A social issue is a problem or situation that affects a number of people in a society. Dramas that examine the social issues of the current time contribute to the social realism genre and the cultural movement of kitchen-sink drama. They often have a strong focus on showing the everyday of the working class and the impact social issues have on their lives. 'A Taste of Honey ' portrays many social issues that were relevant to the time and setting of the play. The way in which Shelagh Delaney conveys this was by use of a variety of dramatic techniques, especially the use of language, for example idiomatic catchphrases such as “daft” or “spiv” to really emphasise her intention of social realism. At the same time the social issues in 'A Taste …show more content…
Shelagh Delaney is often given in reference to the playwright and novelist movement Angry Young Men, which were “Working class writers in rebellion” (Lacey, 1995, p. 1). The way which Delaney came about to write 'A Taste of Honey ' was because she had seen Terence Rattigan’s Variations on a Theme at the Opera House in Manchester and decided that she could do better (Goorney, Hay, and Roberts, 1981, p. 108). Delaney may not have been angry, but instead she created dramatic, revolutionary characters which had not been seen in theatre before. Delaney wanted to show a more realistic narrative for theatre and instead show the domestic life of the working class rather than the upper-class which dominated theatre. On the other hand, Delaney was only 18 when she wrote 'A Taste of Honey ', she was a working class female in Salford, therefore she could possibly only be writing about what she knows. Her source of her inspiration and anger could come from her own personal experiences as her working class background is reflected in the play through use of settings, characters, action and dialogue. Nevertheless, 'A Taste of Honey ' is known for breaking new ground in social realism for testing “the social and political expectations of theatre” (Lacey, 1995, p. …show more content…
Helen and Jo’s flat in the industrial town of Manchester was successful in showing her audience that not everyone received the affluence and prosperity after the Second World War. This was rebellious for the theatre and helped Delaney be recognised for being an influence in the British New Wave and the Angry Young Men movements. Delaney’s focus on structure in her play, with having a mirrored ending and time lapse throughout each scene is effective for social realism. The audience has an understanding and emotional reaction towards both Helen and Jo, and are also shocked by the taboo and more controversial issues that they experience with the male characters throughout the play. 'A Taste of Honey ' is a play that is ahead of it’s time, but also relevant for the audience, it would have been shocking for the 1950s, but from this it has progressed theatre to be more rebellious with it’s language, characters and representation of the working class on
In this essay I will be comparing two playwrights, A Raisin in the Sun and A Doll’s House, to one another. I will also compare the two to modern time and talk about whether or not over time our society has changed any. Each of these plays has a very interesting story line based in two very different time eras. Even though there is an 80 year time gap the two share similar problems and morals, things you could even find now in the year of 2016. In the following paragraphs I will go over the power of time and what we as a society have done to make a change.
The play focusses on three generations of Women, Nan Dear, Gladys and Dolly and where they felt as though they belonged. Nan Dear knew where she belonged and that was the humpy in the flats with her daughter and granddaughter. Nan Dear knows that she won't be accepted into white society just because she is an Aboriginal and those of a different colour or foreign country weren't accepted. Gladys and Dolly both wanted to be accepted into white society, they wanted to feel as though they belonged there.
In the 1980s, women were thought to be the conventional uneducated house keepers of the household and throughout the play, Educating Rita; Rita is constantly battling this set image of a typical Woman in the 80s. Willy Russell has used many dramatic devices efficiently to show the different phases and changes in Rita. In so doing, there have been many impacts on the audience.
A Taste of Honey by Shelagh Delaney is composed of dialogues, proficiently written to disguise social issues in Britain in the1950s. The conversations between the characters reveal their dynamic relationships and Delaney “dresses” each character uniquely based on their social identities and personalities: The “black” characters in the play had uniformed professions to boost their social status since uniforms are associated with “honorable” professions. Social identities based on class is best illustrated by Helen’s clothing, for example her possession of only one hat and her reaction to Jo’s request for new clothes (), however, the clothes for her wedding were new () suggest as change in class, which she could not previously afford (). Hence, the play skillfully relates clothing to racial stratification in Britain, where it was thought that “black” people were affiliated with the jungle () and social division based on wealth, which affected where they lived and level of sophistication they could afford.
To begin, in both plays the men dismiss the women as trivial. In Trifles, when Mrs. Wright is being held in jail for the alleged murder of her husband, she worries about the cold weather and whether it will cause her fruit to freeze which will burst the jars. After the women come across a shattered jar of canned fruit, they converse about Mrs. Wright’s concern about the matter. Mrs. Peters states, “She said the fire’d go out and her jars would break” (Glaspell 918). The women here identify with Mrs. Wright’s concern, because they understand the hard work that goes into canning as part of the demanding responsibilities women endure as housewives. The Sheriff’s reply is “Held for murder and worryin’ about her preserves” (Glaspell 918). In other words, the men perceive the event as insignificant; they clearly see women as a subservient group whose concerns hold little importance. Likewise, the reader can relate to this treatment in A Dollhouse, when Torvald complains to Nora about spending Christmas time the previous year making frivolous ornaments instead of devoting it to family. Torvald says, “It was the dullest three weeks that I ever spent!” (Ibsen 1207). He believes her role i...
Have you ever loved a place as a child, but as you got older you realized how sugar coated it really was? Well, that is how Jacqueline Woodson felt about her mother’s hometown and where she went every summer for vacation. The story, When A Southern Town Broke A Heart, starts off with the author feeling as if Greenville is her home. But one year when she has 9 she saw it as the racist place it really is. This causes her to feel betrayed, but also as if she isn't the naive little girl she once was. By observing this change, you can conclude that the theme she is trying to convey is that as you get older, you also get wiser.
The play entitled “Trifles,” by Susan Glaspell, begins as a murder mystery that turns into a drama as the story unfolds. The story is focused on the investigation of a murder that took place in a farm house. The investigators, who are all men, are in the farm house looking for forensic evidence to help them solve the murder. The wives of two of the investigators are there to retrieve personal items for the wife of the victim. Mrs. Wright, who is the wife of the victim, is in jail as the primary suspect of her husband’s murder. When the story begins, all the characters are in the kitchen engaging in small talk. One of the investigators is criticizing the state of the kitchen by complaining that it is dirty and unorganized. The women, who are also house wives, empathize with Mrs. Wright and defend her kitchen by reminding the investigator that house work on a farm is not easy. Throughout the story, the men consistently make stereotypical statements against the women and Mrs. Wright. This paper will analyze male dominance and the effect it had on the female characters. More specifically it will examine how the female characters were forced to develop an intimate bond and how they formed an unspoken form of communication to combat the patriarchy displayed by the male characters.
Although the dialogues have basically been unchanged from the dramatic version to the prose fiction version, Glaspell has passed her message more effectively in the narrative. While Glaspell uses the characters or actors to vocalize the emotions of the story from the play “Trifles”, she makes the reader feel the emotions in “A Jury of Her Peers” by including descriptive passages to accompany the dialogue in her narration. The opening paragraph of the story was a description of Mrs. Hale’s unkempt kitchen “… which will later serve as a point of comparison with the major scene of the story, Mrs. Wright’s kitchen” (Mustazza). This opening description helps readers foreshadow why Mrs. Hale could easily identify with Mrs. Wright. “Through her brief opening description of the landscape Glaspell establishes the physical context for the loneliness and isolation, an isolation Minnie inherited from and shared with generations of pioneer and farm women before her” (Hedges). The description of the road to Mr. Wright’s farm also helps reveal to readers Mrs. Wright’s “geographical isolation” (Hedges). Glaspell provides the short story v...
Firstly I would set this play in the 21st century so that a modern audience could relate to it. Algernon, one of the main characters in the play, would live in a luxury apartment in the centre of London, over looking the River Thames. His apartment would have a minimalist theme to it and would be influenced by aesthetic; for example he would have a piece of abstract art on the wall for no reason other than that he thinks it looks nice.
2. Consider the women, particularly with regard to their age. In light of their health and their isolation, how does Tea Party present the circumstances of the aged? How can the play be constructed as a social/political argument, with elderly as a
In William Wycherley’s The Country Wife, William Wycherley enlightens the audience to capture several different ironical statements and questionable behaviors. The play fits perfectly into Greenwald’s definition of a comedy of manners: “[Critics] assert that a comedy of manners and the people who inhabit it represent the ostentatiously idle upper-class” (“Social Heirarchy” web). Wycherley also distinguishes several oddities in his characters not typically used to describe the upper-class. For example, Mr. Pinchwife, a wealthy newlywed husband, is so afraid that he is going to become a cuckold, that he does not allow his wife to leave the house (Wycherley act two). One of Wycherley’s goals in writing The Country Wife is to point out the flaws of society (“Q & A” web). Wycherley understands that no one is perfect and that a person’s virtues can be altered if pressures and outside influences become prominent. This is precisely how Wycherley uses Mrs. Margery Pinchwife’s character. Mrs. Pinchwife, a virtuous woman, still succumbs to the immorality of the city of London. Wycherley develops characters who precisely bring out Mrs. Pinchwife’s flaws. Mrs. Pinchwife takes the risks of public shame and a damage reputation to have an affair with Mr. Horner.
Entrenched in irony, the title holds immense significance. It is based on the arrogant, condescending line by Hale, “ well, women are used to worrying about trifles” (1.132). All the things women are reduced to doing—cleaning, cooking, quilting—are deemed insignificant trivialities. Moreover, the men pay little attention to the activities of women, which is a quintessential asset in the play. While the men go off to look in the bedroom where the murder happened, the women stay in the kitchen and other “useless” areas, and end up solving the crime. They look in the kitchen and in bag of quilt pieces and uncover the dark secret that enveloped the Wright home. Putting together clues, they decipher Mr. and Mrs. Wright’s deleterious marriage and the cruelty that possessed Mr. Wright. By worrying about so-called trifles, they ended up solving the crime that the egotistical men could not.
Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House and Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard were famous for the way in which they depicted the changing of cultures. Both plays act as a sort of social commentary during times of widespread liberation, and use the contortive nature of these seemingly stereotypical characters’ actions to speak about groups of people as a whole. Throughout the course of both plays, this subversion of how different groups of people were typically perceived created a distinct contrast which often shocked and appalled audiences of the time. However, the effects of these plays were felt long after they were presented.
In its historical context A Doll’s House was a radical play which forced its audience to question the gender roles which are constructed by society and make them think about how their own lives are a performance for Victorian society.
Pygmalion is one of Bernard Shaw’s most famous and beloved plays, which he published in London in 1912. This play was written during the Edwardian era which was characterised by major political, social and economical changes. Politically, the reign of king Edward VII witnessed a relative involvement of social segments such as labourers and women in political life. Socio-economically, the British society was marked by a strict and a clear-cut social class system in the early twentieth century. During this period and up to First World War, it was believed that 1% of the British population owned approximately 70% of the country’s wealth. As an outcome of the industrialisation and urbanisation processes, however, people increasingly started to get interested in socialist ideas and called for the improvement of women’s position. Given this historical background, Shaw was devoted to write a type of plays different from the Victorian plays which he regarded to be superficial and meaningless. In his view, drama has to be about ideas and conflicts and not about unimportant matters. Thus, Pygmalion can be considered as a social criticism on various topics such as social identity, social class and the power of language. This essay is an attempt to examine the themes of language, social class and gender in Pygmalion. Firstly, a brief summary of the play will be provided. Next, the theme of language and social class will be addressed. The last part will be devoted to the theme of gender and specifically the position of women.