Martin Dysart

A psychiatrist at Rokesby Psychiatric Hospital in southern England, he is in his mid-forties, Martin Dysart tends to Alan Strang at the behest of friend and magistrate Hesther Salomon, attempting to understand Alan’s obsession with horses, and with brutality. Dysart comes to envy the passion of worship that Alan has for horses, placing Alan far outside the mainstream and modern conceptions of normality. Dysart lacks any sort of passion at all in his own life, especially in his married life, which is boring and dull. He has not kissed his wife, Margaret, in six years.

Through a series of therapies, Dysart determines that he will indeed be able to treat and cure Alan, but knows that doing so will probably rob Alan of any and all passion Alan has in life. Alan, Dysart worries, will become nothing more than a ghost. The play ends with Dysart...