“Simply Sitting in a Chair”: Questioning Representational Practice and Dramatic Convention in Marguerite Duras’s L’Amante anglaise and The Viaducts of Seine-et-Oise

Authors

Shelley Orr

Abstract

Marguerite Duras challenges and undermines the conventional, mimetic representational practice typical of theatrical realism in her play L’Amante anglaise as well as in two related works: a novel of the same name, and the play The Viaducts of Seine-et-Oise. In iterations characteristic of Duras’s oeuvre, these works use the same characters and plotlines to tell a story inspired by true crime events, the search for the motive behind a gruesome murder in a small town in France. In telling this story, Duras employs one of the oldest and most familiar plot structures, the murder mystery—or, rather, she appears to use this plot structure, mimicking this form as a disruptive critique in which she asks her audience to recognize and examine the process by which we represent events. Through the use of questioning, repetition, and alternating strategies of omission and excess, Duras encourages the audience to question the seemingly objective project of establishing the facts. The play L’Amante anglaise, in particular, seems simple enough and can be simply staged, but in the course of watching the performance, the audience is invited to question the foundations of mimetic theatre and the project of searching for truth. Duras’s work suggests another purpose for live theatre: its power to raise our awareness of our own presence and the generative potency of our perceptions.

Recommended Citation

Orr, Shelley (2024) "“Simply Sitting in a Chair”: Questioning Representational Practice and Dramatic Convention in Marguerite Duras’s L’Amante anglaise and The Viaducts of Seine-et-Oise," Comparative Drama: Vol. 58: Iss. 3, Article 3.
Available at: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/compdr/vol58/iss3/3