Sarah Kane Complete Plays

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Even by her own standards, Sarah Kane’s 1998 play is an unusually punishing experience that posits a world in which licensed cruelty tests love to its limits. But while it has an undeniably serious purpose and is imaginatively staged by Katie Mitchell, I find its escalating horrors have a sense-numbing effect that outweighs its redemptive lyricism. According to critic Aleks Sierz in his book In-Yer-Face Theatre: British Drama Today, when he saw the play "The audience, many of whom were gay, was very small but appreciative. People loved the play's gender confusions, laughing at Robin's clumsiness as he and Grace swap clothes, and were also gripped by the raw emotion onstage; only one person walked out." [28] a b c d e f g h i j Quinn, Sue (23 September 1999). "Suicidal writer was free to kill herself". The Guardian . Retrieved 26 February 2021. As part of the Sarah Kane season with staged productions of Blasted, Crave and 4.48 Psychosis and semi-staged readings of Phaedra's Love and Cleansed. [9] [10] As a teenager, Sarah Kane was a committed Christian, but after her degree in drama at Bristol University and MA at Birmingham in Playwriting, she rejected these beliefs. As well as writing, she directed other's work, and she also worked hard to encourage other writers in their work. For many years she battled with severe depression and at the age of 28 she committed suicide.

Audio recording of the post-show discussion of the 2005 production of Cleansed at the Arcola theatre. Hosted by Aleks Sierz with discussion from directors Dominic Dromgoole and Sean Holmes, academic Graham Saunders and Sarah Kane's brother Simon Kane. Kane struggled with severe depression for many years and was twice voluntarily admitted to the Maudsley Hospital in London. [7]Translated into German by Elisabeth Plessen, Nils Tabert and Peter Zadek. Performed under the title of Gesäubert. Kane's crime? Writing a play so adventurous—not just in form, but content, too—that it puzzled and disgusted the people sent to review it. As she pointed out, "a play about a middle-aged male journalist who rapes a young woman and is raped and mutilated himself can't have endeared [her] to a theater full of middle-aged male critics." Eyre, Richard; Wright, Nicholas A. (2001). Changing stages: a view of British and American theatre in the twentieth century. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. pp. 400. ISBN 0-375-41203-4.

Kane herself and scholars of her work, such as Graham Saunders, have identified some of her inspirations as expressionist theatre and Jacobean tragedy. [1] The critic Aleks Sierz saw her work as part of a confrontational style and sensibility of drama termed " in-yer-face theatre". Sierz originally called Kane "the quintessential in-yer-face writer of the [1990s]" [2] but later remarked in 2009 that although he initially "thought she was very typical of the new writing of the middle 1990s. The further we get away from that in time, the more un-typical she seems to be". [3]

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Saunders, Graham (2002). 'Love me or kill me': Sarah Kane and the theatre of extremes. Manchester University Press. ISBN 0-7190-5956-9.

The Guardian reported that "Despite the fact that one insensitive member of the audience laughed himself silly when Kane's starring role was announced before the show, the playwright acquitted herself admirably in a role that offers nowhere to hide. It's even possible – at a stretch – to see the play's climatic stitching of a penis to her character's crotch as a symbol of the success of this audacious theatrical transplant." [22] Katie Mitchell's 2016 National Theatre production of the play had the character of Grace present in every scene. Mitchell said this decision was made "to cohere the twenty scenes" and also as the play then could be interpreted as dream: Evans, Daniel (2000). "14". "Conversation with Daniel Evans". 'Love me or kill me': Sarah Kane and the theatre of extremes (Interview). Interviewed by Saunders, Graham. Manchester University Press. p.177. ISBN 0-7190-5956-9.Her last play, 4.48 Psychosis, was completed shortly before she died and was performed in 2000, at the Royal Court, directed by James Macdonald. This, Kane's shortest and most fragmented theatrical work, dispenses with plot and character, and no indication is given as to how many actors were intended to voice the play. Written at a time when Kane was suffering from severe depression, it has been described by her fellow-playwright and friend David Greig as having as its subject the " psychotic mind". [6] According to Greig, the title derives from the time—4:48a.m.—when Kane, in her depressed state, frequently woke in the morning. a b c Saunders, Graham (2002). Love me or kill me: Sarah Kane and the theatre of extremes. Manchester; Manchester University Press: 2002. p.224. ISBN 0-7190-5956-9. Culture Trips are deeply immersive 5 to 16 days itineraries, that combine authentic local experiences, exciting activities and 4-5* accommodation to look forward to at the end of each day. Our Rail Trips are our most planet-friendly itineraries that invite you to take the scenic route, relax whilst getting under the skin of a destination. Our Private Trips are fully tailored itineraries, curated by our Travel Experts specifically for you, your friends or your family. By her following play, Crave, Kane is dealing in total desperation and the rawest of unrequited love. Stylistically, it's a departure: Her work has now dissolved into nameless characters and nonlinear poetry; the theme of the pain of love is all-encompassing, with the characters also being haunted by rape, incest, anorexia, mental illness, and other very real demons. Everything in Mitchell’s production is clear and explicit. We see Carl’s tongue cut out, a pole inserted in his rectum, and his hands and feet brutally mangled. Grace undergoes an operation in which she mutates into her brother with visible genitalia. All this has proved too much for a handful of audience members who have, according to reports, fainted. But I would absolve both the play and the production, in which the sex is as graphic as the violence, of the charge of easy sensationalism. Kane is ultimately making a moral point about sanctioned butchery. My particular problem is that such relentless exposure to man’s inhumanity to man produces a sense of fatigue rather than of horror.