A reworking of Franz Kafka’s short story ‘The Bucket Rider’
By: Srishti Mehta
Tags: Drama, Nihilism, Literatura, Theatre, Franz Kafka

Image source: The Japan Times

Act I

The mountains are ducked under the thick layers of snow. Winds shriek as the cold wrecking gusts of chill hit the vacuum and knocks the rigid, lifeless leaves, merely hanging on the trees, unceremoniously. The Drunkard staggers with the cheapest bottle of whisky in his emerald coat’s pocket and hugs the tree trunk in vain.

The Drunkard: I knew you’d still be here, waiting for me! You’re the most loyal friend I have. (Hiccups fragment his speech as he talks to the tree and nudges the dead tree bark with his nose) You’re the only friend…I have. In fact…

Before he completes his sentence he sees a man riding his empty bucket and gliding down the small snow hill and breaking into a small avalanche as he thuds into the tree. The wind blinds The Drunkard yet he manages to see the outline figure of the man, whom he calls ‘The Bucket Rider.’

The Drunkard: How dare you! How dare you… (He pauses abruptly and thinks of the proper address and then impatiently continues)You… Bucket… Rider!

(He moves towards the Bucket Rider as his vision deceives him to the opposite direction and he collapses)

(Still mumbling in inaudible sentences)

I will find a roof. I have a roof. Don’t come near my tree. I am very hungry. How come your bucket is still intact? A sledge is less risky, you know. What’s a rider doing in the middle of a half-baked snowstorm with an empty bucket?

(The Drunkard starts talking to the tree and the tree talks back)

What do you think he’s doing here? What’s that shovel all about? Is he clearing the snow? Where is his salt? I used to clear snow a few years back, you know. Then the machines replaced me. I miss my Norma. Will you be my Norma? My Norma left me. I think he’s my Norma! The Tree: I think his coal is all spent. The bucket’s insides are colored smudged black. Maybe he wants coal. Maybe his stove is breathing out cold. He must have coal. He’s blue. He is freezing to death. His pitiless stove! Oh! How much I miss the sun. I miss my lustrous green overcoat. Oh this pitiless sky! Help him! The Drunkard: I think he’s a beggar. I’ll take him to the coal dealer. But he has already grown deaf to ordinary appeals; I must prove irrefutably to him that this man has not a single grain of coal left and that the coal dealer means the very sun in the firmament to him! You know, you have to lick their feet at times, not literally. The Tree: I know, figuratively! He must approach like a beggar, who with the death rattle already in his throat, insists on dying at the coal dealer’s doorstep…he’s cold. He’s cold. He’s cold. His coal. His coal. His coal. I need a forest fire! The Drunkard: Not again, not again, Norma! I’ll take care of you, Norma. Here, here, have a sip. You’ll feel real warm. (He pours a small sip at the dead tree roots and brushes his rough palms against the bark) Better? I knew it! Whisky is my only friend! Trust no bitch.

After moments of deep silence, The Drunkard hears The Bucket Rider talk, talking to the vacuum.

The Bucket Rider: My mode of arrival must decide the matter, so I ride off on the bucket. Seated on the bucket, my hands on the handle, the simplest kind of bridle; I propel myself with difficulty down the stairs; but once down below my bucket ascends, superbly, superbly; camels humbly squatting on the ground do not rise with more dignity, shaking themselves under the sticks of their riders. Through the hard frozen streets we go at a regular canter; often I am upraised as high as the first story of a house; never do I sink as low as the house doors. The Drunkard: Bullshit! Here, you just crashed at Norma’s feet. (Mocks The Bucket Rider by copying his pompous tone in a rather aplomb manner) Never do I sink as low as the house doors! Bah! Humbug! The Tree: Ebenzer Scrooge! The Drunkard: (enraged) So what? The Tree: Dickens must have had you in mind. The Drunkard: As if you were never indifferent and rude and nasty and… The Tree: … insensitive and cold hearted miser… No Ghost of the Christmas Yet-to-Come is going the redeem you. The Drunkard: I love you. I want to take care of you. How does it matter to you anyway? You will give up on me like her. But I will help him. I will help him find the coal dealer. I am a good person. Trust me, Norma, I am. I will show you. The Drunkard sees The Bucket Rider vaulting over a big boulder as he rides his bucket. The Drunkard runs behind him to catch up with his pace. The Drunkard (to himself): I bet he’ll float at an extraordinary height above the vaulted cellar of the dealer.

Act II

The bucket has got a dent on its surface so The Drunkard and The Bucket Rider walk through the thick boulevard of leafless trees.

The Drunkard: Believe me, I am telling you, you would have died had it not been for me. The feisty storm is approaching. I need to get back to my Norma soon. I will walk you to the coal dealer. Norma burnt herself five years ago. What do you do for a living?

The Bucket Rider remained silent. He never answered any of the questions asked. And then out of the blue,

The Bucket Rider: I’m cold. I’m cold. I’m cold. My coal. My coal. My coal. The Drunkard: My whisky! (He opens his bottle and takes a sip) Come to papa! (gulps and grins)

I am a non-vegetarian. Norma is a vegetarian. I love chicken. I eat chicken. Norma never liked meat. But I always defended my food. I would say, “Chicken! It, in my dish has achieved complete salvation! Poor chicken, what would he do without me? I mean if I don’t eat him, he’ll take birth, become a cute little chick but soon that will wear out and all day long it’ll peck and peck and poop and peck and mate and wander and die. Isn’t it better on my plate? Young and healthy and de-li-ci-ous!” But Norma would say, “But, how can you eat something dead?” Poor Norma. The Bucket Rider: I am penniless! The Drunkard: Make a promise then. Ask for a shovelful of the worst they have. I am sure your haggard face and blue skin will win you.

They keep walking and The Drunkard keeps staggering here and there. They see the coal dealer’s cellar at a distance.

The door of the coal dealer’s cellar is open to let the excessive heat out. He is crouching over his table and writing. His wife is sitting on the cot and she breathes in and out peacefully while she knits on, her back pleasantly warmed by the heat. The coal dealer is looking at the adjacent wall- deep and hard, a consistent, unbroken sight of the wall. He looks at it as if he feels it. It is blank and bare. Sometimes he gets lost like this, like a moment of insentience. When all he had to do was to look deep and hard for the meaning of his unfruitful life and failed business, he looked and looked and looked at the wall. Life eluded him in those moments. It was a silent demise of his hopes for the incomprehensible nothingness engulfed his spirits. But then he was a mixture of everything. No matter how absurd the nothingness made him feel, he still held on to hope. A paradox he was- like everyone else, but maybe in a deeper sense.

“Coal dealer! Coal dealer!” a cry in a voice burned hollow by the frost and muffled in the cloud. The coal dealer jerked out of the blank and bare sight of the wall. “Please coal dealer, give me a little coal,” the voice continued and the coal dealer questioned the very foundations of the presence of the voice.

Coal dealer: Do I hear rightly? (He gives an imploring look to his wife) Do I hear rightly? A customer! (astonishingly) Wife: I hear nothing. (Continues to knit) “Oh yes! You must hear, it’s me; an old customer; faithful and true; only without means at the moment,” cries a voice. Coal dealer: Wife, it’s someone, it must be; my ears can’t have deceived me as much like that; it must be an old, a very old customer, that can move me so deeply. Wife: What ails you man? (ceasing from her work for a moment and pressing her knitting to her bosom) It’s nobody, the street is empty, all our customers are provided for; we could close down the shop for several days and take rest.

“But I am sitting up here on the bucket, please give me a shovelful and if you give me more, I wouldn’t know what to do. I beg you. I am right here. Oh! If I could only hear the coal clattering in my bucket,” the voice reaches close to the cellar.

Coal dealer: (Leaving his chair) I am coming!

On his short legs the coal dealer climbs the steps on the cellar but his wife is already beside him; she holds him back by his arm.

Wife: You stay here; seeing you persist in your fancies I’ll go myself. Think of the bad fit of coughing you had last night. But for a piece of business, even if it’s one you’ve only fancied in your head, you are prepared to forget your wife and sacrifice your lungs. I’ll go. Coal dealer: Then be sure to tell him all the kinds of coal we have in stock; I’ll shout the prices after you. Wife: Right.

Act III

The Drunkard sees the coal dealer’s wife at once. Standing at the distance, he sees The Bucket Rider standing at the cellar door. A hopeful gleam in his eyes, “I am a good person,” The Drunkard says to himself. He starts mumbling what he sees The Bucket Rider say to the coal dealer’s wife, as if he was a back stage prompter to the main actor.

The Drunkard (In sync with The Bucket Rider): Frau Coal dealer, my humblest greetings; just one shovelful of coal; here in my bucket; I’ll carry it home myself. One shovelful of the worst you have. I’ll pay you in full for it, of course, but not just now, not just now. Coal dealer (shouts from inside): “What does it want?” Wife: Nothing (shouts back), There’s nothing here; I see nothing, I hear nothing; only six striking, and now we must shut the shop. The cold is terrible; tomorrow we’ll likely have lots to do again. The Drunkard (to himself): She sees nothing, hears nothing; but all the same she loosens her apron strings and waves her apron to waft The Bucket Rider away. (Walks close to the cellar in haste) You bad woman! You bad woman!

The drunkard marches up to the cellar door in vain. It’s lights out for the day. He looks around and but cannot see The Bucket Rider. He sees the bucket lying isolated and empty near the cellar door. The Drunkard throws up into the bucket and stands up on his feet, weak and cold. Far from the Coal dealer’s cellar he sees The Bucket Rider ascending into the regions of the ice mountains.