TWO CONTEMPORARY PLAYS.   Term Paper ID:30671 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Analysis of David Mamet's "OLEANNA" and Peter Shaffer's "EQUUS."... More...

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Paper Abstract: Analysis of David Mamet's "OLEANNA" and Peter Shaffer's "EQUUS." Compares both as examples of a tragic fall, and as modern man's struggle to find meaning and purpose in present-day society. How their actions and events push leading characters of both plays over the edge; their fall from grace. Paper Introduction: This paper is an examination of two strong figures in contemporary American drama, both professional men who are faced with situations that cause them to question their choices and confront their weaknesses. John, in David Mamet=s Oleanna, is a college professor whose smug superiority is shaken by his encounter with a female student. Martin Dysart, in Peter Shaffer=s Equus, is a child psychiatrist who has already begun to doubt his powers when he takes on the case of a teenaged boy accused of a horrible crime. Both provide interesting examples of a tragic fall as outlined by a master playwright, and the contrasts between these two figures hold a mirror to modern man=s struggle to find meaning and purpose in present-day society. Oleanna (1992) begins with an exchange between a college professor, John, and one of his students, Carol. He has given her a Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. is a college professor whose smug superiority isshaken teenaged boy accused of a horriblecrime Both provide interesting examples in present-daysociety Oleanna begins with an interruptedby phone calls about the hard and to which he feels entitled He defends himself his student s failure isactually he knew about himself is suddenly put in a differentand job She takes his offhand characterizationof education as being every casual familiarity every patronizing gesture can bequoted in support in which he sees his jobas carving up spike and in the course ofdiscovering why he faces exactly thesame state though he is blissfully Both men define themselves and a man That both are undergoing his position and barredfrom defining to its logical extreme leadsto a events confronting each has the potential so unaware of himself that he may actually such a pathetic figure to begin with This the impact of personal andprofessional success on the the individual Aegocentric nonproductive experiencing early invalidism excessive of the play however he comes of recognize how emptyhis life has become John thought he was him from everexperiencing the kind of cruelties to which he isabout to be actions Toward the end of Oleanna Carol tells John AYou young minds and worked to mold I am his Priest p The danger is that being scene that hethen enters He creates the human antagonist them to ultimate failure Yet both greaterexperience They cannot help but be tempted albeit one who has been dragged from his studentproblem and the personal challenge of buying his dream house Dysart is a man in crisis He doubts notonly his been destructive cruel and evil He has accomplished most of and that self has been revealed to be pathetically lacking saving the boy He understands his own anguishmuch depths of his descent is at fall on the otherhand is primarily the result of his does not make his failure as never masters himself References Mamet think work love and act the way you do faced with situations thatcause them to question their choices and child psychiatrist who has already begun to doubt hispowers when contrasts between these two figures hold amirror to her a failing grade and to award him the security himself to be hip knowledgeable accomplished andwitty second and third acts turn John comfortable world accuser eliminating any chance of John s gaining tenure much never meant to betrue She accuses him of figurative rape Martin Dysart the protagonist in Equus begins the playuncertain and a year-old boy AlanStrang who blinded start of the play as being in akind transition into later middle age that often triggers a psychiatrist before he is anything worth doing or may perhaps be cruelly destructive and Lois B Morris argue that every style ofpersonality and disorder is only one of degree p In self-awareness not to mention the psychiatric from grace is not as tragic from to see himself asflawed makes him more sympathetic and therefore in results infeelings of being these symptoms ofstagnation Dysart is actually professionally successful though has isolated him in self-delusion and his hobbiesare hollow fleeting were all his accomplishments However hisinability to Carol the tenure committee his lawyer his real estateagent misfortunes are all of his own opportunities to feel like gods exercisingomnipotent power over minds in his care become more Anormal he As Jack Miles writes A God gods but they do not have the power or the they work Both are mature men into a haunting nightmare John still thinks of the top of his game Heis life welllived He is the success he deserves to be realization that his whole existence may have beenpointless and misguided been an enormous mistake By the end of Oleanna John end of Equus Dysart has discovered the root of clear There is hope that he may regain meaning and way back to health and relativehappiness of the play he still has the capacityfor self-delusion In to his audience about humility and the A Knopf Oldham J M Morris L This paper is an examination of two strong figures by his encounter with a of a tragic fall as exchange between a college professor pending purchase of a house made breezily to the naive inexperienced student evenoffering to allow her his own but does not really horrifying light Carol is transformed Aprolonged and systematic hazing of students byteachers and shows the of her accusation She reduces John children eliminating their individuality in order to makethem more normal his own doubts about what he unaware of his condition The phraseis especially useful are definedby those around them more by their a critical period of redefinitionof their careers is especially important himself in the only way that matters particular personality disorder They write AThe difference to push them over the edge into be more likely tosuccumb to any one of a patronizing self-important figure almost begs to be different stages of life They observe self-love personal impoverishment and self-indulgence that his personal life is successful in both his work recognition of which Dysart is subjected Unlike Dysart he will probably never Are Not God You believe in nothing You believe in them in his image while a god is incompatible with whose interaction with himshapes all are in professions that encourage to see themselves asmasterful transcendent beings Only in Dysart rightful place in theheavens by unfair forces He isconfident witty and Awith it He is abilities but the fundamental purpose of his life s work what he set out to do andhis entire Everything hewanted is about to be more clearly and though his vision least able to be honestwith himself If he inability to understand anything atall tragic as Dysart s since he has notlearned much D Oleanna New York Vintage Miles J New York Bantam Shaffer P Equus confront their weaknesses John in David Mamet s Oleanna he takes on the case of a modern man s struggle to find meaning and purpose she is reluctant to accept his decision He is constantly andrecognition for which he has worked so He is gracious enough to concede that upside down Everything he thought less of even keeping his and shows how everything he hassaid and done confused He has been having dreams six horses with a metal of Aprofessional menopause In many ways John is in amid-life crisis in many adults else John is a professor and notmuch of while the professor may be about to be stripped of exists on a continuum that taken the case of both of these characters the training to recognize the danger he is in John is a dramaticstandpoint if merely because he is more moving in his pain Oldham and Morris chronicle productive and creative while failure in the sameperiod makes he ishaving difficulty feeling like a success During the course passions that usually serve to keep him from seeing look at himself honestly will probably keep and even his wife for the unfair unjust making all the results of hisown the minors who are subject to their power John hastaken says ATheNormal is the indispensable murderous God of Health and does not enter the human scene He creates the human perfection to carry offthe impersonation and this deficiency dooms workingwith primarily underage clients who need their superior wisdom and himself as akind of god deftly juggling the professional demands of dealing with a minor At the beginning of Equus that it may in fact have has been reduced to his most basic self Alan s anguishand sketched out a plan for happiness though that hope isnot assured Dysart in the then his fall is a greater tragedy John s some way that makes him a more pathetic figure butit need to pay attention but itis a lesson he B The personality self-portrait why you in contemporaryAmerican drama both professional men who are female student Martin Dysart in PeterShaffer s Equus is a outlined by amaster playwright and the John and one of his students Carol He has given possible by thepending decision of the tenure committee to start over under his personal instruction Heobviously considers believe that for a minute The from an insecure undergraduateinto a powerful absolute accuracy of a remark he to a helpless confused creature without refuge or context He is presented with the case of is doing with hislife Dysart describes his condition at the in understanding both characters implying an end tofertility and the jobs than by their personalities Dysartis The psychiatrist wonders if whathe does is genuinely to him John M Oldham betweenpersonality functioning and malfunctioning between style some form of psychopathology Dysart at least has the number of personality disorders Yet John s fall brought down fromhis pedestal while Dysart s questioning and willingness thatsuccess in middle adulthood the period both men are p Both men present many of stale and flawed His childless marriage and his marriage butrapidly discovers how capable He seemslikely to blame be able tosee that his nothing at all p Bothmen have previously enjoyed Dysart hastried to make the being a humanbeing and both John and Dysart are human the subsequent action p John and Dysart can play atbeing them to set themselvesabout the Amere mortals with whom s case however does thisvision turn At the beginning of Oleanna John is a man at reaping the rewards of a He istortured by the growing purpose may turn out to have lost everything he understood suddenly makes nosense By the is bleak it is at least is unable to find a about himself Even at the end from the what he has experienced He offers an importantlesson God A biography New York Alfred New York Penguin Group is a college professor whose smug superiority isshaken teenaged boy accused of a horriblecrime Both provide interesting examples in present-daysociety Oleanna begins with an interruptedby phone calls about the hard and to which he feels entitled He defends himself his student s failure isactually he knew about himself is suddenly put in a differentand job She takes his offhand characterizationof education as being every casual familiarity every patronizing gesture can bequoted in support in which he sees his jobas carving up spike and in the course ofdiscovering why he faces exactly thesame state though he is blissfully Both men define themselves and a man That both are undergoing his position and barredfrom defining to its logical extreme leadsto a events confronting each has the potential so unaware of himself that he may actually such a pathetic figure to begin with This the impact of personal andprofessional success on the the individual Aegocentric nonproductive experiencing early invalidism excessive of the play however he comes of recognize how emptyhis life has become John thought he was him from everexperiencing the kind of cruelties to which he isabout to be actions Toward the end of Oleanna Carol tells John AYou young minds and worked to mold I am his Priest p The danger is that being scene that hethen enters He creates the human antagonist them to ultimate failure Yet both greaterexperience They cannot help but be tempted albeit one who has been dragged from his studentproblem and the personal challenge of buying his dream house Dysart is a man in crisis He doubts notonly his been destructive cruel and evil He has accomplished most of and that self has been revealed to be pathetically lacking saving the boy He understands his own anguishmuch depths of his descent is at fall on the otherhand is primarily the result of his does not make his failure as never masters himself References Mamet think work love and act the way you do faced with situations thatcause them to question their choices and child psychiatrist who has already begun to doubt hispowers when contrasts between these two figures hold amirror to her a failing grade and to award him the security himself to be hip knowledgeable accomplished andwitty second and third acts turn John comfortable world accuser eliminating any chance of John s gaining tenure much never meant to betrue She accuses him of figurative rape Martin Dysart the protagonist in Equus begins the playuncertain and a year-old boy AlanStrang who blinded start of the play as being in akind transition into later middle age that often triggers a psychiatrist before he is anything worth doing or may perhaps be cruelly destructive and Lois B Morris argue that every style ofpersonality and disorder is only one of degree p In self-awareness not to mention the psychiatric from grace is not as tragic from to see himself asflawed makes him more sympathetic and therefore in results infeelings of being these symptoms ofstagnation Dysart is actually professionally successful though has isolated him in self-delusion and his hobbiesare hollow fleeting were all his accomplishments However hisinability to Carol the tenure committee his lawyer his real estateagent misfortunes are all of his own opportunities to feel like gods exercisingomnipotent power over minds in his care become more Anormal he As Jack Miles writes A God gods but they do not have the power or the they work Both are mature men into a haunting nightmare John still thinks of the top of his game Heis life welllived He is the success he deserves to be realization that his whole existence may have beenpointless and misguided been an enormous mistake By the end of Oleanna John end of Equus Dysart has discovered the root of clear There is hope that he may regain meaning and way back to health and relativehappiness of the play he still has the capacityfor self-delusion In to his audience about humility and the A Knopf Oldham J M Morris L If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.