and this is the rhythm of madness.

Today was overall a good day.  in class today we discussed a couple upcoming shows this week as well as Jerusalem from the other day. That discussion actually helped me out a lot with Jerusalem and I now think I can write a little more understandably in my paper. ha. 

after class, i made a sandwich and then Taty and I returned our fans and I returned a couple packages of hangers I didn't end up using. Today was the 28th day we could return them and we did no problems so I was really glad about that. I also haven't been needing that fan because it's been in the 70s here, so that was good.

afterwards, I knew everyone was going to go do the tower of london today, which I have done plenty. So i decided to just do some stuff around Langton Close. 

So, first off, I went to the Charles Dickens Museum right around the corner whcih I've been meaning to go to for awhile. Dickens lived in this house starting in april 1837 with his wife Catherine and son Charles. He had two daughters while there, wrote Oliver Twist, as well as the publications of Nicholas Nickleby, the Pickwick Papers, and various other writings. 

It was a very quaint home which they've refurbished to look as much like it did then as possible. I was surprised to find out how tall it was: basement, ground floor, and then three upstairs floors. LOTS of stairs, though the five servants of the house really occupied the basement and the top floor. We got to see the rooms where he did his writing, where he entertained guests,  where he slept, where he ate, etc. while there. it was very cute, not as professional as it could have been, but I still liked it. 

Some quirky things on display in the house I liked:

-The Garret WIndow: thye had a window on display that was from the bedroom of ten ear old Dickens. the home was demolished in 1910, but this was preserved.

-They have another window on display that is apparently the one he is describing in Oliver Twist that Oliver is pushed through.

-Illustrations by John Leech: Most novels at that time came with illustrations. The ones on display were actually preliminary pencil sketches for illustrations in the first edition of A Christmas Carol. I thought they were so cool because it was Scrooge each with one of the ghosts, and i have definite found memories of scrooges. ohhh fifth grade.

-Dickens's Dreams: There was this painting originally called A Souvenir of DIckens by Robert W Buss. Howeve,r it is actually barely completely because Buss died and no oe finished it. all you can see are the sketches of it and one area (the area with Dickens is painted). I thought it was on purpose at first, but you can tell up close. It was really cool. It's just a picture of him in a chair daydreaming and coming up with his charactersbut it's a very cool image.

-Also noted no showers in the house. One bathroom. wash room (but only for food then), and a wine cellar (mmmm). 

Then I went back to Langton Close and got my sheet music copied for our mock audition musical practice on wednesday. Im not very excited right now because my throat has been hurting all day and that really makes me nervous, but I'm gonna try to take it easy, though I need to practice a lot tomorrow. 

Then I walked to the British Library. Apparently it's something you should see. That's what I thought - I'm going to see a library, I will look at the books and then I will head out. NO! turns out it's a HUGE library (only people who have been recommended by someone of high standing are even allowed to check books out of there), but there are tons of exhibits of cool books they have. I did two: Henry VIII: the man and monarch. and British Library Treasures. I spent more time in Henry VIII, no duh. It was cool, they just gave information about his life. but they did it through books and documents and parchments and whatnot they have gathered over time. SO it was sorta from a literary perspective. A cool thing I liked was this this church devotion/prayer book that Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn used to pass back and forth to each other during church with little loves notes to each other. There was a message on one page from Henry like "oh forget me not, for i love thee truly, i am yours." yada yada. hehe. :) They also had some love letters to Anne saying he'd marry her. Stuff on all the wives. parchments fromhis childhood. books he'd read and studied while tryin to overthrow the pope. stuff about his empire. Things he'd written on. It was very cool! :)  

The British Library Treasures was just a collection of cool books and historical documents the library has gather over time, dating pretty far back and also a little more recent stuff like on the beatles and whatnot. too cool. 

Finally, on my way to the theater I stopped by the London Transport Museum, which is brand new and right next to Covent Garden. It was AWESOME! They had it all set up like you were going on a "Journey" or a trip and it started from1800 and when to present and just went through train history, underground history, bus history, and some water and taxi history. it was really neat. they had lots of train cars you could get in and check out the differences between them. i liked it a lot, especially the underground history. It's crazy how they used to have literal TRAINS underground, musta been so hard to build and operate. lots of models and stuff you could look at and very modernized. they had a future section though where they talked about all these crazy ideas for transport. should be interesting. anyone that has come to London and done all the major tourist-y places shouldn't definitely check this place out! very cool!

And of course, since I was at Covent Garden I had to get a snack from Ben's Cookies! Triple Chocolate Chunk cookie on vanilla ice cream for two pounds! HELLLOOOOO thank you very much! :D

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4:48 Psychosis.

oh boy.

this play was written by Sarah Kane, who only lived for 28 years and wrote about half a dozen plays. She died in 1998 pretty soon after she wrote this particular play -- she killed herself. At the time, people thought her plays were kinda crazy and too shockin gfor the stage, but today in England she has an important voice in contemporary theater and is highly regarded and appreciated. She utilizes lots of sex and violence, gaining influenced from playwrights from the Jacobean period (not really Shakespeare considering how tame he was in regards to violence and sex, overall anyway), and also Antonin Artaud who wrote "the Theater and its double" and who had a few ideas about theater:  1) the best way to move an audience through theater was to shock them, makes them really think - hence sexual violence, etc. and 2) Theater as sort of a religious place - sacramental. Finally she was influenced by Samuel Beckett in the way that as time moved on for Beckett many of his plays became more internal monologues, stream of consciousness, yadda yadda.

the 4:48 comes from the time that Kane tended to wake up every morning when she was depressed. The play is pretty much a troubled state of mind of one girl. and it's spoken in a stream of consciousness way; there's no names, many times in the script nothing is capitalized or has punctuation and there's also absolutely no information in the script about how to produce or direct it, do what you will with it. 

SO the show. was an hour and ten minutes. of Anamaria Marinca as the girl. talking. about how depressed she was. and how nothing mattered. "I'm fat. i'm lonely. i can't eat. i can't sleep." and lots of silence. lots adn lots of silence. you know, she didn't move the entire play. a whole hour, she just stood there and spoke, whenever she felt like it really. 

SO....not up my alley. BUT, I thought the girl did amazing. what an incredibly difficult role to play. Some of the guys were like "Well yeah, but she messed up on a couple lines." SHE SPOKE FOR AN HOUR AND TEN MINUTES. pretty much crying. i cant even imagine. the dedication. the emotional anxiety that takes to get there. it must me so hard. so i have a lot of respect for that.

some quotes: 

"what do you off your friends to make them so supportive."

"the truth no one utters."

"You've touched me so deep...and I can't be that for you because I can't find you."

"I miss a woman who was never born."

"It's not your fault...I know...but you allow it."

"the doctor told me I had 80 minutes to live. I had spent half an hour in a waiting room." 

"an this is the rhythm of madness."

"look away from me."

"it'll never pass."

"Beautiful pain that says I exist."

"You're my last hope...you don't need a friend, you need a doctor."

"I feel your pain but I cannot hold your life in my hands."

"You'll be fine. You're strong."

"I'm angry because I understand. Not because I don't."

"You'll always have a piece of me because you held my life in your hands."

"as still as my voice when you are gone."

"Swallowed. Slit. Hung. it is done."

"The capture. the rapture. the rupture of a soul."

"Watch me vanish."

but yeah, it's down there with been so long. 

The Cherry Orchard tomorrow! yay! :)

Night!

Much Love,

Becca

p.s. i took tons of pictures up today from all the museums, ill try and put some up in the next couple days.