SAINT FRANCIS THE JONGLEUR
A Dramatic Monologue
by Dario Fo
translated by Ed Emery
[Please note: This is the first part of a
draft translation. For reference only. Please do not copy or circulate.]
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SAINT
FRANCIS THE JONGLEUR
A
Dramatic Monologue
by
Dario Fo
translated
by Ed Emery
[Dario Fo tells how the preachings of St Francis
of Assisi were true examples of the art of the giullare, which he used
to provoke and move people through laughter. As in the sermon which he preached
in Bologna on 15 August 1222.]
Introduction
Lu Santu Jullare Francesco is the title of
the show with which we opened at the Spoleto Festival in early Summer 1999.
It is a narration of the life of St Francis of
Assisi, which borrows a number of episodes of his life, some ignored and some
completely unknown. Stories which we have drawn from the canonical texts such
as the "Franciscan Sources", which bring together the first and
second editions of the Life written by Tommaso da Celano (between 1228
and 1229); the Legend of the Three Companions (1256); the Legend of
Perugia (from the same period); the "Little Flowers" (1327-1340)
and including the historical accounts contained within that same volume. But
the sources which enabled us to give this piece a real flavour* of popular
story-telling are the stories of the life of Francis which we have collected in
Umbria, especially in the zone of Casa del Diavolo, Civitella and Santa
Cristina di Gubbio. These testimonies, which are real masterpieces of the oral
tradition, at first struck us as paradoxical and fantastical, and even a bit
excessive - the fruit of excessive* manipulations of history. For example we
have St Francis, when he was still a boy, joining with other tearaways and
hauling on dozens of ropes in order to pull down the towers of the leading
citizens of Assisi. Shortly after, we find him, armed with spear and shield,
fighting in a proper battle agains teh Nobles of Assisi, who were backed by
Perugia. In one of these stories we even see him going, on the orders of the
Pope, to visit a family of pigs, in the sense of real pigs, warts and scofula*
and all, and rolling round with them in their dung, smearing himself* with the
stinking slime* and then, "smeared* with dung", presenting himself
joyously to the Pope, who was seated at table with noble ladies, bishops and
knights.
God's jongleurs
When we then went on to look at the historical
accounts and annals produced in the time of St Francis himself, in particular a
chronicle from Spoleto, from the fourteenth century, and the accounts gathered
by academics* such as Coiro and Muratori, we realised that these supposed
stories were based on real and documented foundations.
Our biggest surprise came from the discovery of
St Francis's incredible public speeches, the orations and sermons that were
entirely original and provocative, sermons which transformed themse5ves into
real and actual jongleur sermons*, with story-telling and acting devices worthy
of a great satiric and comic actor.
Thus we can state that the term "giullare
di Dio" which is often used of St Francis, is not the outcome of the
poetic inventiveness of some literary imagination of the thirteenth or
fourteenth century, as one might imagine, but a description which he himself
and his contemporaries gave to his language and mode of performance before the
public.
In any event, a revolutionary thinker such as St
Francis, who argued for the glorification of, and love towards, every creature,
including the most miserable and wretched, because "everything is worthy
and holy, inasmuch as it is the work of God", necessarily required a
language and a gestuality that went beyond the normal rules, and to the verge
of blasphemy.
We have witness accounts of his original
story-telling expressivity, notably among his contemporaries, including
Salimbene de Adam and Tommaso da Celano. Among other things, Salimbene
associates Francis's model with preaching with that of the other preaching
brothers who preceded or followed him, uch as: Benedetto della Cornetta ("of
the trumpet"), so-called because he used a horn in order to gather a
public round him and to comment on* his own orations; brother Diotisalvi of
Florence, who was described as a fabulous improviser and highly skilled mime;
Paolo Millemosche, famous for his jokes, which overflowed with obscenity; and,
finally, the leading light of all the jongleur monks, the monk Roberto
D'Arbrissel, who was forcved by his superiors to cease his sermons, because,
although they were suggestive,* they "drowned every sacred concept in the
laughter of th epublic".
Joyous dance
These were the brothers who were his teachers
and followers. Thus, in a perfectly giullaresque key, we find St Francis who
"had made a language with his whole body" (de toto corpore fecerat
linguam) when he made an oration before Pope Honor III, to thank the pope,
who had just granted the seal for the Order of Minor Brothers.* Here Francis
describes his own joy, with voice and gestures, moving his hands, arms and
legs, even lifting his feet in a joyous dance. The poe, so far from expressing
only enjoyment, appears moved to tears.
The ability to produce emotion* through laughter
is one of the fundamental conditions for which the saint constantly searches.
Francis insistently brings up the passage from the Gospels where Jesus
castigates those of the faithful who, in the rites of penitence, adopt a face
of desperate sadness and starchy contention.**
"The fact that he made us is a tremendous
gift of the Lord," he repeats. "Life is an unparalleled prize. We who
have received it must show Him who has given it an uncontainable happiness, and
it cannot cost us a lot of effort. The babies who receive the breast of their
mother, how do they manifest their own gratitude, if not by smiles and cries of
joy? Thus we, who are at every moment submerged by gifts by our creator, and
acts of love, how madly we should laugh and dance from happiness!"
Many researchers into the life of St Francis
find out that this incitement to the monks for them to find reasons for
joyousness went back to the more ancient popular religious traditions, such as
the rite of the risus pascalis (Easte laughter) where, in many Christian
communities throughout Italy, for centuries, there had been comic spectacles as
part of the celebrations, exhibitions by clerics masked as fools, the
resurrection of Christ, leading all the faithful to heartfelt laughter.*
Francis also picks up* the Easter rite of the Exultet, a truly festive
representation of the most playful* passages of the Gospels.
Thomas of Eccleston describes, in his English
chronicle, the eating of the monks around the fire: the food was far from
plentiful, the beer was slops*, but the yougn followers of St Francis told each
other amusing stories and invented jokes and paradoxes, until in the end the
whole squalid hole resounded to the sound of laughter.
A rebel against power
But as we know, those in power do not like
laughter, because anyone engaged in producing happiness and laughter,*
inevitably ends up hitting out at the authorities, the generals, the notables
and even God's chosen ones. Finally, it is no accident that in the sealed
rules* of St Francis, among the first suppressed chapters, we find precisely
the one in which the saint encouraged the monks to appear always "cheerful"
(jucindi) and to seek out a smile in every moment,* particularly when
they were helping people when they were sick and desperate.
But one should not imagine that the saint of
Assisi had discovered and appreciated the value of beatific joy and pacific
suavity* right from birth. In fact, on his road to conversion St Francis had to
deal with experiences and life choices that were extremely diverse and
contradictory.
This began when he was a boy, when he joined the
rebellion against the established power of the grandees and the wealthy,
against whom he took up arms and went to battle quite prepared to kill. He
suffered prison, he was obliged to rebuild walls and towers in his role as an
apprentice, and then as an apprentice builder.* He wore the weapons and insignia
of a knight, and fell into a terrible crisis, and deserted. He threw himself
into festive carousings with his friends and with loose women.
He fell into a second crisis, holed himself up
in a cave to meditate and fast. He threw here and there his money and the
precious textiles from his father's shop, like a wild spendthrift. He stripped
naked in public, rejecting the world. He thought of becoming a hermit tucked
away* up in the mountains, but then he abandoned the idea of fleeing the
community of men. and went down into hovels to bring help to lepers and to the
poor. As a way of gathering his breath, he set about restoring derelict*
churches. He undertook endless journeys, to convince the popes to accept his
Order, imposing on his followers absolute poverty, the rejection of any kind of
money or possessions, and an obligation to earn a living with the most humble
of work. He discussed its extension with bishops, learned people of the church,
and with all his fellow friars. He travelled the length and breadth of Italy,
preaching to thousands of the faithful. He went to Egypt, spoke with the
Sultan, and returned much moved* by the goodheartedness of many
"infidels" and disgusted by the total absence of humanity and
Christian charity which he had discovered in the soldiers of the faith.
He was upset and worried by the unforeseeable
success of his proposal of an evangelical life, by the enormous quantity of new
disciples who were asking to join his order. Above all, he had to endure the
humiliation of seeing himself contested by the majority of the lettered friars,
with their thirst for power.
He was forced to renounce the role of leader* of
the order. He withdrew to meditate on the hermitage of Erna*, with a few of his
faithful. Later he rejoined the order, inclined to follow the directives of the
new superiors.
The preaching of St Francis
He began preaching and going to every city in
Italy, from North to South. People flocked en masse to hear him. His sermons
were always like jongleur performances. He would often begin by singing love
sirventesi or grotesque ballads.
He used the most blatantly spectacular*
ingredients of the professional story-teller. He provoked his audience, forcing
them to react and uncover, and then showered them* with repeated humorous
utterances.
He expressed himself in the vulgar tongue,
adapting his outpourings with onomatopoeic wordplays, related to the various
idioms of the whole of Italy. For sure there will have been hundreds of these
speeches, but unfortunately not one text of these story-teller masterpieces and
improvised tale-telling has come down to us. However we know that the brothers
who accompanied him took notes of all his speeches and wrote out sections of
them, or even entire passages. However, unfortunately, when Bonaventura da
Bagnoregio became head of the Minor Friars towards the end of the thirteenth
century, he gave orders that all the writings and documentations on the life of
St Francis that had been written up until that point should be destroyed,
including the speeches dictated by the saint and the transcriptions which were
to be found in far-scattered hermitages, schools and parishes.
Fortunately, beginning in the seventeenth
century, and right up to a few years ago, as if by a miracle, some texts began
to come to light. These were the writings of Tommaso da Celano and many
histories written by monks which had remained hidden or concealed in monasteries
and libraries beyond the confines of Italy. And they are still being
discovered. Who knows, perhaps one day the transcriptions of St Franci's
giullaresque speeches [...] This would be the most upheavalsome discovery of
the whole history of Italian literature.
Thousands of people in Piazza
Grande
While waiting for this miracle to come about, I,
in my foolish presumption, have set about reconstructing one of these famous
speeches, in particular the one which St Francis made in the Piazza Grande of
Bologna, before thousands of spectators.
The giullare saint had been invited to
give a sermon on the title: "Angels, men and demons" (Gli angeli,
gli uomini, i demoni). But it is not hard to imagine that Francis would
have extended his topic to deal with war, and the mourning and wretchedness
that war brings.
This was the day of 15 August 1222. Cities
throughout Italy were at war with each other, with killing on every hand. The
Emperor pretended that he wanted to bring peace, but in fact he was arousing
cities and their lords against each other. The pope and the Emperor were in a
state of continuous conflict. Persecutions and massacres of Cathars and
Albigensians were the order of the day. The war for the liberation of the Holy
Sepulchre was continuing, with massacres, looting and good business to be had.
But one could very much say that in this whole whirl of death* Romagna could
boast of being at the head of the catalogue of atrocities. One only has to read
the Annals of the City of Bologna drawn up by Muzzi, and the Rerum
Italicarum Scriptores of Muratori, to get an idea of the insane propensity
of the people of Emilia and Romagna for ongoing genocide. Castles and town
houses* were razed to the ground, harvests were burned, walls were pulled down,
the gates of cities were torn off their hinges and carried around in triumph by
the victors; noble families within the same city were butchering each other,
intent on wiping each other out; there were clashes between the peoples of
Bologna, Imola, Faenza,* and Forli,* with thousands of dead, women raped, and
people taken prisoner and tortured. So that is the climate within which the
saint found himself delivering his sermon.
But seeing that up until now no text of these
sermons and public speeches has come down to us, what evidence did I have, on
which to be able to reconstruct and recreate the sermon? Fortunately we have
the evidence provided by three people who happened to have been at the event:
the first is Tommaso da Spalato, the second is Federico Visconti, and the third
Boncompagno da Signa
Eyewitness accounts
The first, Tommaso da Spalato, was still a
student* at Bologna when, in August of 1222, he attended St Francis's
provocative sermon. He describes the event as follows: "[The brother] wore
humble garb; there was nothing special about his appearance, and his face had
no beauty. And yet, God conferred onto his words such an effectiveness that
many noble families, among whom the irreducible furor of inveterate enmity had
flared up to the point of shedding so much blood, were constrained to a council
of peace."
The second, Federico Visconti, who later became
bishop of Pisa, describes, with emotion and amazement, the simplicity of style
and language with which that unlettered person succeeded in moving emotionally*
the crowd that heard him. The third, Boncompagno da Signa, also present as a
witness in Piazza Grande, gives us, in one of his works (Book XIII of
the Rhetorica Novissima), the key to the provocation and the subject
developed by St Francis. As well as mentioning the war underway between the
people of Bologna and the cities of Romagna, the author comments on the
exhibition* of the state; he assessesits effect as mediocre, and he pontificates,
as a true connoisseur, on how any proper sermon ought to be delivered.
"The orator who enters on-stage to deliver an incitement to battle, must
present himself armed in every respect, must possibly pretend to be in the
saddle of a fiery steed, must harangue in a voice that is high and full of
feeling, must become increasingly heated in the development of his discourse,
must gesticulate, roll his eyes and, if necessary, at the moment of greatest
pathos, throw himself to the ground, making his armour clatter." Thus,
thanks to the lesson offered by the spocchioso maestro,* we can well imagine
what means and what expressive measure and synthesis the ragged friar must have
used in order to deliver his discourse.
First: thanks to the evidence provided by the three
witnesses, we know what the title and subject matter of his sermon was.
Second, from other evidence we know that the
language used by our jongleur friar was the classic outpouring* of words and
phrases* captured from all the dialects of the peninsula, the classic lingua
france of the giullari.
Third, we know that he used his whole body to
communicate situations, attitudes, and to mark the rhythm of his narrative.
Fourth, we are informed that Francis also used song on many occasions, and that
he was aware of having an extraordinary vocal capacity.
I might add that, since we know the techniques a
ribaltone* used by the giullari, and the way in which story-tellers use paradox
in their description of news items well-known to the public, with a bit of imagination
we can reconstruct the entire process of that sermon, in the certainty that St
Francis the Jongleur will have turned the topic of the war into a paradoxical
eulogy for violence and massacre.
At this point, in order to be sure of being
within the correct mode of expression of the saltimbanco, what we lack is the
so-called "frappata" of the Zanni - in other words the illogical
incident that falls outside the key*, which is also known as the "scaracollo".
In shot, in our case, St Francis, who came from Umbria, and who everyone would
have expected to express himself in an easy-going dialect of the Po
Valley-Romagna region, will instead hold forth in an impossible Neapolitan
dialect.
Here I end my prologue, and now present to you
the sermon delivered by St Francis before the people of Bologna, on 15 August
1222.
ST
FRANCIS PREACHES AGAINST WAR IN BOLOGNA
[He speaks in broad Neapolitan dialect]
People of Naples! Here I am! Oh what a pleasure it is, to be here among you
Neapolitans! You're a wonder, like wild beasts when it comes to war. And you're
powerful. When you go to war, to battles, you slaughter and kill, riding in on
horseback, and crying "Accoppa! Accoppa! Struppa! Struppa! Ammozza!
Ammozza! and Briga! Briga...!" [He raises his voice in a song of war]
Bravo the Neapolitans! Fine people! Courageous and bold! [A pause while he
listens to someone] You're not Neapolitans? [A brief pause] So where
are you from? From Bologna? [A brief pause] All of you? The women too?
And what are you doing here... in Naples... you Bolognesi? Are you passing
through? Are you on your way to the Holy Land, eh? You're going aboard ship...?
No? You're really from here?! So where are we, then? In Bologna...? This is
Bologna...? Are you sure? [A pause] Oh God...! What a blunder I have
made! So that's why I couldn't see Vesuvius...! And couldn't even see the sea!
I was wondering: "I wonder where the sea is!"
[Laughing] Ha, ha... we're in Bologna! Ha, ha, ha, that's
good...! [He sighs] What a disaster! It's true! It's the day after
tomorrow that I'm suposed to be going to Naples...! My mistake! I was getting
things confused in my head! I prepared myself brilliantly with one of my fellow
friars, who is from Naples. I had him talking to me in Neapolitan all day long.
"Hey, talk to me, teach me*...!" You know, I wanted to learn all this
wonderful language, which is such a pleasure... and I had him there talking to
me... "Talk to me... talk to me... so that when I arrive at Naples, I'll
knock them flat with amazement... [He laughs] Ha, ha, ha, and these
Neapolitans would all be saying: "Hey, he's good, that one! He talks just
like us!"
I made a mistake! I prepare myself in
Neapolitan... and I come here to Bologna... And how are you going to
understand? [He sighs] I don't speak Bolognese, no way...* It's a really
hard language... So what am I going to do now? I can hardly say: "I'll go
away, and I'll come back when I've learnt it?!" Hey, no! You're going to
have to make the most of it! I'm sorry, people of Bologna... You're going to
have to make do with Neapolitan... You'll have to make like you understand
everything. So I'm going to begin, the same as before.
People of Bologna! You're a fine race of people,
full of boldness and courage, you go to war, the way you kill each other is a
wonder to behold. [He improvises an absurd war dance, mining fighting and
war songs] "Fire, burn, [...] spike the horses, stick in the spears!
Pull out their tripes and slit their bellies, and kill, butcher, with swords,
spears, clubs, pikes! The axe comes down, [...] [An outpouring of
onomatopeic sounds in a rhythmic grammelot] "Trucca, tigna, tigna,
beffa, boffa, zurra, cacchia, ricahhia, tie!"
People of Bologna! You're fine people! For a
long time now you've been at war with the people of Imola, that vile race, who
are dogs, beasts and animals; it is very right and proper that you go to
fight,* to clash,* with all them, like crazy! What battles! You burned half
their city, and they arrived, and they attacked your women, they plundered
you,* and you went against them, and even uprooted their gates, the gates of
their city, and you carried them off!
It's a fine thing to have an enemy, an enemy to
kill! Not just one, oh no, are we crazy...?
"Poor chap, he's only got one enemy!"
No, you have very many enemies! Enemies in reseve. Well done! Because you puff
up* with courage in every place! You even went against the Emperor, Frederick
the First, the Emperor Barbarossa. You went against him when that animal of a
man came to suck your blood, from you and all the people of Lombardy, like you,
And he scratched* your money out of you, with taxes. You told him: "That's
enough of you getting fat on our meat! Thieves!" And you went against him,
together with all the people of Lombardy, in a manner that was so strong! You
attacked him,* and hauled him down from his horse! And that German, it was just
as well that he fell down among the dead... because otherwise he would have
been done for! Well done! Well done, people of Bologna, because you also went
off on the Holy War, the war against the Pathars of Provencal... Those damned
ones who had transgressed against the holy rules of Christianity. And they had
the absolute nerve to come saying that only they followed the true Gospel, and
that we were heretics, and that the pope was the Antichrist on earth.
"He's not a pope! He's nothing and noone! He's an anti-pope!" They
should never have said that! Pope Innocent III got his wild up in a serious
way, and up on his horse, and taking up a lance as if he was a warrior, led*
the army of the French against the Albigensians. And you too, people of
Bologna, you went up on horseback with them. It was a marvellous massacre! And
at the same time that the war against the Albigensians was being conducted, in
another field a new war [...] for the Holy Sepulchre which was to be liberated!
And you set off another time, and you set to with your arrows, and you set to
with your spears and horses. [He begins a liturgical chant, interspersed
with slashing sword blows and chuckles) Ha! Haha! A proper holy massacre!
Beautiful! Well done! The Holy Land over here, and Provence over there.
And those who were left behind in the city of
Bologna, what were they doing? Scratching their bellies? No, they had to do
some massacre themselves. Just as well that in the city there were the Nobles,
who were fighting it out among themselves: "Wehay!!! The Bonzoni against
the Albergitti, the Camarini against the Zamborghi! Wehey! And they were
burning their houses, and killing each other, and slaughtering each other, and
factions were springing up on all sides. Even within families! What a butchery!
Four hundred and sixty people dead in a week!
All Bolognesi! What a satisfaction... killing within the family! But then there
was a moment* of peace! (He sighs) Rejoice! They've starting returning
home, the fighters of Provence... Not all of them, many of them were left
buried out there, dead. The survivors returned, and what a splendid show! They
marched in with their chests thrust forward... (He mimes a walk with chest
thrust out) No, they didn't march like that... because many of them were
wounded... all of them crippled, lame and limping.* Some of them had a leg cut
off... an arm missing... One with an eye blinded, one missing a foot, another
missing a hand... but with what pride! So then they marched with their chests
out, but an [...], like this. (He walks with a dragging, limping step)
And then all the others came back from the Holy Land... Only a few, though...
because a thousand of them remained buried out there, in the Holy Land. A
thousand tombs to liberate one tomb! What a tombery! What a pleasure!
It's a fine thing to come back from war, and be
able to exclaim: "I've been in battle, and I'm proud for my city, and my
country. I have sacrificed myself!" But you have to have some marks of war
too! Because if a person doesn't have wounds to show, that he's scarred, or
missing a limb... how's he going to manage? He says: "I've been to the
wars!" - "Who are you kidding? Where are the signs? Where wre you in
the war? Hiding?! Under your horse!" But if you've got war wounds...
you're away! "You see, my hand, it's missing! And the other hand, missing
too!" So then people say: " Well done! He's been to war. He's a hero!
Here, shake hands!" - "Sorry, no hands!" - "Well give us a
foot, then!" (He mimes proffering a foot. Then a brief pause. He
turns to another part of his audience, changing tone) Oh but women, ladies,
why are you crying? What's the matter? I know you, and you too. You're the
mother of the one who died in the war. And you too? Your father too was killed
out there? And your husband. Your brother. Your sweetheart. And she over there
lost her father, her son... Lost them all! Widows... How many widows and how
many mothers in grief! But you're proud of your
widowhood! Yes, you're celebrating having given your sons, your men, to
your land, your country. (He pauses for breath)* No? You're not proud?!
Woman, what are you saying?! You'd rather have your son still with you, alive,
in your arms... that he'd never gone to the wars? And you, your father? And
aren't you concerned about the glory and the honour?! And you, your husband.
And you, your brother... And you too? (He
pauses, as if amazed) All of you?! Oh God! It's a disaster! Now I
understand, why you don't want to hear those holy speeches of the Maggiori.
You're beginning to want to think, and think with your own brain, your own
head! That's a really serious danger!
I can already see you: in a day or two, you'll
go to the city hall and you'll demand that the authorities sign a peace with
all the cities and the enemies that there are... And even to make peace with
the nobles within Bologna! Go! Go!
What a disaster!
Yes, and you will achieve that peace! Peace, ah,
what a fine word. Peeeeace! Use your mouth: peeeeace... (Gradually the
rhythm of the words becomes a lyrical song)
The sun shines out, fine and free, high in the
sky. Let us hope that it's going to rain a little, because the land is thirsty,
it needs rain... (In a decisive rhythm) Oh, the rain's coming... [...]
Ti-ti-to-to...
Gently with that rain!
I said rain, by this is a flood from a pisspot!*
It's pouring down, like a tremendous storm!
And what was that lightening?!
Enough! Shut that dam!*
It's raining bucketfuls,* raining, raining,
raining! The plain is becoming flooded, there's a landslide! Disaste, disaster!
Another blow...*
The sun comes back and once again the weather's
fine! Who's celebrating? It's a wedding,
with story-teling and dancing... Go into the cesa, sing... (He speeds up the
rhythm of the song and dance) Drink, drink, your health, I'm getting drunk,
happy, happy!
Sleep, rest... and dream...
[...]
The children, growing... the young girl who goes
and makes love in the barn,
Love and the young girl,
The young girl is in love, and has ended up
pregnant.
We're going to have to have a marriage in
haste... Quick, before the baby pops out here.
The sun comes out again,
The snow has spread everywhere*, and
underneath, the grain is growing,
A bit of golden rain...
Peace, peace, peace... (He stops, with a sigh)
Peace! How boring this peace is! (He pauses) Always the same, everything
repeated, with the same days and weeks and seasons!
Oh what a nostalgia you will have for war, of
beating hearts, and trumpets, and shouting, and fire burning, devouring... The
going of troops and horses (Gradually the rhythm of the words transforms
into a song of war, rich in onomatopoeic sounds) And from afar you see
springing up, and then growing, an army and banners,
Pikes and drums: Hey, look... Sfrunza, sponza!
Lunza, lunza, lunza! Fire the arrows! Cut and
chop!
And seize the women and tear their dresses...
Mount them, ha, ha, ha! And make them pregnant!
Covre, troca... And make them pregnant so that their bellies grow and bring
forth sons,
So many sons,
All bastards! (He stops, and ends) Now
there's a song!
Three days later, the population really did go and
protest in front of the city hall, and all the grandees of the city were
obliged to meet and sign a peace treaty, the concilium pacis. This
document is still to be found in Bologna City Hall, and this thanks to the
incredible provocative sermon delivered by the jongleur saint, St Francis.
Excerpted from
Lu Santo Jullare Francesco
by Dario Fo, edited by Franca Rame.
To be completed.