Tom Stoppard and the Craft of Comedy: Medium and Genre at Play by Katherine E. Kelly (review)

Book Reviews examines them all, and without putting up a stoO[ defence of Giraudoux, holds them up for the many lights of hard scrutiny to play on them. Giraudoux's «nationalism," "elitism," "plagiarism" all have their reverse side whether it is (a) the supreme importance of the Limousin inspiration for much of his sensibility, or (b) the desire to be always "first," always new, at the beginning or, finally. (c) to be at the centre of a conjunction of cultural allusion which makes him the "champion of second-order narrative." The chapters of Body's book deal, in order, with "The Amhor-Character" present throughout his work where the process of self-creation coincides with creation itself; "The Limousin Utopia," "The Player" (an engaging account of the ludic element), ''The Feminine Singular" where Body explores the multiple representations of women and the tangled theme of love in the work. In the final chapter, "The Presence of One Now Absent," Body slyly' adopts Giraudoux's own stratagem so succinctly stated in the paradox "[He] knew and p~cticed absence as a way of being present elsewhere." In this way, Body reveals and·conceals at the same time, leaving the reader with his or her own Giraudoux to discover and yet armed with essential suggestions on how to proceed. A final but not insignificant virtue of this admirable little book is the skill with which Body has managed to include the most recent theoretical approaches to the literary text while avoiding those unassimilaled extrusions that so often keep the reader at ~ 's length. The theory of the "subject," of the ludic, representations of women, lexical analysis aU have their place alongside more traditional thematic and philosophical discussion. While being little more than an extended essay. then, Jacques Body's Jean Giraudoux has the breadth and insight of much more ambitious studies. However, the reader must 'not expect to find in it detailed and definitive readings of the work nor a final statement about the man. JOHN K. GILBERT, UNIVERSITY OF TOROJ'IITO KATHERINE E. KELLY. Tom Sroppard and the Craft o/ Comedy: Medium alld Genre at Play. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press 1991. Pp. 179· $27.95. Katherine Kelly's introduction focuses on Stoppard's distrust of single-minded truths. His craftsmanship, "the 'how' of artistic production," exemplifies a stance that is "both active and detached," committed to a conservative humanism yet wary of certitudes. "The self-announcing procedure of parody" and (later) satire in the plays creates an artifice that subverts expected patterns and. from Kelly's point of view, conventional dramatic strategies. Stoppard "at play" toys with stock responses to the outlines of Hamlet or Godor and the cliches of particular genres or media in order to make us think and see differently. Stoppard. Kelly reminds us, has always been in "dread of the overly explicit": he Book Reviews tends to be crafty as well as craftsmanly. Consequently, it is hard to sift the "coded secrets" of his parodies without bruising their comic playfulness. Though Kelly acknowledges that elusiveness in theory, her explications in practice are often beavyhanded . Her account of the radio plays, for instance, outlines the ways they are shaped but shows little sensitivity to their comic nuance as performances. Aware that "Stoppard often includes the conventions of the medium in what there is to laugh about," she lists externals ("the auditor's collaboration in the protagonist's attempt to see with his mind's eye") instead of exploring the playful use of the medium itself. The sound effects of Artist Descending, she explains, "mark location and time, many of the signs that draw attention to their artificiality," whereas the joke behind the sound of horses' hooves or bounding ping-pong balls relies on the fact that they are effects, designed (as all such sounds are) to trick a listener into visualizing something that is actually not "there." Bang two coconut shells together. as Beauchamp does, and rhe listener "sees" a horses here, though, we ought to have seen coconut shells, just as the taped sounds of ping-pong could literally be taped sound. To ring the changes on Magriue, "This is a pipe!" Similarly, Kelly...