper’s wife.
    FAUSTUS: Aha.
    FRIEND:
And
daughter.
    FAUSTUS: I see your man was a prodigy.
    FRIEND: Sir, you don’t know the half of it.
    FAUSTUS: Which distinguishes me from the gamekeeper’s wife.
    FRIEND: …
and
daughter …
    FAUSTUS: … as you said.
    FRIEND: …
and
son, for all we know.
    FAUSTUS: … so much is hidden from us … (
Pause
) You balk me of my prerogative melancholy.
    FRIEND: You have enrolled me as your foil. Permit me my turn. Again, might you supply a drink, to a traveler, come from the cold unfeeling world?
    FAUSTUS: Ah, have you brought the journal?
    FRIEND: The journal, no.
    FAUSTUS: You have not?
    FRIEND: But is it Friday?
    FAUSTUS: Returned, with its noted regularity.
    FRIEND: I do not have the journal, no.
    FAUSTUS: Oh, my friend, you are damned to Hell. Heaven must shun you, as you use its gifts so ill.
    FRIEND: What gift?
    FAUSTUS: Mendacity Give me the gazette.
    FRIEND: I do not have it.
    FAUSTUS: Give it in any case.
    FRIEND: I would not vex you on this party day.
    FAUSTUS: I warrant you I shall survive what your reluctance indicates as their displeasure.
    FRIEND: They have, we must note, historically praised you.
    FAUSTUS: They praise me, as they praise the mother of the bride, to mask their own concupiscence. What is their praise, they are, as dolt schoolchildren bent over their sums, they round their inclusivities, into the most proximate low error. Their censure and applause are one. But th’ extorted approbation of the mob. Crowds who cry up this slaughterer, thatthief as great? Give me sufficient ink and paper, I’ll make a dog’s bone beloved of the world.
    FRIEND: Do you shun fame?
    FAUSTUS: I accept it. I pursue knowledge.
    FRIEND: Would you then publish your work anonymously?
    FAUSTUS: Discovered, I confess. Am I a libertine? A thief? A murderer? I covet fame. And, like the criminal I plead first, what have I done, and next, who suffered? Yes. I would have fame. For my works, and fame surpassing them, til Faustus’s renown shines free of accomplishment. Read me the journal.
    FRIEND: Read it to you?
    FAUSTUS: The honest man—must in good modesty avert his gaze. It is a disgraceful proclivity. The journals.
    FRIEND: To write them?
    FAUSTUS: To
read
them. To write them is a crime against nature. What do they say of me?
    FRIEND: Pray, delay it past this festive time. How is the boy?
    FAUSTUS: He has a cold upon the chest. Read the report to me.
    FRIEND: (
Takes out a newspaper and reads)…
that…
    FAUSTUS: … please …
    FRIEND: … my eyes as you know are weak.
    FAUSTUS: … supply the lack with concentration.
    FRIEND: “Our celebrated polymath, our local champion …”
    FAUSTUS: Now we enlarge the epigram: even a dead pig finds a truffle. Read on …
    FRIEND: “Faustus: our premier: physician, philosopher, savant-scientist…”
    FAUSTUS: A linguistic supererogation …
    FRIEND: “… having labored for,” et cetera …
    FAUSTUS: … I shall respond to them.
    FRIEND: “Proceeds, our sources inform us …”
    FAUSTUS: … who might these sources be?
    FRIEND: Friends of yourself, and friends of knowledge?
    FAUSTUS: Ah yes, the hopeful constituency of the seekers-after-light, the talented who worship genius, the mediocre, who doubt its existence. Whom do I lack?
    FRIEND: The Average Man. You