our country's good character analysis

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  • our country's good characters
    • harry
      • officer
        • takes advantage of his status
      • madness
        • hearing voices
        • personality disorder
      • audience feel slight sympathy for him
      • jealous
        • duckling
      • vulnerable
      • needy
      • justifies his mistakes and guilt via duckling
      • controlling
      • good posture, strong gait
      • twitchy
        • paranoia
      • negative effects hanging has on the hangman
      • alcoholic
    • duckling
      • audience feel sympathy for her
      • survival
      • manipulative
      • vulnerable
      • needs attention
      • does she want affection or protection?
      • fickle
      • physically provocative
      • uses harry's status for personal gain
      • strong
      • negative effects of capital punishment- relationship is ruined
    • liz
      • nature/nurturedebate
      • survival
      • dislike
      • angry/ dangerous
      • aggressive
      • animalistic
      • bold- physically and verbally
      • self defence
      • solitary
      • vulnerable
      • transformes from the lowest of the low to a formerly speaking woman- redemptive power of theatre
      • how's how convicts were treated with no respect
      • her hanging sparks debate about the fairness of the penal system
      • status
    • sideway
      • eccentric
      • comic relief
      • punishments
      • sees vulnerability in others
      • sympathetic
        • tries to save liz
      • camp
        • coping mechanism
      • theatrical stereotype
        • flourish of hand
      • redemptive power of theatre
      • likeable
      • defiantly acts as ross humiliates him- theatre makes him brave
      • votes to start a theatre company
        • IRL created Sydneys first profesional theatre company
    • wisehammer
      • intelligent- words and meanings
      • what he says is articulate
      • raises all the issues in the play
      • epic theatre
        • love, status, class
        • penal system, innocents, justice
      • power of theatre/words
      • sympathy- in love with Mary
      • quietly affectionate
      • good natured
      • purpose in everything he says
      • earnest man
    • Mary
      • innocence
      • limited voice
      • in dabby's shadow
        • needs protection
      • vulnerable
      • intelligence
        • reading
        • in being vulnerable and attractive towards men
      • youthful
      • act 2- confident, manipulative?
      • 'better breed of convict'- Ralph
        • servant from a well to do house
      • conversations with wisehammer shows the power of language
      • theatre brings people together
        • uses the play's words to tell Ralph how she feels
    • Ralph
      • innocent
      • relationship out of convenience
      • act 1- wants a promotion, he is initially pro punishment
      • isolated
      • humane
      • man of duty
      • amiable officer
      • want him to succeed
      • closer to convict community
        • they need him
      • affectionate- doesn't order Mary around
      • tenderness
      • love vs duty
        • defends convicts in front of campbell
      • later sees the value of education and redemption
        • shows mindsets can be changed
      • at first is immune to the floggings- counts calmly
        • sees convicts as less than human
      • theatre can bring people together- Mary
    • meg long
      • lowest status
      • filthy
      • stinks
      • Ralph is disgusted by her
      • unfairness/ inequality
        • has no chance at redemption because she has stooped so low
    • Dabby Bryant
      • pragmatic
      • mouthy
      • insightful
      • 'if god didn't want women to be whores, he shouldn't have created men who pay for their bodies'
      • isn't bothered about learning lines
      • didn't get involved in the play so didn't change
      • plans to escape back to Devon
    • ketch freeman
      • the girls hate for him gives them something to bond over
      • shows the stigma behind being a hangman
      • sees redemption through theatre
      • by the end he is as much of a part as anyone else
    • black caesar
      • feared by the convicts
      • rapes Mary
      • endangers the production in the final scene  and going missing
      • intention- adds more layers and convicts in the play
    • arescott
      • brutalised enforcer of the gang
      • takes refuge in the play because 'I don't have to remember the things I have done'
      • at the beginning wants to run away
      • completely converted
    • aborigine
      • highlights negative impacts on colonisation
      • highlights the British lack of empathy
      • cultural differences
      • innocent bystander watching the first fleet arrive with wonder and bemusement
      • saw the settlers as ghosts as they were white
    • lieutenant George Johnston
      • has compassion especially for the convict women
      • "he (Jesus) did propose treating sinners, especially woman who have sinned, with compassion"
    • reverend johnson
      • believes the play should uphold christian values
    • campbell
      • major ross' sidekick
      • struggles to make fully formed sentences as he is always drunk
      • full comedic potential
      • comic relief for the audience from the other intense scenes
    • Tench
      • represents  a philosophy of right wing pragmatism
      • believes there are more important things to teach the convicts than to 'sit around laughing at a comedy'
        • build houses or farm
      • represents those resistant to change
      • 'criminal tendency is innate'
        • nature over nurture
        • contrast to Phillips assertion of the convicts innate humanity
      • unable to empathise with the convicts
    • David collins
      • the law must be upheld
        • main motivation is the maintenance of justice in the colony
      • reasonable and intelligent man
      • represents those with an innate sense of justice and fairness
      • the issue isn't about liz it's about justice and thus the audience may become annoyed with him
        • "the courts will become travesties, I do not want that"
    • robbie ross
      • pro punishment
        • believes they cant be rehabilitated
      • "the prisoners are here to be punished and we're here to make sure they get punished
      • too much power can make you nasty
      • unfair hierarchal system
      • despair and hatred of where he is
        • shows even awful people are still human
      • against the play
    • Captain Phillips
      • representation of liberal belief system
      • favours redemption over punishment
      • redemptive and humanising power of theatre
      • respectful
      • interested in liz as she is 'the most difficult woman in the colony'
        • her redemption through art will be an example to all
      • repulsed by the hanging of a 17 year old boy and an 82 year old woman
        • contrasts the harsher views of other officers
      • "surely no one is born naturally cultured'
        • nurture over nature

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