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DIFFERENT THEORETICAL ANALYSIS OF DEs — SURVEY OF LITERATURE
Both Cooper*” and Katafiasz*** state that there is a metonymical structure
in work in cathexis, rather than a symbolic or metaphorical one. This is
important because it means that the objects are actually parts of what they
embody in meaning, but when their meaning is changed the whole situation
needs to be re-evaluated, because the meaning of one part of it change.
Cooper claims that it is important that DEs are part of larger stories, and
summarises that a DE “ruptures, but does not interrupt the story, enough to
surprise us and create a gap for reflection and analysis".
David Davis also points out that DEs are not randomly selected moments
that are made strange in some way, but structure the plays as they “all relate
to the centre of the play and make a meta-text”.?” He argues that Bond’s
work is focussed on how culture and ideology influence individuals thinking
and claims that Bond “works against this control by moving us outside
the domination of language by focussing the audience’s attention onto objects
and situations which can create Theatre/Drama events and onto the ‘invisible
object’”.?” Davis also offers examples of DEs based on Bond’s writing and
these offer a useful insight into his analysis. One of the examples is from
the Ibsen play Hedda Gabler, looking at the moment when she decides to burn
the manuscript of the book written by her former lover which, if published,
would probably threaten Hedda’s husband’s professional position and also
their financial situation and social position.
Bond suggests that to find the DE the actress could start to throw the sheets into
the fire and then as she is doing so, read a page and want to read on but find she has
thrown the next page on to the fire. She retrieves it but it is burning. The skill of
the actor here would be to find the Invisible Object, the reflection of bombed cities
or crematoria: burning the book has consequences for humanity, and this would be
first shown in the sudden inexorable re-emergence of humanness in Hedda Gabler.
If she burns her fingers without noticing it to start with, because she is suddenly
so intent, caught up in really reading for the first time what she is destroying, then
you might have the burning cities and crematoria.*”
Davis suggests that the DE can be created by the actor showing
the contradictions of the action within the situation. The consequences
of burning the book are also shown as a part of the action, the knowledge
contained in the book and the impact it could have is also lost to society.
32 Ibid.
#3 Katafiasz: Stop Acting.
Cooper: The performer in TIE, 138.
3% Davis: Edward Bond and Drama in Education, 170.
3% Davis: Commentary, xxviii.
397 Ibid., xlviii.
394
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