# Appendix

**The Waif**

Here are some earlier notes also by
Ingrid:

'I'm writing this about two weeks after by first experience with the
Waif; it seems like I've known her much longer.
We've fantasised about her past
history and believe she's spent most of her life in an orphanage, until
one night she played with matches and burned the whole place down.
Since then she's spent her time
rather aimlessly collecting things like used contraceptives and
old-bottle tops which she found in the park.
I suppose that the making of
relationships with other people is going to be one of the turning-points
of her life.

'The first thing she became attached to was a blue balloon which she
clutches firmly in her sticky fingers. At first she was very
shy of other Masks and didn't really know how to make
friends.

'One day she was sent to visit Grandfather, who at that time was just
known as "the angry man that hit people". When she arrived she
found a small brown teddy bear lying on the table, which she immediately
became attached to and claimed for herself.
At that point Grandfather, who had
been growling in the background like an old rheumatic dog, leaped on the
Waif from behind and snatched the bear away.
This produced loud wailing noises
and tears.

'For the Waif the teddy was perfect---soft, fluffy, something to clutch
and fumble. Contact with objects made her more
secure. Having the teddy snatched away was
the most violently upsetting thing that had happened to her up to that
point.

'I remember Ingrid coming back into focus and feeling real tears and
terror and thinking "Christ, this is ridiculous---when I take the Mask
off everyone will see that I've been crying, that I really am upset",
but I couldn't stop the feelings. It was as if the Waif's
experience had triggered off a deep emotional response in myself, as if
a part of me was watching the trauma but could do nothing to stop it.
It's very difficult to say whether
it was "me" that was in a bad state towards the end, but I'm certain
that if I hadn't been wearing the Mask, i.e playing a small girl who had
her teddy taken away, I would have "felt" nothing, only acted being
upset. The Waif could never "act" her
responses because her emotional life is so real and alive.
After this Mask session I realised
[to
what extent I'd learned to repress my feelings, especially when things
made me unhappy.]

'Soon after this Keith arranged a "nice" scene where Grandfather
returned the teddy. Her happiness at getting it back
was equally intense. And Grandfather became a very
important person for her.

'Loves sweets. Was given a grape and it kept
falling out of her mouth. She doesn't seem to have any
teeth---can only suck, smacking tongue and palate
together.

'It was a long time before she realised she was being watched.
She didn't seem to mind the
audience providing they didn't get too close.
Keith is a good friend---always
seems to recognise his presence and to direct some of the things she
says to him. I don't get this with other
Masks.

'Speech: the "smacking" or "sucking" of her top teeth over bottom lip
was the first noise she made---as she became more confident her
favourite noise was "cor". When she was happy she also made a
short, hard "ha" and "hee" sound. Learning short words
like "sit" "stand" and "sweet" wasn't difficult, and she was eager to
learn. It wasn't long before she was able
to learn "Mary had a little lamb" but she always made up the end to suit
herself. She was puzzled by words like
"fleece" and "bound" and didn't seem able to accept them---probably why
she made up half the rhyme.

Mary had a little lamb

It was white as snow

And everywhere that Mary went

She had a little lamb.

'This was one of her versions, although I'd have to do it with the Mask
on to make sure. She learned to count up to ten
before learning the rhyme. Her motive I think was because
there was an audience, and as she is a bit of an exhibitionist, it was
nice to do. Being rewarded with sweets was
also good.'

**Three Dreams**

Some dreams announce themselves as _messages_.
There's nothing casual about them.
You wake up and they're completely
vivid in your mind, and you keep thinking about them.
Here are three such
dreams.

My family are eating rubber eggs and they call me over to eat mine.
The surface is cracked, and I can
see deep into the disgusting interior. I put my egg on a high
shelf and leave it there; but my family are eating theirs, a little
slowly but with a pretence of enjoying
them.

[A
treasure is assembled for me by my teachers.
The diamonds are glass and the
pearls plastic and the gold is tarnished. I stand guard over the
treasure, until I realise it's junk and go far
away.]

There is a box that we are forbidden to open.
It contains a great serpent and
once opened this monster will stream out forever.
I lift the lid, and for a moment
it seems as if the serpent will destroy us; but then it dissipates into
thin air, and there, at the bottom of the box, is the real
treasure.

**[Bloomsbury
Methuen Drama]**

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**BLOOMSBURY, METHUEN DRAMA and the Diana logo
are**

**trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing
Plc**

First published in paperback in 1981 by Eyre Methuen
Ltd

Reprinted in 1989 by Methuen Drama

Reprinted with a new cover design
2007

Reprinted 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015,
2016

Originally published in Hardback

by Faber and Faber Ltd in 1979

Copyright © 1979, 1981 by Keith
Johnstone

Introduction copyright © 1979 by Irving
Wardle

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ISBN: PB: 978-0-7136-8701-9\
ePub ISBN-13: 978-1-3500-1797-9

**Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication
Data**

A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of
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Series: Performance Books