Oldal 38 [38]
BEING IN THE SITUATION — THREE RE-INTERPRETATIONS OF LTD
from within the specific context. They are not dealing with different aspects
separately, but in their complexity within the situation. With their actions,
reactions or even inaction they influence the unfolding events and create new
situations for themselves and others involved. There is also a clear connection
between the fictional world and the reality of the participants even though
the event takes place in historic times. The question of relationship with the
adult world, or of responsibility and blame and being questioned in quasi-trial
situations are parts of most teenagers’ lives.
In another drama Bolton worked with children who chose to do a play
about the nativity, as it was Christmas time. The Nativity drama™ is based
on Joseph and the pregnant Mary looking for a place to spend the night.
The participants are a family in Bethlehem who see Joseph supporting Mary
and searching for accommodation. When he asks them, they invite him in.
The teacher then changes roles and becomes someone unhappy about their
decision to take in these people, provoking an argument and warning them of
possible troubles. Finally, the teacher narrates that in the middle of the night
a baby boy was born, and as they pass the baby around the children name
him Jesus. There does not seem to be any apparent crisis in this case, possibly
because the testing of values is more playful and the central aim is probably to
offer the participants a dramatic experience of a story that is a basic narrative
of their culture. But it creates the possibility to experience a moment of awe,
the magic of the birth of a baby, the nativity. The central play here seems to
be between the story from the cultural canon and the story of the children.
Through this dramatization they come to own the narrative to some extent.
The most apparent difference between the crisis in the Crucible drama and
examples of Heathcote’s LTDs is that here there is a clearer ideological, political
element. Another important difference is that Bolton draws the participants
into a long improvisation to experience dealing with the crisis, rather than
stepping out of it to build a rational understanding of it. There is an emphasis
on experiencing the extraordinary in the Nativity drama too, being in
the situation is clearly not only an element but seems to be one of the aims of
this work.
Structuring into Being
Bolton offers the role of a family in Bethlehem to the six-seven year olds.
They decide on where the house is in the classroom space and he asks them
to watch a stranger arriving to the town. The teacher in role behaves as if he
was supporting a pregnant woman, tells her to keep calm, sits her down and
says that he is going to ask some people if they will let them in for the night.
14 Bolton: New perspectives, 82.