Discussing The Rehearsal

The first assignment for today you'll remember, was to "pick five or six comments that people make, or issues they raise, that you'd like to talk about in class; make a list and bring it to class." We'll probably spend most of our class time with the issues people have raised.

When we've done that, we'll turn to the reports on explorations of the background, and we'll take as much time as we can for reading them. This process may continue to Friday.

I've assembled all the responses to the end of term questionnaire and posted them with some of my responses to the comments. You can access them from the main course page.

For Friday morning

I think it would be a good idea at this point for us to take a look at some heroic plays, to get a sense of what they were like. Here's a strategy: have a look at the notes to the online text of The Rehearsal, or to any other edition you have, and identify two or three plays that it's making fun of that you think we might look at. Bring a list to class. We'll identify a few and divide up so that everybody's working with a different one.

Looking ahead

I've learned that Glen Nichols, of the drama department at Mount Allison, is directing a production of Dryden's All for Love later this term. He says that he's adapting the play pretty drastically, so it won't actually be a production of the play as it stands, but he's invited us to be involved. I'm not sure what that might mean, but I think it's clear (for that reason among others) that we should read All for Love. So I'm suggesting that after we've had a quick look at some heroic plays, we should plan on reading that next. I'm hoping to get to Sackville to see the production (no dates yet) and we might try to organize something.