Sarah Kane’s "Blasted" and Pechakucha

Photo taken by Pia Johnson, courtesy of The Conversation.

I think like some of my classmates, the Pechakucha presentation model was completely new for me, which was quite a source of anxiety for me over the past weekend. Being limited to just a few seconds per slide, requires a huge amount of restraint and analysis in prioritizing the most important points to the subject. As someone who is used to long-form hyper analytic presentations, this was certainly a new challenge. Not only was the format new, but the content was also something I had no experience with. As someone who works with theater in the more theoretical sense, I have no knowledge about the logistics of pitching a play, which daunted me even further. Given my lack of knowledge and experience with this kind of project, I decided to bring more elements with which I was more familiar into my pitch. With my background in literature and the humanities, my presentation became more of a justification or call to action than a realistic and pragmatic pitch for a production.

My first mission in justifying the need to produce this play, was to locate the text in the canon. Though Sarah Kane is not a canonical author, she was incredibly influential in English language and world theatre at the turn of the century, and the prevalence of her work in other languages is a testament to this. Despite not being canonical, Blasted along with her other plays, are produced world-wide and therefore carries a large artistic and thematic weight, which is one way to justify the work.

In my presentation, I also tried to dialogue the play with the canon. For example, themes of blindness and eye-loss in Blasted call to attention the same symbolism in works like Edipus Rex, Equus, and King Lear. The act of infanticide and cannibalism seems to echo Johnathan Swift’s 1729 essay, A Modest Proposal, in which as a hyperbolic and satirical solution to the Ruling Elite’s passivity to the hunger and starvation of the middle and lower classes, Swift suggests eating babies. In Swift’s essay he confronts the masses with a horror in order to make a point about the realities of economic disparity. Is that not what Kane is doing in the context of war? I also think of Saturno devorando a su hijo (Saturn Devouring His Son), the famous work by Francisco de Goya y Lucientes (my favorite painter), which depicts the Titan Saturn eating one of his children, though it is thought to be an allusion to the ways which the patria, particularly through civil war, consume its citizens, regardless of culpability. Goya’s perspective on war is, at least I think, visible in Kane’s play. Finally, the play depicts, what could be considered the 7th Circle of Hell as written in Dante’s Inferno. The 7th circle of Hell, which is characterized by violence in three rings. 1.) Against Others 2.) Against the self, 3.) Against God/Art/Nature, all of which are present in the play. Thus, Kane echoes sentiments long discussed by those who have seen war: war is hell, in the case of Kane, war is a hyperreal hell. By dialoging the play with canonical works in several different fields (theatre, art, and literature) I demonstrated the relevance of the play and that in producing and in watching the play, we too are interacting with the Canon(s). Which, I believe to be a valuable argument in favor of producing the play.

In terms of thematic justification, I included discussion of the politics of identity and otherization in this play, two subjects of academic study that have become quite popular in the last decades. The story deals with various aspects of Identity, many of which are fluid--fluid identities challenge the crystalized identity politics that are common of our historical moment. Race is depicted by the racist rhetoric used by Ian. Ethnicity shown in Ian’s own life as a Welsh Brit. Disability is present in both the case of Cate, who is presented to have a cognitive disability, and Ian who becomes blind. Geography is used in relation to the war, and Ian’s identity as both a Welsh and a Brit, something that the Soldier challenges. And Sexual Orientation is also included as well as sexuality and gender, as demonstrated by power dynamics between the characters, and sexual violence. By demonstrating the intricacies of fluid identities in this play, I hoped to explain the worthiness of this play for study and a way to challenge audiences to think of how identities change and evolve, particularly in the face of violence.

Racialization and otherization as Genova pointed out, are important discourse of power incredibly prevalent in today’s social and political world, and are shown as such in the play. Blasted takes place in the UK, in the city of Leeds, however Ian, despite being “the other” himself, and coming from marginalized Wales, wields racism to assert his power and racialize those of different races and geographies. The Soldier, racializes Ian for being Welsh, a member of the non-hegemonic group. However, the geography does not entirely anchor this piece, other than references to the city of Leeds and Welsh identity, this play is universal in the way it depicts racialization, especially perpetrated by white hegemonic groups, and violence and trauma caused by war and power discrepancies (i.e. domestic violence). This play, supersedes geography and its specific location, and remains a valuable treatise on the realities of war, throughout the western world. Therefore, I believe that the play’s universality is extremely applicable to the present moment in the United States, in which racism, misogyny, and homophobia has bubbled to the surface of mainstream hegemonic discourse in recent years and its violences becoming increasingly flagrant. Though unsure of how, I wanted the play to be left vague, and decontextualized a bit, so that it remains universal.

In addition to intertextualities, themes of identity and the plays universality. I also included in my presentation, the discourse regarding media and reportage in the play, and its relevance to the historic moment. In the conversation between Ian and The Soldier, they speak about who/how/and what determine official media narratives, and particularly what people want to see, as Ian posits:

“Shootings and rapes and kids getting fiddled by queer priests and schoolteachers. Not soldiers screwing each other for a patch of land. It has to be…personal. Your girlfriend, she’s a story. Soft and clean. Not you. Filthy, like the wogs. No joy in a story about blacks who gives a shit? Why bring you to light” (46).

In this exchange, and throughout the play, Kane questions the narratives of war and the discourses that they hold, for instance, in the quotation above homophobia and racism are clearly present. The symbol of Ian is a strong challenge to the nature of media narratives regarding war, as he is a journalist by trade but also a sexist, a homophobe, a racist and an ableist. Which, in a world with less critical media literacy than ever, questions of reportage speak to and challenge a current reality here in the U.S. and the Americas.

“The How” the play would be staged was the hardest part for me to formulate, one which my classmates had so many great ideas in regard to, and I am torn between decontextualization and over-specification. On one hand, the universality makes the play applicable to all war, however it fails to augment the power that specificity yields when discussing violence. I toyed with the idea of including real archival documents (photos, newspapers, testimonies) on a projection in the back, but thought they might be too distracting for the audience and would distract from the plot. I thought about recontextualizing the play from a North v. South perspective thus alluding to the geography of our country, the social and political legacies of the U.S. Civil War, the U.S. Border with Latin America, while also incorporating discourse on “the Global South'' and the “the Global North”. Though, it was hard for me to figure out how to do so artfully. Ultimately, these would be decisions that, if I were truly to pitch this play, I would need to discuss with a director, as I lack the logistical and applied knowledge of the discipline. As such, in my presentation, I pose them as potential options that a director has the license to explore.

In terms of staging, the space is interrupted and shaped through the trauma of war, and while scenography poses some interesting challenges to the production of a play, the reality is, this work allows for a lot of artistic license and creativity on the Director’s part. Two simple scenes in the same location, and a way to convey (aurally and/or visually) the violences of rape, eye gouging, infanticide/cannibalism, are all the play needs to stay loyal to the text. With the help of an intimacy coach and perhaps the use of safe spaces, the text could be depicted without alteration, in a way which maintains the safety of the audience and the actors. Though, for me, it is important that the work remains a staged production. I feared that changing the medium would reduce the effect of discomfort and confrontation. In a theater, the setting is far more intimate than through film, and I think that by staging it as a play in a physical theater, the audience has to be confronted with the material and has to be uncomfortable. Without the luxuries of pausing or turning off the production, the audience is forced to reflect about the realities of war and their relationship to it.

The realities of war are more distant than ever, especially for the American people, and even for those who rage war. Drone and aerial warfare has made it so that even those waging war, are blind to its realities. Those who wage war, and those whose taxes pay for such war, should be privy to the realities and atrocities of the war and not blind to the world around them. These images are uncomfortable, but they are uncomfortable because they speak to a truth, and it is why I believed the play should be staged, especially here in Lawrence. With the prominence of nationalism, hyper-patriotism, and racism in Kansas, the themes of otherness and the exposition of the realities of war are especially important themes to educate and create empathy and awareness for the audience. As an intellectual and a place where scholars are formed, KU is particularly primed to stage this production, as a way of educating both artistically and through a meaningful talk-back in which discuss the work’s social and political content and relevance with the crowd.

In my presentation, I hoped to show that the play, through it’s intertextuality and universality, through it’s themes of identity, media narratives, and the way it depicts the realities of war and other violences (that are not exclusive to war) that are relevant to current socio-political trends in the U.S., was worthy of production here in Lawrence, as a way for the audience to confront the realities of war, that are made so distant from us through various processes. While practical knowledge of play production is not something I felt comfortable with, I leaned on my knowledge of the humanities to make a case for the play.

I am looking forward to presenting the play on Monday, and have enjoyed the opportunity to detail my ideas in this reflection outside the limitations of a Pechakucha style presentation.

Blasted by Sarah Kane

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