Behind the Scenes - The Use of the Silent Character in Contemporary Drama

"Who knows about anything?" and "Who are we to believe?" wonder Will and Lily Dale in Horton Foote's The Young Man from Atlanta (p.51). Audiences of both Foote and Stoppard most likely ask these questions as they try to imagine characters such as Randy Carter, Bill Kidder, Mrs. Chater, and Lord Byron. These characters never appear on stage, yet play crucial roles in their dramas. In Tom Stoppard's Arcadia, the promiscuous yet married Mrs. Chater causes discord between several male characters. Her affairs with Septimus and Lord Byron anger Mr. Chater and make Bernard believe that Chater and Byron had fought a duel in her name. Lord Byron, a poet, literary critic, and friend to Septimus, criticizes Chater's poetry and leaves England for reasons which Bernard struggles to uncover. Horton Foote also features major silent characters. Bill Kidder commits suicide by drowning in a lake years before the play's action occurs. His parents, Lily Dale and Will, grieve for him in different ways and cling to a false images of him. Bill's roommate, Randy, cons Lily Dale into giving him thousands of dollars by creating lies about his situation and sympathizing with hers. In both Arcadia and The Young Man from Atlanta, offstage characters serve several purposes. They provoke the audience's imagination, shed light on the characters on stage, and reinforce the plays' themes.

In order to understand their plays' plots, Stoppard and Foote demand that the audience imagine principal characters not appearing on stage. The audience must develop an understanding of silent characters through descriptions given by on-stage characters. Their challenge is to look beyond the opinions and biases inherent in such descriptions. In the first act of Arcadia, Mrs. Chater is the primary subject of conversation. Stoppard gives the audience few facts about her. Married to Mr. Chater, she was caught in "carnal embrace" with Septimus in the Gazebo. However, the other characters cloud such facts with their biased comments. Mrs. Chater cannot speak for herself. Septimus remarks: "I assure you. Mrs. Chater is charming and spirited, with a pleasing voice and a dainty step. . . whose reputation could not be adequately defended with a platoon of musketry deployed by rota." (p.7) On the other hand, Mr. Chater asserts: " There is nothing that woman would not do for me! Now you have an insight to her character. Yes, by God, she is a wife to me!" (p.8) What does one make of a charming, unfaithful wife with a horrid reputation whose husband adores her? Such confusion forces the audience to formulate their own images of Mrs. Chater.

Similarly, the character of Bill Kidder in The Young Man from Atlanta provides somewhat of a mystery. Although all of the characters agree that Bill was a nice young man, they hold different beliefs about his death. Not knowing how to swim, he walked into a lake and drowned. While Lily Dale believes that her son's death was an accident, Will asserts that he killed himself: "I know what happened. He committed suicide. Why I don't know." (p.8) To further complicate matters for the audience, they learn about Bill through his roommate, Randy, who also never appears on stage. Stoppard presents Lily Dale's version of Randy's story of Bill. Thus, the audience's image of Bill is clouded by Lily Dale's bias towards Randy and Randy's purpose of conning Lily Dale. However, the audience cannot simply ignore Bill because he strongly affects the plot as well as the other characters.

Stoppard and Foote demand that the audience imagine silent characters based on statements made by characters on stage. These statements, usually opinionated or biased, reveal much about the characters who state them. Etta Doris, the former house maid of the Kidder's, reminisces: "And I said to him, you remember me little boy. Yes Ma'am, he said. I remember you well. (She laughs.) That's what he said." (p.46) Just as Etta Doris reveals Bill's sensitivity, she reveals her own pleasure in simplicity and affection. Randy uses this way of speaking to con Lily Dale. Because of Randy and Bill's close, loving relationship, Lily Dale feels close to her son by associating with Randy. By sensitively describing Bill's religious faith, Randy becomes a part of Bill's virtue, himself. Just as the audience receives an affectionate image of Bill though Etta Doris, Lily Dale gains a sympathetic understanding of her son from Randy. However, Randy proves to be untrustworthy, making this understanding false. Foote subtly warns the audience not to trust the descriptions of offstage characters made by those on stage. Such descriptions more effectively serve to reflect the character who invents them.

Bernard's judgments and opinions of Lord Byron in Arcadia give life to both characters. Stoppard creates a codependence between Bernard and Lord Byron to develop their characters. Because Bernard's motivation is to understand Byron, the way in which he pursues his goal reveals much about himself. When he cannot prove that Byron was at Sidley Park, he relies on his intuition. He exclaims: "Gut instinct. The part of you which doesn't reason. The certainty for which there is no back-reference. . . you were in there and you bloody know." (p.50) As Bernard tries to understand Byron, Stoppard sheds new light on both characters. Lord Byron represents something different for each character in Arcadia. For Mrs. Chater, he is another man with whom she can have an affair. This affair illustrates both of the silent characters' promiscuity. For Mr. Chater, Byron represents literary society. His reviews can determine Chater's fate as a poet. As a marriage interest for the intellectual Thomasina, he represents an ideal man. She states: "He is the author of the most poetical and pathetic and bravest hero of any book I ever read before, and the most modern and the handsomest." (p.79) Although Thomasina does not love Byron, his writing appeals to her feminine senses. While Stoppard previously portrays her as intellectual and non-emotional, she appears romantic in the light of Byron's writing. His writing acts as his voice when Hannah recites several of Byron's poetic lines: "I had a dream which was not at all a dream./ The bright sun was extinguished, and the stars/ Did wander darkling in the eternal space. . . "(p.79) In this poem, entitled "Darkness", Byron describes the end of life on earth, believing that anything is possible. Hannah comes closer to understanding Byron than Bernard does because she refers to his actual words, and does not speculate. The offstage character of Lord Byron creates a mirror in Arcadia. As Bernard, Chater, Thomasina, and Hannah uncover Lord Byron, they reveal their own characters as well.

This endeavor to understand other people and past events illustrates Stoppard's theme of the pursuit of knowledge. He demands that the audience attempt to perceive and gain knowledge of characters not appearing on stage. The different opinions and images of Mrs. Chater and Lord Byron make this task difficult and complex. Nevertheless, the audience must pursue the knowledge of these characters for the simple purpose of knowing. Hannah states: "It's all trivial. . . Comparing what we're looking for misses the point. It's wanting to know that makes us matter. Otherwise we're going out the way we came in." (p.75) This philosophy asserts that the pursuit of knowledge, no matter what sort of knowledge, makes human beings human. When central characters of a play never appear before the audience, it is natural and imperative that the audience strive to learn about them. Stoppard requires that his audience pursue a deliberately unattainable goal. It is impossible to fully understand Lord Byron and Mrs. Chater based on other characters' opinionated statements. Similarly, Hannah and Bernard cannot completely comprehend the historical events of Sidley park because they were not present to witness them. In Arcadia, Byron does not speak. Stoppard creates a mystery around the poet which compels the audience to seek out his voice through his writing. By keeping Lord Byron off stage, Stoppard urges the audience toward the pursuit of literary knowledge. Valentine remarks: "You can put back the bits of glass but you can't collect up the heat of the smash." (p.93) This metaphor for the pursuit of knowledge illustrates the way in which the audience can understand characters whom they never see. Just as bits of glass can be put back together to resemble the original vase, bits of knowledge can be assimilated to form a reinvention or an image of the actual character. However, just as it is impossible to collect the heat of the smash, it is impossible to fully understand the depth of a silent character. The audience can piece together information about Mrs. Chater and Lord Byron to form general sketches, but they cannot understand the essence and depth of these characters. This sort of comprehension requires the use of imagination. Stoppard thus distinguishes knowledge from imagination.

Horton Foote also utilizes offstage characters to reinforce his play's themes. On the surface, The Young Man from Atlanta appears simple and direct. However, a close examination of the play reveals its dark, sarcastic and satiric undertones. The play itself thus symbolizes the theme of deceiving appearances. Both Will and Lily Dale fall into Bill and Randy's trap of deception. Randy's sympathetic manner and sensitivity toward Lily Dale allow him to deceive her. Fooled by his appearance of desperately needing money, Lily Dale gives him thousands of dollars. Bill also deceives his parents. Will and Lily Dale cling to a smart, kind, happy, religious, and almost perfect image of their son. Will denies that he could be anything else: "There was a Bill I knew and a Bill you knew and that's the only Bill I care to know about" (p.52) Because Bill does not appear on stage, the audience must adhere to the Kidders' image of him. However, a close examination of the play reveals that Will and Lily Dale have misconceived notions of their son. By committing suicide, he proved that he was not happy and that his life was anything but perfect. Does Foote intend for Bill to deceive the audience, as well? In order for the audience to form and unbiased image of Bill, they must disregard the Kidder's lengthy and doting descriptions. Foote subtly clues the audience that such descriptions are misconceptions. Will and Lily Dale, the Kidders, are "kidding" themselves into believing the perfection of Bill's life. Foote emphasizes this family name several times throughout the play. As an offstage character, Bill has the power to deceive the audience. He represents Foote's themes of false appearances and the need to explore below the surface. Foote titles his play to hint at this theme. Both young men from Atlanta, Bill and Randy, deceive the characters as well as the audience. By keeping Bill Kidder and Randy Carter off stage, Foote accentuates his satire and his theme.

The use of the silent character serves as one of the few common threads between Arcadia and The Young Man from Atlanta. Otherwise, these contemporary plays work on entirely different levels. While Foote satirically spoon feeds the plot to the audience, Stoppard creates a complex web of personalities and events. By creating offstage characters, both playwrights demand an active yet cautious audience to imagine and pursue knowledge of them. The audience, themselves, play a crucial role in illustrating the plays' themes. In seeking out the silent characters, the audience begins to wonder what they really can know and how important this knowledge is. The audience thus uncovers Stoppard's insistence on the pursuit of knowledge and Foote's demand to overcome deceptive appearances in this pursuit. Even after a thorough analysis of Arcadia and The Young Man from Atlanta, the silent characters do not become fully comprehensible. This mystery ensures an endless pursuit of understanding and, on a more abstract level, suggests hope for humanity: "When we have found all the mysteries and lost all the meaning, we will be alone, on an empty shore." (Arcadia, 94)