In listening to the narratives of the Congolese, I came to terms with the extent to which their bodies had become battlefields.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the struggles and trauma faced by the Congolese people, illustrating their bodies as symbols of conflict and suffering.
Lynn Nottage's quote reflects a deep understanding of the physical and psychological scars left on the Congolese people due to ongoing violence and conflict. By emphasizing that their bodies represent actual battlefields, it conveys the idea that personal narratives are intertwined with larger socio-political issues, encouraging listeners to acknowledge the profound impact of war on human lives.
In practice
In a speech about the impact of war on civilians, this quote can emphasize the profound consequences of conflict.
People probably have different philosophies about this, but I think that when you're first shaping the play and trying to find a character, the initial actors that develop it end up imprinting on it - you hear their voices; you hear their rhythms. You can't help but to begin to write toward them during the rehearsal process.
There were not a lot of women in the theater department - it was really run by men, and so the message was that women can be onstage, but women can't really be backstage.
The person whose work introduced me to the craft was Lorraine Hansberry. The person who taught me to love the craft was Tennessee Williams. The person who really taught me the power of the craft was August Wilson, and the person who taught me the political heft of the craft was Arthur Miller.
I was repeatedly told that there isn't an African American woman who can open a show on Broadway. I said, 'Well, how do we know? How do we know if we don't do it?' I said, 'I think you're wrong.'
Once working people discover that, collectively, we have more power than we do as individual silos, then we become an incredibly powerful force. But I think that there are powers that be that are invested in us remaining divided along racial lines, along economic lines.
It's incumbent on us to reach beyond the confines of the institutions that traditionally produce art and find new ways to get it to the people.
Grim-visaged war hath smoothed his wrinkled front; _x000D_ _x000D_ And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds _x000D_ _x000D_ To fright the souls of fearful adversaries, _x000D_ _x000D_ He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber _x000D_ _x000D_ To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
He once told Allie and I that if he'd had to shoot anybody, he wouldn't've known which direction to shoot in. He said the Army was practically as full of bastards as the Nazis were.
Air Power is, above all, a psychological weapon - and only short-sighted soldiers, too battle-minded, underrate the importance of psychological factors in war.
All you have to do is hold your first soldier who is dying in your arms, and have that terribly futile feeling that I can't do anything about it... Then you understand the horror of war.
If men make war in slavish observance of rules, they will fail. No rules will apply to conditions of war as different as those which exist in Europe and America...War is progressive, because all the instruments and elements of war are progressive.
Air power may either end war or end civilization.
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