Anna Christie quotes

Neither his voice nor his general manner dispel this illusion which has made him a personage of the water front. They are soft and bland.

But beneath all his mildness one senses the man behind the mask—cynical, callous, hard as nails.

He is lounging at ease behind the bar, a pair of spectacles on his nose, reading an evening paper.

But what was yuh so scared about—that I'd kick up a row? That ain't Marthy's way. [Scornfully.] Think I'd break my heart to lose yuh? Commit suicide, huh? Ho-ho! Gawd!

The world's full o' men if that's all I'd worry about!

[Then with a grin, after emptying her glass.] Blow me to another scoop, huh? I'll drink your kid's health for yuh.

ANNA—[Her eyes narrowing.] Ain't you smart! Well, I got yours, too, without no trouble.

You're me forty years from now.

That's you! [She gives a hard little laugh.]

The judge give all us girls thirty days. The others didn't seem to mind being in the cooler much. Some of 'em was used to it. But me, I couldn't stand it. It got my goat right—couldn't eat or sleep or nothing.

I never could stand being caged up nowheres.

I got good and sick and they had to send me to the hospital. It was nice there. I was sorry to leave it, honest!

[Wearily.] Gee, I sure need that rest! I'm knocked out. [Then resignedly.] But I ain't expecting much from him.

Give you a kick when you're down, that's what all men do.

[With sudden passion.] Men, I hate 'em—all of 'em! And I don't expect he'll turn out no better than the rest. [Then with sudden interest.] Say, do you hang out around this dump much?

ANNA—A coal barge! [With a harsh laugh.] If that ain't a swell job to find your long lost Old Man working at!

Gee, I knew something'd be bound to turn out wrong—always does with me.

That puts my idea of his giving me a rest on the bum.

ANNA—Not on your life, it wasn't. It was true for two years.

I didn't go wrong all at one jump.

Being a nurse girl was yust what finished me. Taking care of other people's kids, always listening to their bawling and crying, caged in, when you're only a kid yourself and want to go out and see things.

ANNA—[Forcing a short laugh.] No—course not. Only—it's funny to see you and not remember nothing.

You're like—a stranger.

CHRIS—[Sadly.] Ay s'pose. Ay never come home only few times ven you vas kit in Sveden. You don't remember dat?

Ven Ay gat money for pay passage home as passenger den—[He bows his head guiltily.] Ay forgat and Ay spend all money. Ven Ay tank again, it's too late. [He sighs.] Ay don't know vhy but dat's vay with most sailor fallar, Anna.

Dat ole davil sea make dem crazy fools with her dirty tricks.

It's so.

You don't know how nice it's on barge, Anna. Tug come and ve gat towed out on voyage—yust water all round, and sun, and fresh air, and good grub for make you strong, healthy gel. You see many tangs you don't see before.

You gat moonlight at night, maybe; see steamer pass; see schooner make sail—see everytang dat's pooty.

You need take rest like dat. You work too hard for young gel already. You need vacation, yes!

ANNA—Why not? [With a trace of strange exultation.]

I love this fog! Honest!

It's so—[She hesitates, groping for a word.]—Funny and still. I feel as if I was—out of things altogether.

ANNA—[The exultation again in her voice.] I love it! I don't give a rap if it never lifts! [CHRIS fidgets from one foot to the other worriedly. ANNA continues slowly, after a pause.]

It makes me feel clean—out here—'s if I'd taken a bath.

CHRIS—[After a pause.] You better go in cabin—read book. Dat put you to sleep.

ANNA—I've told you a hundred times I hated it. [Decidedly.]

I'd rather have one drop of ocean than all the farms in the world!

Honest! And you wouldn't like a farm, neither. Here's where you belong. [She makes a sweeping gesture seaward.] But not on a coal barge. You belong on a real ship, sailing all over the world.

Dey all vork rotten yob on sea for nutting, don't care nutting but yust gat big pay day in pocket, gat drunk, gat robbed, ship avay again on oder voyage. Dey don't come home, Dey don't do anytang like good man do.

And dat ole davil, sea, sooner, later she svallow dem up.

ANNA—[With an excited laugh.] Good sports, I'd call 'em. [Then hastily.] But say—listen—did all the women of the family marry sailors?

ANNA—Sure—like I'd been living a long, long time—out here in the fog. [Frowning perplexedly.] I don't know how to tell you yust what I mean.

It's like I'd come home after a long visit away some place.

It all seems like I'd been here before lots of times—on boats—in this same fog. [With a short laugh.] You must think I'm off my base.

ANNA—[Persistently.]

But why d'you s'pose I feel so—so—like I'd found something I'd missed and been looking for—'s if this was the right place for me to fit in?

And I seem to have forgot—everything that's happened—like it didn't matter no more. And I feel clean, somehow—like you feel yust after you've took a bath. And I feel happy for once—yes, honest!—happier than I ever been anywhere before!

BURKE—To hell with the drink—but I'll take it just the same. [He tosses it down.] Aah! I'm needin' that—and 'tis fine stuff. [Looking up at her with frank, grinning admiration.] But 'twasn't the booze I meant when I said, was I dreaming.

I thought you was some mermaid out of the sea come to torment me.

[He reaches out to feel of her arm.] Aye, rale flesh and blood, divil a less.

BURKE—[Delighted.] It's no lie, and why shouldn't I be, with me shoveling a million tons of coal in the stokeholes of ships since I was a lad only. [He pats the coil of hawser invitingly.]

Let you sit down, now, Miss, and I'll be telling you a bit of myself, and you'll be telling me a bit of yourself, and in an hour we'll be as old friends as if we was born in the same house.

[He pulls at her sleeve shyly.] Sit down now, if you plaze.

BURKE—He wasn't telling no lie. [With sudden melancholy.]

It's a hard and lonesome life, the sea is.

The only women you'd meet in the ports of the world who'd be willing to speak you a kind word isn't woman at all. You know the kind I mane, and they're a poor, wicked lot, God forgive them.

BURKE—[Following her—with fierce, pleading insistence.]

I'm telling you there's the will of God in it that brought me safe through the storm and fog to the wan spot in the world where you was!

Think of that now, and isn't it queer—

BURKE—You don't know the like I am.

Death itself wouldn't make me forget her.

So let you not be making talk to me about leaving her. I'll not, and be damned to you! It won't be so bad for you as you'd make out at all. She'll be living here in the States, and her married to me.

BURKE—'Tis not. 'Tis your own mad notions I'm after telling. But you know the truth in your heart, if great fear of the sea has made you a liar and coward itself. [Pounding the table.]

The sea's the only life for a man with guts in him isn't afraid of his own shadow!

'Tis only on the sea he's free, and him roving the face of the world, seeing all things, and not giving a damn for saving up money, or stealing from his friends, or any of the black tricks that a landlubber'd waste his life on.

Then she begins, fighting to control her emotion and speak calmly.] First thing is, I want to tell you two guys something. You was going on's if one of you had got to own me.

But nobody owns me, see?—'cepting myself.

I'll do what I please and no man, I don't give a hoot who he is, can tell me what to do! I ain't asking either of you for a living. I can make it myself—one way or other. I'm my own boss.

ANNA—[Touched but a bit embarrassed.] Don't bawl about it. There ain't nothing to forgive, anyway. It ain't your fault, and it ain't mine, and it ain't his neither.

We're all poor nuts, and things happen, and we yust get mixed in wrong, that's all.

CHRIS—[Eagerly.] You say right tang, Anna, py golly! It ain't nobody's fault! [Shaking his fist.] It's dat ole davil, sea!