The meaning of the game of roles…according to the play's protagonist, Leone Gala:
L: Certainly, I shouldn't be here, my friend. And yet, I force myself, as much as possible, to be here as little as possible...not only for everyone else, but for myself, too.
You see, my friend...the fault...is in the fact that I was born...And when a fact is made fact, it remains there, like a prison for you. Yes, ahahah...
I'm here. And I'm Silia's husband, too. Another fact, this prison.
And this role, assigned to me by our story cannot be destroyed, it remains: I'm here...I'm Leone...I'm the husband...in spite of the fact that I found this solution of going away...taking with me only my books and my cooking utensils...things that, as you know, are inseparable from me...and to leave everything here to her, since she was suffering so much in the role of the wife...as my wife...
L: Ah, how sad it is, my friend, when you've understood the game!
L: It's very simple, my friend…You have to learn to defend yourself from everyone else, and, above all, from yourself; from the hurt that life inflicts on us all...It's unavoidable!...from the hurt that I inflicted on myself for her...the hurt that I inflict on her...the hurt that you inflict on me...
L: But, of course, it's unavoidable! We inflict harm, all of us, on each other, naturally! That's life. You have to learn to empty yourself of that instinct. You have to learn to empty yourself of every passion…of every feeling...of affection...of emotion...of...love...
L: I'm left with…with…watching others', and our, lives, from the outside…from far away...from a distance...
L: Yes, but you're compensated by a marvellous pleasure: namely the game of the intellect, which clarifies your whirlwind of feelings, which fixes in precise lines everything that moves you inside...here...every time... when you're suffering...when you're feeling ill...when you're unhappy...
L: Listen to me, let me finish…I'll explain it to you in simpler terms: so, the game of life...is like the game of facts and concepts...
L: Look, it's as if you suddenly found yourself landed with, I don't know from where, a newly-laid egg...
L: To give you a new image of the facts and concepts. If you aren't ready to grasp a fact...to take it...to seize it, it'll smash on you...it'll break on you... exactly like an egg, just think! If, on the other hand, you're ready, you can take it, you can pierce it, and you can drink it...as if it were an egg...exactly...What would you be left with in your hand?
G: Il guscio vuoto....dell'uovo....del fatto....
L: And that's the concept! You skewer it on the point of your pin and you have fun making it turn and turn and turn...or you play with it, as if it were a ball...tossing it from one hand to the other...from there, to there, to there...and then...snap...you puncture it...and you throw it away.
L: Come here…remember…stay alert…to yourself and to the infinite feelings that the facts of life inspire in you...remember...that you must empty yourself of them straightaway, and draw out the concepts from them, so that you can then play the game and possess those ideas.
