9780415317856_the_routledge_creative_writing_coursebook

www.ATIBOOK.irDrama 179certain regional variations. How, then, does McPherson develop the drama, increaseconsequence, make contact with things, experiences, people, not ‘usual’? Given only acountry pub with a group of ordinary characters, how does he break the pattern ofroutine, rob the scene of its predictability? These ‘usual circumstances’ continue in theplay. The characters talk, drink, tease and amuse each other. Nothing excessive. Then,when one of them arrives with a new guest, Valerie, a stranger to the area, they start toexchange anecdotes about ghosts, about the supernatural. Around these parts there usedto be something known as a ‘fairy road’. It runs through the house where Valerie isstaying. The point is to entertain Valerie with some items of native folklore, a vitalelement of their narrative culture. Some are old stories going back five generations,others recent. Naturalistic speech in The Weir arrives laden not just with frequentexpletives and quirky idiom but with stories that blur the distinction between the livingand the dead. Finally it is Valerie’s story—about her daughter who was drowned—thatmoves the characters, and the audience, to operate at the highest level of attention.Here is Valerie’s story about what happened after her daughter’s drowning accident ina local town baths. For some time she didn’t really know how to cope:VALERIE: … Just months of this. Not really taking it in like.PauseBut, and then one morning. I was in bed. Daniel had gone to work I usually lay there for afew hours, trying to stay asleep, really. I suppose. And the phone rang. And I just leftit. I wasn’t going to get it. And it rang for a long time. Em, eventually it stopped, andI was dropping off again. But then it started ringing again, for a long time. So Ithought it must have been Daniel trying to get me. Someone who knew I was there.So I went down and answered it. And. The line was very faint It was like a crossed line.There were voices, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying. And then I heardNiamh. She said, ‘Mammy?’ And I…just said,you know, ‘Yes’.Short pauseAnd she said… She wanted me to come and collect her. I mean, I wasn’t sure whetherthis was a dream or her leaving us had been a dream. I just said, ‘Where are you?’And she said she thought she was at Nana’s. In the bedroom. But Nana wasn’t there. Andshe was scared. There were children knocking in the walls and the man was standingacross the road, and he was looking up and he was going to cross the road. Andwould I come and get her?And I said I would, of course I would. And I dropped the phone and I ran out to the car injust a tee-shirt I slept in. And I drove to Daniel’s mother’s house. And I could hardlysee, I was crying so much. I mean, I knew she wasn’t going to be there. I knew shewas gone. But to think wherever she was… that… And there was nothing I could doabout it.Daniel’s mother got a doctor and I… slept for a day or two. But it was… Daniel felt thatI… needed to face up to Niamh being gone. But I just thought that he should face upto what happened to me. He was insisting I get some treatment, and then…everything would be okay. But you know, what can help that, if she’s out there? Shestill… still needs me.PauseJACK: You don’t think it could have been a dream you were having, no?