A dramaturgical choice that stood out to me most was the ending of the play. Rather than give closure to the end of the play she leaves us with a cliff hanger. Now most of the time cliff hangers like this drive me crazy, but I really liked this ending because it made me wonder just what would have happened next. I came to two options. Either Nena is supposed to take blame for Orlando's death or Leticia is asking for Nena to take her life with the gun. Honestly, I can see this going either way and which way it truly is supposed to end, well only Maria Irene Fornes knows the answer to that, but she wouldn't have ended it the way she did without a specific reason.
The actions of the play are violent and cruel but are there for a reason. Maria Irene Fornes is showing us a world that is heavily influenced by violence and the effects it has on both men and women of this world. The violence of the world itself has conditioned men and women to be aggressive, destructive and victimized. Each character is enduring a form of pain and the only way they can get deal with the pain or get rid of it is to put pain onto someone else.
Oh, and I think that this is called The Conduct of Life because Nena raises the question of how she should go about her life with all the horrific things she encountered. She says 'I want to conduct each day of my life in the best possible way.' She then later says, 'And if someone should treat me unkindly, I should not blind myself with rage, but I should see them and receive them, since maybe they are in worse pain than me.' Unlike the other characters of this play, Nena chooses to accept and see people rather than retaliate with rage and hatred like the world around her.
I agree with your dramaturgical choice Taylor. I usually hate cliff hangers too, but I genuinely enjoyed them in this play. I thought that was an intriguing choice as well and personally, I was pissed when I read the ending. Nena seems like that innocent little girl who gets the raw end of the stick all the time and it's sad because I don't think she knows any better either. I don't think she would kill Leticia, but I definitely believe she'd take the blame for the murder if asked to.
ReplyDeleteI was also struck by the ending of the play. That last scene is so jam packed with information that just seems to spill out. Whether it's true or not, we don't know. I also kind of liked the open ending. I don't think it was because she wanted lots of interpretation, but because she was trying to convey a message. When you are being tortured, you may confess to something, but that is only to get the torturer to stop. It isn't always fact.
ReplyDeleteI’m going to comment on why you think it’s called The Conduct of Life. I have honestly not thought of it that way. I just thought she called it that because of the way Leticia and Orlando went about their lives. Your reasoning honestly makes way more sense, so thank you for pointing that out to me as you have officially changed my mind about why the play is called that.
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