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University Microfilms 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106 A Xerox Education Company 73-2068 McKERNIE, Grant Fletcher, 1942- POLITICS IN MODERN BRITISH DRAMA.: THE PLAYS OF ARNOLD WESKER AND JOHN ARDEN. The Ohio State University, Ph.D., 1972 Theater University Microfilms, A XEROX Company, Ann Arbor, Michigan THIS DISSERTATION HAS BEEN MICROFILMED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED. POLITICS IN MODERN BRITISH DRAMA: THE PLAYS OF ARNOLD WESKER AND JOHN ARDEN DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Grant Fletcher McKernie, B.A., M.A. The Ohio State University 1972 Approved By ~&2Z- Adviser Department of Theatre PLEASE NOTE: Some pages may have indistinct print. Filmed as received. University Microfilms, A Xerox Education Company ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to express my sincere gratitude to Dr. John Morrow and Dr. Roy Bowen for supporting my doctoral candidacy in the Department of Theatre, for encouraging my pursuit of this subject and for guiding and assisting me throughout the preparation of this dissertation. I wish also to thank Dr. Konrad Zobel, Mr. Wayne Lawson and Ms. Francine Shuchat for their helpful comments on the text. VITA April 7, 19^2 Born - Moline, Illinois 1964 .... B.A., Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 1965 .... M.A., The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1967-1969. Teaching Associate, Department of Political Science, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Oh'io 1969-1972. Graduate Administrative Associate, University College, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio FIELDS OF STUDY Major Field: Theatre Studies in Dramatic Literature. Professors John Morrow and Roy Bowen Studies in Acting and Directing. Professor Roy Bowen Studies in Theatre History. Professor John Morrow 1 11 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ii VITA I ii Chapter I. THE HISTORICAL CLIMATE 1 Introduction Psychological Malaise Events after 1956 Theatrical Conditions in 1956 II. THE CRITICAL CLIMATE 3k !. The Critical Context Definition of Political Drama Concentration on Wesker and Arden III. THE POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY OF ARNOLD WESKER 63 Introduction Marxist Philosophy as Expressed ift the Plays of Arnold Wesker British Socialism and the Plays of Arnold Wesker IV. SOURCES OF DRAMATIC TENSION IN THE PLAYS OF ARNOLD WESKER 100 The Ki tchen Chicken Soup with Barley Roots T'm Talking about Jerusalem Chips with Everything Their Very Own and Golden City The Four Seasons The Friends Conclus ion IV Chapter Page V. JOHN ARDEN AND THE POLITICAL SYSTEM Ml Introduction Serjeant Musgrave's Dance Left-Handed Liberty Armstrong's Last Goodnight The Workhouse Donkey The Hero Rises Up The Business of Good Government Waters of Babylon Live Like Pigs Conclusion VI. THE THEATRICAL BALLADS OF JOHN ARDEN 179 Ballad Characteristics The Ballads of John Arden Cone1us ion VII. POLITICS AND THEATRE 208 The Issue of Political Theatre Aesthetic Implications of the Political Plays of Wesker and Arden Politics and Theatre BIBLIOGRAPHY 238 v CHAPTER I: THE HISTORICAL CLIMATE Introduct ion Critical interest in British drama since 1956 abounds. Al­ ready, over fifteen dissertations have been undertaken which deal with some facet of the contemporary British theatrical scene.' The Tulane Drama Review devoted an entire issue to the subject on the tenth anniversary of its 'birthday,' the opening of John Osborne's Look Back 2 in Anger. The bibliography of the subject reveals well over fifty books published, as well as hundreds of articles. While an important segment of this literature is concerned with theatre in Britain rather than drama (most notably, the attention given to the directorial work of Peter Brook), the weight of published material treats the drama of the period. The dramatic explosion that followed John Osborne's success — journalistically tagged the 'New Wave1 or the 'Angry Young Men' move­ ment— is well documented. Of concern here is the focus, or orienta­ tion, much of this documentation has taken. Taking their cue from Osborne's initial play, critics have labeled the dramatists 'angry,' 'committed,' 'socialist,' 'political,' 'rebellious' and 'polemical.' All these are suitably prefaced with pejorative laudatory or condemna­ tory phrases, depending on the particular critic's predeliction for the politics of the playwrights. The dramatists were quickly 1 associated with the 'angry1 novelists of England—John Wain, Doris Lessing and Bill Hopkins, and the committed philosophers of the period —Colin Wilson and Stuart Holroyd. A valiant, if scattered, attempt to provide the movement with a set of individual manifestoes appeared in 1957 with the publication of Declaration, artistic statements of faith from these novelists and philosophers, as well as from Osborne, drama critic Kenneth Tynan and (at that time) film director Lindsay Anderson. Because the writers "all shared a working-class origin, and expressed a passionate interest in that origin (curiously obvious given that new dramatists are always urged to write from their own experience), the 'protest1 and 'angry' labels gained credence. That the new dramatists were developing this angry political profile pri­ marily on the basis of the working-class setting of their plays is no doubt more a reflection of the middle-class bias of their critics than of the sincerity of their commitment. By 1962, however, critics were in retreat from their original assessment. John Russell Taylor, in his seminal text, Anger and After skirted deftly around the question of the extent of political commit­ ment of the new writers.^ Raymond Williams' article in 1963 avoided the writers' politics altogether.^ And Gordon Rogoff in 19^7 dared critics to revive the phrase "kitchen sink dramatists" by declaring, . certainly journalists, hungry for copy, were only too quick to pick up the Court's claims and the Osborne play and turn them into a convenient label. Today, the retreat is a stampede. Allardyce Nicoll has culled the annals of English drama since 1890 and concluded that the 'new' dramatists are rather traditional after all.? Clifford Leech, avoiding pejorative political labels, discovers O 3 Wesker to be a "romantic," while Laurence Kitchen describes Wesker's The Kitchen as "compress ionist" drama.9 Finally, in a summary state­ ment of the period 1957-1967, Charles Marowitz concludes, after almost completely dismissing the decade's drama, "What I don't want to be interpreted as saying is that there was no New Wave. At just the time when critics have swung the pendulum full away from their concern for the writers' commitment, the 'movement, 1 if there ever was one, has apparently died. Not only did" Marowitz use the past tense in referring to the new wave, but Laurence Kitchen has also commented, "No new dramatists of major quality has appeared 0969], and several of the post-1956 English group have been absorbed by the visual media. The playwrights themselves have lost their original anger. Osborne has had one play produced in four years his Time Present and Hotel in Amsterdam created little critical excite­ ment, undoubtedly because they were both little more than Jimmy Porter revisited. Wesker's newest play, The Friends, is apolitical even, by the most flexible of critical standards. Harold Pinter was never con­ sidered a politically committed writer. David Storey, the newest success in the West End, writes in a style as firm as a rowboat in the English Channel on its way from Pinter to Beckett. Only John Arden continues to write plays which critics think flirt with politics. Like Arden's other works, they are attended less by the public than the cr iti cs . Whether the movement bar in fact exhausted its exhortative energies, or has become middle-aged and middle-class, it is apropos to evaluate with the objectivity of time and distance the political commitment of those writers known as the "Angry Young Men." Critics have uniformly and obediently noted the politics of these writers; the dramatists' ex cathedra essays have been published. Yet there has been no systematic attempt to discuss the political philosophy under­ lying their plays.