All My Sons Flashcards
Keller: I don’t read the news part anymore. It’s more interesting in the want ads
Symbolic of Keller’s ignorance to wider societal problems.
AO3: Soldiers returning home in the news feed, and criticism of war profiteering
Keller: In my day, either you were a lawyer, or a doctor or you worked in a shop
Repetition
Keller is a relic of the past
Triplet
AO3: Class distinction, Product of the 1920s, 1940s vs 1920s attitudes
Keller: That was a very happy family used to live in your house, Jim
Past tense - no longer happy, foreshadowing Steve’s story, criticism of Jim’s family who live there now.
Tone shift - realist but offensive
Jim: The block could use a pretty girl
Simple declarative
Institutionalised sexism or fact?
AO3: Establishes 2 types of women - pretty women (Annie) and controlling women (Sue)
Keller: I showed you my gun, didn’t I?
Chekov’s gun
Tag question
Foreshadowing
Chris: My whole bloody life
Profanity - frustration
Internal conflict
Mother: I was fast asleep and … [raising her arm over the audience]
Stage Directions:
Paralinguistic feature
Voice of nostalgia and longing for the past (e.g. “remember” - imperative, isolation, desperate appeal)
Monologue - insight into her inner thought
If she doesn’t bring them in, she is isolated in her grief
Mother’s speech about her dream
Fragmented speech with frequent punctuation to reflect her fragmented mind
Agitated and hesitant
Voice of grief and denial
Desperate in sustaining her denial
Mother: Mom, Mom! … Mom
Repetition - helplessness and sense of responsibility she has to him
Manifestation of her failed responsibility
Complicit in Keller’s actions
Increasingly distressed - fragmented
Mother: It was like the roaring of his engine
Past infiltrates the present
Simile
Wind as a stimulus for her dream
Mother: [Turns with a reprimanding finger shaking slightly at Keller] See?
Body language implies a caution/admonishment
Blame at Keller
Building dramatic tension
Chris: Too soon!
Exclamatory
Acceptance
Her resistance to accept is a source of conflict
Mother: Everyone was in such a hurry to bury him. I SAID not to plant it yet
Collective noun
Hyperbole
Isolated in her grief
Prosodics and emphatic stress
Accusatory tone
Conflict
Chris: We’re like at a railroad station waiting for a train that never comes in
Simile
Reflective of his acceptance and mothers denial
Keller: Try to see it human, see it human
Repetition - appeal to human empathy
If Steeve can be forgiven, so can Keller for his actions
Mother: Be smart now Joe. The boy is coming. Be smart
Voice of caution and concern
Flouting maxim of manner
Repetition
Shared knowledge = guilt
Minimises George “boy”
Significance of George
End of Act 1
George is a catalyst for Keller’s anagnorisis.
Voice of legal authority
Presence has gravity
