After reading Herman Hesse’s “Steppenwolf,” one probably notices the main character in this novel, Harry Haller, is in a constant internal battle, where there is a “continual and deadly enmity” (41-42) between two natures, one where he claims to possess and the other to be divided by “a human and a wolfish one” (41). Although one can gain many insights from reading Steppenwolf, I believe Haller seeks to conform to the bourgeois in every aspect of his life. However, he belatedly realizes how he actually despises the bourgeois for its complacency and conformity. He comes upon this conclusion when he meets several people who are willing to help him form this conclusion by way of preparing him to experience the “Magic Theater.” I also believe that the Magic Theater is an important learning ground for teaching one to laugh, including Haller.
The Magic Theater, which I believe to be “a world of pictures, not realities,” (178) is a reflection of Haller’s own mind. I also believe that when Haller enters the Magic Theater he is completely separated from reality because the elixir allows Haller to see what his own soul seeks; thus, the Magic Theater serves as an important learning ground for Haller, for it helps him to “see everything through the eyes of Harry and the old spectacles of the Steppenwolf” (176), which is meant to help him see his true self, as he sometimes failed to see before.
In addition, the Magic Theater shows Harry his “past life had been false and full of stupid unhappiness” (199). These regrets and mistakes in his past help him to gain understanding of life so that “he can rearrange these pieces of a previous self in what order he pleases,” (192). Therefore, the Magic Theater also serves, as the chess player pointed out, to show Haller that life’s obstacles and decisions are “all the hundred thousand pieces of life’s game” (217) that’s in his pocket. For this reason Haller will be able to control his own life, to not make the same mistakes again. Rather, he will be able to relive every moment in life again as it is meant to be live.
As Haller simultaneously learns how to laugh in the Magic Theater, he is intrigued by the events that take place within the Magic Theater. In one instance, within the Magic
Theatres and How We Had Fun." Little, Brown, and Company. (Boston, Toronto, London); 1991. P. 139, 144.
Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night is a comedy that has been interpreted in different ways, enabling one to receive multiple experiences of the same story. Due to the content and themes of the play, it can be creatively challenging to producers and their casting strategies. Instead of being a hindrance, I find the ability for one to experiment exciting as people try to discover strategies that best represent entertainment for the audience, as well as the best ways to interpret Shakespeare’s work.
The audience is an important factor to determine the success of a spectacle. It is known that there is no spectacle without audience. The musical theater presentations are known for their number of people, which according to the Broadway League (n.d.), the 2013 season reached attendance of 11.57 million. However, the number of spectators has been decreased in comparison with the peak of popularity for musicals in the last century. The first reason for that is that the spectators of musical theater presentations were a more specific group such as wealthy and intellectual people that used to go to this type of presentation, and this pattern has been consistent until now, as it can be seen in the price of a Broadway spectacle that is very expensive. Second, the spectators have to go where the spectacles are set up, which makes the live presenta...
Beaumont's failed comedy, 'The Knight of the Burning Pestle', is a unique play that seeks to satirise and burlesque the theatrical and social domain. Crucial to this satire is the collision of two concurrent plots that vie for the audience’s attention. These collisions allow the audience to see opposing ideologies in contrast through the dramatic effect of the breakdown in the boundaries of theatre. It is arguable that this play encourages one to question hierarchy and tradition through exploration of ideology, disputed genres, and Rafe's potential rebellion.
“However, at the end of the performance, the audience has already experienced the highest emotional climax, the memory of which is strung along by the inevitable plot resolution. The audience has no choice but to leave with the rapidly fading memory of their dramatic stimulation and return to the underwhelming reality that awaits them outside of the theatre.”
...by and enchantment. In real life, most of us are Helens hoping that this trance will last forever, except we do not have the magic to prolong the love or the fake realities we create. Shakespeare reveals how absurd it is to live on these unrealities by throwing in Titania’s realization of her love for Bottom. Titania’s love reveals that we are not all doomed to this life of living on the edge of hope, that we can be truly elated with our real world. Aside from this criticism Shakespeare’s contrast between appearance and reality shows us how ignoring reality and accepting unrealities can sometimes prove to be the better pathway to take in life, as Theseus and the rest of the audience of Pyramus and Thisbe display for us. Shakespeare is telling us to live our lives more like Titania and less like Helen so that we can be completely content with reality.
When you first enter the theater, you are immediately in awe of the strongest aspect of this production: the set. The stage features a life-sized enchanted forest with “tress” as tall as the ceiling and a lit-up backdrop of a twilight sky. The tress would move around throughout the performance to make way for different scenes. In front of your very eyes, an enchanted forest would turn into the outside of a charming house with a lit porch and a well. The twilight sky would turn to a starlit sky and a soft spotlight simulating moonlight would compliment the faint sound of crickets. Suddenly the house and tress move around and you’re in a town with a little cart selling baguettes, or a lush dining room with Victorian wallpaper, a chandelier, and china displayed on the walls. The world shakes once again and now you’re in, inevitably, a ballroom. A white Victorian gate opens up to become the walls of the ballroom, and a white marble bridge and staircase appear for the outside of the castle. Adults and children alike were in awe of the craftsmanship and technology.
In William Shakespeare’s book, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, magic is a powerful and useful tool for the characters that have the capability to use it. Some of the characters abuse the power of magic, while others are more responsible in how they use it. Oberon is one the characters that abuses the power of magic. Oberon’s magic has an immense impact on the plot of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. More specifically, Oberon’s magic affects his own life, the lives of other characters, and all the characters in the story experience his magic differently. We will see that even the person who has power to use the magic can become surprised by it. Magic, the ultimate supernatural power, is often unpredictable and inexplicable.
It makes sense to me to see in this Shakespeare's sense of his own art--both what it can achieve and what it cannot. The theatre--that magical world of poetry, song, illusion, pleasing and threatening apparitions--can, like Prospero's magic, educate us into a better sense of ourselves, into a final acceptance of the world, a state in which we forgive and forget in the interests of the greater human community. The theatre, that is, can reconcile us to the joys of the human community so that we do not destroy our families in a search for righting past evils in a spirit of personal revenge or as crude assertions of our own egos. It can, in a very real sense, help us fully to understand the central Christian commitment to charity, to loving our neighbour as ourselves. The magic here brings about a total reconciliation of all levels of society from sophisticated rulers to semi-human brutes, momentarily holding off Machiavellian deceit, drunken foolishness, and animalistic rebellion--each person, no matter how he has lived, has a place in the magic circle at the end. And no one is asking any awkward questions.
One of its aspects is satire; it criticizes the absurdity of lives lived unaware and unconscious of ultimate reality and the deadness and mechanical senselessness of half-conscious lives. Its goal is to make people aware of "man's precarious and mysterious position in the universe. It is not concerned with ideological considerations or heroic deeds but with a man’s "descent into the depths of his personality, his dreams, fantasies and nightmare .The Theatre of the Absurd is a theatre of situation asagainst a theatre of events in sequence. It does not employ psychology, subtlety of characterization and plot in the conventional sense.
Theater of the Absurd applies to a group of plays with a certain set of characteristics. These characteristics convey a sense of bewilderment, anxiety, and wonder in the face of an unexplainable feeling. These plays all have unusual actions and are missing a key element that would clearly define other pieces of literature. Language and actions differ from the usual and sometimes cannot be explained in the Theater of the Absurd. In the works of Albee and Ionesco language, behavior, and structure are abnormal if compared to other plays. Language is a key factor that is presented as a weak form of communication throughout “The Future is in Eggs,” “The Zoo Story,” “The American Dream,” and “The Leader.”
Wilson, E., & Goldfarb, A. (2008). Theater: the lively art (6th ed.). Boston: McGraw Hill.
The survival of theatre lies in the very nature of humankind: its inner voyeuristic drive. The desire to watch other people dealing with their conflicts and fates challenges as well as reinforces values and the morality of society. The theatre provides an exciting opportunity to watch stories and situations as if they were real life, showing us the truth of our nature.
For thousands of years, people have been arguing that theatre is a dying art form. Many people think theatre is all just cheesy singing and dancing or just boring old Shakespeare, but there is much more to theatre than those two extremes. Theatre is important to our society because it teaches us more about real life than recorded media. Theatre has been around for thousands of years and began as a religious ceremony that evolved into an art form that teaches about the true essence of life. Theatre can incorporate profound, and provocative, observations of the human condition that can transcend time; lessons found in Greek plays can still be relevant to the modern world. People argue that the very essence of theatre is being snuffed out by modern
The Alchemist is only one of many plays that influenced the way that we viewed Elizabethan society. It showed us that in the worst of times, no one was safe from treachery and deceit. The theater was one of the main forms of entertainment and anyone could enjoy plays such as this. It also shows that Shakespeare was not the only great playwright of this time. The Elizabethan period was a great time in our world’s history, and the theater was it’s greatest moment.