Oldal 114 [114]
MY ANALYSIS OF DES: LOOKING AT EXAMPLES FROM BOND PLAYS
to be bricked by all the children together in an act that marks their promise
to keep Joes secret. In the fifth scene the Man collapses and is then carried
as a dummy through the next scenes, taking forward the same helpless state.
In the scene discussed it is the sleeping helpless children who are now bricked
by an adult. The motif is taken further in the play when the child killed in
the fire appears to Joe and is dressed similarly to the puppet according to
the stage directions. In the final scene of the play Joe decides that he must
find someone, he is able to start taking action rather than just reacting to
situations created by others. He moves himself out of the helpless dummy
state of children in the adult world.
The brick is used in different situations by different characters: first by Joe
to stone the puppet in an attempt to test his own situation. Then the group
of children throw bricks at the puppet to swear alliance; the image resonates
the biblical theme of communal stoning and also mob lynching at the same
time. Later the Man uses a brick from his own house to take revenge, but as
discussed above cradling it as his child before killing with it. This action can
be almost seen as him using his dead son as a tool to murder other children.
The brick retains its brick characteristics through the play, but the objectives
behind its use change in the specific situations and offer the possibility to
see the differences and similarities between actions, situations and motives.
The brick’s value and meaning are re-evaluated, while it also connects
different layers of the story, this is a clear example of Cathexis, a Bondian
concept referred to before. Understanding the dramaturgy of these themes
through the play offers practical possibilities in rehearsal that I will come
back to in the next section.
The situation discussed exemplifies the intention present in all DEs: that
of impacting at different levels on the audience at the same time. While
the underlying contradictions demand a meaning-making process by
the audience, many other elements of the situation demand a felt reaction
from those watching. The suddenness of the change between ‘father’ and
‘child murderer’ is one such element. Another one is the use of language and
sounds. The poetic language and tune-humming of the Man is followed by
an inarticulate ‘hgn’ after the murder. The sound can be realised in different
ways and can mean very different things, but it carries an animal-like quality
that is at the other end of the spectrum when put beside humming and poetic
language. How these three letters should actually sound in performance is
not defined in the text, it poses a very useful challenge for anyone working
on the performance of the play. This is the territory that I examine further,
looking at how DEs need to be worked on practically.
In relation to creating DEs in LTD lessons it is the complexity of
the development of images, themes and use of objects within the narrative that
offers an important challenge and also new possibilities. The dramaturgical
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