Hi all
People have been using the blog comment buttons! Check out in particular
Colin Reeves' mini-essay at the end of the review of Sixteen Words for
Water. Perhaps this part of Theatre Notes might, after all, come alive - it
would be great if so. Feel free to question, point out my mistakes, or
plain disagree, any time you like - (outrageous flattery and praise always
welcome, naturally) -
And this week's review -
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, directed by Peter Evans,
performed by Anita Hegh. At the Store Room until April 3.
As soon as Anita Hegh props herself primly on a wooden schoolroom chair and
glances neurotically at her right hand, as if it were some wild animal that
might escape any moment, you realise that you're in for a special
performance. Nothing that follows disabuses this expectation.
It's a performance of a short story by the early feminist Charlotte Perkins
Gilman, in which an unnamed woman who is being treated for a nervous
condition is confined by her doctor husband in a room notable for its
particularly ugly wallpaper. The story traces her mental breakdown through
a series of snatched diary entries. The Yellow Wallpaper rivals Georg
Buchner's story Lenz as a compelling depiction of the subjectivity of
madness, notable for both its imaginative expressiveness and the almost
clinical precision of its observations.
Read more at http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
All the best
Alison
Alison Croggon
Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
Editor, Masthead: http://masthead.net.au
Home page: http://alisoncroggon.com
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