The Antiphon: A PlayA three-act verse tragedy by Djuna Barnes. Set in England in 1939 after the beginning of World War Two, the drama presents the Hobbs family reunion in the family's ancestral home, Burley Hall. The play features many of the themes or motifs that run through Barnes's work, including betrayal, familial relations, regression and transgression. The dialogue is highly stylized and poetic. The play tells the story of the reunion of Augusta Hobbs, her brother, Jonathan Burley, and her four estranged adult children: Dudley, Elisha, Miranda and Jeremy. The play begins with the arrival at Burley Hall of Miranda, a 'tall woman in her late fifties', and a coachman, Jack Blow, that she has met in Dover during her journey to England from France. She reveals that, along with her sibling, uncle and mother, she has been summoned by her youngest brother Jeremy to the family's ancestral home. However, Jeremy is nowhere to be found upon their arrival. The building has not been occupied for some time and is in a state of dilapidation thanks to German bombing campaigns; the house's former contents are sprawled all over the set. Miranda is shortly joined by her uncle, Jonathan Burley, as well as her two brothers, Dudley, a manufacturer of watches and Elisha, a publicist, and later by her mother, Augusta. As they wait for Jeremy, they discuss family history and air old grievances, many of them about the family's deceased patriarch, Titus Hobbs. Dudley and Elisha exhibit a strong dislike for Miranda and their mother, playing a number of increasingly cruel and violent tricks upon them. Miranda starts to suspect that the invitation might have been a trap set by Dudley and Elisha to lure them to the home and murder them. Augusta, however, remains oblivious to her sons' behavior. Miranda and Augusta argue, with Miranda suggesting that just as Augusta was blind to the sexual and physical abuse she suffered at the hands of her father, she is also blind to the murderous intent that her sons present towards her. The final act begins with all the characters asleep on stage. Jeremy has still not arrived. Augusta, unable to sleep, begins to playact as if she was a young woman once again and that the traumatic events she has lived through have not happened. Miranda silently watches with horror and empathy. She tries to warn Augusta again of the violent dangers posed by Dudley and Elisha. However, Augusta, believing Miranda to be betraying her own family, smashes her skull with a curfew bell and kills her. Jack then reveals that he is, in fact, Jeremy and that he invited them to the house with the intent that the family would implode as they have. When he is asked why he did it by his uncle, he responds that 'This is the hour of the uncreate; the season of the sorrowless lamenting'. The play ends with Jonathan Burley watching his nephew, Jeremy, silently and 'with what appears to be indifference' leave the stage. |
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Common terms and phrases
ANTIPHON AUGUSTA BURLEY AUGUSTA I've AUGUSTA Jonathan AUGUSTA MIRANDA balcony beast Beewick bloody bone breath brother BURLEY and JACK BURLEY AUGUSTA BURLEY JACK BURLEY My dear catch Crying curfew-bell damned dance daughter dead doll's house door DUDLEY and ELISHA estrangement Exit face father fear finger fool foot frightened gallery girl glory gone Grinning Grosvenor Square gryphon hand head hear heaven Hee-haw heel horse hunting JACK AUGUSTA JACK Bless Jack Blow JACK MIRANDA JACK Wait Jeremy journey knocking lady lamp Langue d'Oc leaned Look madame mercy mind MIRANDA AUGUSTA MIRANDA JACK mother mouth move never once play pull pushed remember rings road so late running seen sitting sons stand stay Stop stroke tapping tell there's thing thrown tick Titus tongue tureen Turning uncle vagrancy Victoria walked watch What's whip whistle wind woman