Preview

a small family business

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
645 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
a small family business
A SMALL FAMILY BUSINESS
How does Alan Ayckbourn make use of comic resources in the play? (page 1-3)

From “A Small Family Business” a play in which people work together as a team, united to reach to the same goal and sharing values, the author Alan Ayckbourn exposes atmospheres of humorous situations to cut with tension and make the scene weird and funny at the same time.
Various comic resources are used in this first scene where Jack is coming back from work and his wife, Poppy, waits for him with a great welcome surprise where family and friends are gathering together too.
He makes use of ironic situations, sarcasm, visual and black humor, dramatic and embarrassing situations also, to make up this scene a humorous scene.

The first situation of humor in this scene is between the dialogue of Yvonne and Ken:
Yvonne: “Jack is here, Mr Ayres. He has just arrives”
Ken: “Jack who?” Ayckbourn is using black humor in this situation as a comic resource. We can interpret this because it’s obvious of which “Jack” Yvonne is talking about, and Ken is trying to call the attention asking what Jack, Yvonne is talking about. Ken knows the answer, but he makes the situation funny by asking that question, and as an objective he wants to cut with the tension they were all passing through while they were hidden in the dark silence. As another comic resource, we can stand out the visual humor, because of the ridiculous situation of when Poppy moves into the kitchen, and pretends to be busy herself at the sink so that Jack doesn’t suspect anything out of the ordinary when he sees her, while on the next room, the whole family is hidden in the dark and giggling for silence. Everyone knows from where Jack is going to arrive, and in which moment, but Jack doesn’t have a clue of what’s going on. Here, the author makes use of visual humor because of the actions that the characters are making; they make quite a comic scene. Sarcasm is also state in this scene when Jack

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Better Essays

    Chris Lilley obviously wants characters within the scene to be perceived as humorous and from last night I can now appreciate that not everyone will have the same response to a text. We all react in our own unique way bringing our various life experiences to the piece. A composer’s intent for a text often differs from the audience’s response.…

    • 1313 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    This paragraph will show how scenes with comedy used within the movie can alter a mood change to the people relating to the situation.…

    • 601 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The author reveals humor in the story with Daves', Stephanie's father, attitude towards his daughter's boyfriend, Paul. Being a father, Dave feels uncomfortable with his daughter dating; thus, humor is created through awkward situations. Clearly showing humor, when Dave sees that Paul has bought Stephanie flowers, "he wince[s]." However, Dave is glad that Paul does not look like him because "he had read that if a girl didn't feel love from her father she would look for someone just like her father to love her." Apprehensive of his daughter dating, Dave acts humorously when his insecurities are resolved when he concludes that since Paul looks nothing like him, his daughter must love him. Through Dave's uneasiness with Paul, humor is evident through his insecurities and awkwardness.…

    • 354 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    A lot of the humour is melodramatic. One of the melodramas is when the man from Ironbark knocks out the barber. Another melodrama is…

    • 377 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Hunting and Ralph

    • 732 Words
    • 3 Pages

    4. He scolds Jack for hunting while he should have been watching the fire and he tells him he can’t even build a hut. This act symbolizes Jack’s true violent nature and that he is really just a bully.…

    • 732 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Parks’s Topdog/Underdog and Gish Jen’s Typical American, comedy in dialogue is implemented to mislead the audience away from the serious and tragic nature the works. While on the surface the dialogue in both of the stories may seem humorous, there is a deeper and more serious meaning that is foreshadowed by the remarks of the characters (mainly Booth’s and Ralph’s) throughout the story. Due to this, it is as if the audience is deliberately blinded by comedy until there is a sudden shift in the tone of the stories towards the brutal reality of Lincoln’s and Theresa’s fates.…

    • 1802 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Humor - Humor is apparent in his section headings, “The Prince of Prescriptivists”, “Linguists Spring into Action” (MacNeil, page 307) and in the examples that he includes “In downtown Pittsburgh—pronounced “dahntahn”—the question, ‘Did you eat yet?’ sounds like ‘Jeet jet?’”(MacNeil, page 312). He uses humor to keep the audience's attention, so he can insert more sensitive and educational topics.…

    • 441 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Different characters provide different symbols. Jack is a symbol of savagery and anarchy. Golding relates this to the evil and cruel people in the world. When Jack first arrives on the island he is excited to have rules for their new settlement. Jack exclaims on pg. 33 “ We’ll have rules!” he cried excitedly. “Lots of rules!…” Jack changes his view on rules towards the end of the story because he rebels from Ralph’s leadership and starts his own clan. Jack’s character goes from a choirboy who doesn’t have that much power to a savage and power hungry character without guidelines. While Jack’s first attempt to kill the pig failed, his quote “ Before I could kill it-but-next time!” foreshadowed his future of savage hunting. When Jack shows signs of belligerence by arguing with Ralph, the meaning of a child is stressed. The fighting of Jack and Ralph in the early chapters, foreshadows the future conflicts between them in the future. In chapter four called “ Painted Faces and Long Hair”, Jack’s savagery is becoming more known. Jack’s mask of face paint represents a cover that he can hide behind, which liberates and frees him, allowing him to do anything when wearing it, without worrying about any important matters. Jack still does not understand Ralph’s concern with the fire, and…

    • 1189 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    * A great deal of humour comes in the play in the form of insults towards the directors. For example when Lewis defensively asserts Justin that “I am not a ward, I am director”. This creates a sense of humour because the educated audience would think that there is no…

    • 949 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    An example when Alexie’s character, Jackson Jackson used humor in this story was when he was awoken from a drunken comma on the railroad tracks by a police officer. As Jackson wakes up he recognizes Officer Williams, a good white cop with a sweet tooth. “I am taking you over to detox,” Officer Williams said. “No man, that place is awful. It is full of drunken Indians.” They both laughed and drove off. “I do not know how you guys do it” he said. “What guys?” Jackson asked. “You Indians. How the hell you laugh so much? I just picked your ass off the railroad tracks, and you’re making jokes.” he said. Jackson replied, “The two funniest tribes i have ever been around are Indians and Jew, so I guess that says something about the inherent humor of genocide.” In this conversation Jackson uses humor to find laughter in a situation where Indian stereotypes say that all Indians are alcoholics. A further meaning to this is that Jackson uses humor to get past this situation. When compared to his life, multiple divorces, flunking out of college, and being a homeless alcoholic, shows his capability of moving on past events the way he laughed off the comment about drunken…

    • 275 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    She is able to see humor in her need for order and cleanliness … and in her tendency to forget the word she wanted to use and her…

    • 982 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    1. Humor and irony are used as a comedic relief in the story. Atwood uses them to downplay the seriousness involving rape. An example is seen when Chrissy is beginning her story and Estelle says “so who takes baths with their clothes on?’ I found her sarcasm very humorous. Irony can also be seen in her own rape fantasies when she somehow persuades the fellow from not raping her. It is ironic because they usually end up helping each other out, when in reality, that is not what happens during rape.…

    • 400 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Brush uses imagery and irony to portray the feelings and emotions to express the current state of the married couple. Brush uses imagery to depict a joyous and anticipated moment, "... the violin-and-piano orchestra played " Happy Birthday to You" and the wife beamed with shy pride over her little surprise, and such few people as there were in the restaurant tried to help out with a pattering of applause,"throughout imagery this excerpt expresses the euphoria that the wife and public felt. However, it is later on that we realize the irony,"...the husband was not pleased..."…

    • 313 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    He’s explaining to Jack that children will always ask questions to things they don’t understand and should always answer them.…

    • 1332 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Immediately after Gwendolen said that she started questioning Jack, which is an example of verbal irony. When Lady Bracknell entered and asked Algernon if Jack’s country estate is where his friend Bunbury lived, he told her that Bunbury died. The irony in Algernon’s situation is that Bunbury doesn’t even exist. Lady Bracknell is an ironic character, because she values money and status although she married into fortune. Towards the end of the act, a few occasions of situational irony occurs throughout the end of the plot. One example was when readers found out that Jack is actually Algernon’s brother, but was lost when Miss Prism put him in her handbag instead of the three-volume manuscript she wrote. The fact that readers most like didn’t expect to find out that the handbag Jack was found in was Miss Prism’s could be considered situational irony. Another example was when Jack was trying to find out his Christian name and it ended up actually being Ernest John. When he learned about his true origin it turned out he didn’t really lie, and it allowed him to finally be engaged to…

    • 535 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays

Related Topics