i.i
[Scene: A ZOMBIE walks into a room. He is well dressed, clean shaven, and carrying a speech. He is met with applause from an audience. He walks up to the podium at center stage and begins his lecture.]
ZOMBIE [putting on his glasses]: I'd like to begin with a story about a Chinese philosopher who dreamt he was a butterfly. The dream was so vivid that when he awoke he could no longer tell whether or not he was a Chinese philosopher dreaming he was a butterfly, or butterfly who was dreaming that he was Chinese philosopher. [pause]
Things had to proceed as they did. There was really no alternative. Biologically speaking, we do feed on you. No offense. And it's not as though we don't sympathize. You are all very cute. Believe me, I was like you. Really, I swear. And to be absolutely truthful, it's not that great. The whole business just wasn't for me. Much happier now. Plus all the brains I could ever want…[the ZOMBIE lecturer continues to rattle on as the scene fades.] [blackout]
i.ii
[Scene: A secondary school in France. The main auditorium has been converted to a refugee shelter. Enter LOGICIAN and OLD GENTLEMAN speaking to each other on the auditorium stage. JEAN and BERENGER are slumped down in the front row. They have just woken up. Their belongings are scattered around them. BERENGER begins drinking gin. JEAN does not approve.]
LOGICIAN [to the Old Gentleman]: Here is an example of a syllogism. The zombie has four paws. My cat had four paws. Therefore, my cat is a zombie.
OLD GENTLEMAN [to the Logician]: My dog has got four paws.
LOGICIAN [to the Old Gentleman]: Then it's a zombie.
BERENGER [to Jean]: I've barely got the strength to go on living. Maybe I don't even want to.
OLD GENTLEMAN [to the Logician, after deep reflection]: So you're saying that, logically speaking, my dog must be a zombie?
LOGICIAN [to the Old Gentleman]: Logically, yes. But the contrary is also true.
BERENGER [to Jean]: Solitude seems to oppress me. And so does the company of other people.
JEAN [to Berenger]: You contradict yourself. What oppresses you - solitude, or the company of others? You consider yourself a thinker, yet you're devoid of logic.
OLD GENTLEMAN [to the Logician]: Logic is a very beautiful thing.
LOGICIAN [to the Old Gentleman]: As long as it is not abused.
BERENGER [to Jean]: Life is an abnormal business.
JEAN: On the contrary. Nothing could be more natural, and the proof is that people go on living--.
BERENGER [cutting Jean off mid-sentence]: There are more dead people than living! And their numbers are increasing. The living are getting rarer.
JEAN: The dead don’t really exist, there's no getting away from that! Ah! Ah ...! [He gives a huge laugh, though somewhat sarcastic.] Yet--we're oppressed by them. How can we be oppressed by something that doesn't exist?
BERENGER: I sometimes wonder if I exist myself.
JEAN: You don't exist, my dear Berenger, because you don't think. Start thinking, then you will.
LOGICIAN [to the Old Gentleman]: Another syllogism. All zombies die. Socrates is dead. Therefore Socrates is a zombie.
[blackout]
i.iii
[Resume: ZOMBIE in the lecture room at the podium. Time seems to have passed since scene i.i.]
ZOMBIE: Given that the human body rejects viruses, the analogy that the Earth could reject the human species as a virus is very apropos and has good biological precedent. As an operation, the extinction would be cataclysmic. What we have here, what we are experiencing, is an aborted symbiosis in which the parasite, our source of nutrition, is exhausting the host to such an extent that the host has designed a new specie of antibody--us. Said specie is however incapable of exhausting it's parasitic ration. Rather, their population is bottlenecked just enough to guarantee mutual survival for both the antibody and the parasite. Restoring the initial parasite to host ratio. And in doing so, assuring a sustainable future for the host.
[blackout]
[end]
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I really like that last bit about Earth rejecting the human species as a virus. It connects to the idea that maybe zombies are somehow connected to an environmental problem, that we've simply abused our Earth and this is how it is getting back at us. Really cool writing you've done here!
The idea of the Earth itself maintaining homeostasis...doesn't seem that absurd to me. Especially when I think about dinosaurs. I probably just lost half my audience, but give me just 30 more econds of your time. We are a blip on the timeline of the Earth, and dinosaurs were another blip. Imagine if they didn't just eat each other all the time, or vegetation, or swim around in the oceans and did the same thing (see sharks or birds for modern day dinosaur relatives, everyone knows this already but it's cool to bring it up) but kept a record of their time, other than leaving their bones around to be fossilized (sp?). What if zombies would were just the next step in the evolutionary chain? And wore glasses? Gave speeches? The blog above is full of brain food. Eat up.
Y'know Rachel, I'm in an archaeology class right now, and I've been thinking of the same thing! Humans evolved over such a long period of time; have we stopped evolving, or is there still another link in our evolutionary chain...?
Zombies as a "next step" is an even more interesting idea. Hey, they've beaten death, something that humans alone can't overcome. Death, disease, and malnutrition seem to be a thing of the past where zombies are concerned, for the most part.
This piece is really interesting on many levels. I love that you wrote it as a play, the stage notes provide really helpful context and they make the whole story very easy to visualize. I also love the juxtaposition of philosophy and the zombie apocalypse. It brings and absurd reality to the whole senario that is really refreshing.