Homework•Close Reading Assignment Due: Song Lyrics or Poem Analysis•Elizabeth Bishop’s “Questions of Travel”•“Home Thoughts, From Abroad,” Robert Browning•“A Letter From Home,” Anne Bronte•“Inner Light,” Beatles•“Home,” Michael Buble •Read Assignment #3

Absences and How They Are Filled

Jessi’s absence, sorta filled by ruthFamily bonds/affection, filled again by ruthlove—sex/violenceSex—longing, desireUnity—ruthWall—figurative walls, max/samOther rooms—imagination/assumptionDialogue/pauses—humorMacgregor—jessi’s background--physical—verbally present, constantly thereFamily roles/no place—self-interestChildren/innocence—childishness, joey, nastinessRuth’s kids lose mom--??PURPOSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!—savage, nothingSam—samTeddy first half, empty chair—samReal woman, gender expectations—opp. Roles, all masculine worldMorality/respectDifferent kinds of knowledge—ignoranceNormal, functional relationships—maybe sam/teddySam/teddy—ruthFun, lightness—adult world stuffNormal family unit in max/teddy-selfishness, self-interestedness

“the naked truth”

“I won’t be lost in it”

“Meaning which is resolved, parceled, labelled and ready

for export is dead . . . and meaningless”

--Pinter

“The truth, in other words, is anybody’s guess. Meaning is what you make it.”

“The thrill of the play is its realization of Pinter’s aesthetic: a precarious balance between ambiguity and actuality.”

--John Lahr