The American Dream Summary and Analysis the Quick Kenzie Way

Summary and Analysis the Quick Kenzie Way:

The American Dream

Edward Albee

First performed 1961

Somewhat Existentialist, Theatre of the Absurd

Author: Edward Albee

Setting: Living room of Mommy and Daddy’s apartment.  One-Act play, room never left.  Supposedly the present, 1960s America.

Plot: Mommy and Daddy live in their apartment.  While never directly stated, we learn that they have killed an adopted son and are looking for a replacement.  Mrs. Barker is the lady who is supposed to help them get their “satisfaction” but is confused as to why she is there in the first place.  Grandma becomes sick of Mommy and Daddy, so when the Young Man enters looking for a job, she is quick to formulate a plan to have him be the new son (the old son was his twin).  Grandma leaves after this, and the play closes while “everybody’s got what he thinks he wants”.  Not much of a plot.

Significant Characters:

Mommy – Controller, very superficial, not very smart.

Daddy – Weak, copycat of Mommy, tries to prove his masculinity but fails.

Grandma – Talks much about her old age, witty, does not approve of Mommy and Daddy

Mrs. Barker – The lady from the Adoption Service, is involved in so many things, but nothing that actually matters.  Is often referred to as “they”, will sometimes call herself “we”.

Young Man – Beautiful in form, empty in soul.  Cannot love, suffered many loses without explanation, is the twin of Mommy and Daddy’s first son.

Narrative voice: No narrator

POV:  3^rd person, with no narrator.  Audience has no interaction with characters until the very end when Grandma leaves the stage and enters into the audience, speaking directly to them.

Tone: Very critical of society, shifts towards the positive when Grandma joins the audience, but mostly is critical throughout.

3 Significant Quotes and why:

1) Daddy: I do wish I weren’t surrounded by women; I’d like some men around here.

Mrs. Barker: You can say that again!

Grandma: I don’t hardly count as a woman, so can I say my piece?

This is a good quote because a) Daddy acts like a woman, so this is ironic.  B) Mrs. Barker agrees, though she happens to be very pro-feminist, could also relate to her husband being wheel chair-bound.  C) Grandma is as manly/strong as Daddy is feminine/weak, which provides good contrast.

2) Mommy: You can’t get satisfaction; just try.  I can get satisfaction, but you can’t.

Here Mommy goes again, asserting her dominance over Daddy.  This also brings up the idea of “satisfaction” which is referenced heavily throughout the play.  Satisfaction often comes to the characters though money, dominance, and sex.

3) Young Man: … In every other way I am incomplete, and I must therefore . . . compensate.  (LATER) . . . I can feel nothing.

This shows that the Young Man, while seemingly perfect, is empty and dead inside.  The New American Dream may also look appealing, but unlike the old, has nothing in its core.

4) Mommy: Would you like a cigarette, and a drink, and would you like to cross your legs?

This could be a good quote to use because it can be interpreted many different ways.  For example, Mommy is bossy.  She is telling Mrs. Barker what to do.  Or, this is just furthering the point that Mrs. Barker is a prostitute.  Or, this is another technique Albee used to show to the audience the absurdness of the entire situation and relationships between the characters.  

Theme: The idea of what Americans value (their “American Dream”) is exaggerated, highlighted, and then attacked to show the readers Albee’s view on the declining state of our society.

Elements which Support this Theme:

n      Setting – Characters presumably in America in the present-day.

n      Plot – No traditionally-styled plot, which highlights the meaninglessness of life.  The reader is to favor Grandma, and so her ideals are pushed, and dislike Mommy and Daddy/

n      Title – “The American Dream” works well as a title because it forces the reader to think of the American Dream and what that means.  (And it’s more than just what Grandma calls the Young Man!)

n      Narrative Voice – Grandma becomes the Narrator when she enters the audience in the very last moments of the play and addresses them directly.  This shows her importance and connection to the audience.

n      Author’s style – Very commonplace language used, characters are somewhat relatable, causing reader/audience to wonder how they fit in to this American Dream, if they support Grandma or relate to Mommy’s ignorant superficialness.)

n      Tone – Critical of society and modern values.

n      Imagery – Language is used to create disturbing scenes (like the disfiguring and murder of the first son) which show the wrongness of today’s world.

n      Symbolism – Grandma is a symbol for the Old American Dream, and the Young Man for the New American Dream.  Where Grandma is old, filled, and has a life of experience, the Young Man is young, physically attractive, but empty inside.

Close Reading -- October 21, 2012

http://weeklyworldnews.com/headlines/26946/end-of-world-may-21-2011/

Any article about a potential upcoming Doomsday would grab anyone's attention, but keeping the reader involved is the trick.  Frank Lake wrote about a new Rapture date prediction, which I find interesting, but it was his use of carefully chosen details, fast-forward syntax, and helpful diction that keeps the reader wanting to know more. 

Lake includes a background story of a past End Times prediction made in 2004 by a pastor in New Jersey.  After the predicted day (which was his wife 50th birthday) came and went without a hitch, he then "beat his wife to death with a Bible" out of frustration (Lake).  While completely unrelated to the current Doomsday prediction the article was based on, this detail gives hint to Lake's beliefs on End Times predictions -- that they're totally false.  Even a small detail like this background story can say so much, without really saying anything.  Similarly, Lake mentions the current relationship status of one of the believers, saying very simply "[H]er husband left for Vegas to drink and spend his life savings on prostitutes" (Lake).  While that information could have easily not gone viral, it clues the reader in to Lake's true opinions.

Clear, straightforward sentences to keep the reader engaged and moving.  There's no long, boring sentences, which helps keep the article from feeling long and boring.  "May 2012 is over.  The Rapture has come and gone."  Lake just keeps slapping down facts and ideas, keeping the reader alert and ready for more.  There's a bundle of information presented, but it is not difficult to pick up on or understand.  

Because details the apparent upcoming apocalypse is not regarded as common knowledge, Lake uses both information and diction to help the reader "see" what is going on.  When describing the reaction of those whose Rapture day came and went, he calls them "crestfallen followers", implying through "followers" that they are part of a cult, and that they have "fallen", probably both in social status and their confidence of their beliefs.  "Ominous" implies both death and dread, and paints a vivid picture of the predicted doom to come.  With a few descriptive words, the reader can better understand the scenario presented, and therefore want to know more.

Open Prompt -- October 14, 2012

Open Prompt -- October 14, 2012 

1975. Unlike the novelist, the writer of a play does not use his own voice and only rarely uses a narrator's voice to guide the audience's responses to character and action. Select a play you have read and write an essay in which you explain the techniques the playwright uses to guide his audience's responses to the central characters and the action. You might consider the effect on the audience of things like setting, the use of comparable and contrasting characters, and the characters' responses to each other. Support your argument with specific references to the play. Do not give a plot summary.

Edward Albee -- The American Dream 

Edward Albee may be thought of as a very "different" playwright based on his writings which often fall under the Theatre of the Absurd category, but like all playwrights he cannot use his own voice to direct the audience's response to character and action within his plays. Because of this, in his famous play The American Dream, Albee relies on a commonplace setting, the contrast between Mommy and Grandma, and Grandma's response to the arrival of the Young Man.  

The American Dream is set in a living room of an apartment.  There's truly nothing special about the setting, and that is what makes it work.  Everyone knows what a living room is -- it's the center of the home, and so it makes sense to stage a play about a family right in the middle of where they live.  The audience can relate to this common setting, and therefore can relate to the characters and their actions within that room.  The family room is never left throughout the entire play, and this isolated world becomes the foundation for the audience's response to the action that takes place.

Grandma and Mommy are two very different characters who constantly clash.  Mommy is middle-aged, manipulative, and concerned with getting her fair share of satisfaction.  Grandma, her mother, is refreshing, old, loud, and not afraid so speak her mind.  The audience leans towards favoring Grandma throughout the play, and become sick and tired of pathetic Mommy as the play goes on.  By having this be, Albee guides the audience's response to favor Grandma's solid ideals, as opposed to Mommy's materialistic ones.  There's no "this is what I think and how you should think" but instead, the audience naturally sides with Grandma, supporting Albee's ideas.

The audience also gets a glimpse of what Albee is trying to say with the Young Man's interactions with Grandma. The Young Man is a fresh, new character who arrives towards the end of the play.  Many sides of Grandma have been seen, and when this new character comes along, her reaction helps the audience know what to make of him.  At first Grandma does not want to come into close contact with this flashy "American Dream", but admires him and tries to find him a job nonetheless.  The Young Man opens up to Grandma later, and her gentle response helps the reader understand him without Albee directly coming in to explain. 

Writing a play has considerable challenges that writing a novel doesn't, but they can be overcome in a remarkable way.  Using the setting, contrasting characters, and character's responses to one another, playwrights like Edward Albee can create works in which they themselves don't need to hold the audience's hand the entire time.

Response to Course Material #2

A Few Things I Now Know, 

and think about all this. 

Existentialism 

Oh, those poor existentialists!  They went off to war and didn't know why and saw death and destruction and had to live with it, never understood or loved by society! 

Ha, they actually believe humans are free to do whatever they want all the time?  And all this absurdness is getting ridiculous.  Writing about meaninglessness is just going to confuse me. I'm not going to like any of this "theater of the depressed and crazy". 

Ah, the great big existentialism packet.  While there are some things I like about the whole existentialist philosophy, (taking responsibility for your own actions) I don't agree with all of it (every single thing is meaningless, why have values when nothing matters, etc).  However, I do think that it is interesting, for sure.  I don't feel like I have a very good grasp of it yet, but I think that with a little deeper look into The American Dream and talking more about what The Theater of the Absurd is, I'll be able to understand it better.

Major Literary Movements 

I realize this is totally re-stating not re-processing, (to some extent,) but it helps me think about all we've learned with just a few words.

Classical.  Greek and Roman guys.  Epic heroes, oral tradition, gods, Odysseus and Oedipus.  Plato, Aristotle.

Medievalism.  Vikings.  Religious texts.  Dante's Inferno, rings of Hell.  Allegories. Beowulf.

Renaissance.  Rebirth.  Probably the most talked about in school.  Nation-states.  Shakespeare.  

Humanism (thing within Renaissance).  Less God, more Us.  Sciencey. 

Romanticism.  Individuals.  Hero against society.  Life is beautiful even when it's not.  

Victorian Literature.  Queen Victoria.  Good guy wins.  Morals. 

Realism and Naturalism.  American lit class!  Common man, every day events.  NOT ABOUT LOVING NATURE.  Nature is too good for us, humans always lose to nature.  

Modernism.  Make it new!  WWI, industrialization, new stuff.  Lost generation.  Irony, things are like as they seem, surrealism, impresssionalism.  

Post modernism.  Modernism on steroids.  Nostalgia.  High and Low Culture.  Intertextuality.  IRONY IRONY IRONY.  What is truth?  

The American Dream 

What?  What?  What just happened?  Is Mrs. Barker still out of her dress?  Gramma took the water out of the house?  What?  What was the point of all this?  So is the Young Man their baby?  They got rid of their baby?!  

That was what was going through my head after the last line of The American Dream.  I'm not good at reading-between-the-lines or getting over my own perceptions/biases/beliefs, so I probably should not be surprised that there was a lot I did not really understand considering The American Dream is filled with all sorts of meanings.  Already, after reading what Grandma stood for (the old American dream, in case you were wondering) my mind was blown and what we read was only on Grandma.  What I'm really looking forward to is Mrs. Barker... I really do not get her!