Cosi Lewis Nowra Essay
Lewis Nowra’s semi auto biographical play ‘Cosi’ is a touching yet biting portrayal of human relationships in a Melbourne mental institute, where the patients are astracised by society. Throughout the play Lewis Nowra illustrates each and every character that suffers with a mental illness as normal people with a desire to do or think things different to others from the society of the 1970s. Throughout the play Nowra poses a question, can anybody be classified as insane? When there is insanity all around us. The play they are to perform ‘Cosi fan Tutte’ is a play about love and fidelity which becomes a topic of disagreement of the cast. Act 1 Scene 3 addresses love and fidelity & Confusion with reality & illusion With Nowra’s intelligent use of dramatic techniques such as Characterization, Dialogue & Symbolism to present his central ideas within ‘Cosi’.
‘Cosi’ is a dramatic play written by Lewis Nowra, which is set in the early 1970s in the midst of the Vietnam War. The inmates in the asylum are to performance of Mozart’s opera ‘Cosi fan Tutte’ as a therapeutic technique to the patients and is directed by an insecure university graduate Lewis, who brings the patients together and becomes as involved into the play as every other member of the cast and gets labelled as ‘one of them’ by society outside the asylum.
In act 1 scene 3 moments after the toilets in the theatre have been a result of Doug’s pyromaniac problem. The cast re assemble and continue on with the play, during the play Ruth is confused between reality & illusion and the number of steps she needs to take in each scene “I was wondering where you wanted me to walk and how many steps?” Nowra canvases Ruth’s confusion between reality and illusion through to the audience with the use of characterization, amplifying Ruth’s obsessive disorder through to us the audience in a way where we get a sense of understanding on the obsessive-ness in Ruth’s character and her disorder.
The theme of love and fidelity
‘Cosi’ is a dramatic play written by Lewis Nowra, which is set in the early 1970s in the midst of the Vietnam War. The inmates in the asylum are to performance of Mozart’s opera ‘Cosi fan Tutte’ as a therapeutic technique to the patients and is directed by an insecure university graduate Lewis, who brings the patients together and becomes as involved into the play as every other member of the cast and gets labelled as ‘one of them’ by society outside the asylum.
In act 1 scene 3 moments after the toilets in the theatre have been a result of Doug’s pyromaniac problem. The cast re assemble and continue on with the play, during the play Ruth is confused between reality & illusion and the number of steps she needs to take in each scene “I was wondering where you wanted me to walk and how many steps?” Nowra canvases Ruth’s confusion between reality and illusion through to the audience with the use of characterization, amplifying Ruth’s obsessive disorder through to us the audience in a way where we get a sense of understanding on the obsessive-ness in Ruth’s character and her disorder.
The theme of love and fidelity