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You are left with DOUBT. Right.
There are only 4 spoken characters in the whole book - yet so much goes on in such a short story/play. It is riveting and superbly written - considering it's only 60+ pages long.The play takes place in a 1960's Catholic Church School where a nun suspects the priest is molesting one of his students.
What a powerful piece. Was she wrong.
It's a story about doubt. Did he do it.
You just don't know. I found that the ending was well suited for this piece and I highly recommend it.
If the movie was excellent, the script is outstanding. The author sees life as one should struggle to. The dedication of the play to nuns is very sincere, touching and true. Read it for a life-enhancing experience.
They voice our doubts, ask our questions, tremble with our fears. This beautiful ambiguity could have burned audiences, but Shanley handles it with such aplomb that the tension between possibilities makes the play sing with life.Only a few years old, this brief, quick, powerful play is already recognized as a contemporary classic.
Father Flynn thinks Sister Aloysius impedes the redeeming work of the church. Sister Aloysius thinks Father Flynn is abusing a student at the parochial school.
Any attempt to nail it down to a single meaning is destined to fail because the characters and their conflict are too slippery to admit of simple definitions. Both of them try to recruit naïve young Sister James, manipulating her innocence to their own ends.
When the fallout begins, no one knows who to believe; even the priest and the sisters lose sight of the truth.Shanley's most famous play is stunning in its evasiveness. And no wonder, since its characters say the words many of us wish we could speak.
Not just for theatre fans, Shanley's "Doubt" is a play that audiences and readers treasure and consume time and again.
Of the black student, Donald Muller, Sister Aloysius says, "He's isolated. O'Byrne, Cherry Jones, Heather Goldenhersh, and Adriane Lenox. She is bent on destroying the priest. Muller (Adriane Lenox) fiercely defends her son and in a brilliant scene outmaneuvers the zealot-principal. Her conviction, her certitude make her less of a Christian. The movie opened up the action, made it more dynamic with other characters and exterior scenes. Reading it now after seeing the excellent movie version with a screenplay by the author and directed by him, the play seems claustrophobic and too condensed.
The movie made the four lead characters more complex, richer in detail.The author in his introduction says, "We've got to learn to live with a full measure of uncertainty. There is no last word."Sister Aloysius (Cherry Jones) is so certain of Father Flynn's guilt that she will not let doubt creep into her mind. In April of 2005 I saw the play "Doubt" by John Patrick Shanley on Broadway with a cast consisting of Brian F. There's nothing wrong with love." His second sermon, done with an Irish brogue at times, is on the subject of intolerance, and is aimed at the school principal.In the struggle Sister James has lost her peace of mind and cannot sleep. Mrs. A person's nature is of no interest to the principal; she's only concerned with actions. Many left the theater with the feeling of doubt that the playwright wanted them to leave with. And plunder they did.the hunters had a field day." It's a disturbing play.
It's a short play with no intermission. The little sheep lagging behind is the one the wolf goes for."The priest asks, "Where's your compassion." and the Mother Superior answers, "Nowhere you can get at it."It's interesting that Shanley, describing the Catholic Church in 1964 said, "We had, like many animals, flocked together.we were terribly vulnerable to anyone who chose to hunt us. She says, "I'll bring you down." Flynn says "It's an old tactic of cruel people to kill kindness in the name of virtue. Don't believe it. When trust is the order of the day, predators are free to plunder. Some, however, left with the uneasy feeling they had been taken for a ride, manipulated rather than enlightened.
The item arrived promptly and was in excellent condition, like new. Excellent customer service by the vendor.
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