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What Is The Irony In Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?

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Who 's afraid of Virginia Woolf? Is set in the fictitious New England College town of New Carthage. It becomes apparent that the house is on the campus of a small New England college. The fact that George and Martha live on campus shows that they 're both firmly under the thumb of Martha 's father, who is the president of the university. It 's also interesting that Albee describes it specifically as a small college. This makes George look like even more of a flop, as he can 't even move up in the ranks where there 's undoubtedly less competition than there would be at a large university. It also makes Martha 's worship of her father seem more pathetic ( Solomon 123 ).

The three-act structure of who 's afraid of Virginia …show more content…

The play Who 's afraid of Virginia Woolf is popular for its very cynical type of writing and for its usage of a lot, if not too much of black humor. Harsh aggressive Language with sexual connotations. E.g: " Hump ', " angel-tits", " you should try me.. " is constantly used by the characters involved in order to shock and irritate the reader and the audience
( Kichmayar 4 ).

The kind of language used can be noticed in Martha 's Relation with George. The dialogue between the two can be described as most extravagantly absurd. George and Martha know that they are at times of entertaining, acting and even using their guests for their own theatrical purpose.
( Bollobas 59 ).

All the characters are involved in a complex language game. The two masters of the ceremony, George and Martha are experienced players, who normally make up or change the rules as they go along, and show a fire ear to their modulation all along. They play different kinds of plays/ games, which could be brought under headings like games of revelation and deceit, truth and falsehood, reality and make-believe
( Kichmayar 3 …show more content…

Even those who found the play 's themes too unsettling or the subject matter unsavory had high praise for his skill as a playwright. His sharp and incisive dialogue is only one of the elements that make Albee 's style both recognizable and memorable ( Kichmayar 15 )

Humor in Who 's afraid of Virginia Woolf is often very funny, George and Martha are so verbally skillful that their exchanges often make you laugh at the same time you feel the pain they inflict. Examples of Albee 's humor come in several categories .Wit as an Example " there are many " George responds to Martha when she has changed into a revealing outfit: " Why, Martha… your Sunday chapel dress !( Solomon 70 ).

Farce is apparent as George appears with the shotgun that " explodes " into a colored parasol. Also, George open the door to their guests as Martha screams " Screw you" . Furthermore, Insult Humor George and Martha are expert at pointed bitchery. Their insults are accurate, deadly, yet often hilarious ( Solomon 20

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From the start of the play Mary felt mistreated by her teachers. When she voiced her displeasure, she was often confronted with questions and ended up getting punished. Mary would often exaggerate her sorrows and faked illnesses to get out of punishments. Fearing that she would have to return to school , Mary persuaded her grandmother to let her stay by suggesting Karen and Martha are lesbians.

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In two passages, Virginia Woolf compares meals she was served at a men’s and at a women’s college. The contrasting meals reveal Woolf’s frustration at the inferior treatment that women face. The first meal at the men’s college is elegant, enjoyable, and satisfying while the second is plain, cheap, and bland. This clearly juxtaposes the expense and luxury afforded to the men with the “penny-pinching” nature of the women’s in order to show Woolf’s underlying attitude of dissatisfaction against the inequality that women are not granted the same privileges and investment as men.

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The play, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, written by Edward Albee in 1962, is set on a chilly winter night in New England University during the time of The Cold War. It gives a vital insight into the American life through two couples while bringing out the raw human truth behind the phony exterior portrayed by the society. Albee presents characters caught in hopeless, repetitive, and meaningless situation, trying to battle their inner turmoil between truth and illusions. The meaninglessness of life is further brought out through the distorted relationships between the characters by Albee’s characterisation. He brings out the sense of Nihilism where the lack of belief in the world is fuelled by the fear of a nuclear war.

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The diction and tone in Woolf’s essay affects her message as it was melancholy and calm. The diction was clear and understandable to ensure that the audience could understand her message, rather than try and decipher large incoherent words. Woolf also uses many words with negative connotations, but takes a neutral attitude to the subject. At the beginning of the essay Woolf 's tone is very hopeful, but as the essay progresses it turns dark and somber. At the beginning Woolf used phrasing such as “ Pleasant morning” (Woolf 5) and “enormous energy of the world”(Woolf 24) .

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This can be exhibited when she states “..that a highly gifted girl who had tried to use her gift for poetry would have been so thwarted and hindered by other people, so tortured and pulled asunder by her own contrary instincts, that she must have lost her health and sanity to a certainty.” Woolf desires to validate the idea that “woman cannot write the plays of Shakespeare” but intends to clarify that this is not due to a lack of talent or ability equal to that of men, but simply because the societal structures at the time rendered it impossible for them to be equally successful. In the development of her argument, Woolf starts out by exposing the belief that it was impossible for women to “have the genius of Shakespeare” and she contextualises the reader with some basic information, given by an authority figure “Professor Trevelyan” about women’s conditions during the era. Woolf then provides the reader with a hypothetical situation to ponder on: What if Shakespeare had had a sister — that is, a female sibling of

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