Shoe Horn Sonata & the Send Off

In the poem Exposure by Wilfred Owen, Owen has used some language techniques to appeal to my imagination by using personification, repetition and alliteration. By analysing the poems language techniques in-depth to see a bigger picture of how traumatising their experience's during the war were like and how severely nature's wrath tormented the soldiers, and to see what the poem is trying to convey. Owens most important message in the poem is to avoid war at all cost because of the harshness of nature and how tormenting it

Through the use of techniques and themes, a composer is able to create distinctively visual images when describing the setting and characters in detail which help us to understand and form meaning of what the composer is trying to convey in their texts. The use of techniques such as body language, symbolism, lighting, music and photographic background slides create distinctively visual images same with themes that are being used within the texts such as truth which is evident in the dramatic text ‘The Shoe-Horn Sonata’ by John Misto, the song ‘Lose Yourself’ sang by Eminem, and the film ‘The Eye’ directed by David Moreau and Xavier Palud featuring Jessica Alba. These three texts demonstrate how the responders are impacted and what is

“The Shoe- Horn Sonata” is a play by John Misto that gives an insight into two lives of two female POWs in WW II and is a vector of Misto’s thoughts. It explores the little known and often terrible events associated with female prisoners of war. The play follows a friendship of two women through the war to a point of tension that’s beyond what any normal friendship would have to deal with. Misto engages his audience by using a multitude of mediums to portray his story creating a truly multimedia performance. The playwright challenges the audience to look beyond this to the underlying ideas of survival, loyalty and truth.

Distinctively visual texts use a variety of techniques to convey the experiences during the war. In John Misto’s 1996 play ‘The Shoe-Horn Sonata’ which is about women nurses enduring Japanese POW camps, such distinctive experiences as power and survival are shown through techniques like lighting, projecting image, sound, symbols, dialogue and body language.

The Shoe Horn Sonata provides an insight into the lives of two women who were made prisoners of war by the Japanese and explores the little known and horrific conditions and events the women endured. With the use of distinctively visual techniques, John Misto brings Bridie and Sheila’s experience vividly to life. Through the use of projected images, sound, music and symbolism; the horrors of war, survival and resilience are portrayed throughout the drama.

Dreams of war encapsulating bravery, suffering and endurance of the human spirit are evident throughout history and marked through commemoration. However the wartime experience of women, civilians and many migrants have never been acknowledged creating significant gaps and silences in our perception of the past. John Misto in his drama The Shoe-Horn Sonata pays tribute to women POWs through distinctively visual techniques that incorporate music, images and dialogue, compelling the audience to recognise the injustice of their plight and to continue the pursuit for reconciliation. Similarly Peter Skrzynecki in his poem Immigrants at Central Station presents images of displaced

The action cuts between two settings: a television studio and a Melbourne motel room. The opening scene shows Bridie re-enacting the kowtow, a tribute to the emperor of Japan. (Bridie stands in a spotlight. She bows stiffly from the waist, and remains in this position). Stage directions allow the readers to visualise exactly how the composer wants it to be performed. The reader is able to share their experiences, and feels engaged with Bridie at this point. Misto uses photographic images, projected on a screen behind Bridie to support the dialogue. [On the screen behind Bridie are projected several 1940 posters for the Women’s Army. These are followed by photographs of the Australian army nurses disembarking in Singapore]. This allows the reader to feel included into the play, and creates an emotional impact by reminding us that although the play is fiction, the stories themselves are real, and real people who suffered in this way. Wilfred Owen’s first line of ‘the Send-Off’ illustrates the soldiers singing happily, heading to defend their country. ‘Down the close, darkening lanes they sang their way to the siding-shed’. Owen opens the poem with this powerful visual line to display the juxtaposition present in the happy soldiers and the ‘close, darkening lanes’. This line reflects the soldiers being sent to their death, and we as the readers are able to understand that Owen points

This very much represents the physical crossing from the ‘normal’ world into a world which is not seen from the outside, and pushed to the edge of society, and further resembles a glimpse of hope for the patients’ recovery. In the later scenes of the play, during the performance of Mozart’s opera, the entire theatre has been transformed into something completely different, with its white walls, the bright, colourful costumes, and Mozart’s “music of the spheres” echoing within the once dark and dismal place. The new theatre in all its splendour metaphorically resembles the transformations of the characters themselves, and from this, the audience is encouraged to realise the significance and therapeutic nature of art, in this case theatre and music: “the music of this opera will keep the world in harmony”, especially in contrast to hopeless treatments such as shock therapy. Through his play, Nowra also encourages the audience to agree with his personal view that war is unnecessary, and in a way is a kind of madness itself, due to its chaotic and uncontrollable nature.

Through their effectual and extensive use of distinctly visual elements and techniques, John Misto’s play ‘The Shoe-Horn Sonata’ and the song ‘I was only 19’ by Redgum, offer a variety of perceptions of the world. Distinctively visual elements and techniques assist us to develop an awareness of languages in other texts and allows us to understand how our perceptions of and relationships with others and the world are shaped through written, spoken and visual language. The play ‘The Shoe-Horn sonata follows the experience of two former women POW, describing their experiences, and trying to reconcile their differences. This play challenges the reader to look past the pain of these characters, at the wider social and political context, which allowed

Owen's poem is certainly disturbing and this is primarily owed to the fact that the story that he

The live performance I have chosen to write about is ‘Warhorse’ which I saw on the 3rd February at the New London Theatre. In this essay, I am going to explain and analyse how the staging and the lighting together created the different atmospheres and moods such as fear and tension. Throughout the play, numerous themes are illustrated such as the barbarity of war and the cruelty of man. The themes of loyalty and hope are also illustrated and portrayed. Not only did the set and lighting help portray these

Working thesis: Bill Viola’s video installation of The Quintet of the Astonished serves as a breaking point for art because of Viola’s ability to so successfully portray and convey the complexity of human feelings.

I am a musician and composer. My work allows me as an artist to use music as an inherent and universal means of communication to invoke my audience in a period of time on an emotional level. I choose music because I feel an image can be interpreted in a plethora of ways while music generally elicits a unanimous emotion that convey a theme instead of being restricted to one central focus. Bheetoven’s, Moonlight Sonata was written for a Countess Giulietta Guicciard whose beauty he said, reflected that of the moon. The musical composition envokes a sense of elegance and imperfection. Like that of an image of nature in a glass of water one could conclude deduce that Bheeetoven’s composition invoked beauty in both its radiance and imperfections.

In the film, Dancer in the Dark, and the movie, The Piano, Lars von Trier and Jane Campion respectively utilise various literary and circumstances. The historical contextual settings of both texts encapsulate worlds of destruction in which the central female protagonists, Ada Mcgrath and Selma Jezkova, withstand the understanding between the native Maori people towards the scripted and sterile play – which served as a form of happiness and communal gathering for Victorian Europeans – suggests that different forms of expression such as drama and music often lacks understanding when compared to reality. Contrastingly, in the musical interludes, von Trier explores the idea that creativity brings a sense of connection and unity through the use of artificial lighting, saturated colour palette, non-diegetic sound track and head shots and long shots exposing a community singing, dancing and embracing. The vibrancy and liveliness in these musical scenes directly contrasts with the raw reduction in the ‘reality’ scenes and ultimately suggests that musicals create a hopeful and reconciliatory world where, contrasting Campion’s, there is “always someone to catch you when you fall.”