MADAME PEPITA

A monologue from the play by Gregorio Martinez Sierra


  • NOTE: This monologue is reprinted from The Plays of G. Martinez Sierra. G. Martinez Sierra. New York: E.P. Dutton, 1922.
  • DON GUILLERMO: There is no obligation whatever upon you to cry. Even if there were, your feelings are beyond your control. To compel ourselves to feel what we do not feel is hypocrisy, a fraud upon ourselves, because it mortifies our pride to realize that our feelings do not measure up to our expectations. If your feelings do not prompt you to cry, you ought not to cry. Tears, unless they are heart-felt, are injurious. They do no good to the deceased. Your love has evaporated, like perfume which has stood in a wardrobe for years. Today you have been cleaning house; you find the bottle and it is empty. The contents are gone, they have been dissipated, they have ceased to be. You have forgotten him, so why worry? Little by little our bodies change, until, after seven years, not one atom of what we once were remains. Remember, he has been absent sixteen years. Not one vestige now remains of the flesh and blood that glowed and quivered with love for him. You are not the same woman, you are a different woman, who has had nothing whatever to do with that man.

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