I noticed a few similarities between monologues. The two similarities that include all three monologues are that they are centered around funerals and they each go to the Green Mill. Emil goes there on his date, Mac to get drunk, and Virginia to meet with Frank. The other things I noticed were really only between two monologues each. In the first monologue, the death of a 103 year old women is mentioned. In the second monologue, that women is Mac's grandma Nettie. In the second monologue, it is mentioned that Mac has to fly to Pittsburg for the funeral, and in the third monologue, Pittsburg is where Virginia and her husband lived. Then in the third monologue, Ed carpolotti, another mentioned death in the first monologue, is Virginia's deceased husband. Bob O'Klock is also mentioned in both the first and third monologues.
While each monologue is marked by a funeral, it is not the funeral itself that links them. I think it is the way they are handled. In the first monologue, the focus is that Emil is in love with a woman he can never have. Her funeral isn't the focus, in fact, the ending is Emil still trying to profess his love to her.
In the second monologue, Mac's grandmother has passed. However, the monologue is about how Mac robs corpses to make ends meet and how she accidentally killed her family. She never once genuinely morns the loss of her grandmother. Again, the ending is about how she dropped a stolen ring into the grave and how she prays, "for the touch of a hand that has known my touch".
In last monologue, it is Virginia's husband who has died. However the whole monologue is spent talking about money and debts.
I suppose another thing that links them all, is that each of them had the love of their lives stolen from them by death. None of them got the chance to say goodbye the way they wanted to. Emil had to embalm his true love. Mac killed her family in attempt to kill herself and when she recovered, they were already gone. Virginia's husband died alone, a week before Christmas. Funerals are a way of celebrating the life of a loved one and properly saying goodbye. But none of the characters were able to say goodbye the way they would've wanted to.
I mentioned the Green Mill too! So I’m guessing you think that these people should know each other as well. The fact that these characters never got to say goodbye is a good point Laine; it never crossed my mind until now. Each of them has lost a loved one and they’re coping with the pain. They’re also dealing with the “what if” factor. I think by going to these funerals they’re substituting the chance they didn’t get.
ReplyDeleteI forgot all about Mac's family dying. All the characters lost people close to them, but I found the way they seemed to handle it very odd. Nobody seemed to behave the way you would think they would at a funeral.
ReplyDeleteAs generic as it sounds, it seems to me that you are trying to say that they are all linked by the way they focus on relationships. The focus isn't on the funeral itself, but the people involved and the different ways they reach out. The loosely-linked details provide milestones for the reader to keep up and see the links but i think the focus lies on the characters themselves. I agree with you that death is also very prevalent in this play, and how the individuals deal with the pain that ensues.
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