We were out in the country, and we all went to Christmas mass together, you know, he was all dressed up in his Buddhist finery, you know, it was one of those awful dreary Catholic churches on Long Island where the priest talks about communism and birth control. And as I was sitting there in mass I was wondering: "What in the world is going on? I mean, here I am, I'm a grown man, and there's this strange person living with me in the house, and I'm not working, I mean, you know, I was doing nothing but scribbling a little poetry in my diary. I can't get a job teaching any more, and I dunno what I want to do...." When all of a sudden, a huge creature appeared, looking at the congregation! It was about, I'd say, six foot eight, something like that, you know, and it was half bull, half man, it's skin was blue, it had violets growing out of its eyelids and poppies growing out of its toenails, and it just stood there for the whole mass. I mean, I could not make that creature disappear. You know, I thought: "Oh, well, you know, I'm just seeing this because I'm bored," you know. I could not make that creature go away. Okay, now: I didn't talk with people about it, because they'd think I was weird. But I felt that this creature was somehow coming to comfort me. That somehow he was appearing to say: "Well! You may feel low, and you might not be able to create a play right now. But look what can come to you, on Christmas eve! Hang on, old friend! I may seem weird to you, but on these weird voyages, weird creatures appear! It's part of the journey. You're okay! Hang in there!" [Pause. Laughter at another table.]
WALLY: By the way, did you ever see that play, The Violets Are Blue?
ANDRE: [Without expression:] No.
WALLY: Oh, well, when you mentioned the violets, it reminded me of that. It was about people being strangled on a submarine. [André gives Wally a bemused/puzzled look; he says nothing. Pause. Wally sighs.] Well! So that was Christmas! What happened after that?
ANDRE: You really want to hear about all this?
WALLY: Yeah!
ANDRE: Well. Around that time, I was beginning to think about going to India. And Kozan suddenly left one day. And you know, I was beginning to get into a lot of very strange ideas around that time. Now, for example, I had developed this...well, I got this idea which I...well, it was very appealing to me at the time, you know, which was that I would have a flag, a large flag, and that wherever I worked this flag would fly, or if we were outside, say, with a group, that the flag could be the thing that we'd lay on at night, and that somehow between working on this flag and lying on this flag, this flag flying over us, that the flag would pick up vibrations of a kind that would still be in the flag when I brought it home? So, I went down to meet this flag maker that I'd heard about, and you know, there was this very straight-forward looking guy, you know, a very sweet and really healthy-looking and everything, nice, big, blond; you know, he had a beautiful clean loft down in the village with lovely, happy flags. And I was all into The Little Prince and I talked to him about the Little Prince and his adventures and everything, how I needed the flag and what the flag should be, and he seemed to really connect with it. So, two weeks later I came back: he showed me a flag that I thought was very odd, you know, 'cause I'd...well, you know, I'd expected something gentle, and lyrical. There was something about this that was so powerful, it was almost overwhelming! And it did include the Tibetan swastika.
WALLY: [Swallows abruptly.] He put a swastika in your flag?!
ANDRE: It was the Tibetan swastika, not the Nazi swastika. It's one of the most ancient Tibetan symbols. And it was just strange, you know. But, I brought it home, because my idea with this flag was that before I left, you know, before I left for India, I wanted several people who were close to me to have this flag in the room for the night, to sleep with it, you know, and then in the morning to sew something into the flag. So I took the flag in to Marina, and I said: "Hey, look at this. What do you think of this?" And she said: "What is that? That's awful!" And I said: "It's a flag!" And she said: "I don't like it!," you know. And I said: "Oh, well, I kinda thought you might like to spend the night with it," you know. But she really thought the flag was awful. So, then, Chiquita threw this party for me, before I left for India, and the apartment was filled with guests, and at one point Chiquita said: "The flag! The flag! Where's the flag?" And I said: "Oh, yeah, the flag!" And I go and get the flag and I open it up. Chiquita goes absolutely white and runs out of the room and vomits! So the party just comes to a halt and breaks up! And then the next day, I gave it to this young woman who had been in my group in Poland, who was now in New York. I didn't tell her anything about any of this. At five o'clock in the morning she called me up and she said: "I gotta come and see you right away!" And I thought: "Oh, God!" She came up and she said: "I saw things! I saw things around this flag! Now I know you're stubborn and I know you want to take this thing with you, but if you'd follow my advice you'd put it in a hole in the ground and burn it and cover it with earth 'cause the Devil's in it!" Well, I never took the flag with me! In fact, I gave it to her, and she had a ceremony with it six months later in France, with some friends, in which they did burn it.
WALLY: Hunh! God! That's really, really amazing! So did you ever go to India?
ANDRE: Oh, yes, I went to India in the spring, Wally, and I came back home feeling all wrong. I mean, you know, I'd been to India, and I had just felt like a tourist. I'd found nothing. So, I was spending the summer on Long Island with my family, and I heard about this community, in Scotland, called Findhorn, where people sang and talked and meditated with plants. And it was founded by several rather middle-class English and Scottish eccentrics, some of them intellectuals and some of them not. And I'd heard that they'd grown things in soil that supposedly nothing can grow in 'cause it's almost beach soil, and that they'd built--not "built"--they'd grown the largest cauliflowers in the world, and their sort of cabbages, and they've grown trees that can't grow in the British Isles. So I went there! I mean, it is an amazing place, Wally. I mean, if there are insects bothering the plants, they will talk with the insects! And you know, make an agreement by which they'll set aside a special patch of vegetables just for the insects and then the insects will leave the main part alone! [Wally laughs.] Things like that. And everything they do, they do beautifully. I mean, the buildings just shine. I mean, for instance, the icebox, the stove, the car, you know, they all have names. And since you wouldn't treat Helen, the icebox, with any less respect than you would Margaret, your wife, you know, you make sure that Helen is as clean as Margaret, or treated with equal respect. And when I was there, Wally, I remember being in the woods, and I would look at a leaf and I would actually see that thing that is alive in that leaf. And then I remember just running through the woods as fast as I could with this incredible laugh coming out of me. And really being in that state, you know, where laughter and tears seem to merge. I mean, it absolutely blasted me open. When I came out of Findhorn, I was hallucinating nonstop. I was seeing clouds as creatures; the people on the airplane all had animals faces. I mean, I was on a trip, you know. It was like being in a William Blake world suddenly. Things were exploding. So, immediately, I went to Belgrade, because I wanted to talk to Grotowski. And Grotowski and I got together at midnight in my hotel room and we drank instant coffee out of the top of my shaving-cream. And we talked from midnight until eleven the next morning!