Language:
English
Year of publication:
1995
Titel der Quelle:
American Theatre
Angaben zur Quelle:
12,2 (1995) 16-20, 69
Keywords:
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945), and the theater
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) Influence
Abstract:
Discusses the ways in which modern American drama brings the Holocaust closer to the audience by examining its effects on the individual psyche. In Arthur Miller's "Broken Glass" (1994), set in Brooklyn in 1938, the heroine is reduced to paralysis by news of the "Kristallnacht" pogrom, while her self-hating husband is impotent and violent toward her. Cynthia Ozick's "Blue Light" (1990) is set in 1979 and deals with the tension between an obsessed Holocaust survivor and her niece who has chosen to forget. A Holocaust revisionist appears, seduces the niece, and tricks a confession from the aunt that her stories are invented. Other Holocaust plays using a psychological technique include: Sybille Pearson's "Unfinished Stories, " Diane Samuel's "Kindertransport, " Barbara Lebow's "A Shayna Maidel, " and Jon Robin Baitz's "The Substance of Fire." Also discusses the theatrical nature of the exhibit at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, and its attempt to bridge the dichotomy between collective catastrophe and individual suffering.
Note:
In the American theater.
,
Another version appeared in "The Americanization of the Holocaust" (1999).
URL:
Locate this publication in Israeli libraries
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