4.48 Psychosis
By Sarah Kane

4.48 Psychosis was first performed after the suicide of the playwright. It was performed by three actors, but there are no defined characters. This is a section from early in the play.

---

I am sad

I feel that the future is hopeless and that things cannot improve

I am bored and dissatisfied with everything

I am a complete failure as a person

I am guilty, I am being punished

I would like to kill myself

I used to be able to cry but now I am beyond tears

I have lost interest in other people

I can't make decisions

I can't eat

I can't sleep

I can't think

I cannot overcome my loneliness, my fear, my disgust

I am fat

I cannot write

I cannot love

My brother is dying, my lover is dying, I am killing them both

I am charging toward my death

I am terrified of medication

I cannot make love

I cannot fuck

I cannot be alone

I cannot be with others

My hips are too big

I dislike my genitals

At 4.48
when desperation visits
I shall hang myself
to the sound of my lover's breathing

I do not want to die

I have become so depressed by the fact of my mortality that I have decided to commit suicide

I do not want to live

I am jealous of my sleeping lover and covet his induced unconsciousness

When he wakes he will envy my sleepless night of thought and speech unslurred by medication

I have resigned myself to death this year

Some will call this self-indulgence
(they are lucky not to know its truth)
Some will know the simple fact of pain

This is becoming my normality

---

Order The Complete Plays of Sarah Kane from Amazon.

This monologue brought to you by The Monologue Database.