Sarah Kane: Complete Plays Study Guide & Plot Synopsis

Sarah Kane: Complete Plays Plot Summary

Preview of Sarah Kane: Complete Plays Summary:

This collection contains the five plays and one screenplay that constitute Sarah Kane's total canon. These works have a common set of themes and motifs, though their settings vary from modern England to a sort of metaphysical concentration camp to the nether-space of the disturbed mind. They are characterized by degradation, violence, suicide, and gallows humor.

Sarah Kane's first play, "Blasted", concerned Ian and Cate, a middle-aged racist journalist and a child-like woman, who enter a Leeds hotel room together years after the end of an affair. As an insurgent siege rails outside, Ian tries to convince Cate to have sex with him. He is dying of lung cancer and liver disease, and he implies that he may have carried out killings for the government. He rapes Cate, and the next morning, a rebel soldier breaks into their room. Cate escapes, and a bomb destroys...
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