Social Injustice causes Frustration in a postmodern era in the Context of John Osborn's play, Look Back in Anger (original) (raw)
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CLASS AWARENESS IN OSBORNE'S LOOK BACK IN ANGER
The play, first produced at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in May i 956 by the English Stage Company, is concemed with a group of young people living in a tumble-down, squalid one room attic in the Midlands in the mid-1950's. The atmosphere of the opening setting is dark, dingy and rather miserable. The visual impact ofthe set, with its water tank disguised as a sturdy dining table, shabby old armchairs, gas stove, chest of drawers littered with clothing and books, light from a skylight, invites the audience directly to look into the world which is indeed very unpleasant but nonetheless realistic. At the same time, this sort of domestic setting demonstrates in an immediate and visual way that the play is dealing with the realities of life and the current social problems in a workiIıg-elass environment(l).
The paper aims to show Look Back in Anger and its sequel Déjà vu as a journey of the playwright and plays’ protagonist, Jimmy, encompassing the thirty six years of their life. The journey which started thirty six years before, from social protest, has concluded with alienation and loss of the self. Look Back in Anger is one long frustration of Jimmy’s life in which he comes to judge the other people by how much they feel and Déjà vu denotes the last days of Jimmy as J.P. “Déjà vu is a fiction based on a fiction, and J.P. is a fictional character aware of and suffering from his own functionality” (Alan Cater 233). Achieving material gain and making money did not provide him with the guarantee of pleasure and happiness. In the first play, Jimmy was roared for the change and in the other play, J.P craves for the past. Key words- Social
This article, at the outset, lays focus on the theme of alienation, internal conflict and hostility experienced by Jimmy Porter in John Osborne's play Look Back in Anger by examining how the character, Jimmy is furious with life, friends and his wife, alienating himself from the society, religion and women. It concludes, by stating that of all the modern dramatists, John Osborne has been gifted with the credit of dramatizing the insecurity and alienation felt by the younger generation by effectively picturing the loneliness of the central character Jimmy Porter in Look Back in Anger. What is generally held is that the drama, more than the other arts, is most directly influenced by the spirit of the age and the modern dramas are nothing but the cultural product of a new pattern of society that emerged in the wake of the World War – II, which reduced Britain from the position of a great imperial power to that of a second class power. This is evidently pointed out in the lines that follow: ‚In Hungary; the people rebelled against their Russian – imposed Government and Russia put down the revolt in a good old – fashioned imperialist way by sending in tanks, while the rest of the world looked on and did nothing. In the Mediterranean, the Egyptian Government announced that it was taking over the Suez Canal, up to then owned and
John Osborne's play Look Back in Anger created history in England when it was first staged on 8 May 1956. It depicts the disillusionment and rebelliousness of post-war youth in Britain. The suffering hero Jimmy Porter is the representative of this generation with nowhere to go. Having lost the war against society he fights for a place of his own in domestic relationships and dominates the action of the play. Though "Look Back in Anger is the one-man play per excellence." 1 Helena Charles, the friend of Jimmy's wife Alison, makes her presence felt in spite of his dominance in the play by her guts who stands up to Alison's defense. Later she falls to Jimmy's bait easily, becomes something like his mistress and then leaves him and thus paves the way for a reconciliation between the husband and the wife. This paper aims at studying Helena's arrival and departure and how do they contribute to the reunion of the estranged couple.
‘Despair is Inevitable’: A Critical Review on the Concept of Injustice by Daniel Dorling
2021
The inequalities between the poor and the rich and the variant attitudes of social disparity result in great injustice across the world. The book, Injustice: Why Social Inequality Still Persists by Daniel Dorling looks at the phenomena driving these inequalities in the society and functions as a critical contribution to the current and on-going debate on growing social inequality and injustice. It perceives a set of beliefs of the powerful, such as, ‘elitism is efficient’, ‘exclusion is necessary’, ‘prejudice is natural’, ‘greed is good’ and ‘despair is inevitable’ that causes injustice. Through this review article, the reader critically analyses the last tenet of Dorling ‘Despair is inevitable’ and perceives the progress of the argument how inequality and injustice related to this belief. It is a critical involvement and engagement in the enduring debate on mounting social inequality.
This paper’s starting point is Judith Shklar’ diagnosis of a pathology marring democratic societies: complex injustices passing as “misfortunes” that nobody feels responsible for. I propose that denunciations can reveal the political nature of the suffering that everyone conveniently ignores, thus advancing democratic accountability. While denunciations can target various invisible injustices and take many forms, this paper deals with the case of societies with an unmastered past of violence. In order to avoid taking responsibility for the plight of victims, the past is often redescribed in the language of “catastrophe” or “necessity.” Building on Hannah Arendt’s views on spectatorship and storytelling, this paper analyses theatrical denunciations addressing the wider community. Theatre – professional or amateur – can repoliticise neutralised areas of social interaction and transform passive onlookers into reflective spectators. The Argentinean performance of escraches and Thomas Bernhard’s play Heldenplatz are discussed as examples of successful political denunciations communicated in dramaturgical form.
From Historical to Enduring Injustice
Advocates of remedying historical injustices urge political communities to take responsibility for their past, but their arguments are ambiguous about whether all past injustices need remedy, or just those regarding groups that suffer from current injustice. This ambiguity leaves unanswered the challenge of critics who argue that contemporary injustices matter, not those in the past. I argue instead for a focus on injustices that have roots in the past, and continue to the present day, what I call enduring injustice. Instead of focusing on finding the party responsible for the injustice, I argue that we use history to help us understand why some injustices endure, which I suggest is partly due to the limitations of liberal justice. I conclude with a conception of responsibility for repairing enduring injustice that deemphasizes searching for the causal agent, and instead focuses on how to repair the injustice, which I explain through an expansive conception of shared space.
Is Justice Blind?: Performance and Perception of Injustice
It will be the work of this paper to show another approach to justice that, like a system, has its organization and accountability, but also, has a means for challenging systemic abuses. The impulse of this paper largely stems from a perceived gap between theoretical approaches to justice and what actually occurs ‘on the ground.’ It is my central thesis that the gaps of justice theory could be addressed by a partnership with performance. Namely, because the latter is concerned with the relationship between theory and praxis, word and action, artistic unity and realistic plurality. To assist my thesis, I will summarize some of the ‘theoretical’ moves that recover particularity, plurality, and quantitatively irreducible goods. I will then draw upon these contributions as they are actualized in Augusto Boal’s work, Legislative Theatre. Boal’s work gestated centrally in Brazil, but as is the invitation of his writing, I will place his discoveries in our own context through Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen’s play, The Exonerated.