STUFF HAPPENS By David Hare

'America changed.' That's what we're told. 'On September 11th everything changed.' 'If you're not American,

you can't understand.' The infantile psychobabble of popular culture is grafted opportunistically onto

America's politics. The language of childish entitlement becomes the lethal rhetoric of global wealth and

privilege. Asked how you are as President, on the first day of a war which will kill around thirty thousand

people: 'I feel good.'

I was in Saks Fifth Avenue the morning they bombed Baghdad. 'Isn't it wonderful?' says the saleswoman. 'At

last we're hitting back.' 'Yes,' I reply. 'At the wrong people. Somebody steals your handbag, so you kill their

second cousin, on the grounds they live close. Explain to me,' I say, 'Saudi Arabia is financing Al Qaeda. Iran,

Lebanon and Syria are known to shelter terrorists. North Korea is developing a nuclear weapons programme.

All these you leave alone. No, you go to war with the one place in the region admitted to have no connection

with terrorism.' 'You're not American,' says the saleswoman. 'You don't understand.'

Oh, a question, then. If 'You're not American. You don't understand' is the new dispensation, then why not

'You're not Chechen'? Are the Chechens also now licensed? Are Basques? Theatres, restaurants, public

squares? Do Israeli milk-bars filled with women and children become fair game on the grounds that 'You don't

understand. We're Palestinian, we're Chechen, we're Irish, we're Basque'? If the principle of international

conduct is now to be that you may go against anyone you like on the grounds that you've been hurt by

somebody else, does that apply to everyone? Or just to America?

On September 11th, America changed. Yes. It got much stupider.

that’s something I do better than other people. You’re all spoiled brats. Go on shoot me, but that’s the truth!

Talk about the Me Generation! All this nonsense about personal identity and self-growth and being fulfilled!

What a load of self –indulgent crap. Has it ever occurred to any of you that there was a generation of men and

women who didn’t wake up in the morning and wonder how the day was going to pan out for them, but leapt

out of bed intent on figuring out how the world was going to pan out for everyone? Maybe we got things

wrong. Maybe we went too far. Maybe we had a goddamn mission and that was to make this planet a better

place for our inheritors than it was for us. You whiners and whingers! What would you rather? That I’d sat

quietly back and lead a sweet, unrestrained, anonymous life? So that your destiny as repressed, stupefied,

second-class citizens could have gone on uninterrupted? I happened to get famous and now you’re going to

use my fame against me because you’re not happy with yourselves? Why don’t you take a little responsibility

and, while you’re at it, show a tiny bit of ordinary gratitude?

snapped, finally. Not me...it. The whole arrangement. You can go along...forever, and

everything's...manageable. You make all sorts of excuses to yourself...you know...this is life...the hell with

it...maybe tomorrow he'll be dead...maybe tomorrow you'll be dead...all sorts of excuses. But then, one day,

one night, something happens...and SNAP! It breaks. And you just don't give a damn any more. I've tried with

you, baby...really tried...I'm loud, and vulgar, and I wear the pants in this house because somebody's got to,

but I am not a monster.

There was a second, just a second, when I could have gotten through to you, when maybe we could have

cut through all this crap. But that's past…. I sat there at Daddy's party, and I watched you...I watched you

sitting there, and I watched the younger men around you, the men who were going to go somewhere. And I

sat there and I watched you, and you weren't there!

And it snapped! It finally snapped! And I'm going to howl it out, and I'm not going to give damn what I do, and

I'm going to make the biggest explosion you ever heard.

concentrate. He just kept going on and on about his collections or something. I normally don’t mind too much,

only if you get a letter like this, you need all your concentration. You can’t have people talking in your ear –

especially when you’re trying to decipher writing like this. He must have been stoned out of his mind when he

wrote it. It wouldn’t be unusual. Look at it. He wants me to come back. Some hopes. To him. He’s sorry, he

didn’t mean to do what he did, he won’t do it again I promise, etc., etc. I seem to have heard that before. It’s

not the first time, I can tell you. And there’s no excuse for it, is there? Violence. I mean, what am I supposed to

do? Keep going back to that? Every time he loses his temper he … I mean, there’s no excuse. A fracture, you

know. It was nearly a compound fracture. That’s what they told me. (indicating her head) Right here. You can

practically see it to this day. Two X-rays. I said to him when I got home, I said, “You bastard, you know what

you did to my head?” He just stands there. The way he does. “Sorry,” he says, “I’m ever so sorry.” I told him, I

said, “You’re a bastard, that’s what you are. A right, uncontrolled, violent, bad-tempered bastard.” You know

what he said? He says, “You call me a bastard again and I’ll smash your stupid face in”.
April from Stephen Sondheim and George Furth's COMPANY
Right after I became an airline stewardess, a friend of mine who had a garden apartment gave me a cocoon for

my bedroom. He collects things like that, insects and caterpillars and all that ... It was attached to a twig and

he said one morning I'd wake up to a beautiful butterfly in my bedroom—when it hatched. He told me that

when they come out they're soaking wet and there is a drop of blood there, too—isn't that fascinating—but

within an hour they dry off and then they begin to fly. Well, I told him I had a cat. I had a cat then, but he said

just put the cocoon somewhere where the cat couldn't get at it ... which is impossible, but what can you do?

So I put it up high on a ledge where the cat never went, and the next morning it was still there, at least so it

seemed safe to leave it. Well, anyway, almost a week later very, very early this one morning the guy calls me,

and he said, 'April, do you have a butterfly this morning?" I told him to hold on and managed to get up and

look and there on that ledge I saw this wet spot and a little speck of blood but no butterfly, and I thought "Oh

dear God in heaven, the cat got it." I picked up the phone to tell this guy and just then suddenly I spotted it

under the dressing table, it was moving one wing. The cat had got at it, but it was still alive. So I told the guy

and he got so upset and he said "Oh no—oh, God, no—don't you see that's a life—a living thing?" Well, I got

dressed and took it to the park and put it on a rose, it was summer then and it looked like it was going to be all

right—I think, anyway. But that man—I really felt damaged by him—awful—that was just cruel. I got home

and I called him back and said, "Listen, I'm a living thing too, you shithead!" (Pause) I never saw him again.
Fiona from Heidi Decker's EYE OF THE BEHOLDER
I'm pretty. There's no getting around it. I just am. Pretty. Pretty is more than just a state of being, it's a way

of life. My Mama always said, you're either pretty or you're not, and there's no in between. She doesn't

believe in bisexuals either. She doesn't like indecisiveness in anyone. So I . . . am pretty. It's what I am. It's

who I am. Now if you're waitin' for me to get to the part where I wish things had been different, that I hate

the superficial world that we live in and beauty is only skin deep, you can forget it. Those are just things that

ugly girls tell each other to make themselves feel better. Now you know it and I know it. There's no need to

pretend for me. This face, and this ass, have gotten me everything I've ever wanted. No, I didn't get things

with sex. I am far too well bred to be that vulgar. Besides, I don't have to. "Pretty" is the promise of sex. Of

good things, better things. I am the trophy that's always juuuust beyond their fingertips

. . . and people will do anything to get a glimpse, a taste, a touch. I'm the Holy Grail! Don't talk to me about

being objectified. Yes, I am able to use four-syllable words. Bein' a woman never kept me from getting a

thing. Now it's not that I don't empathize. I do. I've read plenty about the feminist movement . . . and I feel

sorry for them, I do. But I dont' see what any of it has to do with me. I mean, c'mon, let's be honest here . . .

we all know that those people are just women who were never quite pretty enough. Now that's not my fault.

The truth is the truth, and if it hurts, I can't help it.

extraordinary in this house. I think I must be a freak. I actually like to know where I have put my things. This

is my bed. And this is my desk. And up there on the shelf are my special, most favorite books. Actually one of

the reasons that I keep it tidy is because my very, very special friend, Zara, also like things tidy. Oh yeah, I

should explain to you about Zara shouldn't I? You may have heard my mom talking about my invisible friend?

Well, this is Zara. Zara, say hello to my friends. And won't you say hello to Zara, she did say hello to you. I

invented Zara when I was seven or eight. Just for fun. I think I was ill at the time and wasn't allowed to play

with any of my real friends, so I made up Zara. She's my special friend that no one else can see, except me. Of

course, I can't really see her either. Not really. Although sometimes I--it's almost as if I could see her,

sometimes. If I concentrate very hard it's like I can just glimpse her out of the corner of my eye.

Still...Anyway...I've kept Zara for years and years, it's been almost ten years now actually. Until they all started

saying I was much too old for that sort of thing and got worried and started talking about sending for a doctor.

So then I didn't take her round with me quite so much after that. But she's still here. And when I feel really

sad and depressed, I sit and talk to Zara. Zara always understands. Zara always listens.
Woman from Kate Shein’s A…MY NAME IS STILL ALICE
Excuse me, are you the registry consultant? Well, I'm here to register! For gifts. I'm very excited. When is

the happy event? There isn't one. I'm not getting married. I'll probably never get married. Yes, I know that

you only register brides. Frankly, I find that a little discriminatory. I'm here to register and I really don't want

any hassle. No, no—don't get the manager. It's just that yesterday while I was attaching tiny silver bells to a

spice rack for my friends, this voice inside my head started screaming at me. It said, "Schmuck! Why do you

keep buying presents for people who have found everything they want?" Isn't it enough that they fell in love?

They've already won the sweepstakes, why do they need door prizes? Now then, I need things. I need

matching luggage. Candlesticks! Put me down for two pairs! Come on, just do it! I know I'm single. I

confront that fact every day of my life. You want to know when the special event is? A week from Saturday.

I'm throwing a shower to announce a life of singlehood, and the beauty is I won't have to return anything if it

doesn't work out!