The Tragedy of Jimmy Porter: Overview of the critical opinions about Look Back in Anger and development of a thesis

ISBN-13: 9783640349661 / Angielski / Miękka / 2009 / 60 str.

Lydia Prexl

Opis

Seminar paper from the year 2007 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 1,3, University of Mannheim, language: English, abstract: It is widely accepted that John Osborne's play Look Back in Anger was a turning-point in the history of British theatre, a milestone introducing the era of the New British Drama. Osborne remembers: -On 8 May 1956 ...] Look Back in Anger had its opening at the Royal Court Theatre. This ...] particular date seems to have become fixed in the memories of theatrical historians- and Lacey emphasises: -The moment of John Osborne's Look Back in Anger ...] was undoubtedly a symbolic one in the history of post-war British theatre and of post-war culture generally.- However, Look Back in Anger was not perceived as a break-through right from the beginning. Rather, Osborne had to cope with shattering criticism and at first, his play was a crushing defeat. Osborne himself summarized the reactions towards Look Back in Anger in his autobiography about thirty years later: -There was a vehement, undisputed judgement: the play was a palpable miss.- Nearly all reviews focused on the play's hero Jimmy Porter, whose nature they depicted as the reason for the -essential wrongness- of the play. Jimmy was seen as -a bitter young misfit, - -a boor, self-pitying, self-dramatising rebel- and a -cynical, neurotic young man] of working-class stock, - whose -continuous tirade against life ...] ha d] a deadening effect upon the whole play.- Cecil Wilson sharpened the criticism when she exclaimed that Jimmy Porter's bitterness and his savage and often vulgar talk -crie d] out for a knife.- However, the attitudes towards Osborne and his first play changed with the publication of Kenneth Tynan's testimony in the Sunday newspaper a week later stating that he could hardly -love anyone who did not wish to see Look Back in Anger. It is the best young play of its decade.- This provocative review suddenly shed a new light on the