Edward Albee 's Who 's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?

Communication is undoubtedly an essential component of a healthy relationship. In every good relationship, partners are able to communicate with each other to discuss problems and issues that may be affecting the relationship. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel The Great Gatsby, many different relationships are examined and the complexities of human connections are observed. The novel is set in the 1920s, a few years after the end of World War 1. It was a time when having fun was most people’s main priority, and partying and drinking was an essential part of everyday life. Because of the devastating effects of the war, many people adopted the ‘live life to the fullest” mentality. Because of this mentality, sexual promiscuity was a very prominent part of everyday life and married people were often unfaithful to their spouse. Communication was not generally prioritized in most relationships and resulted in unhealthy or even abusive relationships. Therefore, each couple’s problems are a result of the lack of communication displayed in each relationship.

Television psychologists and pop culture self-help gurus tell us that marriage is hard work; marriage is compromise; marriage is a choice between being right, and being happy. All of these statements are true. What these experts don’t tell us, however, is that marriage is also about putting on blinders, or looking on the bright side, or one of a hundred other trite phrases to explain the art of self-deception. In marriage, there are times when we may find it necessary to look the other way from our spouse’s faults or indiscretions, in the interest of self-preservation. For if we examine these problems too closely, our darkest, most secret fears may come true. Therefore, it can seem easier to focus on the positive. In her poem “Surprise,” Jane Kenyon uses denial, selective perception, and fear of betrayal to illustrate the self-deception that can occur in marriage.

The short story “Sweat” by Zora Neale Hurston seems to exemplify what a dysfunctional marriage is. Hurston uses foreshadowing, irony, and symbolism to demonstrate the relationship between an abusive husband and a wife. In the story, it’s clear to see that the husband, Skyes, doesn’t operate by the saying “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Hurston’s use of literary elements shows that Sykes will get what he deserves. In Hurston’s “Sweat,” the reader can see from the beginning the physical and mental abuse that Sykes places on Delia.

Power Struggles are very common is many marriages. In Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, by Edward Albee, the relationship or marriage between George and Martha is based in power. The power struggle between George and Martha has become the basis of their relationship. Their love has turned into hate. The only connection they have is through their insults and the series of games they play. The power struggle between George and Martha develops is reveled and is resolved through out the play.

Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Elizabeth Bishop, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Lorraine Hansberry each have characters whose romantic relationships are in a state of crisis. For Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper,” the relationship in crisis is the narrator and her husband, John. The speaker of “One Art” by Bishop is moving on from a crisis with a lover. Tom and Daisy Buchanan’s relationship is also in a crisis in Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. In Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, Ruth and Walter Lee’s marriage is at a critical point and may fall apart at any moment. Each couple makes unique decisions about the situation they are in and determines if the relationship will stand the final test.

Divorce rates were more than doubling in the 1970s, because “[s]pouses found it easier in the Swinging Seventies to find extramarital partners, and came to have higher, and often unrealistic, expectations of their marital relationships” (Wilcox, 2009). Over 30 years later and divorce seems to be an overused option in many marriages. In the 2000s-2010s, 40-50% of people are getting divorces and “[c]urrently, 22 percent of women and 21 percent of men have...been in a divorce” (Stanton, 2015). Without setting The Great Gatsby in the 1920s, this aspect would have had to be completely different.

In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, The Beautiful and Damned, a tale of a marriage’s hardships in the 1920’s are put on display. The novel is centered around the relationship of Gloria and Anthony, a newly married couple in the second book of the novel, and the struggles that their marriage endures. With focus on Book II, Chapter II Symposium, it is made clear how the woman in the relationship is emotionally objectified by her significant other. Woman as a whole are portrayed in a weak light in order to demonstrate the power that Anthony has over Gloria. Fitzgerald uses this to portray Anthony’s character negatively, as he slowly develops into the antagonist of the novel.

But in order to fully understand this theme it is best to have an understanding on the time it was written in. It can be said that families have qualities that differentiate them from other families around the world. But in the 1960s there was a wave of American values that had risen due to the tensed relationship between America and the Soviet Union. These traditions were held on tightly and led to the yearning of the “American Dream.” It possessed marriage, a home, children, and success. Many writers, like Albee himself, wrote about these traditions, questioning and challenging them in their works. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? was a controversy when it first appeared to the public. The thought of profanity and sexual content in the play disturbed many but also intrigued others. Albee’s intentions were to challenge American values and it allowed another perspective among family relationships and because sex and cursing was not openly discussed as it is now, it provided a more authentic feel to it and also the discussions about hysterical pregnancies and money, allowed a behind the scenes effect.

The theme of the two stories revolves around the feminist issue of marriage. A common notion between the two short stories is that love is a failure and a mere comic when there is the failure to recognize the beloved as a person and not a mere convenience. The stories also deal with the 18th and the 19th century American life?declining in their spiritual and emotional lives.

Modern literature is known for questioning society and its various conventions. One question that these works often ask is, “What is real?” Some modern authors explore this question by placing their characters within self-constructed illusions that are later shattered by the introduction of reality. Marriages are frequently at the center of this theme, with one spouse crafting an illusory impression of the other. Modern literature demonstrates that a marriage built upon illusion will falter when exposed to reality.

In the play Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, the characters Martha and George are being related to George and Martha Washington. Martha and George from the play greatly relate to the Washington's themselves. In the beginning of the play, we find out that George is six years younger than Martha “I'm six years younger than you are...” (Page 16).

Failing is a form of failure or a fault of individuals; it is also a weakness of a person’s ability of doing something. In the novel, “You or Someone like You”, Chandler Burr writes how a marriage that has a normal and simple life goes through hard times and sometimes, even reaches the point to make an important decision about choosing the success in life or the most desirable thing in each couple’s life: marriage. However, Howard Rosenbaum’s friends refer his wife, Anne Rosenbaum, to start her own book club; Anne’s book club becomes Hollywood A-lister; and Anne sacrifices everything she has achieved in life to save her marriage. Fame, fortune, and newfound friendships are not bad to have in every one’s life but because of these things, marriage is the main thing that is at risk when someone has those things in life. One’s has to choose either marriage or success that has achieved in life.

Martha, who is not the typical woman and wife of that era makes her feel as if marrying George is the only way to boost up her own self esteem and reputation, but George never got up to her expectations, therefore leaving her unsatisfied with her marriage.

Harmful relationships are a common topic in literature and pop culture, because while they are terrible, they are common. Kay Boyle portrays a toxic relationship in “Astronomer’s Wife” and how it affects the harmed party. In “Astronomer’s Wife,” Mrs. Ames lives in a silent house with a dreamer husband, who has his head in the clouds and leaves her on Earth. A broken toilet brings the plumber, who leads her to ponder her relationship, her husband, and humanity in general. In “Astronomer’s Wife,” Kay Boyle suggests through the story’s plot and structure that weak-willed people imprisoned in toxic relationships suffer considerable blows to their psyche and identity.

In the first act of Albee’s play, the two couples are having their conversations friendly, yet as time goes by, Martha starts to make jokes about his husband George and when she is telling the