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fancycwabsSunday afternoon's activity was going to see Pound at Theatreworks. It really was an impressive show, although one could argue that in blurring a couple of lines and attempting to make Ezra Pound into a sympathetic figure, it verges awfully close to being anti-semitic.
Quick background: Ezra Pound, in addition to being a grand poet, was also a notorious propagandist for the Mussolini regime in WWII. After the fall of Italy, Pound was arrested, and eventually brought to the US to face charges of treason. He was declared insane (possibly a ploy to escape the death penalty), and served 12 years in a mental institution before being released.
The play centers on the last couple of weeks/months of his stay in the mental institution. A new psychatrist, Mary Polley, comes to treat Pound prior to his release, and over the course of his treatment reveals that her parents were Italian Jews murdered by the fascist regime, and that she feels that Pound is at least partially to blame. The audience watches as she enacts her revenge, tearing Pound down to a shell of his former self, and leaving him with nothing but remorse over his crimes. All of this is fictional, but in attempting to humanize Pound, the playwrite turns his psychiatrist into a monster, pursuing the man who she deems responsible for the death of her parents with a single-mindedness and ruthlessness that ventures well into the realm of cruelty. She becomes a bully, verbally beating up on a frail old man, leaving him broken.
The problem, is that making Pound's demon personal makes the drama into a revenge fantasy, and degrades the higher meanings that might have resulted from a doctor with other motivations bringing Pound to a point of self-realization. Making Pound'ss ultimate tormenter Jewish (but ashamed of her heritage), but leaving that revelation for the end of the play, pulls the carpet from under the audience and gets them wondering if the Polley's motives are personal, racial, or just spiteful.
That said, the performances are excellent, and it was very cool to have compositions by Ezra Pound as incidental music for the show.
Quick background: Ezra Pound, in addition to being a grand poet, was also a notorious propagandist for the Mussolini regime in WWII. After the fall of Italy, Pound was arrested, and eventually brought to the US to face charges of treason. He was declared insane (possibly a ploy to escape the death penalty), and served 12 years in a mental institution before being released.
The play centers on the last couple of weeks/months of his stay in the mental institution. A new psychatrist, Mary Polley, comes to treat Pound prior to his release, and over the course of his treatment reveals that her parents were Italian Jews murdered by the fascist regime, and that she feels that Pound is at least partially to blame. The audience watches as she enacts her revenge, tearing Pound down to a shell of his former self, and leaving him with nothing but remorse over his crimes. All of this is fictional, but in attempting to humanize Pound, the playwrite turns his psychiatrist into a monster, pursuing the man who she deems responsible for the death of her parents with a single-mindedness and ruthlessness that ventures well into the realm of cruelty. She becomes a bully, verbally beating up on a frail old man, leaving him broken.
The problem, is that making Pound's demon personal makes the drama into a revenge fantasy, and degrades the higher meanings that might have resulted from a doctor with other motivations bringing Pound to a point of self-realization. Making Pound'ss ultimate tormenter Jewish (but ashamed of her heritage), but leaving that revelation for the end of the play, pulls the carpet from under the audience and gets them wondering if the Polley's motives are personal, racial, or just spiteful.
That said, the performances are excellent, and it was very cool to have compositions by Ezra Pound as incidental music for the show.
