One of the most inspiring things about the playwright Sean O'Casey is his ability to tackle the various 'isms of our 'filthy modern tide', taking part
in each, rejecting the immanence of any one of them, yet investing a humanity in to all their concerns. Not unlike the Native American maxim
of 'walking a mile in someone else's moccasins.' The power of this humanist approach allows him to give a voice to all, while bowing to none and
suggesting that 'everything is true is some sense, false in some sense, and meaningless in some sense'. It is this connection of humanity, the
ripe multiplicity of creation, which invests his words with an evocatively emotive strength; writers only dream of writing with this kind of
emotional power. And even in this recognition of humanity he can cut with rapacity to the essence of his character's struggles. Take for instance
these lines from Juno and the Paycock, "Your humanity is just as narrow as everybody else's humanity," indicting a young socialist who
while talking about the future is unable to break his connection with the sexual mores of an outdated religion.
There is a tremendous irony in the phrase used several times, "a principle is a principle," in regards to the sacrifices people make for their ideals.
O'Casey is posing the question, what is it that is worth dying for.? In the end it appears that he has little sympathy for those capable of
sacrificing themselves, physically or emotionally for the supposed 'greater good'; and even less for those who would sacrifice there fellows.
O'Casey definitely appears to have held onto his conviction towards pacifism and the futility of violence to solve political and economic
enslavement. indeed he takes a shot at the whole culture of death and the glorification of that sacrifice with the words, "we have love enough for
the dead, but what o tha livin'"
The character of Bessie in The Plough and the Stars has an overlooked yet pivotal part in the action of the play. Besides being one of the
only instances we have seen of ,'orange' Protestantism, she is important in another way. Her son is off fighting with the British while the
Republicans are fomenting rebellion at home in Ireland. In the song Green Fields of France we feel some of the treachery her and her
fellows felt in the insurrection of the Irish. For it is the sorra' of these mothers that is the central action in both of these plays. Mrs. Tancred
shapes the common response to this battle between mother's sons in the same country with the image of the scales of sorra' balancing the two
dead men. "When will someone take this murderin' hate away?" It is hard to find a more pointed statement in these plays, one that cuts to the
quick the futility of civil war, nay of war itself. One cannot expect to change the course of these emotional differences by resulting to the tactics
of warfare and division. The only persons who benefit from these policies are the arms manufacturers, the importers, and the caretakers. And it is
this glorification of death and sacrifice, so much a part of the Christian symbolism, that maintains the feelings of wrong and justify the
continuation of hostilities. If the parades continue to beat a dead skin, constantly recalling the damage, it remains an oppressive weight, a
baggage from which we can never escape. We shape and are shaped by these memories of the 'martyred slaves of time'.
O'Casey was a man of principles, in refusing hundreds of thousands of dollars for the production of one of his plays, he continued his long
standing aversion to the machinery of capitalism and the unfair distribution of wealth. Ms choice to five as an exile from his homeland, like so
many others artists of the times, suggests what was more important to him; that being the free expression of his creativity without the moralism
and judgement of individuals at odds with his vision. Living for one's vision of the future is close to the heart of his characters as well. Even
though their actions are frequently called into question by the words of O'Casey, he respects their need to feel compelled by something, some
principle by which to guide their lives. This one of the talents of this incredible playwright, by giving them the drive of their passions, for lack of
a better word, he invests them with a humanity that cannot be overlooked or denied. It is in this attention to desire that we find our own
happiness, or as Joseph Campbell would say, "our bliss".
Be always drunken/ Nothing else matters, when Patrick read this poem O'Casey's shade came to sit upon my shoulder and cry out at the
indifference our world has developed towards this glorification of self. It brought a wee tear to my eyes, for nothing else matters save this
passionate and intense dedication to what brings us joy. The world is too dark with forbidding and foreboding, we cannot expect to give to our
future anything except pain and misery if we do not except this maxim in our lives. Be drunken/ If you would not be martyred slaves of time/
Be drunken continually. What else can be said? This in so many ways sums up what O'Casey was suggesting with his scales of sorra. This is
the love of the livin' he was speaking of, denying those martyred slaves who sacrificed their lives, their family's happiness, and the future health
of their country's pysche in an Easter sacrifice upon the cross of time. As Baudelaire says we have awoken and our drunkenness has partly, in
some cases and, in most wholly left us. The ecstatic nature of joyous life has been subsumed in this worship of heroes and their glorified deaths.
Are we ever to kneel before the cross of martyrdom, or will the wheel of time turn again and drowned us with the waters of life, baptizing us in
joy and not sorra'?
When Charlie suggested that we have an idealized image of community, I felt an earnest desire to come to the defense. in our seminar alone, we
have made connections that I will find hard to put behind me. A circle I will return to time and again in my mind and in my heart. The
collaborative work we have done on our performance projects is not an idealization of the idea of community it is the functional reality of it. It is
without a doubt that our communities are tearing themselves asunder, and it might be just the 'Evergreen bubble', but I feel surrounded by a
community of peers who more often than naught share my ideals, my truths. All of us can look at the dissolution of our own families and see the
destruction of community in our time, yet in that is the seed to bring back the sense of connection. Connection to the community, connection to
the environment we share, connection to principles of right livelihood, these are the ideals, which make community work, and this class in many
ways has worked to reawaken this lost sense of connection. Nothing exists in a vacuum and community is just the metapattern for the connection
inherent in interaction. We are family/ I got all my brothers and sisters with me.