I Translated for You: a scene fromThe Tree Climber by Tawfiq Al-Hakim (pages 45—47)

There are no sets in this play, neither are there divides between times and places.??Sometimes, the past, present, and future are all present at the same time.??And one person may occasionally be present at two places on the stage and talking in his or her own voice twice at the same time. Here, everything interconnects with everything else. There are no fixed props.??Every character in the play makes his or her appearance carrying his or her props and accessories and taking them out, as he or she exits, when the scene has finished.??Hence, the detective appears carrying his chair and file in his right hand.??Following him, the old maidservant makes her appearance carrying a light table, which she places in front of him, and on which he spreads out his papers.?

Detective: When exactly did your mistress disappear?

Maid: Just as the lizard returned to its hole.

Detective: Do you mean at the sunset?

Maid: I didn’t see the sun set.

Detective: And when does the lizard return to its hole?

Maid: When my master comes out from under the tree.

Detective: And when does your master come out from under the tree??

Maid: When my mistress yells for him.

Detective: And when does your mistress yell for him?

Maid: When it gets chilly in the yard.

Detective: And when does it get chilly in the yard?

Maid: When my mistress tells him so.

Detective: And when does your mistress tell him so?

Maid: When I am done with my work here and get ready to go home.

Detective: And why do you go home?

Maid: Because I always spend the night there with my blind and disable husband whom I support.

Detective: And when you were getting ready to go home on the day of the incident, was your mistress here?

Maid: No, she wasn’t.

Detective: Where was she then?

Maid: She’d gone out.

Detective: Before yelling for her husband as usual?

Maid: Yes, before yelling for him.??She left him in the yard.

Detective: Why?

Maid: She said she wouldn’t be away longer than half an hour—only as long as it takes to go down the road to buy a skein of wool with which to knit a little dress for her daughter.?

Detective: Her daughter?

Maid: Yes, her daughter Bahiyya.

Detective: And where is her daughter Bahiyya?

Maid: She hasn’t been born.

Detective: Hasn’t been born???And when is she going to be born?

Maid: She won’t be born.

Detective: And how do you know she won’t be born?

Maid: It is a known fact.

Detective: But I do not know—tell me.

Maid: She was going to be born forty years ago, but she wasn’t.

Detective: And why wasn’t she born??