Reading Blog

Equus (by Peter Shaffer)

Pre-reading

I first read Equus as an IB student, when it was one of the plays we studied for Part 3 – the works for Paper 2. It is a strange play – “bizarre” would be an adequate word to describe it, gripping through the strange tale that it represents, and, even more so, because it is based on a real event. As “A Note on the Play” explains, the play itself is not transcription of all that leads up to and follows this event, but rather an “entirely personal” interpretation that creates “a mental world in which the deed could be made comprehensible”. Interestingly, this “Note on the Play” never explicitly specifies what the truthful core to Equus is – Shaffer writes of “an alarming crime”, “one horrible detail”, “[t]he act”, “a dreadful event”, “the deed” and “the crime”, but never states what constituted this crime. We might readily assume that the deed is the act of a youth blinding several horses with a spike, but we cannot actually be sure about this assumption. Shaffer’s comment that the friend who told him of the crime died a few months after their conversation is slightly suspicious also. Can we really be sure at all that this play is based on a real fact or is it all invention? If being such a heinous crime, should it not be possible (even now, more than thirty years after the script’s first publication) to find an article on the story in some newspaper archives? “[N]o name, no place, and no time” are available, but should that make this task impossible? And, in fact, does this statement that his friend revealed no such details of the deed, not make Shaffer even more suspicious, given the fact that the one minute account of his friend aroused in him “an intense fascination”? (Why then did he not immediately inquire about these details?)
There are no definite answers to all this questions, and I do not want to imply that there is no truth in Shaffer’s play. Rather, I want to point to the fact that we must pay attention to an author’s notes and read them with care, particularly in the case of Shaffer, who provides a lot of pre-text commentary. Not every playwright does so. Some include no more than a list of characters, some a brief description of the stage. Shaffer, however, provides “A Note on the Text” (which, interestingly, was put into writing after the first performance, being thus not a traditional dramatic script, but a reflection of the performance itself – even if only the first few pages reveal this), “A Note on the Play” (already commented on), a list of characters as well as the cast that was involved in the play’s first presentation on July 26 1973 (p. 11-12), a description of the setting (p. 13-14) and the horses (p. 15), as well as some indications about the chorus (p. 16). The author’s commentary is unusually detailed, demonstrating that he has a particular vision of his play that he wants to transmit to readers as well as the theatre audience. As we read the play, this should clearly be something we should pay attention to.

The Setting:

-Described in detail; drawing a sketch according to these details would allow readers (not the audience!) to better imagine the stage and place everything where it belongs.

Noteworthy:
1) all the cast of Equus is on the stage during the entire performance.
2) Dysart’s position and the fact that he directly addresses the audience from time to time (What is the purpose of this? What kind of effect is achieved?)

The Horses

Shaffer writes: “Any literalism which could suggest the cosy familiarity of a domestic animal – or worse, a pantomime horse – should be avoided.” Why is this? What is it that Shaffer is trying to avoid?

The Chorus

Shaffer indicates that the Equus Noise is “composed of humming, thumping, and stamping – though never of neighing or whinnying”. Why are the typical horse noises to be avoided? Why “humming, thumping, and stamping”? What effect does Shaffer intend to create with these?
Here we should also make a connection to the Chorus (choros) as used in ancient Greek theatre.