Wit Margaret Edson Analysis

In her play “Wit”, Margaret Edson depicts Professor Vivian Bearing as an intense, brilliant scholar with a passion for the cryptic Holy Sonnets of John Donne. However, as she struggles with metastatic stage IV ovarian cancer and gets closer to death, her perspective seems to shift; when her mentor Professor E.M. Ashford comes to visit her, Bearing wants her to read not one of Donne’s sonnets, but instead the children’s book The Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown. Through her inclusion of The Runaway Bunny in contrast with Donne’s sonnets, Edson highlights the lack of need for the incessant interpretation that Bearing is used to as well as the straightforwardness regarding the idea of salvation, seeming to suggest that simplicity can be more meaningful than a constant analysis of complexity in connecting with people through kindness, and that God has a merciful nature in granting redemption.

In contrast with the complexities of Donne’s sonnets, a children’s book is straightforward and simple.

Though Bearing was previously enamored by the sonnets, Bearing responds “Nooooooo” when Professor Ashford says that she will “recite something by Donne”, so Ashford instead reads to her The Runaway Bunny instead (79). Edson appears to be expressing that Bearing realizes that there comes a point where ceaseless analysis and interpretation is futile, and does not contribute to her desire for kindness. Bearing’s sentiment towards wanting simplicity over her usual complex interpretation connects to how she allows Susie to share a popsicle with her and call her “sweetheart”. After this instance, she states that “nothing would be worse than a detailed scholarly analysis. Erudition. Interpretation. Complication. Now is a time for simplicity,” (69). Edson seems to be suggesting through Bearing’s newfound inclination towards simplicity, as highlighted by her want to have The Runaway Bunny read to her, that actions do not need to be complex to be meaningful, especially in regard to

kindness.
In contrast to the sonnets of John Donne, The Runaway Bunny has a more straightforward approach towards the idea of salvation. While in the middle of reading the story to Bearing, Professor Ashford says that it is a “little allegory of the soul. No matter where it hides, God will find it,” (80). Edson seems to comparing the fact that the mother will always find her little bunny in the story with God, suggesting that God will always grant one salvation no matter where their soul has traveled. Donne’s sonnets, however, undertake the idea of redemption with what Dr. Jason Posner describes as “Salvation Anxiety”; he treats it as a complicated, convoluted “puzzle” that is impossible to understand (76). Edson seems to be suggesting that salvation is a simpler idea than Donne proposes—like demonstrated in The Runaway Bunny, redemption is easily earned because of the merciful and forgiving nature of God.
Margaret Edson appears to be using the clarity and religious connotation of children’s book The Runaway Bunny in her play to suggest that simplicity can be more significant than complexity in human empathetic connection and that God is merciful in giving salvation, contrasting with Bearing’s previous behaviors and the ideas in Donne’s sonnets. An examination of the contrast between the relationship of Bearing and her primary nurse, Susie Monahan, and that between Bearing and clinical fellow Dr. Jason Posner would be insightful in further exploring Bearing’s shifting perceptions of intellectualism and kindness through the play.