Critique of the play How I Learned to Drive by Paula Vogel - Essay Example

How I Learned to Drive Quotes [ID The characters in How I Learned to Drive advance as characters, following psychological progressionsand developments, in a way that is truly unique. Their characters are exposited more and more accurately, and they change over the arc of the story.Quote 1: “Don’t leave your drink unattended when you visit the ladies’ room. There is a such thing as white slavery; the modus operandi is to spike an unsuspecting young girl’s drink with a “mickey” when she’s left the room to powder her nose” At this point, the character Bit is drunk.

She is arguing that girls can be kidnapped or raped, and that people should be careful of date rape drugs. This expresses much more broadly Bits character: When she is drunk, she is cynical but also deeply afraid; her childhood experiences, the warnings her parents gave her, ring out through her at a highly internalized level. This helps inform us how they will interact when it comes to the more serious issue of Uncle Peck.Quote 2: “Yes, sir, your father is ruled by only two bosses! Mr. Gut and Mr.

Peter” This line, uttered by the Teenage Greek Chorus, says that Bits father is ruled by his stomach and his superiors in life. This is a critical expression of how the play and the people within it tend to view men, and will help to give an understanding of the developments of the plot.Quote 3: “Tell her it hurts! Its agony! You think youre going to die! Especially if you do it before marriage!” This quote is literally Bit telling her friend that sex is painful, especially before marriage.

But it is also a sign into how Bit, thanks to her uncles treatment of her, views sex. She has been molested, and she realizes the degree of the trauma to her. It is similar to another quote, Quote #4, which shows that Bit thinks that men are monsters that cannot control their urges.Quote 4: “Lucy, you’d better not be filling Mama’s head with sex! Every time you and Mary come over and start in about sex, when I ask a simple question like, “What time is dinner going to be ready?” Mama snaps my head off!

” This quote has Bit literally asking someone not to talk with sex to her mother. But the quote is showing two things about Bits psychology. First: She views sex as something beyond the purview of control, something that people are just forced into by their urges (and, in her case, others). Second: It demonstrates that she has to talk about sex enough to irritate her mother, which is caused by her trauma.