[Critique Group 2] Leonard's comments on Alice's piece

[tuchyner5 at aol.com]

Can you give a quick synopses of the play. 

It would help me to understand the context ofyour piece.  

Did you ever learn whether they got the  humor of the play. 

What was there abut the play  that made it so relevant to them? 

This report makes the case  for  

regardless of what our backgrounds are, 

we can appreciate each other’s cultures. 

We are all human and can relate to each other onsome level. 

The fact that you had a member in the family whowas a member of the mafia 

does not mean that this was a commonality  that you had with people who have to deal withthat issue every  day, 

especially since where they grew up and perhapsthe color of  their skin 

had much to do with  the issue of prizon.  

This is a well written piece. Bery effective.

 

 

The Class that Loved The Importance of Being Earnest

 

poemby Alice Jane-Marie Massa

 

In the latter 1960s, when my sister was alreadyin college

and I was still in Clinton High School,

the forever younger sister was permitted to goalong with

the older to the ISU Summer Theatre productionof

The Importance of Being Earnest--

in the round--well, more precisely,theatre-in-the-oval. 

A local television weatherman Bud Borchert

played the part of Algernon Moncrief

with the wit and warmth that the playwrightOscar Wilde intended.

The actors’ entering onto the stage from variousstairways through the audience

was a new and exciting experience for me.

 

Sitting there on the reddish-orange, cushioned,but straight-back chair,

I never dreamed that someday, about threedecades later,

I would be teaching The Importance ofBeing Earnest and Oscar Wilde

to my varied classes of college students.

I never imagined that one day in my teachingcareer,

I would have a most enjoyable class

from the hardened inner city--

a class who most relished deeply and thoroughly

the three-act satire of Victorian socialhypocrisy.

Through the weeks of the 90-minute class,

I came to appreciate these students more andmore

as they demonstrated an almost unbelievablefascination for the farce

first performed on Valentine’s Day of 1895.

 

Did they enjoy the comedy

because it was so removed from their ownchallenging lives?

I was never sure.

 

As the semester proceeded, in discussion,

the students wanted me to learn that each ofthem knew someone--

like Oscar Wilde--

who had been or was in prison.

They could not believe that I knew no one whohad been in prison.

Periodically, the question arose again;

much to their disbelief, I assured them that Iknew no one who had been in prison.

I thought of the subtitle:

A Trivial Pursuit for Serious People.

 

One day, during break,

one of the toughest female students joined myguide dog Heather and me

as we were walking back toward the classroom;

She, without a tear, told me about her brother

who had been murdered several months earlier.

The Importance of Being ….

 

One day, after those students had left my life,

I recalled a cousin of my parents’ generation.

He, his wife, and his sister-in-law

rarely visited our Blanford home;

but when they did, all were dressed like amillion dollars.

I was briefly fascinated by these cousins

who were seemingly so out-of-place in our ruralcommunity.

Then, I remembered:

that cousin, in Florida, had been in the Mafia

and had served time in prison.

If only I had recalled this cousin story

when I was teaching

The Importance of Being Earnest

to the class that loved the play the most:

those students could have known that I, indeed,was one of them.
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