An Analysis Of Edward Bond's New Realistic Play Saved

Edward Bond is a famous but controversial playwright in contemporary Britain.He often describes violence as a reflection of reality in his play,which is not only the greatest feature of his drama but also the focus of criticism.It seems to Bond that the plays should interpret social and political problems.It is the writer‘s duty to expose the nature of society and explore ways to change their society.Thus,his plays for the most part have a political background and educational significance.Through violence most of his plays reflect the social reality and the loss of morality and humanness in capitalist society.After World War?,Britain stepped fast into a welfare state with government intervention.There is a strong collision between the rapid development of economy and the shadow in people's mind,which naturally made people confused and puzzled.What Bond tries to do is to awaken people‘s humanness through his plays,to make them know the true essence of their society,and to learn how to be human beings.From the 1950 s to 1960 s,realism revived in literature and art again,including drama.John Osborne‘s Look Back in Anger marks the beginning of a new realism in drama field.Inherited from traditional realistic theatre,the new realistic drama focuses on describing the life of working class and the lower class with different techniques.Since Edward Bond experienced World War?,his plays have some new features of new realistic drama theatre.Integrating his creative theory into his play writing,he wrote many famous plays in the 1950 s.In this paper,the author will analyze one of his representative plays Saved from the perspective of the innovation in new realistic theatre,and get a further study of its social significance.This thesis consists of three parts,which are the introduction,the main body and the conclusion.The first part of the thesis is the introduction,which mainly concerns the updated domestic and foreign research on Edward Bond,The present research on Bond plays home and abroad is mainly divided into four aspects,namely,Marxist study,moral criticism,historical interpretation,and a comparative study with Brecht.And the main content of this paper will be introduce and its significance and importance.The second part of the thesis is the main body,which is divided into four chapters to analyze Saved from the perspective of new realistic theatre in the new context.The new realistic theatre tends to break into the traditional realistic theatre with its unique style to express the reality deeply.The first chapter mainly analyzes the background,the cause,the features and the representative playwrights of the new realistic theatre and the differences between the new-wave realistic theatre and the traditional realistic theatre.The last part focuses on the creative career and writing style of Edward Bond and the influence of new realistic theatre on Bond,the new realistic characteristic of Saved.The second chapter mainly analyzes the characters in Saved from the perspective of the new realistic theatre.Firstly,it analyzes Pam and her parents-Harry and Mary,the victims of the war.Subsequently,it analyzes Len,who is the central character in the play.As the single man who thinks of humanness in the play,he represents a hope of his society.This chapter analyzes his struggle in despair.Finally,it analyzes Fred and his gangs.Fred and his gangs represent the majority of adolescents of his times,who suffer from nothingness,idleness,numbness,violence,pain,confusion,and lack of humanness.As the product of the time,they present the characteristics in their time.This part mainly analyzes characteristics of the social group headed by Fred and further analyzes problems of social reality.The third chapter mainly analyzes the new dramatic techniques in Saved.Firstly,it analyzes its language technique,which is characterized by fragmentation and the violence of language.The new realistic theatre tends to use the language of the working and the lower class.Like Bond‘s characters in Saved,the language is short and ungrammatical.Secondly,it analyzes the setting of extreme situations.Bond puts his characters into an extreme situation to seek the real social problems.Last,it analyzes the use of object in the play.The object links characters to social reality,such as the crack teapot,fishing lure and so on.The fourth chapter emphasizes the theme of Saved.Firstly,it analyzes Bond‘s critique for the loss of humanness.Bond calls for people to be human,which is the basis of a human being.The loss of humanness is rooted in social reality.The social injustice and social cruelty make people cruel and distortion,which forms a vicious spiral to harm society in turn.That is why Bond calls for humanness in Saved.Then it analyzes the theme of violence.The whole play is full of violence,especially the stoning baby in Scene Six.Violence is caused by the lack of humanness,and the lack of humanness is attributed to the capitalist society.These two themes highlight the characteristics of the new realistic theatre.The last part is the conclusion.Through a summary of the above,it renders a deeper understanding of the new realistic characteristics in Edward Bond‘s play.Both Bond's new realistic play and historical play are based on realism and eventually express the reality of contemporary society.Edward Bond establishes a new relationship between drama and reality,which actually is the salvation of today's social crisis.