“getting it straight”: Ambivalent Misalignment and the ...

[Pages:281]"getting it straight": Ambivalent Misalignment and the Kinship Idiom

in the Drama of Sharon Pollock

by

Kathy Kit Yi Chung

A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

Centre for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies University of Toronto

? Copyright by Kathy Kit Yi Chung 2014

"getting it straight": Ambivalent Misalignment and the Kinship Idiom

in the Drama of Sharon Pollock

Kathy Kit Yi Chung Doctor of Philosophy Centre for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies University of Toronto

2014

Abstract

This study explores Canadian playwright Sharon Pollock's work under the conceptual and formal framework of what I call "ambivalent misalignment" and "the kinship idiom:" the former in terms of relationships between individuals and groups, and as a characteristic dramatic form; and the latter, as both the context within which misalignments are manifest and as an idiom through which Pollock's characters and communities articulate their experiences. Scholars have described Pollock as a "playwright of conscience," emphasising the content and instrumental nature of her work. My focus is on Pollock as artist and the forms and techniques she uses to convey her ideas and meanings. I argue that ambivalent misalignment and the kinship idiom form a cohesive framework which makes visible neglected formal, emotional, ethical, and thematic elements in Pollock's work.

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My work is informed by the theoretical observations of Susan Letzler Cole, on tragic drama and mourning rituals; Bennett Simon, on familial conflict in tragedy and its structural representation; Carol Gilligan, on relational psychology and the justice and care orientations in ethical decision making; and finally, G?nther Anders, on the importance of imagination and feeling for ethical action.

Chapter two explores Pollock's representations of the literal and metaphoric family and recurring issues such as identity, self-knowledge, the self-in-relation, and the ambivalent difficulties of belonging. Chapter three focuses on familial loss and mourning and related concerns such as one's relation to the past. I also discuss formal elements of the mourning ritual in Pollock's work, including the liminal, the mourner-inheritor, the beloved deceased, and ambivalence. Chapter four considers stories about relations and relational stories, and how storytelling functions as strategic performance, a way of being in relationship, and a means of selfreflection. I argue that misalignment is a necessary and positive condition for ethical storytelling. Finally, chapter five examines Pollock's visions of desirable communities. I show how Pollock dramatises the ambivalent misalignment between the justice and care orientations in ethical decision making. I also demonstrate how kinship informs Pollock's ethical values and her use of the kinship idiom as a means to create an expansive moral imagination and affective response necessary for ethically responsible action.

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Acknowledgements

The completion of this study has been a long and fitful journey, with many stops and starts and detours along the way. It would not have been possible without the help and support of many many people over the years. In addition, my work in the early years was supported by the University of Toronto Connaught Scholarship, the University of Toronto Open Scholarship, the IODE War Memorial Scholarship, the Massey College Rita and Evelyn Catherall Travel Scholarship, the Ontario Graduate Scholarship, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Doctoral Scholarship.

First, I would like to thank the members of my thesis committee: my thesis supervisor, Richard Plant, Professor Emeritus, University of Toronto and Queen's University; Linda Hutcheon, Professor Emerita, University of Toronto; and Professor Nancy Copeland, University of Toronto. Words cannot convey my appreciation and gratitude for the engaged critical feedback, generous support, kind patience, and unwavering confidence they had in me and my work (often when I lacked that confidence myself). Thank you for cheerfully staying on this lengthy journey with me.

If there are such things as discrete identifiable origins, then I would also like to acknowledge the encouragement and support of Professor Sherrill E. Grace, University of British Columbia, who encouraged me to enter graduate studies in the first place, offered me invaluable experince as her research assistant, and mentored me through many years.

Over the years, many colleagues and friends have shared their time, thoughts, and energies listening to me rant and struggle with this work. They are too numerous to name individually but I would like to thank especially Jessica Gardiner, Nancy Pagh, Ann Baranowski, Ursula and Fred Franklin, Roo Borson, Nellie Perret, Michelle Fost, Susan Hopkirk, Roz Spafford, Tom Robles, Maggie Roberts, Elizabeth Lau, Avy Woo, Laura Gorman, and Liza Bowman. They are my fictive kin. Without their company, my journey would have been impossibly lonely and difficult. I also wish to thank various communities at the University of

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Toronto: the Graduate Centre for Study of Drama, Massey College, the Hart House Chorus, and the members of the 2009?14 Graduate Student Working Groups.

Finally, I wish to thank my family for their love and support. My parents Hon K. Chung and Yuet Shim Chung (ne? Cham) supported me without question throughout the many years of this research work. They gave me opportunities and the means to pursue them which they did not have themselves in their early lives. My siblings Shing Lai Chung, Michael Chung, Sam Chung, and Amy Chung, and their families gave me encouragement. And my cat Squeak kept me company and sane every day.

This research work has been part of my life for a very long time. It would not be what it is, nor I who I am, without all the named and unnamed people who make up my families, my fictive kin, my communities. As Dolly says in Whiskey Six Cadenza: "you're who you are and who you were and who you met and what you did and . . ."--and for all that, I offer my profound gratitude.

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Table of Contents

Chapter One: Introduction ? "getting it straight".. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Chapter Two: The Jigsaw Puzzle.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Individual Identity and the Family: A Piece of the Jigsaw Puzzle.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 The Metaphoric Family: Community and Nation as Kin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 The Structure of Kinship. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Chapter Three: Ghost Stories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 Familial Loss and Grief and the Liminal. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 Obstacles to Mourning.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 Ghosts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 Secrets. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113 Mourning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 Chapter Four: The Crystal and the Beams of Light. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130 Relational Stories. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 Many Light Beams: "true family history". . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143 The Purposes and Effects of Relational Story-Telling: "Doing" Relationships . . . . . . . 170 "Doing" Relationships with the Self: Self-Reflexive Story-Telling. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180 Chapter Five: The Net of Stars. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186 The Kinship Idiom and the Languages of Justice and Care.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192 Bridging the Ambivalent Misalignment Between Action and Imagination.. . . . . . . . . . 208 Ethical Decision Making and the Kinship Idiom.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228 Chapter Six: Conclusion ? "what does it spell?".. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238 What I Found: Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238

The Kinship Idiom. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239 Ambivalent Misalignment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241 Story-Telling and Relational Stories .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243

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Ethical Directions and Viable Communities .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244 So What? Ways of Seeing.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246 What Next? Further Explorations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255 Works Cited. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262

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List of Figures

1. Poster for the Graduate Drama Centre's 1995 production . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 of Getting It Straight by Giambrone Design Ltd.

2. Three Types of Earth's Crust Faults. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 3. Title page for Hofsess interview in Homemaker's Magazine .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

15.2 (March 1980): 41-42.

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