Monday, July 8, 2013

In "Tape" by Jose Rivera, identify the conflict and resolution (if any) of the play.

In Jose Rivera's play called "Tape," the conflict of the
story is that the Person (who is in a room and is very uncertain about what is to happen
there) is dead—and aware of it—and he is in a place where he must answer for the life he
has led. This seems to represent the conflict in the play: the Person facing his
"sins."


Even though the Attendant offers as much help as
possible, the Person becomes frustrated and verbally aggressive, though he apologizes,
also, several times. It's uncertain whether the Person is in Heaven or in hell: this may
represent an unusual form of "Judgment Day." The Person is being forced to look back
over his life. This might not seem too bad until we recall that the Attendant informs
the Person that outside there are ten thousand boxes, filled with tapes. The Person must
listen to each tape—the Attendant will be outside the entire time. However, this is not
even what is so disconcerting. The Attendant explains that the time the Person must
spend listening is unique to him. The Person will have to listen to
himself, only to his voice. The Attendant href="http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/elucidate">elucidates:


readability="23">

Listening, word by word, to every lie you ever
told while you were alive…Every ugly lie to every person, every single time, every
betrayal, every lying thought, every time you lied to yourself, deep in your mind, we
were listening, we were recording, and it's all in these tapes, ten thousand boxes of
them, in your own worlds, one lie after the next, over and over, until we're
finished.



The Person is
horrified and apologizes, repeatedly, but there is no way out. The very idea of having
to listen to ten thousand boxes worth of lies indicates not only what
kind of man the Person was in life, but just how
long this process is going to take—perhaps not an eternity, but a
very long time.


The conflict is that
the Person must face up to the kind of person he was while he lived. There is
no resolution at the play's end. We, as the audience, are left
listening to (perhaps) a mother's voice demanding where he has
been, and we watch as the Person prepares to listen to the
first of his
lies.


Additional
Source
:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/José_Rivera_(playwright)

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