The Shoe-Horn Sonata Essay Example for Free

The Shoe-Horn Sonata Essay John Misto, the person behind the play The Shoe-Horn Sonata, uses his distinctively visual text as a memorial for the Australian Army nurses who died in the war, as they were refused one by the government. â€Å"I do not have the power to build a memorial. So I wrote a play instead. † This drama illustrates the way the women were treated in the Japanese prisoner of war camps, during World War II through the two main characters Bridie – an Australian army nurse and Sheila – an English woman. The different dramatic techniques used in this play aid in the manipulation of the audience’s emotions and sway the preconceptions of the group. Misto utilises projected images and the emotive dialogue to create a vivid image in the viewer’s mind that is both distinctively visual and evokes emotions from the audience. Misto is not the only author to have used this technique in his work, John Schumann’s I Was Only 19 is a song that also features distinctively visual elements throughout the song. This text explores the conditions of the Vietnam war and the effect it has afterwards on someone as young as nineteen and has a similar purpose to Misto’s, to expose the terrible conditions of war and the effect it had and is still having on them today. Schumann uses intense emotive language to influence the listener’s opinion on war and draw attention to the conditions prisoners of war face. The Shoe-Horn Sonata digs deep into the readers mind and challenges their thoughts on the way they perceive injustices been done to the memory of the nurses, and of the thousands of other women and children who suffered with them. Misto is able to do this by projecting images onto a screen in the background. â€Å"Projected onto the screen is a photograph of row upon row of captured British and Australian women bowing to the Japanese. These images contribute to the creation of a physical, distinctively visual element in the drama. The confronting images shown forces the audience to reconsider their understanding of the prisoner of war camps in Japan. The audience begins to visualise the conditions the women faced and this leaves an impact on the viewer. Through this, Misto is able to convey his message to his audience through the distin ctively visual images, not only projected on the screen, but shaped in the viewer mind. Although Misto only intended to expose the injustices that had been done to the women’s memory, he has revealed the effect the war had on them and the aftermath of the camps. Misto brings to light the influence the camps had on the women involved in the war. â€Å"She stole every sheet and towel in her room – once she found out the Japanese own this place. † In this quote it is obvious that the women have still not recovered from the traumatic experience in the camp and still feel livid towards the Japanese. The distinctively visual dialogue is enough for the viewer to visualise the event taking place. The fact that the prisoners of war still feel resentment towards the Japanese suggests to the audience that the things they went through must have been worse than the responder originally assumed. The distinctively visual scene allows Misto to manipulate his audiences thinking, this emphasises the injustices that have been done to the women’s memory as the audience begins to realise the damage done to the women, mentally. The Shoe-Horn Sonata continues to battle the audience’s preconceptions of the prisoner of war camps in Japan by using stage directions as a medium for further exposing the effect the war had on its prisoners in Japan. The final scene Bride and Sheila finally feel free after over fifty years. â€Å"Bridie and Sheila are confidently dancing and the theatre is filled with Srauss’ music. It is the music of joy and triumph and survival. † As the two are dancing, triumphant music begins to play emphasising in the viewers mind that after all the years of fear and uncertainty, they finally feel free and confident again. The distinctively visual dancing reinforces the idea that they are free and dancing is a way of expressing your freedom. Misto was even able to, in his stage directions; convey the drama’s purpose through distinctively visual elements. John Schumann’s I Was Only 19 is abundant with different examples of how the distinctively visual conveys the author’s purpose. Schumann uses strong emotive language to produce a distinctively visual image in the reader’s mind. â€Å"And the Anzac legends didn’t mention mud and blood and tears,† the egative connotations attached to the words â€Å"mud†, â€Å"blood†, and â€Å"tears† contrasts with the idea of the Anzac legends, which has a positive connotations. These ideas contrast forcing the reader to reassess their thoughts on the Anzac legends and how they affected the Anzacs during and after the war. The emotive words create a distinctively visual image in the readers mind as they vi sualise the mud-covered jungles of Vietnam and the pain (blood) and suffering (tears) the Anzacs went through. Schumann is able to form a distinctively visual image using only strong emotive language, and he uses this technique to convey the purpose of his song. I Was Only 19 includes many more examples of how Schumann uses distinctively visual language to convey his message. â€Å"And night time’s just a jungle dark and a barking M16? † The emotive word â€Å"dark† creates a distinctively visual image of a dark, dangerous jungle which also incorporates an almost life-like sound of an M16 firing in the background. This image is formed from the powerful emotion in the language and the imagery it creates. As the viewer pictures the dark jungle, they are confronted with the idea that an actual person had fallen into that unfortunate situation and this is what Schumann wants his readers to reflect on, the idea that someone had to experience those conditions for years. Schumann is hopefully able to evoke sympathy in the reader for the soldiers that were in Vietnam. The distinctively visual imagery aids in the creation of this process. John Misto and John Schumann both have a message they want to get out to the world. They may be similar but they both are just as important as the other. These composers are trained in using language and dramatic techniques to manipulate the audience’s emotions and persuading them to think what they wanted them to think, which in this case, is to spread the story of the women nurses in prisoner of war camps and how this affected them and the Vietnam veterans, including their mental and physical diseases. They have successfully done this, using distinctively visual elements in their texts.