India Song (Characters)

Characters

Beggar Woman

The beggar woman is a mysterious figure who hides in the bushes of the French embassy garden and occasionally peeks her head out to watch the goings-on at the reception. The voices explain that she is from Burma and that she got pregnant at the age of seventeen and left home. They state that the beggar woman walked across Asia for ten years and finally ended up in Calcutta. She has lost all her hair from malnutrition and is bald. The beggar woman can be heard singing at various points throughout the play. At the end of India Song, the voices indicate that the beggar woman has followed Anne-Marie and her friends to the island. While Anne-Marie represents the status of white European women in colonial Asia, the beggar woman represents the conditions of life for Asian women.

George Crawn

George Crawn is an Englishman and an old friend of Anne-Marie's. He arrives at the embassy reception and encourages the other guests to help themselves to drinks from the bar. Toward the end of the play, he travels with Anne-Marie and several of her other friends to the islands.

The French Ambassador

See Ambassador Stretter

The Guest

The guest of the Stretters' is one of the men who attends the reception at the embassy. The next day, he travels with Anne-Marie and several other friends to the islands. There is some indication that the guest may have been one of Anne-Marie's lovers.

Michael Richardson

Michael Richardson is Anne-Marie's lover. He first met her in S. Thala, where he had been engaged to a local girl. After he met Anne-Marie at a party and danced with her, he fell in love with her and broke off his engagement. When Anne-Marie moved with her husband to Calcutta, Michael Richardson dropped everything to follow her. He started his own shipping company in Calcutta so that he could live there and be near Anne-Marie. He frequently travels with her to the island, where they vacation together at the French residence. Toward the end of the play, he plays the piano and watches as Anne-Marie shares a passionate kiss with the young attaché. The voices explain that after Anne-Marie's suicide, Michael Richardson left India and never returned.

Ambassador Stretter

Ambassador Stretter is the husband of Anne-Marie Stretter and is the French ambassador to India. They have been married for seventeen years, during which time they have lived in various capital cities throughout Asia. Ambassador Stretter never appears as a character on stage; however, his voice may be heard offstage at various points during the reception that is held at the French embassy in Calcutta. The voices and various gossiping guests at the party indicate that the ambassador is well aware of the fact that his wife takes lovers. The Stretters' marriage has become more of a platonic friendship than a romantic relationship, so he does not mind her infidelities. Thus, when Anne-Marie vacations on the island with Michael Richardson, her husband goes on hunting trips in Nepal. During the course of the reception, Ambassador Stretter can be heard offstage talking with the young attaché, inviting him to travel with Anne-Marie to the islands and asking him to speak with the vice-consul since no one else at the party is willing to go near him.

Anne-Marie Stretter

Anne-Marie Stretter is the central character of India Song. She is originally from Venice, born of a French father and a mother of unknown origin. When she was seventeen, she got pregnant and married a French bureaucrat, with whom she traveled throughout Asia. She then met Ambassador Stretter and left her first husband to marry him. At the point when the events of the play take place, she has been married to Ambassador Stretter for seventeen years and has lived with him in various capital cities throughout Asia. She has two daughters.

It is well-known that Anne-Marie takes lovers outside of her marriage. At this point, she is in love with Michael Richardson. During the reception at the French embassy, Anne-Marie dances with her husband, with the young attaché, with Michael Richardson, and with the vice-consul. The various guests at the party find her intriguing and mysterious and gossip about her extensively. The day after the party, she and four guests drive to the island to stay at the French residence there. That night, Anne-Marie shares a passionate kiss with the young attaché, right in front of Michael Richardson. Later, she commits suicide by walking into the Indian Ocean.

The Vice-Consul

The man referred to as the vice-consul is the former French vice-consul in Lahore, India. While in Lahore, he suffered a mental breakdown and one night fired a gun from his balcony down onto the beggars and lepers crowded below. He tried to shoot himself in the head but failed to commit suicide. After these events, the vice-consul was dismissed from his post in Lahore. He then went to Calcutta to await reassignment. Anne-Marie invites the vice-consul to the reception at the embassy. Because of his outrageous behavior in Lahore, the other guests avoid him and gossip about him. The vice-consul finally asks one woman to dance with him, but when he tells her that he wants to contract the disease of leprosy (presumably because he is suicidal), the woman stops dancing and walks away from him.

Toward the end of the party, the vice-consul and Anne-Marie dance together. He tells her that he is in love with her, but she responds that she is in love with Michael Richardson. The vice-consul then begs her to let him spend the night at the embassy, but she refuses to allow this. He begins shouting that he loves her and wants to spend the night so that all the guests can hear him. The vice-consul is then told to leave the embassy and is escorted off the premises. Throughout the rest of the night, he can be heard in the distance, crying and shouting Anne-Marie's name.

The day after the party, when Anne-Marie and her friends travel to the islands, the vice-consul secretly follows them. After supper, Anne-Marie walks back to the French residence on the island and sees the vice-consul in the garden but does not say anything. The voices state that he was the only one who saw her walk into the ocean to commit suicide but that he did not do anything to stop her. They explain that soon after her death, the vice-consul resigned from his job, and no one ever heard from him again, though he may have been seen walking among the lepers along the Ganges River in Calcutta.

Voice 1

Voice 1 is a disembodied voice that serves as one of the four narrators of India Song. Voice 1 is that of a young woman and is sweet but tinged with madness. Voice 1's memory of the love story of Anne-Marie Stretter is incomplete and illogical. Yet, she is so fascinated and consumed by Anne-Marie's story that she loses herself in it.

Voice 2

Voice 2 is one of the four disembodied voices that serve as narrators of India Song. Like voice 1, voice 2 is that of a young woman, tinged with madness and sweetness. Voice 2 is consumed with love and desire for voice 1 and continually tries to connect the love story of Anne-Marie back to their own love story.

Voice 3

Voice 3 is a disembodied male voice that is one of the narrators of India Song. Like the other voices, voice 3 is fascinated by the love story of Anne-Marie Stretter. However, voice 3 can remember almost nothing of the story and continually asks voice 4 to remind him of the events surrounding Anne-Marie's suicide.

Voice 4

Voice 4 is one of the disembodied voices that narrates the story of Anne-Marie Stretter in India Song. Unlike the other voices, voice 4, a male voice, can remember every detail of Anne-Marie's love story.

The Young Attaché

The young French attaché, newly arrived in India, is invited to the reception at the French embassy in Calcutta. Anne-Marie dances with him, and he immediately falls in love with her. She invites him to join her and her friends on their trip to the islands the next day, and he accepts. The first night on the island, while they are at the French residence, the young attaché takes Anne-Marie in his arms and kisses her passionately, right in front of Michael Richardson, who does nothing to stop them.

Media Adaptations

• India Song was adapted to film and directed by Duras. It premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 1975. Voice 4 in the film, which is indicated in the script as male, is narrated by Duras.