The author of Equus‚ Peter Shaffer‚ explores the idea of differing views of Religion by showing contrasting characters and conflicting points of view. Specifically focusing on how showing the contrasting ideas of sanity and insanity in regards to Alan and Dysart. These techniques of contrasting characters and contrasting points of view are used to explore the main idea of what is normal. The issue with points of view in Equus is that the characters all believe they are right and that their view
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In Equus by Peter Shaffer‚ Martin Dysart is the psychiatrist of Alan Strang. He is assigned to investigate Alan’s horrible crime of blinding six horses with a spike. During his investigation‚ Dysart questions his career and life and whether it’s his passion. Even though Alan Strang suffers throughout the play‚ Dysart seems to be the one to experience true tragic. As soon as Dysart heard Strang’s story‚ he questions everything that he accepted in his life. This is learned when he starts to trust
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Equus‚ a play by Peter Shaffer‚ written in 1973 was performed on Forbes Center Stage by James Madison University students. It introduced actors- Chris Consaul‚ Noah Heie- allowing them to perform complex roles full of emotion. The playwrights inspiration originated from a friends recount of a story heard at a most recent dinner party in London; a young man who blinded 26 horses with a spike. This story was enough to fascinate Peter Shaffer in constructing a play around it. Alan Strang‚ a unstable
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Equus is a play in which present and past collide and intertwine in spectacular and thematically significant ways. Psychoanalysis (a process of evaluating mental health that was developed by Sigmund Freud) drives the plot forward‚ as the psychiatrist Martin Dysart succeeds in drawing out of Alan Strang a series of repressed memories. His intention is to achieve abreaction‚ which is the discharge of the emotional energy attached to a repressed idea. Theatrically‚ the past events in the plot of Equus are
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the beginning of ‘Equus’ one considers the character of Martin Dysart to be normal as he rarely strays outside of societies boundaries. However‚ as we move through the play one discovers there is much more to Martin Dysart than once thought. In reality the themes dealt with in ‘Equus’ challenges our own sense of what is normal. They are as equally as shocking to Dysart‚ yet made justifiable by Alan Strang’s worship for Equus‚ the god of horses. This is why ‘Peter Shaffer’ uses ‘Equus’ as a sort of device
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good smile in a child’s eyes—all right. It is also the dead stare in a million adults. It both sustains and kills—like a God" (Shaffer 62). Normality exists in a medical textbook; weight of this number‚ intelligence quotient of this quantity‚ social functioning of this quality. Alan Strang and Victor of Aveyron fail to meet standards of normality. In Peter Shaffer’s Equus‚ Dr. Martin Dysart attempts to normalize his patient Alan. In François Truffaut’s L’Enfant Sauvage (1970)‚ Dr. Jean Itard sought
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Equus is as complex as the human mind. Exploring psychological questions such as what does it mean to be normal‚ and should individuality be sacrificed for the sake of normality? Whilst propelling a mystery‚ crime story‚ and a psychological thriller‚ Peter Shaffer’s Equus examines the minds of a young stable boy who has blinded several horses and the aging psychiatrist asked to "cure" him. But would a "cure" really normalize the teenager? A seventeen year old boy‚ Alan is brought to a psychiatric
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Compare and contrast the ways in which ‘The Crucible’ and Equus’ follow when religious faith turns into religious mania. How far does the two text attempt to present a more positive attitude to a life lived in faith? The plays ‘Equus’ and ‘The Crucible’ both explore the positive aspects of religion and its damaging qualities. The critic Mitchel Hay suggests that ‘The parental‚ adolescent and professional conflicts exhibited by Peter Shaffer’s Equus need not be disruptive. They can be fed into a crucible
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In Equus‚ Shaffer uses Dysart’s monologue to explore whether it is better to rehabilitate or incarcerate children whom commit crimes‚ while in Border Crossing‚ Barker uses dialogue. Shaffer uses Dysart’s opening monologue to show that while rehabilitation seems more effective than incarceration‚ it can leave people with no worship or imagination. Dysart states that ‘[he’s] officiating at some... ritual sacrifice… the sacrifice is a herd of children‚’ indicating that Dysart knows that although he
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Diego Avelar Psychology Mini Paper #3 Nov. 19th‚ 2013 Dr. Kenneth Anich The movie Equus by Peter Shaffer is psychological thriller‚ in which Freudian psychology is vividly portrayed; Self-Defense Mechanisms‚ interpretations of dreams‚ the pleasure principle‚ and death drive (Thanatos). The main character‚ 17-year-old Alan Strang‚ is sent to psychiatrist Martin Dysart‚ after he gouges out the eyes of 6 horses. Throughout the movie‚ Dysart struggles with the possibility of curing Alan‚ stripping
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