Lillian Hellman Essay, Research Paper

Comparing Lillian Hellman s The Children s Hour and The Little Foxes.

Lillian Hellman was a well-known American playwright who was born in 1905 in New Orleans ( & # 8221 ; Hellman, & # 8221 ; 1999 ) . She subsequently moved and attended New York public schools and went on to travel to New York University and Columbia University every bit good. Within the confines of her young person, there had been confusion about her household background ( Harmon, 1999 ) . There has ever been talk about her parents troubled matrimony and other events have cropped up to do Hellman an challenging figure. Yet, she went on to turn up and happen a hubby, something typical in her twenty-four hours. She married another dramatist named Arthur Kober, but this relationship ended in divorce ( & # 8221 ; Hellman, & # 8221 ; 1999 ; James, 1999 ) . Her intimate friendly relationship with the novelist Dashiell Hammett would go on until his decease in 1961 ( 1999 ) . Yet, Hellman would ne’er remarry.

Hellman did non get down to compose dramas until the 1930s, her play are good known for concentrating on assorted signifiers of immorality ( & # 8221 ; Hellman, & # 8221 ; 1999 ) . Her work has non escaped unfavorable judgment nevertheless. She has been criticized at assorted times for her dogmatist positions but she however kept her characters from going societal points of position by including believable duologue and a realistic strength which put her a measure above her equals ( & # 8221 ; Hellman, & # 8221 ; 1999 ) . Indeed, Hellman wrote with the accomplishment of a professional but the emotions of a kid. I feel she was able to capture the innermost frights and ideas of people, pulling on their most horrid characteristics. In the encyclopaedia Hellman is described as an American Dramatist, whose dramas are distinguished for the strength of their affair, normally a disapprobation of personal and societal immorality. They are besides noteworthy for character development and adept building ( Encarta ) . These points come through clearly in both The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour and The Little Foxes. Interestingly, Hellman seemed to entitle these plants in an innocuous but arch manner.

In a assortment of plants, it appears that Hellman s subjects have all centered around evil and lies. They have drawn on things that, for the most portion, people do non like to look at. Her plants are genuinely distressing, as she forces the audience to delve deep into their ain minds. It is of import to observe that Hellman had grown up in interesting times. She was a adolescent in the Roaring Twenties, and had lived through the Great Depression. To many, the 1930 & # 8217 ; s were a clip of desperation, but for Hellman, it was clip to get down a memorable calling. The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour was written in 1934 and The Little Foxes would come merely five old ages after that. Much later, things would acquire instead gluey. The United States would travel through a cold war and the McCarthy epoch was upon the state where originative industries were marks. Hellman and Hammett stood by one another through the ill-famed Communist witch-hunts ( & # 8221 ; Dashiell, & # 8221 ; 1996 ) . Hammett had really been a Communist Party member and he had to function six months in federal prison. Hellman did besides back up left-of-center causes but ne’er officially enlisted ( 1996 ) . Her ill-famed words and reactions to Senator Joseph McCarthy and the HUAC commission are as follows: I can t cut my scruples to suit this twelvemonth s manners. ( Elibrary ) She refused to call names of alleged Communists and fortunately she escaped gaol clip.

Hellman & # 8217 ; s life in general was that of the typical author. It seems as if Hellman was relentless and loved her work. Born in the South, she grew up disbursement half the twelvemonth in the Northeast and the other half in the South. Hellman loved New Orleans but felt a driving demand to win in the North. Her concluding place in this life-time was even farther North. Hellman passed off in 1984 near her place which was by so situated near Martha & # 8217 ; s Vineyard, in Massachusetts. I feel traveling around the state gave her a assortment of penetrations into different personalities, something priceless to any author. When she wrote The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour, she broached the topic of sapphism, something much less prevailing so.

The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour is truly non about tribades. It is instead about a malicious prevarication told by a kid. It helps to retrieve that homosexualism during the 1920 & # 8217 ; s was non acceptable and even today, a sapphic instructor would still do enormous moving ridges. Still, during the early portion of the 20th century, homosexualism was even more disgraceful. So when a pupil claimed her instructor was a sapphic there was pandemonium and that is the footing for the narrative. In the narrative, Karen and Martha are the victims of the prevarication and their lives end tragically as one takes her ain life and another interruptions off an battle. Every thing they have worked and dreamed for, including the school suffers and is utterly destroyed.

The work reminds one of modern-day instances of kid maltreatment in schools where kids lie for assorted grounds. Inevitably, the prevarications are corroborated and believed. In this drama, the prevarications seem to travel deeper. Many people do hold a hard clip covering with false accusals. Still, many go on to contend another twenty-four hours. For the primary characters in The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour, no 1 is winning. Even Mary, the small miss who lies, seems to hold important jobs. One might inquire whether or non she herself is troubled or merely prosecuting in infantile behaviour. But her words ruin lives and that can be seen by the dramatic address Karen makes: & # 8220 ; Try to understand this: you & # 8217 ; re non playing with paper dolls. We & # 8217 ; re human existences, see? It & # 8217 ; s our lives you & # 8217 ; re gulling with. Our lives. That & # 8217 ; s serious concern for us. & # 8221 ; ( Hellman, 1979, p.47 )

Karen evidently fights the prevarication but she loses anyhow, showing the power of the word. The old stating & # 8220 ; Sticks and rock can interrupt my castanetss but words can ne’er ache me & # 8221 ; becomes false. This writer demonstrates clearly in The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour that words can non merely ache, they can kill. The work The Small Foxes is excessively based on a prevarication and there is decease, but for different grounds.

The Little Foxes takes a wholly different attack to

the topic of prevarication, although it is a major thematic component. The Small Foxes focuses on a household shiping on a concern endeavor but much of their achievements are based on prevarications, larceny and loans which some might compare with larceny. Hellman forces the audience to oppugn their ain concern traffics. When is a prevarication truly harmful and when is it justified?

The Little Foxes surely brings up the jobs of lying in concern, but this concern involves household every bit good. Therefore, there is demonstrated a greater bond than mere concern spouses would of all time trust to achieve. There is blood that holds these sinister characters together. But the prevarications depicted in this latter work are rather different than the prevarications told by Mary in The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour. Mary is a kid, but the characters in The Little Foxes should cognize better. While lying is cardinal to both plants, The Little Foxes besides focuses on greed, something that The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour does non include. Therefore, the component of greed creates a new dimension in sing Hellman & # 8217 ; s plants. Here, it seems as if some of the characters are propelled by greed and in one sense, it is the enticement of easy money that finally turns people into monsters. Like The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour, this force causes decease. Indirectly, in both dramas, decease consequences due to emotional strain. One might reason that Hellman focuses on emotion to demo how much of an impact it has on life.

In a really indirect manner so, one could state that Hellman expresses the thought that emotion and prevarications can non merely wounded people, but they can destruct lives every bit good. In The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour nevertheless, the character s lives are destroyed non merely due to the prevarications told, but besides because of society & # 8217 ; s feelings about sapphism and non truly the injury feelings of the victims. But indirectly, the characters lose everything because of this judgement. Had homosexualism been more acceptable so, the adult females would hold gone on with their callings and lives. Alternatively, one ends up dead and the other on a possible new life way. The events that play out in The Little Foxes on the other manus destroy a household. But one character does stop up dead due to the emotional daze that had come due to events related to money. Here, emotions straight lead to decease whereas in The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour, the emotions of the society that destroyed the lives of the chief characters indirectly led to one taking her ain life. Both instances exemplify tragic scenarios.

Hellman is non truly a modern twenty-four hours Shakespeare. While her dramas are tragic, these calamities are based on malice and non destine. While Shakespeare excessively utilizes the evil nature of his characters, he besides offers destiny as an account for certain events. Hellman does non make this. Possibly she has felt victimized throughout her life. Unable to do matrimony and ordinary life work, Hellman became a spot of a roamer. She seemed to happen some sense of herself in her authorship. Both The Children & # 8217 ; s Hour and The Little Foxes do intimation of Hellman & # 8217 ; s desperation and feelings of entrapment. Most of her characters in these dramas are boxed into their state of affairss and had been done so by other people. No 1 makes their ain destiny in her plants. These exploited characters are done in by their colleagues or household members due to the evil nature that lurks in the Black Marias of work forces.

Some might state that Hellman was depressed or merely saw life in a blue manner. Possibly that is true, but more significantly, Hellman was able to pull emotion and set it out for all to see. She was able to make struggle through word picture and non reliant on the secret plan wholly. Her accomplishment at composing duologue was superior which rendered Lillian Hellman a dramatist of significance. Lillian Hellman will be remembered for her challenging life, but besides for the interesting characters she was able to convey alive in her well-written parts to the theatrical kingdom.

Beginnings and mentions

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Dashiell Hammett & A ; Lillian Hellman. ( 1996, February 12 ) . Peoples pp.149

Falk, D. ( 1978 ) . Lillian Hellman. New York, NY: Frederick Ungar Publishing Co.

Fleche, A. ( 1996 ) . The sapphic regulation: Lillian Hellman and the steps of pragmatism. Modern Drama 39 ( 1 ) pp. 16-30.

Harlan, M. ( 1996, November 03 ) . Reading between the lines. Newsday pp. C11

Harmon, M. B. ( 1999 ) . Secrets and prevarications: The life of Lillian Hellman. Biography, 3 ( 6 ) , pp. 90.

Hellman, Lillian. ( 2000, July 22 ) . Lillian Hellman. Microsoft Encarta Online Encyclopedia 2000 [ online ]

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Hellman, L. ( 1979 ) . The Children s Hour. Six Plays by Lillian Hellman.

New York: Vintage Books. pp. 1-78

Hellman, L. ( 1979 ) . The Small Foxes. Six Plays by Lillian Hellman. New York: Vintage Books. pp. 147-199

James, C. ( 1999, May 31 ) . That 50 & # 8217 ; s Cocktail of Hellman, Hammett and the Red Scare. New York Times, pp. E1.

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Reuben, P. ( 2000, July 22 ) . Chapter 8: American Drama-Lillian Hellman. Buddy: Positions in American Literature- AA research and mention usher. [ online ]

Webb, K. ( 2000, July 22 ) . It s all a prevarication: Destructive dishonesty in the plants of Lillian Hellman. [ on-line ]

Wright, W. ( 1996, November 3 ) Why Lillian Hellman remains intriguing.

New York Times pp. H9.