Interview: The First Cycle

Interview: Edward Bond The First Cycle Edward Bond is a leading British dramatist; he has also written a number of film scripts. Among his works for the stage are: Saved, Lear, The Sea, Narrow Road to the Deep North, Bingo, andThe Fool. His most recent work is an opera, We Come to the River, for which he wrote the libretto and Hans Werner Henze composed the music. This interview was recorded by Glenn Loney for PAJ in the Summer of 1975. LONEY: There are a number of richly comic characters and situations in The Sea. A grande dame who lords it over everyone else, a draper who thinks beings from outer space have invaded his Edwardian sea-coast town . . . a bizarre but funny funeral, a parody amateur play rehearsal. And yet there is a far more serious tone to it, beyond comedy. BOND: If you mean a comedy as a bag of laughs, well, I don't mean comedy by that. I hope that one would laugh at The Sea very much. Laughing is one of the most dignified things men can do. It's a learning process. In the last fifty years, I suppose comedy has been reduced to the gag. Of course, in that sense, one wouldn't be interested in calling a play a comedy! LONEY: But there seems to be an undertone of sadness in the play, especially at the close. That life is hard and lonely, and all we can do is endure. BOND: I wanted it to be an optimistic play. That is, I wanted to be able to reassure people about their ability to cope, not only with their private problems, but also with their political problems. That human beings have the strength to do that, provided they have the political will. So I wanted 37 it to reassure them. I dislike the Theatre of the Absurd because I think it's basically pessimistic-and therefore cynical-theatre. Its ultimate effect is to destroy in people a confidence and their trust in themselves. If one could create in people a genuine confidence in their ability . . . that would encourage people to realize that they can find meaning in their lives and meaning in their activities. That's why I call The Sea a comedy. LONEY: Near the end, the grandedame tells the hero's fiancee why she has lorded it over the villagers, urging her to go away. Is this lady trying to find meaning in her seemingly wasted life? BOND: No. That's her excuse. But what is nice about her is that she did have to find an excuse. She wasn't like the draper, the fascist who turns his own weaknesses into hysterical convictions. He is always right, or the party is always right, or the race is always right. But she says, "I felt there were no alternatives, and I have to apologize for what I have allowed myself to become." I think what she says about herself is ultimately unacceptable. I don't think you can push people around in the way she does, and then find a legitimate excuse for it. That's wrong. That's the excuse of a lot of leadership-and it's absolute nonsense. LONEY: Several reviewers think The Sea is really an organic analyis of societyBOND Reviewers can't think, but go on! LONEY: In the final scene, doesn't the old hermit offer a kind of social analysis to the dead boy's chum and his fiancee? That the world is an infinitely cruel place, but you've somehow got to fight through? BOND: He doesn't in fact say that alllife is cruel. It's very interesting you thought that. He says exactly the opposite of that, but we're so conditioned by the sort of things we have said to us every day that we pick up a few words, and we assume. "Violence! Aha! We're all destructive! We all want to go out and kill everyone else!" And so on. So we fit everything into our received pattern of thought-or lack of thought-which is a thing one musn't do. Intellectually , it's a very bad...