Exit.

I went to see No Exit and Wild Abandon on the 22nd, and then again the following night. I’ve never been to a play two nights in a row before, and I wasn’t the only one who thought these plays worth returning to. My partner went with me the first and second time, and Prof. Littlejohn was also in the audience both nights.

 So, why? Why were these plays compelling? What made me leave, both times, exclaiming and energized?

 I think these plays are about hope. I think that the story of Steve articulates what we all want to be talked out of– switching from an open circuit to a closed one, not just through suicide (this was his “op-tion”, as he said) but through shutting down. Becoming less human, feeling less, living as less. I don’t want to be okay with watching Alphonse whoever kill the duck in Wentworth Park. The play is important because it discusses the possibility of making choices, of looking the possibility (inevitability) of death in the eye and then…not laughing, but dancing. Beautiful. I loved Scott Shannon’s performance. Once, he was my camp counsellor– he was a hippy then, and I had a crush on him.

 And the same for No Exit. A really wonderful moment in the play, for me, is when the door opens and it becomes clear that all of these characters are able to leave whenever they want– it’s just that they’re making the choice not to. Again, these plays are about hope, the illustrate the enormous options we have, along with the hell we can experience when we deny these possibilties.

Stellar performances from Dr. Bell and especially Dr. Jones, who did the thing with frightening realism. I think I’ve met Inez at bars. The plays were incredibly well done. Incredibly.

 kw

A Preview of Thursday’s presentation

Hey everyone.

Hope you enjoyed your snowday. I stayed home and watched Sleepy Hollow with Johnny Depp for American Film. I think he was better as every other character I’ve seen him play (although he was truly wretched as Willy Wonka, wasn’t he?)

I just wanted to let you know a little of what we’ll be discussing regarding The Way of the World, which is that in the play, Lady Wishfort’s behaviour acts as a microcosm for larger themes in the play as a whole—namely, those of tension and conflict surrounding social appearances, and the ways in which societal pressures generate a disparity between the public and private life. In allowing the audience to view her preparations for meeting her potential husband, and to view the more general contrast between her private life and outward behaviour, she embodies the ways in which Restoration stage blurs the formerly rigid divide between the public and the personal spheres. This tension is staged in a way that develops plot and contributes to Congreve’s broader motifs.

You’ll see where we take it!

kw

Licence my roving hands, and let them go….

Hi guys.

With The Rover, I’d like to discuss one of the points which stuck with me after reading the brief introduction to the text: the reoccuring motif that “male characters have difficulty in distinguishing a ‘maid of quality’ from a harlot” within both this work and the other plays we’ve covered.

 It’s interesting to note that from the perspective of the audience, the characters in Restoration Drama are so sharply drawn that we, unlike the characters in the play, never have any doubt as to whether a woman is supposed to be a virgin or a whore. It’s always pretty clear: there’s the harlots, or girls that are overtly fun and sexual (Hellena, Margery, Angellica, Lucetta, Melantha, Doralice, Kate Wright, etc) and then the maids of quality, who by virtue of their “quality” are not (Florinda, Palmyra, Amalthea). And needless to say, never the twain shall meet. In cases where the narrative is split, the good girls are often engaged in the more serious plotline that require a suitably impleriled virgin (presumably because we care more about the welfare of nice girls than sluts). With all the bases for serious drama and moral sympathy overed, the women in the comic plot are free to flirt and jilt to their heart’s content. They give us something to keep us watching when we start making the puke face behind Leonidas and Palmyra’s back. 

In The Rover, we are meant to care deeply what happens between Florinda and Belville because these characters are morally appealing. They fight the good fight and love one another, and are bound by their circumstances to go through all sorts of unpleasant things to get together. However, it’s the Gypsy plotline with Willmore and Hellena that seems to be really interesting, both for us and for the contemporary audience which called for the popular Willmore’s return.  Despite the interest they add, the bad girls don’t have a whole lot of social capital within the context of the drama, since it’s men like Willmore or Horner that are calling the shots in the end. But it’s the harlotry of women that often moves the plot forward in ways that couldn’t be accomplished by moral virtue.

And women, of course, are usually punished for being bad. Margery gets stuck with her “musty husband” and is threatened with a penknife to the face. Angellica the courtesan is cheated on, taken advantage of, and forgotten, and Hellena (as we find out in the intro) is pillaged for her resources and conveniently dies. Even usually-good Florinda is nearly gang-raped by Blunt and Frederick when she chooses to sneak out. As a woman you’re going to receive some serious fear and retribution when you break out of your role. Horner and Willmore, however, make out fine with tons of sex and the wives they want, save some interim social embarassment.

From what I understand in, say, Alain’s blog and the comments thereon, we sort of wonder if we’re supposed to be critical of Willmore or what. We wonder exactly how we’re meant to veiw him as a character, and through the plays there’s enough shades of authorial intention and dramatic action to cause us to speculate on things like motivation, morality, desire, etc within the male cast. But with the women, not so much. They’re a harlot or a maid of quality, and we know which they are from the start. The question of their sexual/matrimonial availability simply provides a place for the men in the play to act out their own foibles and have a good (or bad) time, creating a homosocial drama without fleshing out the girls themselves.

All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling.

In addition to the Restoration Drama work, I’d like to use this blog as a place to post about my English courses in general (especially since many of us share classes).  

Prior to this semester, I hadn’t written poetry since I was a small child exploited in the service of warmongering at Rememberance Day ceremonies. Therefore, it’s been an interesting experience to start out in the Writing Poetry course offered this year by Anne Compton. Writing poetry as an adult puts you on the line in the classroom in a way that academic writing doesn’t. Daryl, who’s also in Renaissance Drama (and who I hope does not mind me mentioning this), did a great workshop piece last week which made me consider my own writing.  

 For your edification, here are the things I’m working on for this week. Comments, and especially criticism on style/word choice would be great.

Back and Fill

It was held in place all summer
with brackets that accrued barnacles,
then pitted with rust like bad teeth.
they let the slip lurch and grind in the tide.

the world off the edge is a lime smoke
sunk metal and freezing choke.

we withdraw our fingers as if from a snapping dog.

Slow Numbers

Silence weaves through the hourcount and
        around distant spires.

candle gutters on a brick sill. it spills
wax on slats that stretch toward Trinity.
Moored ships in the harbor cant on chains
that strain in monotone.
a curtain waves goodbye from the window &
the city sleeps alone.

Cheers, and see you all soon.

kw

Our poets, virgins– hell, take everybody.

I’ll join the chorus of bloggers who’ve already admitted their lack of experience in this (I guess undertaught?) genre of literature. I’ve never studied Restoration Drama before, not even in high school when the teachers were dragging out their bloodiest and bawdiest (hullo, Oedipus and Mercutio) to keep us interested.

 So this suprised me. I found “The Country Wife” hilarious– heavy on the eunuch jokes, of course. But in an age where nuance onstage could go unheard or overhead (and sexuality of any sort was damn exciting), the repitition probably had them rolling in the aisles. The dialouge reminds me of the banter in works like The Importance of Being Earnest, except it’s unrestrained by Victorian sexual mores .  I dig the self-referential humor about actors being evil and not allowing your innocent country wife to go to plays. Oh, that theatre was still so taboo and sexy. It would certainly be more interesting than what’s currently on at the Imperial.

This play has been too scandalous to print or perform for most of it’s history. It was replaced for a time by a boring rewrite called “The Country Girl” which has now been all but forgotten. Horner does indeed seem able to do and say the most scandalous things (foh! let’s get away from him!), in part because plays like this aren’t intended to mirror real life. Just as Marriage A La Mode was set in an “Italy” than bears no resemblance to the real thing, the events chronicled in The Country Wife aren’t meant to look like honest-to-goodness London society (when was the last time you met a Lady Fidget?). Horner and the boys can say and do whatever they like because they’re not real and aren’t meant to seem real, just as present-day caricatures function in modern drama.

This line is interesting:

“Ask but all the young fellows of the town if they do not lose more time, like huntsmen, in starting the game, than in running it down.” (Act 1)

Anyone else see echoes of the sentiments in Spenser’s ”Lyk as a Huntsman” and Herrick’s ”To Virgins, to Make Much of Time”?

groupie-specific

hey blair, crystal, alain, and rachel.

can you guys comment with the addresses for your blogs? that beats going through all of them trying to find you.

 merci.

Rocking the Restoration

Hey everyone:

I’ve never had a blog, nor have I had a course in which I can see what everyone else in my class is thinking about. So instead of surfing myspace, I’ll now check out what you fine people are writing!

 My student loan hasn’t come in yet, which leaves me

a) hungry and

b) unable to buy the text for this course just now.

This class I’d like to talk with someone about making a photocopy of some material so I can do my readings. After I do that, you can expect my retroactive reflections on this week’s material.

love,

 kw