Necessary Targets: A Story of Women and War

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Necessary Targets: A Story of Women and War is a 1996 play by New York playwright Eve Ensler . It was published as a book in 2001 and is the author's first work since her well-known work The Vagina Monologues , which premiered in 1996 . It is about a renowned New York psychiatrist and trauma therapist who travel to a Bosnian refugee camp to support women traumatized in the Bosnian war .

Eve Ensler had traveled to the former Yugoslavia herself to interview women with war experience. There she was confronted with their experiences, which related not only to the military actions, but to experiences in the immediate time afterwards: "But after the bombing, that's when the real war begins", writes the author in the foreword of the play. This journey and the conversations with the women inspired Ensler to create her piece. It was read by Meryl Streep and Anjelica Huston at a New York fundraising event in 1996, and the same happened in London by Vanessa Redgrave . Glenn Close and Marisa Tomei played the piece in Sarajevo . In addition to the topic of war trauma and its therapy, the play also deals with the isolation of the protagonist JS and her development over the course of the story.

action

In the first of a total of 17 scenes in the play, the young trauma therapist and author Melissa and the older psychiatrist JS meet in their New York apartment for an interview. While Melissa has visited women who were traumatized by the war on site several times, JS had not met this group of people until then. She assumes that her experience with American patients with eating disorders, for example, qualified her for discussions with war-traumatized women. The two decide to travel to Bosnia together to support affected women and to record material for a book by Melissa.

The following scenes take place in a Bosnian refugee camp where the two women are quartered. There they meet five Bosnian women of different ages with different social and professional backgrounds. At first, they were rather irritated by the offer to support them in speaking about their war experiences and to make them known and reject this offer. You are already talking about it all the time and would be tired of being asked about it by visitors. JS wants to break off the visit, but is held back by Melissa, who shows understanding for the frustration of the women. She describes JS and himself as "necessary objectives" (Necessary Targets) of traumatized women and clearly explained to the opposition.

In the following scenes, the women gradually open up - some through differentiated reports, others initially through regressive behavior. In addition, relationships develop with one another, but also conflicts over the roles and privileges of American visitors. In the course of the conversations, repressed and previously repressed most severe traumas are uncovered, which leads to breakdowns and self-harm in some of the women. One of the women always carries a bundle of cloth with her, in which she thought she was a baby - in fact, she had lost the child in an escape situation from rapists and finally has to realize this in view of the empty bundle. JS and Melissa have different opinions on how to proceed. The latter finally leaves the camp to collect further material for her book in Chechnya. JS stays and continues to talk to the Bosnians. The piece ends in JS's apartment in New York, where she records a message addressed to Melissa on tape . The journey has changed the experienced psychiatrist forever, from now on she only wants to be connected with the Bosnian women.

reception

Before the first performance, the play was read publicly several times in the USA, including at charity events for the benefit of Bosnian war victims. It premiered in Connecticut in 2001 .

Markland Taylor acknowledged the play in Variety a need for fine tuning and improved depth of the characters. “Above all, Ensler has to deliver the necessary theatrical sophistication if the play is to live up to its admirable intentions.” Alvin Klein of the New York Times also saw problems with the play, but then said that “it takes an ungrateful person to do it To ignore appreciation for the good teamwork of the ensemble and a curmudgeon who believed that there was nothing here that cannot be repaired ”. Village Voice's Joy Press mentioned the audience's standing ovations, but criticized the piece for being clichéd once or twice too often . Charles Isherwood, also in Variety , described the piece as "awkwardly structured, chopped up into short, meandering scenes" that ended just when they were supposed to begin.

Karen Bovard of the Theater Journal praised the focus on American women in the play. Concentrating on the story of the American psychiatrist avoids speaking for “the other” and the associated arrogant act of imagined empathy. Ensler is concerned about the “change in consciousness” that American women are experiencing, about the effect that war refugees have on foreigners who come from a “privileged and relatively safe position”. According to Bovard, this focus forms “some of the most revealing lines” of the piece.

literature

  • Eve Ensler: Necessary targets: a story of women and war: [a play] . 1st ed. Villard, New York 2001, ISBN 0-375-75603-5 .
  • Sara Constantakis: Drama for students. Volume 23: presenting analysis, context and criticism on commonly studied dramas . Thomson Gale, Detroit, Michigan 2006, ISBN 1-4144-1036-0 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Eve Ensler: Necessary targets: a story of women and war: [a play] . 1st ed. Villard, New York 2001, ISBN 0-375-75603-5 .
  2. ↑ a b c d e Sara Constantakis: Drama for students. Volume 23: presenting analysis, context and criticism on commonly studied dramas . Thomson Gale, Detroit, Michigan 2006, ISBN 1-4144-1036-0 .
  3. ^ Markland Taylor: Necessary Targets. In: Variety. December 6, 2001, accessed March 7, 2020 .
  4. ↑ Klein, Alvin: "Melding Drama with Politics", New York Times, December 9, 2001, p. 14 CN13, quoted in Sara Constantakis: Drama for students. Volume 23: presenting analysis, context and criticism on commonly studied dramas . Thomson Gale, Detroit, Michigan 2006, ISBN 1-4144-1036-0 .
  5. ^ Press, Joy, "The Words of War," in the Village Voice, Vol. 47, no. 10, March 12, 2002, p. 58. quoted in Sara Constantakis: Drama for students. Volume 23: presenting analysis, context and criticism on commonly studied dramas . Thomson Gale, Detroit, Michigan 2006, ISBN 1-4144-1036-0 .
  6. ↑ Isherwood, Charles, Review of Necessary Targets, in Variety, Vol. 386, no. 3, March 4-10, 2002, pp. 42-43. quoted in Sara Constantakis: Drama for students. Volume 23: presenting analysis, context and criticism on commonly studied dramas . Thomson Gale, Detroit, Michigan 2006, ISBN 1-4144-1036-0 .