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Main-Travelled Roads

Overview

Show Type
Musical
Age Guidance
Youth (Y)/General Audiences (G)
Genders
  • Female: 1
  • Male: 1
Playing Age
Young Adult, Adult
Style
Comedic
Length
Short
Time Period
Contemporary
Time/Place
Rural Wisconsin, late 1800s
Act/Scene
Act 1

Context

Text

ED Say Nina, you ever been in love?

NINA Oh, I don’t tink so. No. Vott ist like?

ED Well I’ll tell you. When you are in love, all the world melts away. And all you can see is that person’s face. You go past a field of wildflowers, all you can think of is bringing that person to see them, or maybe picking some to bring to ‘em.

NINA I like flowers. I tried to plant flower garden, but Mutti, my mother, she says nein. She says why waste land where vegetables could be?

ED Well, that’s a shame. Every gal oughta have flowers.

NINA Yah. What else is beink in love?

ED I don’t even know how to describe it, but it’s like your heart is pounding and stopped at the same time. It’s like Christmas when the choir practices up and sings them harmonies. That’s the closest I can come to describin’ it, someday you’ll know what it feels like.

NINA I tink I do now. Dese vords. No Cherman boys talk like this.

ED Aw sure they do.

NINA Nein. Cherman boys talk of pigs und cows und barley. You talk like this. Oh my gutness. Tell me, Edvard. Dis girl, die one you speak off. Ist she Deutsch, or Yankee.

ED Dutch! I should say not!

NINA Oh. Vott ist wrong mit... Dutch.

ED Well... nothing exactly. I’ve seen me some pretty enough Dutch Gals... but take you, for example.

NINA Vere chould vee go?

ED Well, look at ya. Walkin’ around with no shoes.

NINA Choos, yah.

ED And workin’ out in the fields ever day.

NINA But I...

ED I don’t fault you for it. It’s your parents. They are the ones making you work out here. And even without a hat. Your skin is all dirty and brown... and freckled. No Yankee parents would let their daughter do such a thing. Yankee gals sit indoors.

NINA So... you don’t tink I could effer catch a Yankee boy.

ED Well now... that’s an interesting question. There’d have to be a lot of changes.

NINA I can change. Oh Edvard Creamary Man, tell me... tell me...

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