NAME >> NETTY NUR RAHMAWATI
NUMBER >> A. 320 080 037
CLASS >> DRAMA ( A )
Assignment 4 of DRAMA
THE ZOO STORY
by
Edward Albee
- Structural elements of The Zoo Story
The structural elements of The Zoo Story is divided into five parts, they are: character and characterization, setting, plot, style, and theme.
1. Character and Characterization
In The Zoo Story, the are two kinds of characters, and they are major and minor character. The major characters in this play are Jerry and Peter. Both of them are played by the actors. And the minor characters are Colored Queen, Puerto Rican Family, The Landlady, and The Girl. These characters are not played by the actors, theyonly appear in the dialogue between Jerry and Peter as the major characters, but they are able to support the major characters and make them more alive.
a. Major Characters
1) Peter
Peter is the protagonist in The Zoo Story who after coming to Central Park to spend some time alone on his favorite bench to read a book on a Sunday afternoon, has his life forever changed by Jerry, who confronts him He holds an executive position at a small publishing house that publishes textbooks. These details about Peter’s life all come out of the dialogue that he has with Jerry, and although at first they seem to be trivial facts, they serve an important function in establishing the two different worlds in which Peter and Jerry live.
Physically, Peter is neither far nor gaunt, and neither handsome nor homely. He is for about forty years old and is also neat in his appearance.
Quotation:
PETER: A man in his early forties, neither fat nor gaunt, neither handsome nor homely. He wears tweeds, smoke a pipe, carries horn-rimmed glasses. Although he is moving into middle age, his dress and his manner would suggest a man younger. Peter is an educated man. He likes reading books such as Time magazine, etc. Peter is also a religious man who has Catholicity of taste including in his favorite writers. in the play, he often uses the word “Oh My God”. Peter works as a book publisherwho earns for about eighteen thousand a year so that he can be said as an upper middle class. He also lives on Seventy Fourth Street which seems to be an elite area. Peter seems to have a happy and complete family. he has wife, two daughters, two parakeets, and two cats.
2) Jerry
Jerry, the antagonist in The Zoo Story, confronts Peter while he is reading a book in Central Park and coerces him into partaking in an act of violence. Albee gives the following description of Jerry: “A man in his late thirties, not poorly dressed, but carelessly. What was once a trim and lightly muscled body has begun to go to fat; and while he is no longer handsome, it is evident that he once was.” His falls from his physical grace should suggest debauchery; he has, to come closest to it, a great weariness. jerry is a lower middle class man who has no job and lives in a slum apartment. As a poor man, he only has few things in his apartments. He also doesn’t have any happy family like Peter. He comes a broken unhappy family. His mother has an affair with someone else.
b. Minor Characters
The minor characters in this story are not mentioned by their names. They are called with their sobriquets or nicknames.
1) The Colored Queen
He also lives in the same roominghouse with Peter. He is quite weird who sometimes plucks his eyebrows. He always uses is Japanese kimono and goes to the John a lot.
2) The Puerto Rican Family
The Puerto Rican family consits of a husband, a wife, and some kids. they entertain a lot.
3) The Landlady
The Landlady has a disgusting dog. She is a fat, ugly, and full of garbage.
4) The Girl
The Girl here is also Jerry’s neighbor. She always cries and cries all the time.
2. Setting
a. Setting of Place
The Zoo Story is a confrontation between middle-class America and the outcasts of society. Set in central park, Peter, an average American, is confronted by Jerry, a lonely man from the wrong side of the park. Jerry tries to teach Peter the realities of life that Peter has tried to ignore. He tries to teach Peter the nature of human existence and relationships. Through a serious of failed conversations and misinterpretations of the act of love, Jerry begins his experiment to see if the middle class Americas are animals after all. He always spends his time reading a book there. Peter feels satisfied when he reads in this bench. He considers that the bench is his own bench. He never gives up the bench to Jerry who tries to push out him.
b. Setting of Time
The setting of time in this play is on Sunday afternoon in summer, the present. Peter always spends his time reading a book in the park on Sunday afternoon.
3. Plot
a. Exposition:
In The Zoo Story, Edward Albee begins his play with a narration which introduces the major characters, Jerry and Peter and also their physical appearance. Then, it continues to the dialogue between two major characters who talks about their own lives.
b. Complication
The complication in this play begins when Jerry starts to asks the bench which always be used by Peter. he forces Peter to share the bench. He persuades Peter by mocking and punching him. But, Peter does not want to give it because he thinks that he possesses the bench.
c. Climax
The climax happens when Jerry is stabbed by Peter although he does unintentionally. Jerry is stabbed by his own ugly-looking knife. he asks Peter to hold the knife. but, Peterrefuses it. Jerry tries to persuade Peter by mocking him until he gets angry. Finally, Peter takes the knife, not to kill jerry, but only to defend. Suddenly, Jerry impales himself on the knife and he is stabbed. Actually, he tries to suicide.
d. Resolution
The resolution of The Zoo Story happens when finally Jerry dies because he is stabbed by his own knife. Surprisingly, Jerry says thanks to Peter because suicide susseeds. He also asks Peter to leave the park and clean his fingerprints on the knife so that there will be no evidence and no one knows that.
e. Causality
It starts from the appearance of Jerry in the park in which Peter sits on the bench there while reading a book. He forces Peter to get along in a conversation. Peter can’t refuse it. Then, they talk about their own lives. Jerrry tells him about “The Story of Jerry and the Dog”. But, after that, he forces Peter to give the bench. Peter refuses it because he thnks that it is his. Jerry tries to get it until he takes his knife out. He asks Peter to fight and take the knife. Based on those events, the relationship among events shows that the play has a good causality.
f. Plausability
The ending of the story is rather strange. The plausability of The Zoo Story is really unpredictable because he plot is not reasonable. How two men who do not know each other can fight for bench until one of them dies. The bench here seems unworthy. But, they fight for it. By sequencing the plot and events of the play, Albee builds and absurd and surprising plot.
4. Style
In this play, Edward Albee uses both of long and short sentence in the dialogue. He uses yes or no answer for short sentences and also a long narration when the figurative of Jerry tells his story in the dialogue. The first major character, peter, is drawn as a man who comes from upper class. He is an educated man so that he uses polite expression in the conversation and he knows the medical terms that someone from the lower class like Jerry does not know.
5. Theme
The Zoo Story by Edward Albee details what happens when one character enters the life of another character and quickly changes it forever. In the play, Jerry confronts Peter while he sits quietly reading on a bench in Central Park; through a quick series of events, Jerry forces Peter into helping him kill himself. Layered throughout this short one-act play are three overriding themes: absurdity versus reality, alienation and loneliness, and wealth and poverty.
B. Conclussion
The main theme in this play is about the bad side from the social gap between the upper and lower social class because it can make someone can do everything without thinking whether it is good or not and the ignorance of the upper level can make yhose from lower level be envy. So, this drama appeared of Man vs. Society.
The Zoo Story is a confrontation between middle-class America and the outcasts of society. Set in central park, Peter, an average American, is confronted by Jerry, a lonely man from the wrong side of the park. Jerry tries to teach Peter the realities of life that Peter has tried to ignore. He tries to teach Peter the nature of human existence and relationships. Through a serious of failed conversations and misinterpretations of the act of love, Jerry begins his experiment to see if the middle class Americas are animals after all.
In The Zoo Story Albee shows that building up a relationship in this cold society is only possible in using violence, be it verbal or physical violence. Jerry’s attempts to win the world for himself with friendliness have been in vain. Jerry demonstrates that violence seems to be the only opportunity. The attempt to poison the dog and his suicide prove that. Albee also shows the human misunderstandings and the failure of communication between Peter and Jerry who stand for different social classes in America.
The conversation mirrors the discrepancy between lower class and upper class in the American society. What looks like a dialogue in this one-act play is more or less Jerry’s monologue as Peter’s answers are just passive, defensive or empty politeness. He is not really interested in listening to Jerry’s problems or in contributing to the conversation.
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