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Royal Australian Marines in the Play, Our Country is Good

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Our Country is Good is set in the late 1700s in Australia. The play is about Royal Marines who were sent to colonize the country and the convicts sent there also to spend out their sentencing. The play focuses on how the group of convicts, along with Second Lieutenant Clark, put on a play for the King because he was suffering from an illness during that time. Second Lieutenant Clark decides to put on a play called the Recruiting Officer by George Farquhar, which was a very popular play in the time period.
Many things come into play after the announcement of the play being put on by convicts. There are several themes in the play, such as the judicial system and punishment, and sexuality. The underlining theme, the one with the repeating patterns and symbol, was redemption and theater as a humanizing experience. The judicial system used in Australia during that time period was during the Georgian era, which was the system used in England. This was the harshest system of Europe, and possibly the world during the era. Any crime, especially crimes that were minute, was punishable by hanging. The public usually gave punishments for crimes to the criminals. In that era, the public was more concerned about crimes such as theft and less concerned about crimes such as murder. The judicial system and its way of giving punishments mostly did not fit the crimes; criminals would be hanged for stealing food or money. Equality in sexes is another evident theme of the play. The convict

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