Last night, many of us attended the Cherry Hill East production of The Crucible. It was well acted and skillfully done, but as I was watching the play, I began to wonder...Does watching Cherry Hill East's interpretation of The Crucible limit our future intensional perception of it, when we read the play?
Essentially, are our intensional maps of The Crucible locked in or constrained because we watched another group's interpretation of it first? For example, whenever John Proctor's name comes up in my future reading of The Crucible, I will instinctively picture the actor who played him, and his onstage personality. Won't my intensional perspective of the character John Proctor be strongly influenced by the actor who played John Proctor? Of course, we can still use our imaginations while reading the actual play, but doesn't seeing someone else's extensional interpretation of a work already frame what we can see intensionally?
That's one reason why I much prefer reading books to seeing movies. When you watch a movie, someone else's perspective is already framing how you see the events depicted in the movie. Within that frame, we can offer interpretations of the movie, but aren't we already limited? But when you read a book, you are much freer to come up with your own intensional perception and interpretation of the events, without outside influence. If you watched Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (the movie), you weren't really seeing Harry Potter up there on the big screen. You were watching Daniel Radcliffe's interpretation of Harry Potter, as directed by Alfonso Cuarón. Of course, in reading the book version, we still are somewhat framed in our view of Harry by Rowling's descriptions of him, but much less so than a movie would.
Thoughts?
(Eric Wei)
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8 comments:
I agree that we may be limited as to our interpretation of The Crucible now that we have seen it. People all have different interpretations of the characters and other things while reading a book or play. While our perceptions of movie characters (or the characters when you are watching a play) may differ slightly based on our experience I think there is considerably less broad a scale of perceptions.
However, I believe Arthur Miller to be some what of an anomaly in this matter. Since he gives such tremendously descriptive stage directions there is probably less of a difference in how different people imagine the play performed. Admittedly, we may have imagined the character's with different physical characteristics while reading the play but I do think that overall, this will be less of an issue than it would have been in many cases because of the explicitness of Miller's directions.
(Molly Dunbar
I understand your point that books leave more to the imagination but isn't the words used in the book also affect how we interpret the scenes. Descriptive words can have negative and positive connotations. In movies they simply show you the object and you can describe it to yourself how ever you want (well, within reason.) I am a uncritical person so I hardly ever dislike a movie that I see after reading the book even if the director's perspective of a scene is different than mine.
I do think that having seen the play before reading The Crucible will interpret how I picture the scenes but I don't think it will change how I interpret the language. Especially since Jen G. said that they spoke pretty much verbatim from the book.
(Kelley Volosin)
I agree with Eric about the frame constriction. Whenever I think of a particular aspect of the Crucible or the play in general, some particular aspect of the performance or actors comes to mind. It happens in every dual movie/book situation, but I think here is an exception. As Molly pointed out, the fact that Arthur has such descriptive stage directions sort of establishes a constricted frame even in the text version.
Regardless, I thought the Crucible was well done and well acted for a high school production, and will be invaluable in future analysis of the play.
Steve Szumski
I can understand both the points of view of Eric and Kelley. While watching the play, I also took into account how it would affect my reading in the future. But it is also inevitable that Arthur Miller would have used vocabulary, phrases, etc.. that would have altered our perceptions as well. The more verbose an author may be in his/her descriptions, the less liberty we are granted in our own interpretation.
The odd part is that even though I have yet to read The Crucible, I was already picking out how I would have imagined the show to be executed differently while watching. Does this make me a critical person?
I guess what I'm trying to say is this:
Parts of the play took place in the woods, in a house, and in other settings. I would not generally imagine a house from that time period to look like the one depicted on stage. I would also imagine the wooded scenery to be different. Is this because I walked into Cherry Hill East High School with presupposed dispositions due to the knowledge which has been placed on my intensional/extensional maps throughout my lifetime? For example, the things that we learned last year in AP US instilled within me ideas about Christian living during the witch trials. Some aspects of the show went against these pre-existing notions. Maybe I had subconscious expecatations.
(Sam Maliha)
I agree that having seen the play will affect how we interpret it. However, I think that the effect won't be that major. If anything, I think that seeing the play will make for a good comparison to our interpretations.
Basically, everyone interprets things differently. No two interpretations are exactly the same. Even though we have seen the actors' interpretations of the play, we will be able to develop our own interpretation.
Also, it's not like we were able to catch the actors' interpretation of every part of the play. I know that there were some parts that night where I wasn't able to understand what was going on (and I know the people around me shared similar feelings).
I agree with Mary that while having seen the play performed on stage may indeed affect our perceptions of the play when we read 'The Crucible' in the future, it will likely not affect them drastically.
I also understand Sam's observation of our own possible subconscious expectations or predispositions toward the play. Clearly, our studies of the early centuries in US History last year have become part of our intensional maps, which in turn affect how we perceive a play such as 'The Crucible.'
Thus, Sam, I do not think that your subconscious expectations/predispositions while watching the play implies that you are a critical person. Rather, your mind naturally uses your preexisting intensional/extensional map to guide yourself through a new experience.
Here's one quick question: just as seeing a production of a play influences one's perception when reading the play, does the vice-versa also occur (if you read the play before seeing a production of it)? I guess Jen G. would be able to provide some insight on this. What are your thoughts?
(Janet Lee)
Maybe it's just me, but I find the effect of watching the Crucible on my interpretation of the play to be rather minimal since I couldn't see the actors' faces. It might have a lot to do with the fact that I didn't think I'd need my glasses, but when I think of the play, I feel as if the experience was incomplete.. After all, humans are typically visual creatures and if the image that comes to mind is a grainy one with unclear faces, it has a decidedly smaller impact on your thoughts than, say, a movie you saw (clearly).
So yes, the voice inflections and some scenes stick in my head, but the lack of clear faces to match characteristics and scenes with, I think that the play had a minimal impact on my future interpretation of the Crucible. After all, I still have room to impose upon the very bare skeleton the play left in my mind.
Anyone else feel the same? Or am I the only dolt who couldn't see?
I think I tend to agree with Eric. Coming out of the play I realized that my imagination would be much limited after seeing it performed. I know that I will most likely forget details, etc., so my imagination can fill in there. The positive aspect that I see, though, is that I will be less likely to be confused by parts in the book, having had plenty of time to process the plot, etc., after seeing the play.
In addition, I think I see why Eric involves "framing" in his post. Our mindset is, in a way, pre-set now that we've seen the play. We will have a more difficult time looking at the play from different perspectives, different angles, and with broad interpretive skills.
So, there are positives and negatives, but I enjoyed the experience for what it was.
Emily T.
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