Chapter 6 - Love is in the air

Summary

There was a wager . . . as to whether a play can show the very truth and nature of love. I think you lost it today.

Shakespeare in Love (148)

This chapter includes four works – The Real Thing, Indian Ink, – that focus on the nature of love. But as may be expected from a playwright whose works typically engage multiple topics simultaneously, love surfaces in numerous Stoppard plays not included in this section, Jumpers, Night and Day, Arcadia, The Coast of Utopia, and Rock’n’Roll certainly included. In fact, though Stoppard has often been condemned for being a too coldly analytical playwright, many of his works include genuine moments of emotional poignancy. Such moments, however, have been generally overshadowed by Stoppard’s intellectual and farcical intensity. It was not really until the production of The Real Thing in 1982 that the general perspective on Stoppard began to shift and critics began to see levels of emotional honesty even in early works like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead and Jumpers. Directors likewise began creating revivals that tapped into emotions which had until then been downplayed in favor of the plays’ many other Stoppardian strengths. So while this section looks at Stoppard and love as presented by The Real Thing and three successors, it is worth keeping in mind similar emotional dimensions in his many other works.

Conversely, insofar as it is true that his many other plays entwine love in their plots, it must be noted that his love stories are also far more than their billing might suggest. The following are works that remind us of Stoppard’s interest in affairs of the heart, though even as he pursues such affairs, his plays entangle themselves with matters at first glance having little or nothing to do with love.