The Kepler Project




The Kepler Project An Excerpt `The Characters` `ANNA, 31, of Indian descent, a contemporary astronomer` `KEPLER, a 17th Century German astronomer` `GALILEO, a 17th Centruy Italian astronomer` `TYCHO DE BRAHE, a 17th Century Danish astronomer and a nobleman` `DR. CHERNOFF, mid-fifties, the contemporary head of the astronomy department` `BRAD, 29, a post doc in astronomy and Anna’s assistant` `BARBARA, mid-thirties, Kepler’s wife` `MA KEPLER, mid-fifties, Kepler’s mother` `Various other 17th Century characters: Archduke, Torturer` `CHORUS, played by those who are free to sing at the time` `The Setting` `Downstage is a large deck with a hot tub stage right and two chaise lounges.` `Upstage, behind the deck is Anna’s dining room with a big table where she has her computer set up, her books spread out, her papers strewn about.` `Upstage right, stairs lead to a platform where a big desk sits.` `A doorway stage left leads from Anna’s dining room to a porch below the platform.` `A large, sliding glass door that remains open during most of the play separates the Anna’s dining room from the deck.` `The Time` `Now. And the 17th Century.` `ACT 1` `Scene One` `(The theater is completely dark. A single star appears and then another until the sky is filled with stars in proper constellations. We cannot see ANNA or DR. CHERNOFF but we hear their voices.)` `DR. CHERNOFFWelcome. Please make yourself comfortable.` `ANNAHe will ask how my research is coming along.` `(Lights fade up very slowly, initially just enough for us to detect that Anna is sitting in a hot tub looking at the sky and DR.` `CHERNOFF behind a very large desk, facing the audience.)` `DR. CHERNOFFSo, Anna, tell me, how is your research coming along?` `ANNA` `I'll say I'm polishing off the proposal for the NSF grant.` `DR. CHERNOFF` `(over Anna) If you don't publish soon, I will find it impossible/` `ANNA` `(over Chernoff) Dr. Chernoff, I am on the brink of....` `DR. CHERNOFF` `(over Anna) /to support you for tenure.` `(Brief beat)` `Brink of?` `ANNA` `I need more data.` `CHERNOFF` `To what end?` `ANNA` `To prove that the universe is not confined to matter in space and time...` `DR. CHERNOFF` `Yes?` `ANNA` `I can say that can't I?` `DR. CHERNOFF` `Perhaps....` `ANNA` `That the cosmos is an evolving, instantly interconnected...` `CHERNOFF` `Watch your step.` `ANNA` `and fundamentally integral universe made not of distinct elements but instead/` `CHERNOFF` `Careful, careful.` `ANNA` `(animated) /a luminous web of being/` `CHERNOFF` `No, you cannot say that.` `ANNA` `(more animated) /from the most infinitesimal particle to the stars and planets and galaxies, all networked, linked,` `CHERNOFF` `I think/` `ANNA` `communicating.` `CHERNOFF` `/not.` `(Lights fade on DR. CHERNOFF as KEPLER saunters onstage. He is dressed in 17th Century garb: knickers, ruffled collar, waistcoat. He wears a goatee, his hands are gnarled, his eyesight poor)` `KEPLER` `(to Anna) You seem riddled with anxiety and doubt.` `ANNA` `Yes.` `KEPLER` `Why? He seems an affable sort. Just blurt it out, whatever you are thinking.` `ANNA` `Too risky.` `KEPLER` `Perhaps the risk is only imagined.` `ANNA` `I assure you it is real. I've witnessed colleagues suffer the consequences.` `KEPLER` `They were not as brilliant as you, nor willing to be.` `ANNA` `Given I am imagining you, I am now suffering delusions of grandeur.` `KEPLER` `Perhaps I am not imagined.` `ANNA` `How can I tell?` `KEPLER` `You can't.` `ANNA` `Which leaves me right where I began.` `KEPLER` `Namely?` `ANNA` `Not knowing what to say about events that occur but cannot be explained within the current dogma of orthodox science.` `KEPLER` `You can say it has happened before.` `ANNA` `Namely?` `KEPLER` `The universe re-imagined. In my own lifetime. The "strange" Copernican theory of the earth not at the center but a planet among many rotating the sun was considered to be fantastical nonsense, wanton blasphemy, an unjustifiable contradiction of common sense.` `ANNA` `A paradigm shift. How did it happen?` `KEPLER` `By proving that the planets followed laws: elliptical orbits rotating the sun, equal area swept out in equal time; moved not by sprit but by forces exerted from a distance. My discoveries.` `ANNA` `How did you do it?` `KEPLER` `Strict adherence to data. Persistence. An irrepressible imagination.` `ANNA` `Imagination is dangerous.` `KEPLER` `A lack of imagination more so.` `ANNA` `But how? How did you do it?` `KEPLER` `Where do we begin?` `ANNA` `With your first inkling.` `KEPLER` `The comet. I was six. My mother led me up a hill and made sure I had a good look.` `(A comet streaks the night sky. Lights come up on MA KEPLER on a hillside, holding BOY KEPLER's hand)` `MA KEPLER` `(singing)` `Look, a comet` `Look at the comet` `Look at the comet in the sky.` `(Lights come up on Galileo, alone on a hillside)` `GALILEO` `(singing)` `Look, a comet` `Look at the comet` `Look at the comet in the sky.` `TYCHO` `(Lights come up on Tycho Brahe, alone on a hillside)` `Look, a comet` `Look at the comet` `Look at the comet in the sky. Do you see?` `GALILEO` `A comet.` `TYCHO` `Could it be?` `MA KEPLER` `A comet.` `GALILEO` `Where a comet ought not to be.` `TYCHO` `Could Aristotle...` `GALILEO` `His model..` `TYCHO` `And Ptolemy...` `GALILEO AND TYCHO` `Be wrong?` `TYCHO` `Do you see what I see?` `MA KEPLER` `Could it be?` `GALILEO` `Could it be?` `ALL` `Look at the comet in the sky.` `(Lights fade to black on the historical characters.)` `KEPLER` `1577. Tycho measured it from Hveen. The tail fifty times the breadth of the moon and six times as far in space. Totally inconsistent with where comets should appear according to the prevailing model.` `ANNA` `(emerging from the tub) And everyone could see it. (KEPLER shields his eyes as ANNA throws on a thick robe)` `KEPLER` `See the entire universe wrenched off its moorings? You see what you believe.` `ANNA` `How then, how did it happen?` `KEPLER` `Close your eyes for a moment and forget what you know to be true..` `ANNA` `(with eyes closed, tries to hypnotize herself) I'm forgetting, I'm forgetting, I'm forgetting.` `KEPLER` `Imagine the earth is stock still under your feet.` `ANNAYes. That's what it feels like.` `KEPLER` `And that we are standing at the center of the universe.` `ANNA` `Okay, dead center.` `KEPLER` `Now open your eyes and look. (He points) Mars, there. Jupiter, there.` `ANNA` `(pointing) Saturn, there,` `KEPLER` `and Venus, there.` `Imagine each planet nested in its own crystal sphere that is pushed by an angel in a perfect circle, now forward, now back.` `ANNA` `Beautiful.` `KEPELR` `And beyond the planets, the stars in their own sphere, fixed, moving together round and round, predictable, reliable.` `ANNA` `Yes.` `KEPLER` `Above the moon, everything is fixed. Nothing new can ever happen. Until/` `ANNAWhammo! The comet! Appearing where it wasn't supposed to be.` `KEPLER` `Shattering the spheres!` `ANNAFantastic.` `KEPLER` `Terrifying.` `ANNA` `You were there.` `KEPLER` `At the center. Galileo in Italy. Tycho de Brahe on his island in Denmark in his fantastic observatory with roofs that rolled back to reveal the sky. And Bruno, do not forget poor Bruno. Burned at the stake while 200,000 people cheered.` `ANNA` `Rah! Rah! Rah!` `KEPLER` `Just before lighting the pyre, they whispered into his ear, "Okay, we'll let you say the earth rotates the sun, but just recant that bit about the universe being infinite.` `CHORUS` `The universe is infinite` `The universe is infinite` `The universe is infinite` `KEPLER` `He thought for a moment. Then he said he didn't think he could do that.` `CHORUS` `They built a pyre` `They struck the flint` `They said, "Recant,"` `He said....."I can't"` `The universe is infinite` `The universe is infinite` `The universe is infinite` `He turn``ed``to ....ash.` `KEPLER` `One of the world's greatest astronomers ...barbecued.` `ANNA` `Which is exactly why I haven't told anyone what I'm up to.` `KEPLER` `Coward. They don't still...?` `ANNA` `Virtually. And if you're a woman it's worse, there's statistics.` `KEPLER` `You cannot compare it with fire.` `ANNA` `You lose your tenure-track position, are demoted to lecturer, assigned only the beginning astronomy classes with 400 tests to grade and 400 papers to read. Your access to equipment is limited. No one will publish your papers or give you a research grant. Your colleagues avoid you. No, no one strikes flint to a pyre. They marginalize you, ridicule you in public and private until you ...` `KEPLER` `What?` `ANNA` `Go mad with disappointment.` `KEPLER` `You cannot compare it with fire.` `ANNA` `You were there, at the center.` `KEPLERThe universe, upended.`

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