The Tragedy of Jimmy Porter 12+

🔖 Seminar paper from the year 2007 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 1,3, University of Mannheim, language: English, abstract: It is widely accepted that John Osborne's play Look Back in Anger was a turning-point in the history of British theatre, a milestone introducing the era of the New British Drama. Osborne remembers: "On 8 May 1956 [...] Look Back in Anger had its opening at the Royal Court Theatre. This [...] particular date seems to have become fixed in the memories of theatrical historians" and Lacey emphasises: "The moment of John Osborne's Look Back in Anger [...] was undoubtedly a symbolic one in the history of post-war British theatre and of post-war culture generally." However, Look Back in Anger was not perceived as a break-through right from the beginning. Rather, Osborne had to cope with shattering criticism and at first, his play was a crushing defeat. Osborne himself summarized the reactions towards Look Back in Anger in his autobiography about thirty years later: "There was a vehement, undisputed judgement: the play was a palpable miss." Nearly all reviews focused on the play's hero Jimmy Porter, whose nature they depicted as the reason for the "essential wrongness" of the play. Jimmy was seen as "a bitter young misfit," "a boor, self-pitying, self-dramatising rebel" and a "cynical, neurotic [young man] of working-class stock," whose "continuous ...