Word: girard
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This weekend, take a break from studying or tear yourself away from the Grille to see The Insanity of Mary Girard. I saw the show last weekend at a rehearsal, with no sets, no costumes and before any of the final runs had taken place and still I enjoyed it, although enjoyed may not be quite the word to use for a play that is so disturbing...
...play tells the story of Mary Girard, a real woman who, in the 1790's, was placed in an asylum by her husband. Throughout the piece, author Lanie Robertson asks "Is Mary Girard truly insane?" The seeming insanity of the Furies, figments of Mary's imagination, conflict with her seeming reason as she questions her fate. It is up to the audience to decide...
...whether Mayr Girard is insane or not, Insanity leaves no doubt about the inhumanity of ancient mental institutions. Robertson illustrates in shocking detail the primitive treatment of the mentally infirm in days gone by. The cackling of the Furies as splinters were placed under the thumbnails of patients or as patients were thrust into freezing cold baths is enough to chill the blood. The play also discusses the plight of women, which is no coincidence as director Miriam R. Asnes '02 is a women's studies concentrator. Mary Girard, like many women of her time, was legally under the power...
...Mary Girard...
Bound at the play's inception in an asylum's "tranquilizing chair," Mary Girard struggles with only more confinement: even after she is freed from the chair, she must confront not only the stigma of being labeled insane but also the ways in which her gender precludes her from acting for herself. Lanie Robertson's short play considers the fluid nature of sanity and sovereignty as it follows Mary and her attendant group of "Furies," who are either inmates of the asylum, creations of Mary's mind or both. Director Mimi Asnes '02, a Women's Studies concentrator, cites Foucault...