SOURCE: “Transmitting the Bildungsroman to the Small Screen: David Hare's Dreams of Leaving and Heading Home,” in Literature/Film Quarterly, Vol. 24, No. 1, 1996, pp. 92-8.

In the following essay, DeVinney examines elements of bildungsroman and individual states of social and political consciousness in the television versions of Dreams of Leaving and Heading Home.

David Hare and his play writing colleagues, weaned on 1960s British university radicalism, have continued the expression of chronic social discontent begun so scathingly by John Osborne’s 1956 play Look Back in Anger. But in an effort to spread their message to a broader audience, these writers have been working increasingly in the mechanical media. The primary distinguishing characteristic of Hare’s films and plays lies in his insistence on linking political and ethical decline to his characters’ personal lives. To understand how Hare accomplishes this connection onscreen, it is necessary to look closely at his...