# Exiles: every role by lines, words, and stage time

> James Joyce. 7 speaking roles, 18,604 words, about 133 minutes of speech.

- URL: https://www.offbook.com/plays/exiles
- Last updated: 2026-10-08

**Robert** has the most to say in Exiles: about 851 lines and 6,699 words, 36% of the play. Joyce’s only surviving play is a tense drawing-room drama about a writer, his partner, and the friend who courts her. Robert has the largest part, with more than a third of the words. Bertha and Richard are almost exactly even at about a quarter each, and with Beatrice the four principals hold over 90% of the play.

- Speaking roles: 7
- Scenes: 3
- Words: 18,604
- Speech time: 133 min

## Every role, largest first

| Role | Lines | Words | Share | Minutes | Scenes |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Robert | 851 | 6,699 | 36% | 47.9 | 3 |
| Bertha | 682 | 4,743 | 25.5% | 33.9 | 3 |
| Richard | 685 | 4,674 | 25.1% | 33.4 | 3 |
| Beatrice | 215 | 1,371 | 7.4% | 9.8 | 2 |
| Brigid | 85 | 649 | 3.5% | 4.6 | 2 |
| Archie | 74 | 452 | 2.4% | 3.2 | 2 |
| The Fishwoman | 3 | 16 | 0.1% | 0.1 | 1 |

## Who speaks in which scene

Words each role speaks in each scene (scene: words). Scenes: Act 1 = Act 1; Act 2 = Act 2; Act 3 = Act 3.

- **Robert**: Act 1 (2,487), Act 2 (3,409), Act 3 (803)
- **Bertha**: Act 1 (1,611), Act 2 (1,336), Act 3 (1,796)
- **Richard**: Act 1 (2,318), Act 2 (1,644), Act 3 (712)
- **Beatrice**: Act 1 (738), Act 3 (633)
- **Brigid**: Act 1 (214), Act 3 (435)
- **Archie**: Act 1 (341), Act 3 (111)

## The longest speeches

| Speech | Scene | Words | Lines |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Richard: “Yes, here we are! A Distinguished Irishman. Not the least vital of the problems which confront our country is the problem of her attitude towards those of her children who, having left her in her hour of need, have been called back to her now on the eve of her longawaited victory, to her whom in loneliness and exile they have at last learned to love. In exile, we have said, but here we must distinguish. There is an economic and there is a spiritual exile. There are those who left her to seek the bread by which men live and there are others, nay, her most favoured children, who left her to seek in other lands that food of the spirit by which a nation of human beings is sustained in life. Those who recall the intellectual life of Dublin of a decade since will have many memories of Mr. Rowan. Something of that fierce indignation which lacerated the heart …” | Act 3 | 161 | 17 |
| Robert: “A battle of both our souls, different as they are, against all that is false in them and in the world. A battle of your soul against the spectre of fidelity, of mine against the spectre of friendship. All life is a conquest, the victory of human passion over the commandments of cowardice. Will you, Richard? Have you the courage? Even if it shatters to atoms the friendship between us, even if it breaks up forever the last illusion in your own life? There was an eternity before we were born: another will come after we are dead. The blinding instant of passion alone—passion, free, unashamed, irresistible—that is the only gate by which we can escape from the misery of what slaves call life. Is not this the language of your own youth that I heard so often from you in this very place where we are sitting now? Have you changed?” | Act 2 | 154 | 16 |
| Robert: “She wept. She told me she was the divorced wife of a barrister. I offered her a sovereign as she told me she was short of money. She would not take it and wept very much. Then she drank some melissa water from a little bottle which she had in her satchel. I saw her enter her house. Then I walked home. In my room I found that my coat was all stained with the melissa water. I had no luck even with my coats yesterday: that was the second one. The idea came to me then to change my suit and go away by the morning boat. I packed my valise and went to bed. I am going away by the next train to my cousin, Jack Justice, in Surrey. Perhaps for a fortnight. Perhaps longer. Are you disgusted?” | Act 3 | 140 | 14 |
| Robert: “Here you are. You are lucky to find me in. Why didn’t you tell me today? You were always a devil for surprises. I suppose my evocation of the past was too much for your wild blood. See how artistic I have become. The piano is an addition since your time. I was just strumming out Wagner when you came. Killing time. You see I am ready for the fray. I was just wondering how you and the vicechancellor were getting on together. But are you going in that suit? O well, it doesn’t make much odds, I suppose. But how goes the time? Twenty past eight already, I declare!” | Act 2 | 110 | 11 |
| Robert: “Until I had come to like her more and more (because I can assure you it is only a lightheaded idea of mine), to like her deeply, to love her. Would you have spoken to me then as you have just now? It would have been different, would it not? For then it might have been too late while it is not too late now. What could I have said then? I could have said only: You are my friend, my dear good friend. I am very sorry but I love her. I love her and I will take her from you, however I can, because I love her.” | Act 2 | 109 | 11 |
| Robert: “These cigars Europeanize me. If Ireland is to become a new Ireland she must first become European. And that is what you are here for, Richard. Some day we shall have to choose between England and Europe. I am a descendant of the dark foreigners: that is why I like to be here. I may be childish. But where else in Dublin can I get a bandit cigar like this or a cup of black coffee? The man who drinks black coffee is going to conquer Ireland. And now I will take just a half measure of that whisky, Richard, to show you there is no ill feeling.” | Act 1 | 108 | 11 |
| Richard: “I have wounded my soul for you—a deep wound of doubt which can never be healed. I can never know, never in this world. I do not wish to know or to believe. I do not care. It is not in the darkness of belief that I desire you. But in restless living wounding doubt. To hold you by no bonds, even of love, to be united with you in body and soul in utter nakedness—for this I longed. And now I am tired for a while, Bertha. My wound tires me.” | Act 3 | 94 | 10 |
| Robert: “Richard, you are too suspicious. It is a defect in you. He assured me he has the highest possible opinion of you, as everyone has. You are the man for the post, he says. In fact, he told me that, if your name goes forward, he will work might and main for you with the senate and I … will do my part, of course, in the press and privately. I regard it as a public duty. The chair of romance literature is yours by right, as a scholar, as a literary personality.” | Act 1 | 92 | 10 |
| Richard: “Not that fear. But that I will reproach myself then for having taken all for myself because I would not suffer her to give to another what was hers and not mine to give, because I accepted from her her loyalty and made her life poorer in love. That is my fear. That I stand between her and any moments of life that should be hers, between her and you, between her and anyone, between her and anything. I will not do it. I cannot and I will not. I dare not.” | Act 2 | 92 | 10 |
| Richard: “Why? Many reasons. To give Archie lessons. We have known one another so many years, from childhood, Robert, you and I—haven’t we? You have always been interested in me, before I went away and while I was away. Then our letters to each other about my book. Now it is published. I am here again. Perhaps you feel that some new thing is gathering in my brain; perhaps you feel that you should know it. Is that the reason?” | Act 1 | 80 | 8 |

## Questions actors ask

### Who has the most lines in Exiles?

Robert, with about 851 lines and 6,699 words, 36% of everything spoken in the play. Bertha is next, with about 682 lines (25.5%).

### How long is Exiles?

The full text has 18,604 spoken words, about 133 minutes at 140 words a minute before pauses, scene changes, and cuts. Most productions cut the text, so running times vary.

### How many speaking roles are in Exiles?

7 named roles speak in this edition, across 3 scenes. 1 of them have less than 2% of the words, which is why small parts are often doubled.

## How we count

Counts are computed from the full text of the [Standard Ebooks edition](https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/james-joyce/exiles) (public domain; retrieved 2026-10-08). Words are every spoken word, with stage directions removed. Lines are verse lines as printed, plus prose at 10 words a line, because prose has no fixed line breaks; editions differ, so other sources give slightly different line counts. Time is words at 140 words a minute, before pauses and stage business. A role is counted in a scene when it speaks there. To count a script that is not in the library, paste it into the [script line counter](https://www.offbook.com/tools/script-line-counter).