Previous
Act 2
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Man and Superman, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Love and Marriage
Ideal Humanity (the Superman)
Morality and Hypocrisy
Gender Roles
Summary
Analysis
At a natural amphitheater overlooking a road in the Sierra Nevada mountains, a group of brigands sit around a dying campfire. Their leader is Mendoza, an older Jewish man with “a Mephistophelean affectation.” Mendoza rises, and his followers (middle-aged men—Englishmen, a Frenchman, and some Americans) applaud. Addressing the group, Mendoza returns to the subject the group has debated over the last three nights: whether anarchists or social democrats are braver. The group engages in a lively debate—until the sound of an approaching car brings the argument to a halt. It’s Tanner and Straker, who are now in the band’s clutches.
Act 3’s opening may somewhat disorient readers, with the action picking up in a strange and unexpected place (the Sierra Nevada mountains of Spain) amid a mysterious group of new characters. The absurdity of the brigands’ “debate” over which anti-establishment group—socialists or anarchists—is edgier is a somewhat ridiculous scene that begins Act 3 on a somewhat comedic note. It’s rather ridiculous and ironic for a group of anarchist criminals to be so organized.
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Tanner gets out of the car. Mendoza introduces himself as “Mendoza, President of the League of the Sierra!” He explains that he supports himself “by robbing the rich.” Tanner replies, “I am a gentleman: I live by robbing the poor.” They shake hands, and the English social democrats cheer. Mendoza dismisses his band of brigands. Some go to a nearby cave, and others move toward the road to play cards. Mendoza offers to broach the subject of Tanner’s ransom now, or they can hold off until morning. Tanner says tomorrow is fine and that money isn’t an issue for him: he’s wealthy enough to pay anything Mendoza demands.
Tanner’s remark, “I am a gentleman: I live by robbing the poor,” is a joke, but as with most comedy, there is an underlying truth to it. As a “gentleman” (a man who has inherited his wealth and doesn’t have to work for a living), Tanner really does live by exploiting the labor of working-class people. His glibness about this fact further establishes his character as fundamentally selfish despite all his talk of moral ideals, making him as much as a hypocrite as any of the establishment-supporting characters he criticizes, albeit in a different way.
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Mendoza and Tanner talk politics. Tanner admits to being “a bit of a Socialist.” This isn’t a great surprise to Mendoza: if socialism can catch on among a band of brigands, it makes sense the wealthy elite would take an interest in it as well.
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Mendoza tells the men the story of his life, describing a woman he once loved. The woman was smart, beautiful, and funny. Mendoza would have given anything to marry her, but the woman—a Gentile—didn’t want to marry a Jewish a man because she believed that all Jewish people consider Gentiles to be “dirty.” Tanner is shocked to hear this, but Straker isn’t: his sister worked as a cook for a Jewish family and has confirmed that it’s true. Mendoza continues his story. Heartbroken over his unrequited love, he considered suicide and even murdering his beloved. Eventually, he fled to America. There, he fell in with some criminals, one of whom introduced him to “capitalists of the right sort,” and Mendoza formed a crime “syndicate.” Despite his successes, though, he still pined for his beloved, Louisa.
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Hearing the name “Louisa,” Straker, shocked, realizes that his sister is Mendoza’s beloved. There’s momentary tension as Straker threatens to fight Mendoza if he speaks ill of Louisa, but then Mendoza returns to lamenting his broken heart. Tanner demands that Mendoza stop his sulking. He tells Mendoza, “You are sacrificing your career to a monomania.” Mendoza agrees but doesn’t think there’s anything he can do about it. Tanner is annoyed when Mendoza starts to recite a melodramatic poem he has composed in Louisa’s honor.
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The men fall asleep to Mendoza reciting his poem. As the scene fades to blackness, music from Mozart’s Don Giovanni sounds. The scene shifts from the Sierra Nevada Mountains to Tanner’s dream, which takes place in hell. The characters transform into the cast of Don Juan, with Tanner assuming the titular role. In hell, an old woman (Dona Ana)—a newcomer who died that morning—approaches Don Juan and laments her loneliness. When Don Juan confirms that the woman is in hell, she struggles to accept it: she confessed all her sins, after all. Don Juan assures the woman that there are many good people in hell. Plus, her lack of pain only further justifies her being there: the wicked feel right at home in hell.
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Don Juan explains that he himself is not wicked and therefore feels “bored” to be in hell. He did kill a man, but it was in self-defense and therefore not technically “murder.” The man he killed was an older gentleman who had attacked Don Juan to “defend[] his daughter’s honor.” The old woman (Dona Ana) admits that her own father died defending her honor in a duel, as well. She asks Don Juan if there is “justice in heaven,” and he says no—but there is in hell.
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Don Juan asks the old woman (Dona Ana) how old she was when she died. She says 77. Don Juan replies that in hell, she can be whichever age she’d like. Intrigued, the old woman decides she’d like to be 27—and immediately transforms into a radiant beauty who strongly resembles Ann Whitefield! Don Juan gasps, immediately recognizing the woman’s younger self as his beloved, Dona Ana—and Dona Ana recognizes Don Juan as the man who killed her father.
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Don Juan asks Dona Ana if she wishes to see her father. Dona Ana is appalled at first and refuses to believe her father could end up in hell. Don Juan assures Ana that her father is in heaven, but he visits hell from time to time because he finds heaven supremely boring. Ana is disturbed at the thought of seeing her deceased father. Don Juan tries to comfort her and accidentally addresses Dona Ana as “my dear Ana.” He tries to dismiss the show of emotion as merely “a slip of the tongue.”
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Just then, a D-minor chord and its dominant (the statue motif from Mozart’s Don Giovanni) sound, marking the arrival of Dona Ana’s father. Don Juan tells Dona Ana to leave while he “prepare[s]” her father. Dona Ana obliges as a living statue of white marble—which closely resembles Roebuck Ramsden—emerges from the darkness. Don Juan mocks the Statue, urging him to sing Mozart’s theme for him. Then he informs the Statue that his daughter Ana has died. The Statue is confused at first, not remembering his daughter’s name. Then he asks if Ana’s husband—Don Juan’s friend, Ottavio—is here, too. Don Juan says no.
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Dona Ana reappears just then and condemns her father for forgetting her name. The Statue addresses Ana and urges her to please treat him as a “fellow creature” rather than a parental figure—here, in hell, “the farce of parental wisdom is dropped.” Ana accuses him of speaking “as this villain,” Don Juan.
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When the Statue refuses to say a bad word about Don Juan, Dona Ana realizes she is surrounded by “devils” who wish to antagonize her. She starts to pray, but the Statue urges her not to. He tells Ana that above the gate to hell reads the message, “Leave every hope behind, ye who enter.” Hope, the Statue explains, is just a kind of “moral responsibility,” and because there’s no hope here, neither are there obligations. In hell, everyone can just do whatever they like.
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The Statue turns to Don Juan and tells him he’s “come to a momentous decision.” First, though, he wants to ask the Devil something. He summons the Devil, who appears out of thin air (and greatly resembles Mendoza). “Don Juan, your servant,” the Devil says, turning to Don Juan. He greets Dona Ana with the same deference. Dona Ana is confused and beside herself. The Devil is understanding, though. Ana has come from Earth, after all, which is “full of the prejudices and terrors.” He knows she must have heard lots of unfair—and untrue—negative talk of the Devil there.
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The Devil praises the Statue for his longtime support—then he condemns Don Juan, who “has always disparaged and avoided” him. Don Juan defends himself, claiming to always treat the devil politely. But the Devil replies he doesn’t care about manners—what he truly desires is “warmth of heart, true sincerity, the bond of sympathy with love and joy—” At this, Don Juan cuts the Devil off, disgusted by the Devil’s talk of goodness and love. The Devil decries the cruel “irony” that a “cold selfish egoist” like Don Juan has been sent to hell while the Statue ended up in Heaven. But the Statue insists that his being sent to Heaven was just, for he was indeed a “hypocrite” in life.
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The Devil declares the Statue too good to suffer among those doomed to heaven, and he invites him to come stay in hell indefinitely. The Statue accepts. Overjoyed, the Devil begins to sing in an obnoxious, operatic style; the Statue joins him an octave above. Don Juan, disapproving, declares that “music is the brandy of the damned.” The Devil, undeterred, claims that Don Juan has a warm heart underneath his shell of cynicism. He suggests that Don Juan go to Heaven, where he might fit in better. Dona Ana interjects, surprised—and pleased—to learn that anyone can go to heaven if they want to. The Statue scoffs at Ana’s happiness, suggesting that heaven isn’t all that great—indeed, it’s supremely boring.
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Don Juan, curious, asks if the Devil could return to heaven if he wanted. The Devil claims that he can—and often does. When Ana suggests that there’s “a great gulf fixed” between heaven and hell, the Devil explains that the only thing separating the two is the difference between good and evil. To illustrate this point, he uses the earthly example of people who attend fancy orchestra concerts and people who go to racecourses. There’s no rule preventing those who visit racecourses from attending classical concerts—but their respective tastes prevents them from doing so, and vice versa.
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When Ana declares that she’d like to go to heaven in that case, the Statue interjects, continuing the Devil’s analogy of the classical concert. The Statue suggests that people who attend classical concerts don’t actually enjoy classical music—they just think they ought to. Heaven is the same way: it’s full of people who don’t actually like it there, but they think they “owe it to their position to be in heaven.” He adds that most of heaven’s inhabitants are English. The Devil confirms it: “An Englishman thinks he is moral when he is only uncomfortable.” The Statue warns Ana that if she chooses to go to heaven just because she thinks she ought to, she’ll not feel comfortable there.
Ana resolves to leave hell immediately, but Don Juan advises Ana to stay put. Earth, he explains, is not real: it’s a “nursery” where mortals try to convince themselves that they are “heros and heroines, saints and sinners.” In time, life’s many sufferings and indignities—like starvation, aging, and disease—robs them of this illusion. In hell, though, they are freed from “the tyranny of the flesh.” Here, there are “no social questions,” nor politics nor religion. You can still hold all the same views you held on Earth, but now “there are no hard facts to contradict you,” no reality to show the hollowness of “your pretensions” and delusions.
Dona Ana replies that if hell is really as great as Don Juan claims, then Heaven must be even better. Don Juan, the Devil, and the Statue simultaneously erupt in protest. Don Juan explains that Heaven’s inhabitants “live and work instead of playing and pretending.” It’s the opposite of hell. The Statue scoffs at Don Juan’s description. Don Juan thinks the Statue’s disapproval makes sense, though, for the Statue is an incurious man who has never desired to contemplate his own morals and views. Don Juan, in contrast, believes the self-contemplation one undergoes in Heaven to be the highest pursuit one can undertake.
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Dona Ana asks Don Juan if “contemplation” is what Heaven is all about, and he says that for him it is. The Devil scoffs at this, claiming that humankind’s capacity for “reason” has only made it “beastlier than any beast.” As the Devil sees it, humanity’s capacity for reason hasn’t improved people’s quality of life or made them more moral. Citing the cotton factory as an example, he claims that humanity’s technological advancements aren’t all that impressive and only serve to showcase humanity’s underlying “greed and sloth.” The same applies to arts and politics, as well.
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Don Juan refutes the Devil’s critique of humankind. He explains that Man “loves to think of himself as bold and bad,” when in fact he is neither. In fact, Man is only “a coward”—yet it’s this title that Man most fiercely rejects. The Devil agrees with Don Juan that humans are cowards—and he therefore finds it all the more laughable that Don Juan is so invested in self-contemplation and in humanity’s so-called “Life Force.” Don Juan, undeterred, explains that “you can make any of these cowards brave by simply putting an idea into his head.” The Statue interjects, declaring Don Juan’s theory nonsensical.
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Don Juan defends his stance, explaining that self-contemplation and having faith in ideas is what creates and sustains bravery. Citing the crusades as an example, he lauds the solider that “fought, not for himself, but for the Cross.” He declares, “It is not killing and dying that degrade us, but base living, and accepting the wages and profits of degradation.” Ana interjects, suggesting that the man who goes off to fight for his ideals “shirks all his responsibilities, and leaves his wife to grapple with them.” The Statue agrees.
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Don Juan segues into how women figure in his philosophy of humankind. Women, he declares, are totally distinct from men. They don’t share men’s ideals and instead commit themselves to procreation, which is “Nature’s […] highest achievement.” A woman uses men to fulfill this high purpose, and in return they let man have “his dreams, his follies, his ideals, his heroisms,” and so on. Don Juan thinks it was foolish for Nature to create a distinct sex whose sole purpose is “her own impregnation,” however, for leaving this task to women alone has enabled men to focus on their own earthly pursuits. Man, Don Juan claims, “has created civilization without consulting [woman], taking her domestic labor for granted as the foundation of it.” Ana agrees with all this so far.
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The Devil implores Don Juan to speak more on civilization, and Don Juan obliges. He praises humanity and all its potential. He believes that men can make themselves into “more than the mere instrument of Woman’s purpose.” He believes that men ought to strive for “higher and higher organization and completer self-consciousness,” even if their pursuits more often end in failure. This impulse to reach a higher purpose—the so-called “Life Force”—may be “stupid,” but “Death and Degeneration” are more stupid.
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Don Juan laments the shortcomings of mortal men –the professors, the doctors, the politicians—who have tried and failed to fulfill a higher purpose. He also condemns “the Artist,” whose creative pursuits inevitably lead them to “worship of Woman,” which only serves to distract them from achieving their higher purpose. He explains that women only manipulate men into thinking they love them to achieve their higher purpose of procreation.
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Don Juan recalls his own romantic history, when a lady who used to be “happy and idle enough before, became anxious, preoccupied with [Don Juan], always intriguing, conspiring” to make Don Juan “her prey.” Don Juan recognized this and fled from the woman, and he’s been doing it ever since.
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Though Don Juan insists he never ran away from Ana, Ana claims that he would have, if he’d had the chance. She defends women’s control of men, claiming that someone must force men to uphold their responsibilities. She also insists that the ideals Don Juan lauds don’t exist and that “flesh and blood” is all there is. If Don Juan can’t accept this, then he “must go without: that’s all.”
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Don Juan, the Statue, and the Devil visibly disagree with Ana’s take, but she continues anyway, condemning Don Juan for speaking ill of “chastity,” which she finds personally offensive. Don Juan scoffs that Ana’s “chastity” is fine, since it “took the form of a husband and twelve children.” To this, Ana replies that she “could have had twelve husbands and no children,” which “would have made all the difference to the earth which [she] replenished.” The Statue applauds Ana’s comeback and declares that Ana has handily defeated Don Juan in this argument.
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But Don Juan retorts that really, it would make no difference whether Ana had 12 children with one man or one child each with 12 different men. He also points out that it would be totally socially acceptable for one woman to have 12 “lawful children” with three different fathers—but society would scorn a woman for having “one unlawful infant.” He asks whether Dona Ana would say this latter woman is “less self-indulgent.” When Ana replies that that woman “is less virtuous,” Don Juan suggests that the only reason the Life Force recognizes marriage is because marriage is a social construct created to ensure that people have more children and care for those children well.
Ana’s disgust only encourages Don Juan, and he continues to condemn marriage as a sham that women lure men into. Ana insists that “most marriages are perfectly comfortable,” but Don Juan thinks this is ridiculous. What Ana describes as “comfortable,” Don Juan sees as “sensible people” choosing to just make the best of their situation. If people really wanted to be in their marriages, then why does society force them to vow to stay with their spouse?
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The Statue interjects to say that if Don Juan had lived to old age, as Dona Ana and the Statue himself have, then he might realize that people who choose to enjoy themselves rather than take on the exhausting responsibilities of marriage and children have only “the fear of old age and ugliness and impotence and death” left to occupy their mind with. He admits, however, that he was quite popular with the ladies as a young man—and that when he himself finally agreed to marry Ana’s mother, he knew it “meant defeat and capture.” Ana is appalled at this. The Statue allows that Ana was more a delight than a burden to him, as she gave “most of the trouble” to her mother.
Don Juan asks the Statue why, if his domestic life wasn’t all that bad, he has left Heaven to “wallow” in hell. The Statue realizes that Don Juan has a point. The Devil, realizing Don Juan’s growing influence over the Statue, demands that the Statue remember what “hideous dullness” the Devil has rescued the Statue from in letting him stay here in hell. Then, addressing Don Juan, the Devil asks if Don Juan has actually benefited from his rejection of marriage, which the Devil believes will bring about the “sterilization and extinction of mankind.” Don Juan retorts that he’s not arguing in favor of mankind’s “extinction.” Don Juan insists that this isn’t true and implores the others to let him speak a while longer to make his point.
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Don Juan describes his hope for the future of humankind. Rather than rejecting procreation altogether, he says that the “great central purpose of breeding the race” is to gradually improve humankind until a “superhuman” comes into existence. He hopes that in the future, society will toss aside its talk of “love and romance and prudery and fastidiousness” in order to see the “real purpose of marriage,” which is merely to procreate, as the Life Force compels humans to do.
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Don Juan and Ana debate the merits and costs of marriage some more. When Don Juan rails against the inherent superficiality of norms surrounding courtship, the Statue interjects to ask Don Juan how he would woo the ladies. Don Juan demands that the Statue answer first. The Statue describes how he used to pledge his commitment and loyalty to whichever woman he was pursuing. Don Juan, disgusted at the lengths the Statue would go to woo women, calls the Statue an “old rascal.” Statue insists he was being “sincere” with these women—or at least, he genuinely believed in the things he was saying at the time.
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Don Juan condemns the Statue’s talk of sincerity. He insists that the Statue had only been lying to his women and to himself. The Statue defends his past actions as the delusions of “a man in love.” Don Juan says that he, too, has had “moments of infatuation” when he would have done anything for love. But, once he recognized that he was acting that way because “the lady’s instinct was set on [him],” he knew that he had only two choices: “lifelong servitude or flight.” Ana, disapproving, suggests that Don Juan is only saying all this to brag about his success with women. Don Juan protests that he has in fact suggested the opposite. In fact, it was Dona Ana who seduced him—and then, hypocritically, summoned her father to destroy him.
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The Statue protests that Don Juan murdered him, not the other way around. But Don Juan holds firm, insisting that the Statue was the better fencer and would certainly have killed Don Juan—it was only by mistake that Don Juan ended up killing the Statue. The Devil interjects at this point to condemn Don Juan for insulting his friends. Don Juan replies with yet another lengthy monologue in which he decries the hypocrisy of his audience. “Your friends,” Don Juan insists to the Devil, are not as moral or educated or pure or artistic as they claim. They are all only performing convention, doing what is expected of them so as to appear good and upright and respectable on the outside. Those who claim to be “artistic,” meanwhile, use their art as an excuse to be “lascivious.”
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The Devil cuts in to suggest that while Don Juan’s speech might be impressive, that’s ultimately all it is: talk. In response, Don Juan suggests that all the things the Devil praises—love, beauty, art, and so on—are mere words as well. They have no basis in reality. He continues, expressing how bored he has become of hell, in which “there is nothing but love and beauty,” which Don Juan considers superficial, ultimately meaningless distractions. Turning to the Statue now, Don Juan asks whether there are any beautiful women in Heaven. When the Statue confirms that there are not, Don Juan eagerly declares that he will go there immediately.
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The Devil addresses Don Juan now and advises him that he will surely tire of Heaven just as he has tired of Hell. People get tired of everything, the Devil warns. Each new generation of people believes that “the world is progressing because it is always moving,” but in fact, that movement is merely “a swing of the pendulum” from one direction to the other. Don Juan might hope that humankind will progress until it gives birth to the superhuman Don Juan aspires to, but this is merely another “infinite comedy of illusion.” Humankind can get better and better, and still it will not achieve this superhuman status. The Devil insists that Don Juan is mistaken to believe that Nature has “a purpose” simply because Don Juan himself has purpose.
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Don Juan contends that while this might be true, it is always better to at least aspire to a higher purpose. He asks, “Does a ship sail to its destination no better than a log drifts nowhither?” Then, he declares, “The philosopher is Nature’s pilot. And there you have our difference: to be in hell is to drift: to be in heaven is to steer.” There’s a bit more heated debate, and then, at last, Don Juan bids his companions farewell. Ana says she’d like to go with him, but Don Juan says he can only guide himself to Heaven—Ana will have to find her own way.
The Devil gloomily declares Don Juan’s departure “a political defeat.” He insists that “these Life Worshippers” are all the same. Eventually, they all leave hell behind in pursuit of higher purpose. He cautions the Statue not to follow Don Juan’s foolish pursuit of “the Superhuman.” When the Statue asks the Devil what the “Superman” is anyway, the Devil explains that it’s just a new fad “among the Life Force fanatics”—an idea concocted by a “madman” named Nietzsche. Nietzsche was actually in hell for a bit, but he soon ascended to Heaven. Anyway, Nietzsche didn’t invent the concept of the Superhuman—he merely made it popular. Soon, there will be some new craze.
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Ana interjects to ask where she can find this Superman character, and the Devil replies that Superman doesn’t yet exist. Inspired, Ana declares that she has “work to do” and must find “a father for the Superman!” Then, she disappears, and the scene gradually returns to the Sierra Nevada Mountains. A voice cries out to announce an oncoming automobile: it’s Violet, Hector Malone, Ann, Octavius, and Ramsden come to rescue Tanner and Straker.
The rescue party arrives. Hector explains that Ann has “tracked [Tanner] at every stopping place: she is a regular Sherlock Holmes.” To this, Tanner replies: “The Life Force! I am lost.” Octavius announces how glad he is to have found Tanner and Straker unharmed. Ramsden, staring at Mendoza with a puzzled look on his face, notes how familiar Mendoza looks. He feels he’s met Mendoza before. Hector, Octavius, and Violet all think they recognize Mendoza, too. Mendoza laughs and says he recognizes them all from the Savoy Hotel: Ramsden used to meet ladies there. Hector used to have lunch with Violet there, too. Octavius is shocked to hear this—he thought that Violet and Hector had only just met. “What impertinence!” Violet cries out. Then she and Hector run up the hill. Ramsden is irritated at Mendoza, too.
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Mendoza doesn’t understand why they’re all so upset with him: it was they who claimed to recognize him first. He merely confirmed how they all came to know one another. Tanner condemns his rescuers for insulting Mendoza. Violet calls down from the hill that the soldiers have come to rescue them. When the lead soldier, addressing Tanner, asks who Mendoza and his band of brigands are, Tanner replies that Mendoza is his “escort.” Mendoza flashes a “Mephistophelean smile” as he bows.
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