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NAME:Zeynep Burcu
SURNAME:CEVHERLİ
NUMBER:01120525
COURSE: ACL 435
DATE:Dec,31,2008
INSTRUCTOR: Mehmet Yılmaz
My paper bases on the feminist play writer Wendy Wasserstein’s play Heidi Chronicles and Beth Henley’s play Crimes of Hearts, which includes feministic point of view. Heidi Chronicles deals with the changing role of woman during 1960s. Moreover, Crimes of Hearts is about three sisters’ struggle to survive without family support and about how they cope with their emotional failures. I will compare and contrast the protagonist’s characters, their lives and their perspectives on life. Then, I will talk that the reason that make these plays feminist drama. In addition I will mention that the men who has an important roles and who gives us some clues about the writer’s point of views towards the male characters in both plays.
The female protagonists in both plays give us some ideas about female’s roles in both the plays, which takes place at that those times. Heidi is Heidi Chronicles’ protagonist. The play follows Heidi from high school in the 1960s to her career as a successful art historian. She is well-educated New England woman in East coast setting. On the contrast, that Beth Henley’s protagonist Lenny is from South, and she lives in a small town. She passes her days at home. On the other words one may say that she is a homemaker; while Heidi is an art historian. Both characters lament their lack of identities. Lenny sees herself a victim of life as she is the head of house. She has devoted herself to caring for their sick grandmother, and she is afraid of losing her grandmother. Because she will be alone when her grandmother dies. She says that “Things sure are gonna be different around here... When Old Granddaddy dies. Well, not for you two really,but for me.”(page:59) Unlike her younger sister, she still lives in their childhood home. All this self-sacrificing make her unhappy. One...