Lady Windermere's Fan · OmniClassics

LADY WINDERMERE’S FAN A PLAY ABOUT A GOOD WOMAN BY OSCAR WILDE * * * * * METHUEN & CO. LTD. 36 ESSEX STREET W.C. LONDON _Sixteenth Edition_ _First Published_ _1893_ _First Issued by Methuen & Co. Ltd._ (_Limited Editions on _1908_ Hand-made Paper and Japanese Vellum_) _February_ _Third Edition_ (_F’cap_ 8_vo_, 5_s._ _net_) _September_ _1909_ _Fourth Edition_ (5_s._ _net_) _June_ _1910_ _Fifth Edition_ (_F’cap_ 8_vo_, 1_s._ _net_) _November 3rd_ _1911_ _Sixth Edition_ (1_s._ _net_) _November_ _1911_ _Eighth Edition_ (1_s._ _net_) _1912_, _Ninth and Tenth Editions_ (1_s._ _net_) _1913_, _Eleventh Edition_ (1_s._ _net_) _1914_, _Twelfth Edition_ (1_s._ _net_) _1915_, _Thirteenth Edition_ (1_s._ _net_) _1916_, _Fourteenth and Fifteenth Edition_ (1_s._ _net_) _1917_ _Sixteenth Edition_ (5_s._ _net_) _1917_ _The literary and dramatic rights of_ “_Lady Windermere’s Fan_” _belong to Sir George Alexander_, _by arrangement with whom this play is included in this edition_. _The acting version_ (_Samuel French_) _does not contain the complete text_. * * * * * TO THE DEAR MEMORY OF ROBERT EARL OF LYTTON IN AFFECTION AND ADMIRATION * * * * * THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY Lord Windermere Lord Darlington Lord Augustus Lorton Mr. Dumby Mr. Cecil Graham Mr. Hopper Parker, Butler * * * * * Lady Windermere The Duchess of Berwick Lady Agatha Carlisle Lady Plymdale Lady Stutfield Lady Jedburgh Mrs. Cowper-Cowper Mrs. Erlynne Rosalie, Maid THE SCENES OF THE PLAY ACT I. _Morning-room in Lord Windermere’s house_. ACT II. _Drawing-room in Lord Windermere’s house_. ACT III. _Lord Darlington’s rooms_. ACT IV. _Same as Act I._ TIME: _The Present_. PLACE: _London_. _The action of the play takes place within twenty-four hours_, _beginning on a Tuesday afternoon at five o’clock_, _and ending the next day at_ 1.30 _p.m._ LONDON: ST. JAMES’S THEATRE _Lessee and Manager_: _Mr. George Alexander_ _February_ 22_nd_, 1892. LORD WINDERMERE _Mr. George Alexander_. LORD DARLINGTON _Mr. Nutcombe Gould_. LORD AUGUSTUS LORTON _Mr. H. H. Vincent_. MR. CECIL GRAHAM _Mr. Ben Webster_. MR. DUMBY _Mr. Vane-Tempest_. MR. HOPPER _Mr. Alfred Holles_. PARKER (_Butler_) _Mr. V. Sansbury_. LADY WINDERMERE _Miss Lily Hanbury_. THE DUCHESS OF BERWICK _Miss Fanny Coleman_. LADY AGATHA CARLISLE _Miss Laura Graves_. LADY PLYMDALE _Miss Granville_. LADY JEDBURGH _Miss B. Page_. LADY STUTFIELD _Miss Madge Girdlestone_. MRS. COWPER-COWPER _Miss A. de Winton_. MRS. ERLYNNE _Miss Marion Terry_. ROSALIE (_Maid_) _Miss Winifred Dolan_. FIRST ACT SCENE _Morning-room of Lord Windermere’s house in Carlton House Terrace_. _Doors C. and R. Bureau with books and papers R._ _Sofa with small tea-table L._ _Window opening on to terrace L._ _Table R._ [LADY WINDERMERE _is at table R._, _arranging roses in a blue bowl_.] [_Enter_ PARKER.] PARKER. Is your ladyship at home this afternoon? LADY WINDERMERE. Yes—who has called? PARKER. Lord Darlington, my lady. LADY WINDERMERE. [_Hesitates for a moment_.] Show him up—and I’m at home to any one who calls. PARKER. Yes, my lady. [_Exit C._] LADY WINDERMERE. It’s best for me to see him before to-night. I’m glad he’s come. [_Enter_ PARKER _C._] PARKER. Lord Darlington, [_Enter_ LORD DARLINGTON _C._] [_Exit_ PARKER.] LORD DARLINGTON. How do you do, Lady Windermere? LADY WINDERMERE. How do you do, Lord Darlington? No, I can’t shake hands with you. My hands are all wet with these roses. Aren’t they lovely? They came up from Selby this morning. LORD DARLINGTON. They are quite perfect. [_Sees a fan lying on the table_.] And what a wonderful fan! May I look at it? LADY WINDERMERE. Do. Pretty, isn’t it! It’s got my name on it, and everything. I have only just seen it myself. It’s my husband’s birthday present to me. You know to-day is my birthday? LORD DARLINGTON. No? Is it really? LADY WINDERMERE. Yes, I’m of age to-day. Quite an important day in my life, isn’t it? That is why I am giving this party to-night. Do sit down. [_Still arranging flowers_.] LORD DARLINGTON. [_Sitting down_.] I wish I had known it was your birthday, Lady Windermere. I would have covered the whole street in front of your house with flowers for you to walk on. They are made for you. [_A short pause_.] LADY WINDERMERE. Lord Darlington, you annoyed me last night at the Foreign Office. I am afraid you are going to annoy me again. LORD DARLINGTON. I, Lady Windermere? [_Enter_ PARKER _and_ FOOTMAN _C._, _with tray and tea things_.] LADY WINDERMERE. Put it there, Parker. That will do. [_Wipes her hands with her pocket-handkerchief_, _goes to tea-table_, _and sits down_.] Won’t you come over, Lord Darlington? [_Exit_ PARKER _C._] LORD DARLINGTON. [_Takes chair and goes across L.C._] I am quite miserable, Lady Windermere. You must tell me what I did. [_Sits down at table L._] LADY WINDERMERE. Well, you kept paying me elaborate compliments the whole evening. LORD DARLINGTON. [_Smiling_.] Ah, nowadays we are all of us so hard up, that the only pleasant things to pay _are_ compliments. They’re the only things we _can_ pay. LADY WINDERMERE. [_Shaking her head_.] No, I am talking very seriously. You mustn’t laugh, I am quite serious. I don’t like compliments, and I don’t see why a man should think he is pleasing a woman enormously when he says to her a whole heap of things that he doesn’t mean. LORD DARLINGTON. Ah, but I did mean them. [_Takes tea which she offers him_.] LADY WINDERMERE. [_Gravely_.] I hope not. I should be sorry to have to quarrel with you, Lord Darlington. I like you very much, you know that. But I shouldn’t like you at all if I thought you were what most other men are. Believe me, you are better than most other men, and I sometimes think you pretend to be worse. LORD DARLINGTON. We all have our little vanities, Lady Windermere. LADY WINDERMERE. Why do you make that your special one? [_Still seated at table L._] LORD DARLINGTON. [_Still seated L.C._] Oh, nowadays so many conceited people go about Society pretending to be good, that I think it shows rather a sweet and modest disposition to pretend to be bad. Besides, there is this to be said. If you pretend to be good, the world takes you very seriously. If you pretend to be bad, it doesn’t. Such is the astounding stupidity of optimism. LADY WINDERMERE. Don’t you _want_ the world to take you seriously then, Lord Darlington? LORD DARLINGTON. No, not the world. Who are the people the world takes seriously? All the dull people one can think of, from the Bishops down to the bores. I should like _you_ to take me very seriously, Lady Windermere, _you_ more than any one else in life. LADY WINDERMERE. Why—why me? LORD DARLINGTON. [_After a slight hesitation_.] Because I think we might be great friends. Let us be great friends. You may want a friend some day. LADY WINDERMERE. Why do you say that? LORD DARLINGTON. Oh!—we all want friends at times. LADY WINDERMERE. I think we’re very good friends already, Lord Darlington. We can always remain so as long as you don’t— LORD DARLINGTON. Don’t what? LADY WINDERMERE. Don’t spoil it by saying extravagant silly things to me. You think I am a Puritan, I suppose? Well, I have something of the Puritan in me. I was brought up like that. I am glad of it. My mother died when I was a mere child. I lived always with Lady Julia, my father’s elder sister, you know. She was stern to me, but she taught me what the world is forgetting, the difference that there is between what is right and what is wrong. _She_ allowed of no compromise. _I_ allow of none. LORD DARLINGTON. My dear Lady Windermere! LADY WINDERMERE. [_Leaning back on the sofa_.] You look on me as being behind the age.—Well, I am! I should be sorry to be on the same level as an age like this. LORD DARLINGTON. You think the age very bad? LADY WINDERMERE. Yes. Nowadays people seem to look on life as a speculation. It is not a speculation. It is a sacrament. Its ideal is Love. Its purification is sacrifice. LORD DARLINGTON. [_Smiling_.] Oh, anything is better than being sacrificed! LADY WINDERMERE. [_Leaning forward_.] Don’t say that. LORD DARLINGTON. I do say it. I feel it—I know it. [_Enter_ PARKER _C._] PARKER. The men want to know if they are to put the carpets on the terrace for to-night, my lady? LADY WINDERMERE. You don’t think it will rain, Lord Darlington, do you? LORD DARLINGTON. I won’t hear of its raining on your birthday! LADY WINDERMERE. Tell them to do it at once, Parker. [_Exit_ PARKER _C._] LORD DARLINGTON. [_Still seated_.] Do you think then—of course I am only putting an imaginary instance—do you think that in the case of a young married couple, say about two years married, if the husband suddenly becomes the intimate friend of a woman of—well, more than doubtful character—is always calling upon her, lunching with her, and probably paying her bills—do you think that the wife should not console herself? LADY WINDERMERE. [_Frowning_.] Console herself? LORD DARLINGTON. Yes, I think she should—I think she has the right. LADY WINDERMERE. Because the husband is vile—should the wife be vile also? LORD DARLINGTON. Vileness is a terrible word, Lady Windermere. LADY WINDERMERE. It is a terrible thing, Lord Darlington. LORD DARLINGTON. Do you know I am afraid that good people do a great deal of harm in this world. Certainly the greatest harm they do is that they make badness of such extraordinary importance. It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious. I take the side of the charming, and you, Lady Windermere, can’t help belonging to them. LADY WINDERMERE. Now, Lord Darlington. [_Rising and crossing R._, _front of him_.] Don’t stir, I am merely going to finish my flowers. [_Goes to table R.C._] LORD DARLINGTON. [_Rising and moving chair_.] And I must say I think you are very hard on modern life, Lady Windermere. Of course there is much against it, I admit. Most women, for instance, nowadays, are rather mercenary. LADY WINDERMERE. Don’t talk about such people.