© Paris Review Fall 1998
The Paris Review; Fall 1998 40.148

L'histoire du Soldat
adapted by Kurt Vonnegut

A production of this work with a new text was envisioned by Robert Johnson, the artistic director of the New York Philomusica Chamber Ensemble. Feeling that the rather tepid Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz fairy tale hardly suited the times (World War I) or caught the character of a soldier deserting the killing grounds of the Western Front, he thought instantly that Kurt Vonnegut, himself a prisoner of war in World War II and a survivor of the bombing of Dresden (Slaughterhouse Five) would be a perfect choice to provide a completely new accompaniment to Stravinsky's music. In January, 1993, Vonnegut completed the text, changing the venue to World War II and picking Pvt. Eddie Slovik, the first US soldier executed for desertion since the Civil War, for his lead character. There have been a number of productions of the work, the first in Alice Tully Hall, May 6, 1993, starring Eli Wallach, Ann Reinking, Malcolm Gets, and Martin Vidnovic, choreographed and directed by Patricia Birch.

CAST: Major General, Soldier, Military Police Sergeant, Red Cross Girl, Two Ordinary Infantry Privates

PROLOGUE

GENERAL: Good evening. L'histoire du soldat, in English A Soldier's Story, has until now been performed as it was premiered in
1918, in peaceful Switzerland when World War I, in which eight million soldiers died, was going on. Bursts of brilliant music by the
great Igor Stravinsky alternate with spoken words written by the composer's Swiss friend, the novelist Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz.
Neither collaborator had ever been a soldier. The story Ramuz wrote to go with Stravinsky's music is based on an intentionally silly,
whimsical Russian folktale, supposedly about a soldier. But this soldier is unlike any real soldier in all of history. How is he armed?
With a rifle? With grenades? With a spear? With a violin, friends and neighbors. A violin! That's it! Let's hope it doesn't rain.

He is all alone, as a real soldier almost never is-a private without comrades, without a superior to tell him what to do next. Does he
run into an enemy? Or at least into a military policeman, who asks him what in hell he's doing away from his unit, and armed with
nothing but a violin? Not this soldier. He runs into a devil, who offers him great riches and the favors of a beautiful noblewoman, in
exchange for violin lessons. To protest that this soldier isn't a real soldier would be like protesting that the wolf in Prokofiev's Peter
and the Wolf isn't a real wolf-in yet another lighthearted Russian folktale set to music. (Pause. ) To protest that the soldier isn't a real
soldier would be perfectly inane, if it weren't for this: Igor Stravinsky's music, possibly in unconscious response to the sufferings and
deaths of millions of real soldiers not far away, is anything but innocent. Its folkloric merriment is so soured by wry melodic ironies
that it might in fact be a setting for a real down-and-dirty soldier's story.

We propose to prove this-as I become the commander of an American infantry division invading Germany very near the end of World
War II. Our front is three miles (pointing left) in that direction. It is under heavy bombardment-an erupting earth under an exploding
sky and a blizzard of razor blades. Not nice.

PART I-THE SOLDIER'S MARCH

GENERAL: ( Wry, weary, humane) A victory march? Almost. Not quite, The enemy capital Is nearly in sight. The decisive battles Have all been fought and won. In a very short time, now, This war will be done. So I order my men, children, actually, and far from home, To fight and die for nothing.

(SOLDIER enters left, goofy, dazed. ) What the hell are you supposed to be? No rifle, no helmet, no pack. What a sad, sad sack!

SOLDIER: A sack of shit. I quit. I quit.

GENERAL: Snap to attention! Salute! Salute!

SOLDIER: That's all over for me. You can have my fucking soldier suit. (Shell-shocked, singing dreamily) We don't want no more of
your bullshit, We don't want no more of your bullshit. We don't want no more of your bullshit. We just want to eo home.

GENERAL: Where are you supposed to be today?

SOLDIER: Where all the people are getting killed. So I ran away.

GENERAL: That's all you've got to say?

SOLDIER: If you knew me, you'd know That all my life I've run away. Never asked to be born in the first place.

GENERAL: You couldn't have run away to a worse place. I can have you shot for being here.

SOLDIER: All I want is what we're fighting for

GENERAL: Which is?

SOLDIER: Freedom from fear. (SOLDIER laughs helplessly.) Kyuk kyuk kyuk.

PART II-AIRS BY A STREAM

GENERAL: (Calling) MP! MP! (MP enters smartly, salutes.)

MP: Sir!

GENERAL: Take this disgusting wreck somewhere And wring his neck.

MP: Company G, or I miss my guess. Artillery had their range. One hell of a mess. Probably one of the replacements came in last
night. (To SOLDIER) That right? SOLDIER: (Airily) Howdy do.

GENERAL: A pitiful sight! The human trash they send us now, And
they're supposed to fight! Arrest this creep, And charge him with desertion In the face of the enemy. (To SOLDIER)

You are about to become infamous All the way to Supreme Headquarters. SOLDIER: Little old me? Just a P.V.T.?

GENERAL: You'll see.

SOLDIER: The guy in the foxhole with me, He quit, too.

GENERAL: (Emptily) Whoop-dee-doo. What was his name?

SOLDIER: Should have been Fountain.

GENERAL: Fountain? (To MP) Write that down.

MP: Yes, sir!

SOLDIER: That's what his neck was After his head fell off.

PART III-THE SOLDIER'S MARCH

(SOLDIER and MP in ruined farmhouse)

SOLDIER: Nice place we have here. I'm a very lucky louse.

MP: Used to be a farmer's house. This is where an enemy sniper died. They blew off the roof, And shot out the windows With him
inside.

SOLDIER: Died a hero. What a way to go. Somebody should tell his mother so.

MP: His helmet hangs over there on a rusty nail, and this former family dwelling Is now a makeshift jail.

SOLDIER: Cozy.

MP: It is now my duty, captured coward, Who could take no more, To read aloud to you Article Number Fifty-eight From the Articles
of War.

SOLDIER: My mother used to read aloud to me Before I went sleepy-bye.

MP:Article Number Fifty-eight is about (pause) Going sleepy-bye.

SOLDIER: Love it already!

MP: (Reading)"The penalty for misbehavior In the face of the enemy-"

SOLDIER: Never saw one.

MP: "Shall be dishonorable discharge From the service-"

SOLDIER: (Gaily) Can I go home now?

MP: "Forfeiture of all pay and allowances-"

SOLDIER: (Mockingly) Boo-hoo.

MP: "And being shot to death By a firing squad."

SOLDIER: I'm dead. I'm dead.

MP: Didn't you hear what I said? They haven't shot anybody in this man's army For what you did since 1865, Since the Civil War!

Not one American was shot for cowardice During the Spanish-American War. Not one American was shot for cowardice During the
First World War. And nobody is going to be shot for cowardice In this damn war. You're as safe as you'd be in your mother's arms.

SOLDIER: You don't know my mother, brother. Or my bad luck.

MP: (Impatiently) Oh fuck! A couple of years in prison, Ten years at most. You'll be well-fed, And warm as toast.

PART IV-PASTORALE

(RED CROSS GIRL enters, stops at imaginary doorway.)

RED CROSS: (Aside) The Red Cross girl. I'm their mother, their sister, The girl next doorWhen what they need, so close to Death,
is a brainless whore, A holeA piece of meat with leaky orifices, Which is what they've become, Diddley dum, diddley dum. (Calling)
Anybody in there? Red Cross. Red Cross. (To SOLDIER) Who says you're not lucky? Red Cross!

She can get you coffee and doughnuts, Shaving cream, toothpaste and dental floss. If you were an officer, She might fuck you.
Since you are an enlisted man, She will duck you, And your cow-eyed pleas for relief.

RED CROSS: (Aside) Good grief! As though I weren't an angel of mercy, but a rank-happy sex-appeal abuser.

SOLDIER: Don't tell her I'm a loser. Don't tell her what I did, that I ran away.

MP: Entrez, mademoiselle, s'il vous plait. (Aside) Feminine sex appeal corrupts. Feminine sex appeal near the front corrupts
Absolutely. That she sleeps with the general Is common knowledge.

RED CROSS: (Aside) Not because he's a general, But because we've both been to college. He went to West Point, I went to Bryn
Mawr.

MP: (Aside) Har de har har.

RED CROSS: I'm here to pay your prisoner a call.

MP: No prisoner in here at all, at all. Just me and my heroic buddy here.

SOLDIER: (Aside) Nobody here but us chickens.

RED CROSS: Oh dear. I wonder where they've got him.

MP: Search me.

SOLDIER: Search me.

RED CROSS: You think they've already shot him?

MP: They don't shoot deserters anymore. (To SOLDIER) Tell her.

SOLDIER: They don't shoot deserters anymore.

RED CROSS: You haven't heard? Here's the latest word: Supreme Headquarters has just made a decision Which sickens the
commander of this division. The deserter he's put under arrest Is to be made a lesson for all the rest. And killed.

SOLDIER: (A two-note long) Bing-go.

PART V-AIRS BY A STREAM

(Same farmhouse. SOLDIER sitting, inert, resigned, MP standing. GENERAL enters. MP snaps to attention, salutes.)

MP: (Barking) A-ten-hut!

(SOLDIER stays seated. GENERAL stands over him. )

GENERAL: On your feet!

SOLDIER: (Inert, expecting to be taken to
execution) I'm ready. Make it short and sweet.

GENERAL: You're not going to be shot. You're going back to your platoon.

SOLDIER: Take a flying fuck at the moon. I'd just run away again, If I wasn't killed before I could do it. So screw it.

GENERAL: In violation of orders From Supreme Headquarters, I've offered you a chance to go on living, And you just blew it.

SOLDIER: I'm no damn good. Never was. So get it over with.

MP: What about your folks? SOLDIER: Sorry they ever had me. Look at me! Me and my Folks are dirty jokes.

GENERAL: A girl? A wife?

SOLDIER: No girl, no wife, no fucking life. Get it over with! (GENERAL does dementia dance.)

GENERAL: Act like a raving maniac! Put on a really zany act. Be so sick and crazy that you never should have Passed your draft
physical in the first place. And save your butt!

SOLDIER: I'm not a nut. I'm just a disgrace to the human race. At least it won't hurt much. At least I'll know who did it and why,
which is more than I'd know If I were some poor runt at the front. At least it won't leave me a cripple. Get it over with!

PART VI-THE SOLDIER'S MARCH

(GENERAL and RED CROSS in his office. He is seated, she stands behind him, massaging his neck and shoulders.)

GENERAL: "For this relief much thanks; 'Tis bitter cold, And I am sick at heart."

RED CROSS: A general quoting William Shakespeare!

GENERAL: The world is full of surprises, dear. West Point was my joint,

But my father was an English teacher. RED CROSS: Mine was a preacher.

GENERAL: After years of faithful and honorable service To my nation, I am now under orders to commit What either of our fathers
Would declare an abomination. For me, Betty, And for my beloved division, It will be An utterly undeserved humiliation. (RED
CROSS stops massage, moves away, spooked.)

RED CROSS: Betty is dead. My name is Caroline.

GENERAL: What happened to Betty?

RED CROSS: She had body lice.

GENERAL: We all do. (He scratches himself.)

RED CROSS: On her way to the delousing station, Betty stepped on a mine. (Scratches herself) The lice lived through it.

GENERAL: If anybody can, the lice can do it. (Pause, with RED CROSS considering him and their empty relationship from a
distance.)

RED CROSS: You must have sent many boys to die.

GENERAL: Without batting an eyeIn North Africa, and Sicily and France. But every one of them had a fighting chance. I now find
myself the only American officer In eighty years to be ordered To stage a shameful dance, With some poor, weak son of a bitch
Who has probably shit in his pants, And shoot him. Some show! It'll let every soldier know That he can be killed for entertainment.

RED CROSS: Entertainment for who?

GENERAL: Somebody at Supreme H.Q. (He scratches himself.) Son of a bitch! Oh, how I itch!

PART VII-THE ROYAL MARCH

(GENERAL, RED CROSS, SOLDIER and MP do lice dance, scratching. All but SOLDIER and MP exit, setting next scene, which is
back in farmhouse. SOLDIER is seated, happily writing with pencil on a pad. )

MP: You've already made quite an impression On people who would really Rather not shoot you. What more do you hope to
accomplish With a written confession?

SOLDIER: I want everybody to know it's okay, What they have to do. The more I think about it, The less reason there is to raise A
stink about it. I always wanted to do something good. Nobody ever thought I could. All of a sudden, guess what? I can give my life
for my country. Other soldiers will fight better because of me.

MP: (Vomiting sounds) Bluhh. Uhhh. (etc. ) (RED CROSs enters, carrying a paperback booklet, an army manual, stops at imaginary
door.)

RED CROSS: Red Cross! Red Cross!

MP: (To SOLDIER ironically) Coffee and doughnuts, shaving cream, Toothpaste and dental floss. (To RED CROSS): Entrez,
mademoiselle, s'il vous plait.

RED CROSS: (Entering) How is the prisoner this awful day?

SOLDIER: (Cheerfully) I'm all set to play.

MP: He says it's all okay.

RED CROSS: The general will do anything to stop it, If only you'll cooperate.

SOLDIER: (Radiant) I'm giving the orders now.

RED CROSS: You've turned the general, Who's one in a million, into a chickenhearted civilian.

SOLDER: (Radiant) Tough shit for him.

RED CROSS: He sent this book. He thought you ought to have a look. It's an army manual written in 1863.

MP: The Civil War.

SOLDIER: It's just for me?

RED CROSS: (Hauntedly) We'll see. We'll see. It's still in print. This copy's mint. (SOLDIER takes manual.) You now have in your
hands, Along with your own life, So help you God, The official manual For the organization and duties Of a firing squad.

SOLDIER: Somebody must be really pissed off at me. Who could it be? So mightily pissed off At little me.

PART VIII-THE LITTLE CONCERT

MP: (Reading) "The place of execution will be prepared to provide For a back wall made of absorbent material, before Which the
prisoner will be placed. An upright post Will be placed in front of the back wall, And will be used to support the prisoner If necessary.
If, while the condemned is being prepared for, Or marched to, The place of execution, Collapse has taken place Or is imminent, A
suitable braceboard And straps Will be adjusted."

PART IX-THREE DANCES

(GENERAL tangos with RED CROSS, SOLDIER with MP. GENERAL exits, leaving SOLDIER, RED CROSS and MP to continue
previous scene.)

SOLDIER: (Reading aloud, with MP raising his hand whenever sergeant is mentioned) "A firing squad in charge of a sergeant,
Consisting of not less than eight And no more than twelve enlisted men"(Aside) All pals of mine"Enlisted men skilled in the use Of
the regulation rifle"(Aside) I used to have one of those. Easy come, easy go"Will be selected by the officer designated To carry out
the act Of execution. When the hood has been adjusted, And the signal given that the prisoner Is in final readiness, The firing squad
Will be marched by the sergeant To a designated spot And formed in a single or double rank, Facing the prisoner, And not less than
twenty paces from him. The members of the firing squad Will be armed with regulation rifles, Each of which will have been loaded
And the pieces locked by the officer Charged with the execution of the sentence. One of the rifles will contain a blank round, And the
identity of this piece will not Be disclosed."

PART X-THE DEVIL'S DANCE

(GENERAL enters left and RED CROSS retreats to right, to serve as observers, while MP and SOLDIER and two other ENLISTED
MEN dance a pantomime of taking SOLDIER from place of confinement to place of execution, tying to a post, and putting a hood
over his head.)

GENERAL: So we shot him.

PART XI-LITTLE CHORALE

GENERAL: His last words were

SOLDIER: (SOLDIER removes hood, takes time before speaking.) They'd better be good. (Experimenting unseriously) How much
wood could a woodchuck chuck, If a woodchuck could chuck wood?

GENERAL: His last words were

SOLDIER: (Experimenting) Oh, beautiful for spacious skies, For amber waves of grain.

GENERAL: His last words were

SOLDIER: With my life all through, These words will have to do: (Pause) Remember me. (Silence. ALL onstage are drained, sick of
the story, no longer military, becoming actors in the present, having done a job they didn't like. GENERAL strips off tunic. MP and
two ENLISTED MEN get rid of helmet liners, throw them away or whatever. SOLDIER remains at the stake, still a troubling figure.)

GENERAL: (To audience, a casual host once more) No more acting. (To SOLDIER) Not coming down from the cross?

SOLDIER: In a minute.

GENERAL: No rush.

SOLDIER: (Sepulchrally) There's something else the people here should know.

GENERAL: Indeed. Would you like to tell?

SOLDIER: Let a woman tell.

RED CROSS: By process of elimination that must be me. (Pulls herself together, takes center stage) Okay. This new libretto is
based very loosely on the true story of the execution of an American private, a friendless replacement sent at once to a unit under
heavy artillery fire. It was too much for him. He was terrified. He ran away. His name was Eddie D. Slovik.

MP: Serial number 36896415. The first number, three, indicates that he hadn't volunteered. Eddie Slovik was a draftee, a poor boy
from a Polish neighborhood in Detroit, who had been arrested once for petty thievery.

SOLDIER: Eddie Slovik confessed that he had deserted. He said he would do it again, if he was forced to fight.

RED CROSS: (Pleading his case) That's how Eddie Slovik was. Under fire, Eddie became what he was born to be.

SOLDIER: A deserter from G Company, 109th Infantry.

GENERAL: Twenty-eighth Infantry Division, which was engaged in heavy fighting near the French village of Elbeuf.

ALL: Poor son of a bitch!

GENERAL: All this can be found in a splendid book by William Bradford Huie, The Execution of Private Slovik.

SOLDIER: Now out of print.

GENERAL: Published in 1954.

PART XII-DEVIL'S SONG

SOLDIER: Eddie Slovik, the only American soldier Executed for cowardice Since the Civil War, And to the present day. He died of
multiple bullet wounds At 10:04 in the morning, On January 31, 1945.

GENERAL: Instantly! That much we know.

SOLDIER: Easy come. Easy go. Private Slovik had no last words. We put those words in his mouth:

ALL: Remember me.

RED CROSS: He was shot in a French garden in the wintertime.

PART XIII-GREAT CHORALE

RED CROSS: I showed our libretto to a Russian emigre, and he couldn't believe it.

GENERAL: Couldn't believe what?

RED CROSS: Thousands of soldiers were shot by their own armies in two world wars for running away from the enemy: Russians,
Germans, Italians, British, French. You name it. It made no sense to him to hear That we, the United States of America, Had
executed Exactly one. He thought we must be crazy.

SOLDIER: The man who signed Eddie Slovik's death warrant was General of the Armies Dwight David Eisenhower.

ALL: Ike.

GENERAL: Years later, General Eisenhower, then retired from the presidency to his estate in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, was asked
by the historian Bruce Catton to comment on the unique position in American military history to which he had assigned Eddie
Slovik. And the general is said by Catton to have Replied

MP: May I?

GENERAL: By all means.

MP: (Impersonating Eisenhower) As a matter of fact, I approved that one. It was for a repeated case of desertion. The man refused to
believe That he would ever be executed. At the very last moment, I sent my judge advocate general to see him. And I said, "If you
will go back and serve in your company honorably, and until this war is over, you'll get an honorable discharge, and not the death
sentence." He said, "Baloney," or words to that effect.

ALL: (Continuing impersonation) And so he was executed.

THE TRIUMPHAL MARCH OF THE DEVIL

THE END