Word: heartbreakingly
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...character. "Oh, this is a crazy house," wails another. "Is this England, or is it a madhouse?" a third laments. What kind of house is it? It may not have been a full house but it was certainly an appreciative one attending the opening of George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. For three hours, lunacy reigned withing the austere decor of Dunster dining hall: a long-lost daughter dropped in, a practical businessman dropped out, a host of curious and spurious extramarital relations grew entangled...
...that we're better than we really are?" And to top it off, there is mad Captain Shotover endlessly traversing the stage in search of the seventh degree of concentration, leaving behind him a wake of nonsensical criticism, and them harrumphing back across the stage with still more. Yes, Heartbreak House is a madhouse--but it is England as well...
...this point Shaw is explicit. In his preface to the play, he calls Heartbreak House "cultured, leisured Europe before the war." Elsewhere he dodges the issue of what it all means: "How should I know? I am only the author." Shaw subtitled the play "A Fantasia in the Russian Manner on English Themes" as homage to Anton Chekhov, whose Three Sisters appeared earlier this semester at the Loeb. The imprint of Chekhov's style is apparent in Shaw's reliance on dialogue, rather than physical action or plot development, to express characterization and the atmosphere of pre-war England...
...Heartbreak House...
...Heartbreak House...