A taste of honey test Flashcards
Summary of Act one Scene one
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Helen , act one scene one
- Helen and Jo move in to a flat , helpless and hopeless , described as being “surrounded by teneents and slaughterhouses”
- Introduced to the atypical relationship between Helen and jo ,-“why can’t you leave thins alone .”
- get an isnight into helens rootless life , hiding from someone , constantly on the move jo describes as living of her “immoral earnigs” .
Themes in act one scene one - Helen
Peter’s presence emphasises the complexity of the relationship between mother and daughter. On the face of it there is little affection between
-Helen’s poverty is partly due to her own lack of ambition, will-power and sense of her own worth.
• It is clear, though, that she finds herself in this situation partly because of the role of women in 1950s society: they are dependant upon men. •
Poverty and a lack of decent living conditions are commonplace.
act one scne two helen
helen talks about jo’s father as being retarded , but She also claims that he had been her first lover because her husband was too puritanical to have consummated the marriage.
act two scene one helen
She immediately starts to bully Jo.
• Helen promises to send Jo money regularly.
• Peter arrives, very drunk, and is thoroughly unpleasant to everyone, quarrelling with his wife, insulting Geof and mocking Jo.
• Helen offers to take Jo home, to look after her; but Peter is, of course, furious. •
He gives Helen an ultimatum: go home with him, without Jo, or stay away. She chooses to go with him, urging Geof to look after Jo.
themes act two scene one (Helen)
• Helen shows a prejudiced attitude to Geof’s homosexuality.
• Helen has a brief impulse to look after Jo, but when Peter says she must choose between him and Jo she settles for him and his money
• Helen treats Geof despicably, openly despising his gentle feminine qualities
. • In spite of her own promiscuity, Helen accuses Jo of having low sexual standards. Does she have some hope that Jo will avoid drifting into the kind of lifestyle she has led?
fruther illustrations of act two scene two .
• Helen’s attitude to Geof’s sexuality is even more unpleasant than before.
• Helen’s reliance on alcohol is emphasised again.
• Helen is revealed as a virulent racist.
• Helen’s stay in Peter’s better quality house has made her contemptuous of the poverty of Jo’s flat – which she had been glad to get for herself a few months before.
The world must revolve around her and at the moment she wants to play at being a grandmother. This is because Peter has rejected her and she can no longer play her wife role
Helen reacts violently to the news that the baby will be of mixed race. She is appallingly rude about it.
Act one scene one Jo
-Jo feels that she has the potential to make more of herself than Helen has. • Helen seems not to care what happens to Jo. Highlgihting rebillios younger generation of the 1950s .
-We see that Jo has higher standards than her mother, in spite of being brought up by her.
• Helen, the ‘semi-whore’, is clearly unable to organise her own life in a satisfactory way
. • Jo despises much of her mother’s attitude to life. The two women squabble constantly, refuse to help each other and score points off each other.
• Their relationship seems more like that of peers rather than mother and daughter. This is emp
Jo resents Peter
act one scene two jo
Act one scene two
-The boy proposing to jo – although not known eachother for long
Jo’s acceptance of the proposal is casual. She is interested in his toy cr ,a s much as the ring .
• She assures the Boy that Helen will not be prejudiced against him because of his colour.
• Jo’s hostility to Peter is partly because of his attitude to her, but also because of her opposition to the marriage.
On her own wedding day, Helen is violently opposed to Jo’s engagement. (she reminds jo of the duities of being a wife and wat it takes , “YOU’RE USELESs”
• Jo is remarkably calm about the likelihood that the Boy will not come back to her after his six-month tour of duty.
Helen reveals that Jo’s father was ‘retarded’, and this makes Jo worry that she may have inherited a mad streak
deeper jo act one scene two
We see further evidence of the complexity of the women’s relationship. They are still sniping at each other; Helen feels no obligation to look after Jo; she doesn’t seem to care what happens to her in the future. Yet Jo is distraught at the idea of the marriage and even wants to be taken on the honeymoon with them.
• Jo has higher ambitions for herself than Helen has. But she is unclear about how to achieve them and runs the risk of slipping into her mother’s ways just because society appears to offer her no escape.
Act two scene one Jo
-Jo made friends with homosexual man .
Jo has an attack of self-pity. She also claims to hate babies and the thought of motherhood.
-Geof forces himself onto Jo tries to kiss her , as h knows she needs tats tbiltiya s a singl mother and the ostracisations he will face .
Jo’s lack of prejudice is shown in her attitude to Geof.
• His hatred of people who laugh at others is stated. We can assume that he has been laughed at because of his sexual preferences. He also is an outsider from society also gets ostracised .-
Geof further challenges our attitudes to sexual stereotyping by making clothes for Jo’s baby.
deeper act two scene one - jo
she still has a childlike side to her character. It is brought out here as she plays with the brightly – highlighting the fate of the working class .
Jo can’t resist teasing Geof about his sexuality but there is no hint of prejudice in her attitude – just curiosity. • There is a warm friendship developing betwe
-geof seems to have many @feminine chaacteristics .’ and his behVIOUR IS CONTRADICOTRY , HE DOSEN’T DENY BEING GAY , BUT WOULD ALSO WANT marry jo and look ager the bay .
Jo also has not considered an illgal aboritoin , she believes her mother has had several but surpsilingly has different standards from her mothe r..
act two scene two
-helen moves in
geof moves out
-bulbs from act one died , foreshadowing soemethign ?
act two scene two deeper
Geof struggling to understand motherhood , follows the normal stereotypes of 1950s , by bringing jo a life sized doll to”Praxctice a few holds” to which jo reacts violently . but more specifically the colour of the baby ? and afaraid of others thinking ahout her . In the end , jo is stuck with her mother again like the beginning of the play , highglighting the cyclical luife of the working -class in thr 1950s.
attitudes to mothers in the 1950s
- signel mothers views as a disgarce and autmoatcally second-class citizens .
- Mother and baby hoes were run bys trit nuns the idea of it eing to rehabilate women back into society via repentance and hardwork .
- A double standard for a tatse of honey , a tatse of honey can leave a bitter taste of an unwated pregnancy where the women suffer and the men are free .
- Single mothers were given insurance but jo nver ended up gettign any highlgithng how not eveyone got the wave of beenfits and opportunity after the war .
- giving birth to a mxied race baby , you would have een ostacsed from your family . and invertiably doomes
