Travesties

Henry Carr, a onetime employee at the English Consul General in Zurich, and now an old man, pieces together his memories of James Joyce, V.I. Lenin, and Tristan Tzara. But Carr’s memories are untrustworthy: they collide, collude, and corrupt. Scenes repeat, teeter into the absurd, or are structurally infected by memories of other forms including the limerick, the Shakespearean sonnet, and Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest. Thus Travesties is a formally inventive play, setting most scenes in the mind of Carr, and yet owes its success to its comic incorporation of older forms.
This notion of playwright Tom Stoppard borrowing other writer’s forms also appears to have something to do with the theme of the play. Carr opens the second scene with a monologue on his encounters with the three famous men, acknowledging that his run-ins with them have also set him in the limelight. But as it turns out, Carr was not even in Zurich at the same time as Lenin and had little to do with Tzara. His real claim to fame is his litigation with Joyce (Joyce won but he carried a grudge) that eventually led the author to take revenge by writing an unflattering parody of Carr in Ulysses. And so as Carr continues to have delusions of grandeur in the play, riding the coattails of famous men, one might make the connection to Stoppard knowingly, ironically doing the same in Travesties. And yet as faulty and lurid as Carr’s memory and Stoppard’s use of form are, they are inventive, technically dazzling, and original. (You could think of Travesties as a forerunner to the screenplays from Charlie Kaufmann.)
That said, I would like to add my sole criticism of the play: one is not moved emotionally by Stoppard but wowed like a child before a magician. ( )

Maddingly elusive comic genius: i spent over 2 months working as assistant director of this play and it took my the entire course of which to believe that i had understood all of the jokes. Of course i then went on to read more of Joyce and Wilde and the play took on whole new volumes of meaning. Its that complex. Another review advised to curl up with it for an afternoon...fun, perhaps, but not nearly as rewarding as it could be having done the background needed to get this play. "Halfway to Finland Station with V.I. Lenin" seriosly folks, how many of us would get that reference off the bat? still, diffilculty aside, this play is so amazing and funny that one can spend the entire time chuckling with only the most cursorary of readings/viewings. There is an absolutly fantastic scene done entirely in limerick form where Stoppard stretches his poetic legs (which prove to be quite well muscled). Acadamians and ignoramouses alike, READ IT! IT WILL BLOW YOU AWAY!

Stoppard, Tom. Travesties. Grove Press, New York, 1975. ( )