"A comedy? . . . and I thought that . . ."
"That they would begin to pull each other's hair, no doubt . . . for even that sometimes happens behind the stage between the best of friends and actors. From what planet have you dropped down that these people surprise you so greatly? . . ."
"I came from the country where one hears hardly anything about artists, only about the theater itself," she answered straightforwardly.
"Ah, in that case, I beg your pardon. . . . Now I understand your amazement and I will presume to enlighten you that all those quarrels, rumpuses, intrigues, envies, and even fights are nothing but nerves, nerves, nerves! They vibrate in all of these people at the slightest touch, like the strings of an old piano. Their tears, their angers, and their hatreds are all momentary, and their loves last about a week, at the longest. It is the comedy of life of nervous individuals, acted a hundredfold better than that which they present on the stage, for it is played instinctively. I might describe it thus: all women in the theater are hysterical, and the men, whether great or small, are neurasthenics. Here you will find everything but real human beings. Have you been long in the theater?"
"This is my first month."
"No wonder that everything amazes you; but in a month or so you'll no longer see anything surprising; everything will then appear to you natural and commonplace."
"In other words, you infer that I also will become a subject to hysteria," she gaily added.
"Yes. I give you my word that I am speaking with absolute sincerity. You think you can live with impunity in this environment without becoming like all the rest of them; while I tell you that that is a natural necessity. Suppose we expatiate on that a bit . . . will you allow me?"
"Certainly."
"In the country you must know the woods. . . . Now please recall to your mind the woodsmen. Have they not in themselves something of that wood which they are continually chopping? They become stiff and stalwart, gloomy and indifferent. And what of the butcher? Does not a man who is continually occupied in killing, who breathes in the odor of raw meat and steaming blood, in time become stamped with the same characteristics as those beasts which he has slain? He does, and I would say that he is himself a beast. And what of the peasant? Do you know the village well?"