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Sarah Kane’s Blasted and its Grotesque Space and Body

  • Journal of Modern English Drama
  • Abbr : JMBARD
  • 2016, 29(1), pp.89-121
  • Publisher : 한국현대영미드라마학회
  • Research Area : Humanities > English Language and Literature > English Literature > Contemporary English Drama

lee danbi 1

1고려대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

The visceral and shocking depiction of violence in Sarah Kane’s Blasted has caused fierce controversy since the premiere of the play. However, the core of Kane’s drama does not lie in violence itself. Rather, Kane focuses on the value of hope and love, which can be rather ironically discovered in virtue of violation. In this sense, it is important to ask how violence transforms into a positive value in understanding the core of Kane’s drama. Also, importantly, such transformations can be examined through the aesthetics of grotesque. The word ‘grotesque’, which is derived from grotta(a cave), originally referred to a decorative art painted on the wall, and the features of grotesque include awareness through defamiliarization, humor caused by exaggeration and satirization, and transformation through the deconstruction of binaries. In other words, the hybridity of grotesque works as a force to blur boundaries, bringing about changes and transformations. In this context, it is also possible to examine how violence transforms into hope, especially by focusing on the grotesqueness of space and body in Blasted. The moment of ‘explosion’ in this play leads to the coexistence of the two realities, and this ‘liminal’ space in turn defamiliarizes the existing world and creates a new awareness of the reality. In addition, in this grotesque space the protagonist, Ian, experiences extreme physical pains and recognizes his body as an abject. Ian’s transformation from the perpetrator to the victim suggests a possibility of new insight and change. To conclude, Kane’s dramatic vision to show a beauty inherent in despair, can be understood in the context of grotesque and its hybridity.

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