Sarah Kane was a young, very controversial English contemporary playwright and poet during 1990's. Her works revolve around themes of love, torture, sex and death and are well-known for including very graphic on-stage torture and violence. Her work has been labelled with the term 'In-yer-face theatre' by the critic Aleks Sierz, this type of theatre includes the works of Anthony Neilson and Mark Ravenhill. In her short lifetime she wrote five plays (Blasted, Phaedra's Love, Cleansed, Crave, 4.48 Psychosis) and one short film (Skin).
Kane struggled with severe depression towards the end of her life and eventually killed herself in 1999. This affected her life and her writing in an extreme way, her fellow playwright and friend Mark Ravenhill described in her obituary that 'Kane fell out of love with life. And so began great, harrowing cycles of depression, self-hate and hospitalisation.'
In terms of her inspirations and motives, Kane was deeply affected by Edward Bond's play 'Saved' - a play written in 1965, set in London and centred a generation of young people in poverty, it is well-known for graphic scenes of violence most namely a baby being stoned to death. Kane said that 'You can learn everything you need to know about the craft of play writing from Saved'.
Her first play- Blasted- is the piece that we have focussed on whilst exploring Sarah Kane. It is set in an expensive hotel room in Leeds in the middle of a war-zone and centres a peculiar relationship between a young, seemingly intellectually simple minded woman (Cate) and a much older, extremely unlikable, racist, sexist, homophobic man (Ian). In the first half Ian forces her into various shocking sexual acts before she leaves and a soldier enters. The soldier converses with Ian for a short time and Ian's power quickly diminishes from what we see in the first half. There is then an explosion and the hotel room is covered in dust and there is a huge hole in one of the walls. Following this, the play becomes more and more absurd, violent and shocking. The soldier speaks of some of the many disgusting acts he has committed and seen during this war with pride and grit. At the end of scene 3, the Soldier rapes Ian, sucks out his eyes and then kills himself with a revolver. Cate returns with a baby and converses with Ian -who is now blind and suicidal. Cate realises the baby is dead and 'bursts out laughing, unnaturally, hysterically, uncontrollably'. The final scene is a montage of various disturbing images that follow the deterioration of Ian's mental and physical state as he starves in the midst of the war torn world around him. We see him strangling himself, crying blood, hugging the dead Soldier and even eating the baby. The stage directions then say that he dies and rain falls heavily onto his face but he then continues to speak. Cate comes back with food and gin, with blood seeping down her leg implying that she has had to sell herself in order to survive. The two then eat the food and Ian says 'Thank you'.
From this synopsis it is very clear that Kane wanted to truthfully present the extortionate horrors of war but on a very small, intense, personal scale. Especially when compared to the Brechtian Style which forces the audience away from the personal and the emotional, making them see the play from an entirely wider, political point of view. If we compare the silent scream from Mother Courage and Her Children and the completely visceral, graphic and disturbing on-stage break down of Ian in the final scene of Blasted, it shows the contrast between two very different styles of theatre that essentially have the same objective: to make the audience reflect and realise the horrors and injustices of modern society. Kane said as an explanation of her work that
'The logical conclusion of the attitude that produces an isolated rape in England is the rape camps in Bosnia and the logical conclusion to the way society expects men to behave is war'
From this quote, it could be said that Kane has set the play in an alternate setting to the place she intends to be making a comment on in order to distance the audience from that particular situation in Bosnia so that they can see the violence and the rape and the torture from a different perspective. This is very similar to the Brechtian technique of Historicisation. However, maybe because the play is set in England and intended for a British, Western audience, she wanted to make the audience feel more connected to it rather than distanced from it.
As Kane's first work, Blasted was met with complete outrage from the media when it first premiered. Most famously it was described by Jack Tinker as a 'disgusting feast of filth' and it was thought to have been the biggest theatre scandal since Bond's 'Saved'. In spite of this, fellow playwrights praised and came to see the importance and meaning of the work, stating that it was 'rather a tender play'.
The critic Ken Urban said that
'For Kane, hell is not metaphysical: it is hyperreal, reality magnified'.
Kane struggled with severe depression towards the end of her life and eventually killed herself in 1999. This affected her life and her writing in an extreme way, her fellow playwright and friend Mark Ravenhill described in her obituary that 'Kane fell out of love with life. And so began great, harrowing cycles of depression, self-hate and hospitalisation.'
In terms of her inspirations and motives, Kane was deeply affected by Edward Bond's play 'Saved' - a play written in 1965, set in London and centred a generation of young people in poverty, it is well-known for graphic scenes of violence most namely a baby being stoned to death. Kane said that 'You can learn everything you need to know about the craft of play writing from Saved'.
Her first play- Blasted- is the piece that we have focussed on whilst exploring Sarah Kane. It is set in an expensive hotel room in Leeds in the middle of a war-zone and centres a peculiar relationship between a young, seemingly intellectually simple minded woman (Cate) and a much older, extremely unlikable, racist, sexist, homophobic man (Ian). In the first half Ian forces her into various shocking sexual acts before she leaves and a soldier enters. The soldier converses with Ian for a short time and Ian's power quickly diminishes from what we see in the first half. There is then an explosion and the hotel room is covered in dust and there is a huge hole in one of the walls. Following this, the play becomes more and more absurd, violent and shocking. The soldier speaks of some of the many disgusting acts he has committed and seen during this war with pride and grit. At the end of scene 3, the Soldier rapes Ian, sucks out his eyes and then kills himself with a revolver. Cate returns with a baby and converses with Ian -who is now blind and suicidal. Cate realises the baby is dead and 'bursts out laughing, unnaturally, hysterically, uncontrollably'. The final scene is a montage of various disturbing images that follow the deterioration of Ian's mental and physical state as he starves in the midst of the war torn world around him. We see him strangling himself, crying blood, hugging the dead Soldier and even eating the baby. The stage directions then say that he dies and rain falls heavily onto his face but he then continues to speak. Cate comes back with food and gin, with blood seeping down her leg implying that she has had to sell herself in order to survive. The two then eat the food and Ian says 'Thank you'.
From this synopsis it is very clear that Kane wanted to truthfully present the extortionate horrors of war but on a very small, intense, personal scale. Especially when compared to the Brechtian Style which forces the audience away from the personal and the emotional, making them see the play from an entirely wider, political point of view. If we compare the silent scream from Mother Courage and Her Children and the completely visceral, graphic and disturbing on-stage break down of Ian in the final scene of Blasted, it shows the contrast between two very different styles of theatre that essentially have the same objective: to make the audience reflect and realise the horrors and injustices of modern society. Kane said as an explanation of her work that
'The logical conclusion of the attitude that produces an isolated rape in England is the rape camps in Bosnia and the logical conclusion to the way society expects men to behave is war'
From this quote, it could be said that Kane has set the play in an alternate setting to the place she intends to be making a comment on in order to distance the audience from that particular situation in Bosnia so that they can see the violence and the rape and the torture from a different perspective. This is very similar to the Brechtian technique of Historicisation. However, maybe because the play is set in England and intended for a British, Western audience, she wanted to make the audience feel more connected to it rather than distanced from it.
As Kane's first work, Blasted was met with complete outrage from the media when it first premiered. Most famously it was described by Jack Tinker as a 'disgusting feast of filth' and it was thought to have been the biggest theatre scandal since Bond's 'Saved'. In spite of this, fellow playwrights praised and came to see the importance and meaning of the work, stating that it was 'rather a tender play'.
The critic Ken Urban said that
'For Kane, hell is not metaphysical: it is hyperreal, reality magnified'.
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