Female Monologues
From The Fantasticks Luisa: This morning a bird woke me up. It was a lark, or a peacock; something like
that. So I said hello. And it vanished, flew away, the very moment I said hello! It was
quite mysterious. So do you know what I did? I went to my mirror and brushed my
hair two hundred times, without stopping. And as i was brushing it, my hair turned
mauve. No, honestly! Mauve! Then red. then some sort of a deep blue when the sun
hit it.... I'm sixteen years old, and ever day something happens to me. i don't know
what to make of it. When i get up in the morning and get dressed, I can
tell...something's different. I like to touch my eyelids, because they're never quite the
same. oh, oh, oh! I hug myself till my arms turn blue, then I close my eyes and cry
and cry till the tears come down and I can taste them. I love to taste my tears. I am
special. I am special! Please god, please, don't let me be normal!
From Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul.
After the dishes are washed and the sink rinsed out, there remains in the strainer at
the bottom of the sink what I will call, momentarily, some “stuff.” A rational
intelligent, objective person would say that this is simply a mixture of food particles
too big to go down the drain, composed of bits of protein, carbohydrates, fat and
fiber. Dinner dandruff. Furthermore, the person might add that not only was the
material first sterilized by the high heat of cooking, but further sanitized by going
through the detergent and hot water of the dishpan, and rinsed. No problem. But
any teenager who’s forced into washing dishes knows this explanation is a lie. That
stuff in the bottom of the strainer is toxic waste – deadly poison – a danger to health.
In other words, about as icky as icky gets. One of the very few reasons I had any
respect for my mother when I was 13 was because she would reach into the sink
with her bare hands – BARE HANDS – and pick up that lethal gunk and drop it into
the garbage. No teenager who wanted to live would have touched that without being
armed with gloves, a face mask, and stainless-steel tongs. Once, in school, I came
across the French word ordure, and when the teacher told me it meant
“unspeakable filth” I knew exactly to what it referred. We had it every night. In the
bottom of the sink.
Lindsey
(Talking to her friend.)
I had a boyfriend when I was five. Why can’t I get one now? I had them lining up! In
kindergarten, I got married. It was just pretend, but we kissed and walked all the
way to the circle- time spot holding hands. Then in first grade, three boys all wanted
to marry me at once. I was adored! What happened? (Pause.) Maybe I don’t deserve
a boyfriend now. Back then I was little and cute and smart. Now I’m the tallest girl in
my state. People think I’m twenty, but I’m thirteen. You don’t get glasses, braces, and
pimples all in the same month unless you’re thirteen. Oh, I wish I could snap my
fingers and right-now-ugly me would just disappear! Then I’d be the next me whoever that is. Who do you think I’ll be when thirteen is over?
Echo (at a spelling bee)
He’s guessing! I know he’s guessing. Please, please let me win. Please! I want five
minutes! Just five minutes when all the lights are on me, and all the pictures are
being taken of me, and for five minutes I’m the most famous child in America, and
Mom and Dorothea see it! After that you can wash me back into the ocean with
everybody else. I’ll just be on of the rabble, hoi polloi, the clamjamfry, the... What?
Excuse me, could you repeat the word? Clamjamfry? I don’t believe it! She asked me
the exact word I was thinking of! Clamjamfry. C-L-A-M-J-A-M-F-R-Y. Clamjamfry. I
know everything in the world!
Jean
(Talking to her teacher.)
Respect is a two-way street. Why should I respect anybody who treats me like that?
All I was doin’ was sittin’ on the bus, listenin’ to my music, lookin’ out the window.
OK, my backpack was on the seat next to me, but there were only four people on the
whole bus. Then this old guy gets on, walks up, and pushes my backpack on the
floor. He didn’t poke me to get my attention, ask me, nothin’. Just pushed my
backpack on that dirty floor. Then he didn’t even sit in the seat next to me. I mean,
what’s that about? He shoved it on the floor cause I’m a kid. That’s all. Do I deserve
that? Like I say, respect is a two-way street. He’s got to be respecting me, if he wants
the same.
Excerpt from Snow White Gets Her Say
Catherine: That you don’t recognize me by name is but the first of my complaints
about my tale. Oh you know me alright. I’m the main character—in a tale titled with
the name of one of the men in the story. But what’s in a name? A lot. Especially if it’s
a man’s name. This man’s name is the answer to the question upon which rests the
fate of myself and my newborn child. So his name is very powerful, it is very
important. My name apparently is not.
Nor is my life. For whether it is to be filled with joy and delight from being with my
newborn, or empty with grief and loss from separation is to be decided by a mere
guessing game.
Nor are my words important. I denied my father’s boast. I told the King I most
definitely could not spin gold out of straw. But he didn’t believe me. Of course not.
He chose instead to believe the words of an immature, egotistic, vain man. And I
suffer the consequences.
The consequences. To pay for my father’s ridiculous lie, I lose my sanity, my
freedom, and my dignity for three nights—and almost my child, forever. (And one
sentence—one sentence in the whole tale is devoted to that ‘choice’, that decision to
give up my child in return for my life.)
Because I ‘succeeded’ on the third night, I was ‘rewarded’ with marriage to the King.