length: 923 words 2.6 double spaced pages rating: red free oleanna by david mamet documents what occurs between a professor and his student over a period of three meetings in which trivial daily interactions and their meanings are interpreted the wrong way. The critics who call oleanna a parable about the tragedy of failing to listen are absolutely correct. If john and carol had actually listened to each other, they may have been able to communicate effectively and nothing bad would have come from their meetings. Instead, due to the nature of their characters, they ruin any sort of connection that could have been made between the two. However, neither john nor carol are villains, they are flawed characters who represent humans with the same human flaw a failure to communicate. Their failure to communicate ultimately leads to the accusations against john and his retaliatory actions against carol.

Their failure to communicate can easily be spotted starting on the first page of the play. Their conversation is broken and neither person can complete a sentence without the other one interrupting. Lines such as what can i do? 12 and what don't you understand? 12 show john's confusion. In addition to this, john's telephone constantly rings, interrupting both of them at the same time. Mamet uses the telephone as a tool to grab john and carol out of their conversation whenever they are about to make a connection. But also his conversations with these two people are the only instances in the play when either of the two main characters is shown communicating with the outside world. This fact is also important because it helps to establish the idea that john is a normal person who has a life outside of the school.

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Since carol is never actually shown communicating with anyone from the outside world, she is portrayed as a loner, isolating her from the reader even more. Constant interruption from either person can be looked at closely and reveal much about their character. John's constant interruptions show his lack of actual concern for carol and his own arrogance.

He goes off on tirades about his discontent and frustration with the higher education system, sometimes unrelated to carol's inability to comprehend the material in his class. It sounds as if he is just reciting or paraphrasing from his own book, which carol has already read. Another reason why he constantly interrupts carol is that he understands what it feels like to be in the subservient position. i was brought up, and my earliest, and most persistent memories are of being told that i was stupid. Why must you behave so stupidly' or, can't you understand? can't you understand?' and i could not understand. 14 since he was always being commanded as a child and has been in the same position as carol, he sees this opportunity to be the one in control and in power. Because of this overzealous attitude, coupled with his arrogance, john just keeps on talking without stopping to think if carol understands everything.

Carol has similar flaws to john in the fact that she also has a certain view, which dictates her outlook and attitude. Like john's view on the higher education system, carol has this mindset in which she cannot perform well in class because she comes from a different social a different economic background 10 because of this certain mindset, she does not really absorb the advice that john tries to give her during the first meeting. Instead, she vents her frustration at her own inability to learn by going on rants about how nobody tells me anything. i don't know what it means and i'm failing 13 because of her inferiority complex, carol effectively puts up a type of barrier in which she filters out anything and everything that is said to try and help her. Character flaws are not the only reason why miscommunication occurs between the two in this play. When john is explaining the material in his office, he does not realize that carol does not understand the words he is using. She repeatedly tells him that she does not understand the charts he uses in class and stops him in the middle of sentences to define words.

Therefore, we have john, who does not understand what carol is saying because he does not care, and we have carol, who does not understand john because she lacks self esteem and proficiency in english. If either character had just stopped thinking of themselves or their own interest for just a minute, then everything could have been avoided. The play may be about political correctness, gender politics, higher education, and other things, but at its most basic level, it is about how people communicate.

At first, john is in control, however, after the accusations are made, carol becomes the one with power. By the end of the play, the power shift finally switches over to john one last time. When he cannot get his message through to carol by traditional means of communication, he resorts to the most unambiguous method possible: physical violence.

22 feb 2016 our writers can help get your essay back on track, take a look at our services to learn more about how we can help. Essay writing service essay marking service place an order carol's opening line what is a term of art? foreshadows the language theme of play. It reflects the postmodern view that the words do not precise meaning in the outer world, but rather are dependent on context for meaning. Technically, as john explained it, a term of art is a legal concept: it seems to mean a term, which has come, though its use, to mean something more specific than the word would, to some one not acquainted with them â‚¬â¦.indicate. In oleanna, mamet intentionally uses a number of dialogic devices which reflect varying levels of difficulty through which the problem of impaired communication can be easily traced and diagnosed. Among these devices, the multiple phone calls are significant in the sense that they frequently interrupt the conversation and divert both characters in ways that inevitably distort and hinder clear perception and mutual understanding. From the start, both characters experience difficulty understanding one another, partly due to the difference in language competency between professor and student.