9780415317856_the_routledge_creative_writing_coursebook

www.ATIBOOK.irThe routledge creative writing coursebook 178Would we describe this scene as realism? Hardly. But it does speak to the audience aboutthe real—almost too appallingly real—position of a human being in a state of abjectionassociated with extreme old age. Though this time the consequences look like being fatal,(in the final scene Lear crawls over the huge falls and disappears in the sound of ragingwaters), the tone of his ‘carers’, his offspring, seems to be a knowingly light cruelty, as inFamily Voices. Writing for the theatre confers a wide choice of language modes (the‘song’ above, the references to Greek myths) and of ways of presenting characters; thoseabove are unpleasant to the point of comedy (‘All he needs is his skin’). Demented Learthinks he’s in a restaurant, thinks high status. (I’ve ordered. Why are they taking solong?’) The scene shifts through four verbal sequences: they arrive, Lear’s mad shoutsand songs, the confusion with money, they leave him to die. It does help to be aware ofthese shifts of sequence, to know how many there are in each scene, how long each onelasts, how one moves into another.This scene can be played on an empty stage. The consequences of being in thesesurroundings are very high, very serious. But the point is made by how the charactersrefer to these surroundings, not by elaborate stage sets.Naturalistic RepresentationAnother term for this approach to theatre is illusionism—the attempt to create the illusionthat the events and characters we witness are real. As well as objects in a setting, the mostdefinitive element in naturalistic presentation will be speech and dialogue. The sounds ofordinary speaking voices, sentences unfinished, interrupting each other, of mumbling,humour, scattered formalities: all these will most likely be found in a naturalistic setting.Although I did attempt that type of dialogue in the scene from Never, I was equallyconcerned with metaphor—the forest, waterfall, wilderness, as reflections of a mind. It’shard to know what people would usually talk about while pushing their aged relative up aforest track in a wheel-barrow at night. It’s not so difficult if you are writing a scene in acountry pub in Ireland, the wind blowing outside, a warm fire burning, and a few localsgathered round. Somebody might say These big stones will look after you’, but it’s morelikely they’ll talk something like this from Conor McPherson’s play The Weir. Here thecharacters talk about putting a bet on a horse:FINBAR: Ah the principle of the thing is to win a few quid and don’t be giving out.JACK: Who’s giving out? I’m not giving out. All I’m saying is that the way I go at it, theprinciple’s not, the science. It’s the luck, it’s the something that’s not the facts and thefigures of itFINBAR: Jaysus. And do you and Kenny get down on your knees and lash a few quickHail Marys out before he stamps your docket or something?JACK: Ah it’s not like that. I’m not talking about that. For fuck’s sake.(McPherson, 1994:16)This is a wonderful definition of luck, which is, of course, not chance. But the language isno more special or striking than it would be on any other night in this place, betweenthese characters or people very much like them. Naturalistic means simply that—language as it is spoken, received and understood, under usual circumstances, given