Reviews for Garden Party and Other Plays

The average rating for Garden Party and Other Plays based on 2 reviews is 4.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2010-11-08 00:00:00 Juliana Yarosh A book that was given to me as a present by one of dearest mentors in high school, my public speaking coach who wrote a dedication on the first page saying "It's time to stop fooling myself: smart books belong with smart people." So, taking my mentor's word for it, I assumed that this would be a smart book (one which a smart person like myself could handle) and I embarked on a voyage that took me along unexpected paths, surprise twists and turns, all the while, keeping the Northern Star in sight and seeing some common themes throughout the various plays that Vaclav Havel wrote from the early 1960s until the late 1970s. I was intrigued by the prospect of reading this book. My only familiarity with Czech literature was through the works of Milan Kundera, who was quoted saying that "If there are any theatres left that base work entirely on the writer's text, theatres that value the development of poetry in drama, then Havel's plays will never be out of repertoire." I love Milan Kundera for the lyricism of his literary dramas, the almost Greek tragedy-like characters, and poignant depictions of life under communism. I was not wrong to expect that Havel would have the same poignancy in his plays while also employing virulent ideas through subtle language against the dangers of totalitarianism, demagoguery, and censorship. I also have great respect for the dissident members of Charter 77 and the brave artists who performed their art, life and dissent at the Theater of the Balustrade before, during and after Prague Spring. I wrote my political science thesis in college on dissident movements in Poland and Czechoslovakia and the efforts of Havel, unwilling Charter 77 leader and later president of the Czech Republic featured strongly in my research. One of my favorite works about the power of dissent, the importance that art, family, friendship and the private sphere can play under a totalitarian regime is Havel's memorable "Power of the Powerless". The stage was set (so to speak) for me to enjoy this collection of plays. So what are my impressions on them? I was surprised to see how much freedom of speech Havel had in his early plays and the unwilling restraint he employs in his later ones, presumably post-1968. It should not have surprised me that the Czechs were much more free in the early 1960s than the rest of the Eastern bloc and then became one of the most insulated people in the region for fear of more Soviet retaliation. The plays "The Garden Party" and "The Memorandum" were by far my two favorite ones in the collection. Both of them delve into the notion of the loss of individuality and conviction in the face of repression or peer pressure. One of the last quotes in "The Memorandum" - a play on the invention of a synthetic and efficient language to increase the clarity and precision of inter-office communication - is "you must not lose your hope, your love of life and your trust in people". The alienation of people from their peers and from themselves is perceived as an irretrievable loss of humanity. Manipulated, automized little cog in a system that erases all form of individuality in exchange for submission "man loses the experience of his own totality; horrified he stares as a stranger at himself, unable to not be what he is not, nor to be what he is." The play on words, the subtle language, the comic relief at interesting twists of phrases are mind-boggling - superb translation work which managed to grasp the essence of the text without robbing it of its stylistic value. A series of 4 plays "The Audience", "Unveiling", "Protest" and "Mistake" employ the same central character, a politically undesirable playwright who has been reduced to work in a brewery. Vanek is confronted in his daily life with dubious people whom you are never too sure if he should trust because they could be "double agents" who monitor his moves, make him seemingly friendly offers of help, and lure him into their world in order to make him betray/compromise himself and be once and for all eliminated. There is no resolution of Vanek's situation but Havel has lost his initial optimism by the end of the series. I hope anyone who reads or sees Havel's plays will see his brilliance, sophistication, sensitivity, creativity and unwavering belief in people's goodness and hope.

Review # 2 was written on 2012-01-18 00:00:00 Bryan Sillman Started for this book group. All unquestionably interesting as historical artefacts, as drama some of Vaclav Havel's plays have aged better than others. In general, Theatre of the Absurd appears very unfashionable at the moment and it's a rare sighting except at large festivals like Edinburgh. Reading these plays outside academia, there are few resources: the odd article on Havel, occasional reviews of performances, but films or detailed commentary are absent. This edition has no introduction nor footnotes. The Garden Party In a Kafkaesque environment conveyed by repetitive dialogue and a confused sense of time, Hugo successfully climbs the Czechoslovakian civil service ladder, at some cost to his personal identity. It still has the potential to chime with the modern corporate or public sector environment, though the sense of boredom and slow fear situates it historically. The Memorandum For the modern reader, this could have made a better short story than a play, perhaps. Attempts to impose a new, synthetic language to control and improve civil service communication lead to interpersonal machinations and absurd contradictions. Sometimes augh-out-loud funny, but also marked by long polemic speeches. The length of this play creates greater emotional involvement with the characters; if the work were shorter they could have ended up simply being symbols. The Increased Difficulty of Concentration Inventive farce about a philandering sociology professor and a team who try to interview him using a malfunctioning early computer. It's a transparent metaphor for the party machine, but manages to be entertaining of itself. I couldn't help wondering how much of Havel the womaniser makes up Prof. Huml. Audience The best, most modern and most accessible of these plays. Evidently it's closely based on the period when the Communist Party sent Havel to work in a brewery: this is a two-man play featuring the Mary-Sue, Vanek, and a Foreman. Conversation is natural (though with a few instances of absurdist repetition): banter is traded, the foreman drunkenly tries to talk Vanek into introducing him to an attractive actress, class resentments are aired without ever seeming forced. It felt like real insight into people in 1970's Czechoslovakia. Unveiling Vanek is invited to the newly decorated flat of a couple of friends whose pretentious concerns with fashion rival any 2000's hipsters. Havel is making the point that people should be concerned with important political issues, not cultural innovations, but he fails to understand the other perspective, the fear that may drive escapism, and the question of present quality of life. I have some sympathy with the hipster couple, though the later dialogue Havel gives them emphatically makes them look foolish. Protest Again Havel rails against intelligent people who have a different approach to life under the Communist regime. Stanek is also a playwright, more successful and working for television; he sympathises privately with Vanek's views but publicly compromises in order to make a good living for himself and his family. Mistake Finally, this is a different beast all together: an aggressive symbolic short scene set in a prison There is a serious shortage of strong, active and sympathetic female characters here - Anna Balcar in Difficulty of Concentration is the only one who stands out. It's somewhat disappointing given the outsider nature of these pieces, and contributes to the dated feel of some of the plays. And inevitably one wonders to what extent this relates to Havel's own attitudes to women - though it is very plausible they changed in the decades after these plays were written. Havel practically never shows loyal party members as evil, unlike many writers of Communist eastern europe. He was unusually belevolent in opposing recriminations when he was elected President, and he always supported the rights of unpopular minorities such as Roma in the face of a critical electorate.