THE OTHER SIDE OF FIFTY: THE CRONES AMONG US by Bonnie M. Benson A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of The Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and letters in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Florida Atlantic University Boca Raton, Florida August2003 Copyright by Bonnie M. Benson 2003 ii The Other Side of Fifty: The Crones Among Us By Bonnie M. Benson This dissertation was prepared under the direction of the candidate's dissertation advisor, Dr. Susan Love Brown, Department of Anthropology, and has been approved by the members of her supervisory committee. It has been submitted to the faculty of the Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters and was accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. SUPERVISORY COMMITTEE: ean, The Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts & Letters iii Abstract Author: Bonnie M. Benson Title: The Other Side of Fifty: The Crones Among Us Institution: Florida Atlantic University Dissertation Advisor: Dr. Susan Love Brown Degree: Doctor of Philosophy Year: 2003 The playwright can be both a public intellectual and an agent for social · change. In this creative dissertation, consisting of a series of essays and a full­ length play, I demonstrate an alternative view of aging women to combat the pejorative images now current. Drawing on dramatic portrayals from the past 100 years and current information on aging in the United States, I explore the dominant viewpoint on aging women. Combining the structures of spiritual quest and rite of passage with an appreciation for the ritual that celebrates such events, I have written a play, The Crones Among Us, from a female viewpoint. Presenting female characters as subjects rather than objects, the play provides an alternative view of women on the other side of fifty. Using the archetype of the crone, the play affords a more empowering view of women as they age in a society which has privileged youth and beauty. iv To all the Crones becoming ... Table of Contents Introduction ••••••.•••••••.•....•.•..•.•.•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••.•• 1 Chapter I Playwright as Public Intellectual .•.....••....••••••..••••••..••••..••.•••.• 5 Chapter 2 Aging in the United States ••.•••••••••••.••••.•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 19 Chapter 3 The Crone as Archetype ...•..•..........•...••.••••.••••••••.•..•••••.•••••29 Chapter 4 Theatre, Women and Aging •••..••.•••..•••..•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 37 Chapter 5 Creating an Alternative Vision ......•...••••••.•.••••••••••••••••••••••••.• 57 Chapter 6 The Crones Among Us••.••••••••.••••••••.•••••••••••••••••••••••••••.•.••. 68 References Appendix I - Development History of The Crones Among Us •••.•.••••••.•..•••.••• 163 Bibliography •.••••••••••.•••.••••••••.•••••.•••••..•.•...•••••••••.••.••••••••••••.••••••••••••••. 165 Curriculum Vitae •.••...•..•.••.•.••.•.•••••.•..•••••••••••..••••••••••.••••••••••••.••••••••••••• 172 v Introduction "The Other Side of Fifty: The Crones Among US' is a creative dissertation, consisting of a play and several supporting essays. This non­ traditional, inter-disciplinary approach has been employed by various scholars (Vought 1994, Levenherz 1996, Eddins 2001 ). Using a creative medium such as playwrighting, I have created an alternate view of women and aging in the United States to combat the largely pejorative images I have seen, both on stage and in society. The essays that precede the play record my artistic and intellectual journey to The Crones Among Us. Exploring the functions of a playwright as public intellectual caused me to look more clearly at the medium within which I am working -the limitations of theatre, the limitations of playwrights and the images projected on stage. Beginning with the study of playwrights who focused on social issues, I eventually narrowed my view to images of aging women. Using the archetype of the crone, I searched for signs of her emergence. When I found the images wanting or altogether absent, I used my knowledge of the craft of playwrighting to create new ones. Using a variety of dramatic conventions and methods and subverting their customary usage, I have written a play, The Crones Among Us, from a female viewpoint. Presenting female characters as subjects rather than objects, the play provides an alternative view of women on the other side of fifty. I Drawing on the crone archetype, the play affords an empowering view of women as they age in a society that has privileged youth and beauty. My work in theatre is based on my roles as a spectator, a writer and a feminist. These three roles affect how I view theatre and how I write for it. This creative dissertation draws on all three roles. As a spectator, I am a member of the audience, one of those people sitting in the dark watching the performance on stage. As such, I am an integral part of theatre. Peter Brook has said: "The only thing that all forms of theatre have in common is the need for an audience. This is more than a truism: In the theatre the audience completes the steps of creation" ( qtd. in Brockett with Ball 8). Unlike a poem or a novel, a script is not theatre until it is performed. And yet, I have often left performances feeling vaguely discontented. While others were delighted with performances, I found myself wondering what was missing - why the piece hadn't touched me, why I found it somewhat hollow. It was clarified for me when I read Jill Dolan's The Feminist Spectator as Critic (1988). In this pioneering work, Dolan explains that all the material aspects of theatre are designed so that "the performance's meanings are intelligible to a particular spectator ... [h]istorically, in North American culture, this spectator has been assumed to be white, middle-class, heterosexual, and male" (Dolan16). Dolan notes that this ideal spectator is a reflection of the dominant culture whose ideology he represents. Perhaps I'd been sitting in the wrong seat. But, wasn't theatre a mirror, holding up a view of life? Robert Brustein, in his discussion of the theatre of social critique in The Theatre of Revolt (1962), 2 sees theatre as mirror, echoing Hamlet's words to the Players that the purpose of acting, "both at the first and now, was and is to hold as 'twere the mirror up to nature." This has been an enduring image in theatre, albeit a somewhat limited one. For a mirror can reflect only that which appears to it and this means a representation of the status quo, because a mirror also requires a certain fidelity to the image reflected. However, this does not discount satire or farce, which might be viewed as refractions distorted by a fun-house mirror. Nor does it prevent the presentation of some of the uglier aspects of life. But seeing theatre merely as a mirror denies the power to critique inherent in theatre. According to Dolan, theatre is not simple mimesis; it is not really a mirror of reality. "A mirror implies passivity and noninvolvement, an object used but never changed by the variety of people who hold it up and look into it. The theatre has in fact been much more active as an ideological force" (Dolan 16). Roszika Parker and Griselda Pollock agree: "Art is not a mirror. It mediates and re-presents social relations in a schema of signs which require a receptive and preconditioned reader in order to be meaningful" (Parker and Pollock 119). What is presented on stage or seen in a gallery is one person's worldview, shaped by the experiences and society in which that person lived. As a creative writer, I come to theatre from poetry. I bring my love of the word with me, using it to explore the dark side, the unexplained, my discontents. Writing is an attempt to make sense of that which is unintelligible, to answer questions, to come to terms with that which is both feared and wanted. Writing for the theatre requires the writer to speak in multiple voices, showing the 3 interaction of people and ideas. It was the danger, the possibility of theatre that intrigued me. As Hallie Flanagan of the Federal Theatre Project said: "The theatre, when it is potent enough to deserve its ancestry, is always dangerous" (Flanagan, Dynamo 46). Art is the creation of a new vision. Theatre is an opportunity to present the vision to a larger public. As a feminist member of the Boomer generation which is crossing into its fifties, I have looked for visions of myself and my future as an older woman and found them missing. The models from the past do not fit, the solutions of previous generations do not seem applicable. However, the transition, the inevitable aging, is the same. It is how those transitions are dealt with that creates new opportunities, new visions, new futures in the artistic realm. 4 Chapter 1 Playwright as Public Intellectual Drama is made up of what people most fear and deny in themselves. The taboos. The secrets. The devils and the demons. The only reason they let us live, I suppose, is because somebody has to confront what those things are like and tell other people about them. Elizabeth Ashley1 There is no better indication of what the people of any period are like than the plays they go to see. Edith Hamilton2 The theatre, when it is potent enough to deserve its ancestry, is always dangerous. Hallie Flanagan3 Playwrights and public intellectuals have much in common. Their roles have often overlapped, and at various times in history an individual has performed both roles. A short list of such individuals might include Machiavelli, Clare Booth Luce, George Bernard Shaw, Federico Garcia Lorca, Lillian Hellman, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Vaclav Havel. Both playwrights and public intellectuals trace their beginnings back to ancient Greece. Aristotle's earliest manuals for the two arts, Rhetoric for orators and The Poetics for playwrights, date from this time (330 B.C. E.). While orators were working the public sphere of the marketplace, playwrights were offering their social critique in the amphitheatres of the day.