Structuralist (Saussurean)interpretation of true west play (sam shepard)

1. Presentation by Sami ul Haq LAHORE LEADS UNIVERSIT 2. In sociology, anthropology and linguistics, structuralism is the theory that elements of human culture must be understood in terms of their relationship to a larger, overarching system or structure. It works to uncover the structures that underlie all the things that humans do, think, perceive, and feel 3. How the surface meaning and the deep meaning are reflected are when the play True West is read with a structuralistic approach. On the surface the story is of the transformation of two sons into their father, in the deep however, man himself transformed into an object by capitalism to suppress others to reduce them into objects is reflected 4. For Structuralistics the object is to explain every thing. Sign is arbitrary and according to social context. 5. I wanted to write a play about double nature , one that would not be symbolic or metaphorical, or any of that stuff, I wanted to give just a taste of what it feels like to be two sided. Its a real thing double nature. I think we are split in a much more devastating way than psychology can ever reveal. Its not so cute, not some little thing we can get over, its something weve got to live with. 6. AUSTIN: early thirties, light blue sports shirt, light tan cardigan sweater, clean blue jeans, white tennis shoes Austin is clean and he wore good and tidy dress. 7. LEE: his older brother, early forties, filthy white t- shirt, tattered brown overcoat covered with dust, dark blue baggy suit pants from the Salvation Army, pink suede belt, pointed black forties dress shoes scuffed up, holes in the soles, no socks, no hat, long pronounced sideburns, "Gene Vincent" hairdo, two days' growth of beard, bad teeth Old West Old and shabby dress Holes in shoes and without socks. 8. Night. Sound of crickets in dark. Candlelight appears in alcove, illuminating AUSTIN, seated at glass table hunched over a writing notebook, pen in hand, cigarette burning in ashtray, cup of coffee, typewriter on table, stacks of paper, candle burning on table. Austin: Candle light 9. Soft moonlight fills kitchen illuminating LEE, beer in hand, six-pack on counter behind him. He's leaning against the sink, mildly drunk, takes a slug of beer. Lee: Moon light 10. Two brothers Austin writer who is small. University education has seen. Lives with his wife and children in the city. Television, house, car, "American Lifestyle" has the object 11. LEE: (to phone) Hang on a second, operator. (LEE lets the phone drop then starts pulling all the drawers in the kitchen out on the floor and dumping the contents, searching for a pencil, AUSTIN watches him casually) LEE: (crashing through drawers, throwing contents around kitchen) This is the last time I try to live with people, boy! I can't believe it. Here I am! Here I am again in a desperate situation! This would never happen out on the desert. I would never be in this kinda' situation out on the desert. Isn't there a pen or a pencil in this house! Who lives in this house anyway! AUSTIN: Our mother. 12. LEE: How come she don't have a pen or a pencil! She's a social person isn't she? Doesn't she have to make shopping lists? She's gotta' have a pencil. (finds a pencil) Aaha! (he rushes back to phone, picks up receiver) All right operator. Operator? Hey! Operator! Goddamnit! (LEE rips the phone off the wall and throws it down, goes back to chair and falls into it, drinks, long pause) 13. AUSTIN: Lee, why don't you just try another neighborhood, all right? LEE: (laughs) What'sa' matter with this neighborhood? This is a great neighborhood. Lush. Good class a' people. Not many dogs 14. SAUL: I am absolutely convinced we can get this thing off the ground. I mean we'll have to make a sale to television and that means getting a major star. Somebody bankable. But I think we can do it. I really do. 15. SAUL: Uh--I have in the past. Produced some T.V. Specials. Network stuff. But it's mainly features now. LEE: That's where the big money is, huh? 16. LEE: Nah. I think there's easier money. Lotsa' places I could pick up thousands. Maybe millions.I don't need this shit. I could go up to Sacramento Valley and steal me a diesel. Ten thousand a week dismantling one a' those suckers. Ten thousand a week! 17. AUSTIN: 'Course you could. You know what a screenplay sells for these days? LEE: No. What's it sell for? AUSTIN: A lot. A whole lot of money. LEE: Thousands? AUSTIN: Yeah. Thousands. True West LEE: Millions? AUSTIN: Well-- LEE: We could get the old man outa' hock then. AUSTIN: Maybe. LEE: Maybe? Whadya' mean, maybe? AUSTIN: I mean it might take more than money. LEE: You were just tellin' me it'd change my whole life around. Why wouldn't it change his? 18. LEE: You probably think that I'm not fully able to comprehend somethin' like that, huh? AUSTIN: Like what? LEE: That stuff yer doin'. That art. You know. Whatever you call it. AUSTIN: It's just a little research. 19. LEE: Yeah. Contemporary Western. Based on a true story. 'Course I'm not a writer like my brother here. I'm not a man of the pen. 20. LEE: I mean plenty a' guys have stories don't they? True-life stories. Musta' been a lota' movies made from real life. 21. AUSTIN: After you break into people's houses and take their televisions? LEE: They don't need their televisions! I'm doin' them a service. 22. AUSTIN: Who said anything about killing? LEE: Family people. Brothers. Brothers-in- law. Cousins. Real American-type people. They kill each other in the heat mostly. In the Smog-Alerts. In the Brush Fire Season. Right about this time a' year. AUSTIN: This isn't the same. LEE: Oh no? What makes it different? True West 26 AUSTIN: We're not insane. We're not driven to acts of violence like that. Not over a dumb 23. Analysis of the Game Wild West, two brothers, two people, is a game that compare the two lifestyles. Two Screens and consists of nine stage, but also the nine scenes "space" passes. 24. Hero needs a villain in order to be hero. Ferdinand de Saussure concentrates on sign which itself is divided into two parts: signifier and signified, that is to say each word signifier ,written or spoken,carries a meaning (signified ). It is a system of distinct signs corresponding to distinct ideas 25. True West True West Civilized urban life Candle light Younger Educated Screen writer False West Wild West Desert life Moon light Older Less or Uneducated Nomadic Desert drifter 26. Civilized Family life Thief Mother Artificial Wife Uncivilized Desert life Screen writer Father Natural Prostitute 27. IF A=B THEN C=D And if we know A,B,and C, then we can predict D In True West nuclear family is shattered. Father is in desert , Mother in Alaska, Lee at Mojave Desert and Austin in the North. 28. In True West by Sam Shepard, we see two characters at the beginning of the play, Austin as a writer and man of letters and Lee as a loafer and thief. But at the end of the play, they change their places without any linear reason. The writer, Austin, becomes a thief and the thief, and Lee, becomes a writer. In the same manner Austin and Lee have their own True West 29. MOM: Picasso. (pause) Picasso's in town. Isn't that incredible? Right now. (pause) AUSTIN: Picasso's dead, Mom. MOM: No, he's not dead. He's visiting the museum. I read it on the bus. We have to go down there and see him. Cubism In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassembled in an abstracted forminstead of depicting objects from one viewpoint, the artist depicts the subject from a multitude of viewpoints to represent the subject in a greater context 30. AUSTIN: Yeah well don't tell me I can't kill him because I can. I can just twist. I can just keep twisting. (AUSTIN twists the cord tighter, LEE wakens, his breathing changes to a short rasp) MOM: Austin! 31. (LEE is motionless, AUSTIN very slowly begins to stand, still keeping a tenuous hold on the cord and his eyes riveted to LEE for any sign of movement, AUSTIN slowly drops the cord and stands, he stares down at LEE who appears to be dead) AUSTIN: (whispers) Lee? Capitalist system turned them into objects, they are quarreling for money. 32. Lee was a nomadic drifter, he was rigid in dealing, wild longing for call girl Austin was living a family life, wife, children, house, car, an American style of living. Old man was living in desert, all he need was money ,so that he may drink with it. Was unaware of his wife and sons. 33. Mother She was living alone, she went to Alaska for seeing Iceland and igloos. She returned for Picasso and house plants. Saul Kimmer was selling scripts to Hollywood so as he may earn money. All binaries reflect two sides of American life, this is two sided play showing both shades of True West.