The theme of sexual desire is arguably the most profound,
most obvious presence in the play. Two great examples of this would be Maxine
Faulk and Charlotte Goodall.
Firstly, Maxine whom was widowed by her late husband Frank
expresses her desire for Shannon with no shame or hesitation. She even rages a
little bit on Hannah; accusing her of having some kind of flirtatious acts with
Shannon, which of course she denies. On another note, Charlotte is a
16-year-old girl travelling with the church group on Shannon’s bus. The problem
with this is that Shannon slept with her and is accused of statutory rape by
their church leader, Mrs. Fellowes. Fellowes threatens Shannon that he will get
fired over this matter and since then, he has been trying his hardest not to
fall into Charlotte’s “temptations” as he called it.
The other theme is loneliness. It is as if almost all the
key characters in the play are lonely people. Let us start with Maxine. She
admits in the beginning of the play that she has always been lonely, even when
Frank was alive because even when they were still together they grew tired of
one another, seeming that he was some decade of two older than she was. With
this, Maxine takes out her loneliness on the hands of Shannon.
After his previous fall with a minor, Shannon gets seduced and falls into temptation with another minor, Charlotte. We can get a sense that that Shannon is a man thats very lonely and can't help himself but be with this girl. Although Charlotte is a beautiful girl, and although Shannon is in this situation, he can't be falling with this because Mrs. Fellowes will just make life worse for him.
ReplyDeleteYea and also I think he has his subconscious in his mind that enough is enough with committing sins.I think he has reached the point where he's doing everything he can to sort of make up for the wrongs. For example, in the play, when he ordered Hank to stop by the bridge to stare at the innocent women and children, it's as if he wanted to be that innocent as well. Another one is when he takes in Hannah and Nonno in the verandah although Maxine was disinclined to take them in for the night as they didn't have any money. It's as if Shannon, as I've mentioned already, is being as righteous as possible because deep n him he wants forgiveness. And that forgiveness can either be from God or even himself.
ReplyDeleteExactly, it seems like you said he is trying to do everything possible to redeem himself from all the acts of "sins" that he did. Although he knows from bible that a man cannot be redeemed from the acts of righteousness that he does, he still seems to put in his head that from the good things that he does will be enough for God to "forgive" him and make him a minister again.
ReplyDeleteAlthough, I might be wrong on this but he rarely mentions God until the end... So at the same time I'm left skeptical because he's trying to do right for God, yet he drinks etc. Wouldn't that be counter productive? But then again he could have been utterly confused.
ReplyDeleteYe thats what I was thinking as well. On one scene he'll be writing a letter to the head Bishop saying that he wants to become a minister of the Gospel again, but then again you have him drinking and swearing which totally contradicts everything that a priest should be doing. But I don' know, these catholic priests are something....
ReplyDeletehahaha Derick!
ReplyDeletePlus Shannon blames his desires (actually all his problems) on his "spook" he lets himself get entranced with some alcohol and a curious 16 year old girl. Do you guys think the spook he refers to is his desires or his conscious
ReplyDeleteIt's his desires. If he kept it only as a conscious thing, he wouldn't have acted upon them.
ReplyDelete