Boys

THE HAPPY PRINCE

From the Oscar Wilde fairy tale about a statue of a former prince
Boy, Age 8 to 14

PRINCE: Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow, far away across the city I see a young man in a garret.  He is leaning over a desk covered with papers, and in a tumbler by his side there is a bunch of withered violets.  He has large and dreamy eyes.  He is trying to finish a play for the Director of the Theatre, but he is too cold to write any more.  There is no fire in the grate, and hunger has made him faint.  Alas! I no longer have rubies to give him.  My eyes are all that I have now.  They are made of rare sapphires, which were brought out of India a thousand years ago.  Pluck out one of them and take it to him.  He will sell it to the jeweler, and buy firewood, and finish his play.  Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow, do not weep so.  Do as I command you and pluck out my eye.
 

LORD OF THE FLIES

PIGGY

I expect there’s a lot more of us scattered about. You haven’t seen any others, have you? I’d run and have a look about with you, but my auntie told me not to run, on account of my asthma. Can’t catch me breath. I was the only boy in our school what had asthma. And I’ve been wearing specs since I was three. I expect when we find the others, we ought to have a meeting. And we’ll want to know all their names, and make a list. I don’t care what they call me, so long as they don’t call me what they used to call me at school. They used to call me ‘Piggy.’ No. Please! I said I didn’t want to be called --” Oh. Oh fine. Just so long as you don’t tell the others.”

Original monologue for a boy age 8 to 12 years old

HISTORICAL PLAYS ARE BORING

This play would be so much better with ninjas. I tried to tell my teacher we needed to add some action to it. Like an evil alien army showing up to battle the pilgrims and Indians for control of earth at the big feast scene. But she wouldn’t go for it. She said it wasn’t historically accurate. Oh, and that the Thanksgiving feast being peaceful was the whole point of the play. A bunch of people in itchy clothes stuffing their faces is the whole point of the show? Seriously? She has no idea what entertainment looks like. Not surprising since she’s older than my grandma, but come on. We gotta keep the audience awake, and her show is duller than my sister’s ballet recitals.

So I talked to the guys. And it turns out, they’d been thinking the same thing. That’s why we’re all wearing swords under our costumes tonight. When I give the signal, all the boys from room nine are going to erupt in the most wicked battle to the death ever. Garrett and Ethan even taped sandwich bags full of ketchup to their stomachs, so it’ll look like real blood when they get stabbed. This is going down as the best Thanksgiving play in school history. Just wait.

THE SECRET GARDEN Colin is a boy age 8 to 12 who has been bedridden his entire life.

COLIN: The springtime.  I was thinking that I’ve really never seen it before.  I scarcely ever went out, and when I did go I never looked at it.  I didn’t even think about it.  That morning when you ran in and said ‘It’s come!  It’s come!’ you made me feel quite queer.  It sounded as if things were coming with a great procession and big bursts and wafts of music.  I’ve a picture like it in one of my books - crowds of lovely people and children with garlands and branches with blossoms on them,  everyone laughing and dancing and crowding and playing on pipes.  That’s why I said, ‘Perhaps we shall hear golden trumpets’ and told you to throw open the window.