Wit Play Analysis
Throughout Margaret Edson’s post modern drama, a plethora of implicit and explicit connections to John Donne’s metaphysical poetry are illuminated through the characterisation of Vivian Bearing as she lives through Donne. John Donne has been abducted to the sterilized academic world of ‘publish or perish’, along with the myriad central values of enduring themes that engulf the audience due to their prevailing ability to transcend contextual barriers.
The connections shared between Donne’s metaphysical poetry and Edson’s play Wit, occupies more than the adaptation of ideas and form, it represents the relationship between text and context. Wit reshapes Donne’s experiences of agency and self evaluation, thereby rejuvenating the humanistic paradigms …show more content…
I am after all a scholar of Donne’s Holy Sonnets, which explore mortality in greater depth than any other’ states Vivian Bearing. But the true sense of reality can’t survive the values of life’s thematic concerns through academic rigour. Therefore Edson uses postmodern techniques such as Absurdist theatre, which challenges realist theatre conventions and thereby confronts audiences with the reality of death: ‘It is not my intention to give away the plot, but I think I die at the end.’ This theatrical opening highlights her deprivation of experiences of love and her curious interest in Donne’s contrasting experiences through his poems: ‘but of Donne’s own God, of the faith that makes his work riveting... no place can be found in (Bearing’s) personal experience.’ Bearing’s lack of understanding and experience of love compared to Donne, further shapes her personal identity: In reply to ‘you’re not having any visitors’ Edson uses italics to assert her response ‘none to be precise.’ This lack of life experiences reflects her dehumanized state, ‘that’s all there is to my life history.’ Edson positions her audience to see Vivian’s intellectualising as a means of self-identity: ‘My only defence is the acquisition of vocabulary.’ Vivian’s confidence in herself is powered through the grand knowledge of Donne’s
The connections shared between Donne’s metaphysical poetry and Edson’s play Wit, occupies more than the adaptation of ideas and form, it represents the relationship between text and context. Wit reshapes Donne’s experiences of agency and self evaluation, thereby rejuvenating the humanistic paradigms …show more content…
I am after all a scholar of Donne’s Holy Sonnets, which explore mortality in greater depth than any other’ states Vivian Bearing. But the true sense of reality can’t survive the values of life’s thematic concerns through academic rigour. Therefore Edson uses postmodern techniques such as Absurdist theatre, which challenges realist theatre conventions and thereby confronts audiences with the reality of death: ‘It is not my intention to give away the plot, but I think I die at the end.’ This theatrical opening highlights her deprivation of experiences of love and her curious interest in Donne’s contrasting experiences through his poems: ‘but of Donne’s own God, of the faith that makes his work riveting... no place can be found in (Bearing’s) personal experience.’ Bearing’s lack of understanding and experience of love compared to Donne, further shapes her personal identity: In reply to ‘you’re not having any visitors’ Edson uses italics to assert her response ‘none to be precise.’ This lack of life experiences reflects her dehumanized state, ‘that’s all there is to my life history.’ Edson positions her audience to see Vivian’s intellectualising as a means of self-identity: ‘My only defence is the acquisition of vocabulary.’ Vivian’s confidence in herself is powered through the grand knowledge of Donne’s