I've got no business talking about politics. Really, I don't. Who am I to start running off about politics, politicians or even political theatre, for that matter. The fact that I was invited to do so seems, to me, largely beside the point. Mind you, it's not going to stop me from doing it, but I just wanted to point out at the beginning that I have no purpose in doing it, no expertise to back me up, no handy graphs and charts to add depth, intellectual content or even colour. This is just going to be about me, rambling on about something I know little or nothing about, as I so often do, on the page and in life. So, here goes.
What the hell is political theatre, anyway? What I do - sometimes well, sometimes poorly - is write for the theatre, no matter what the subject. To categorise is to ghettoise. I'll have no part in that, thank you. I've read a great deal in recent columns by various colleagues about this and that - what they feel political writing is, where we stand as a nation and/or artists, what the name of their new play is, where they are currently being produced, and so on. Precious little, however, has been said about why this is of any importance to you or me or anybody else. I understand that it's important to them and this paper, but I have less understanding of how this might actually be efficacious to my life. And that's what it's all about in the end, isn't it? Me. Everything in this life is about me, in some way, as far as I'm concerned, just as it's all about you in your house. If the personal is political, and vice versa, then I'm a veritable political animal, because it's all about me, baby. Always has been, always will be. I like everybody else just fine, but believe me, you're all in second place. A distant second.
Sure, I'm interested in reading what Arnold Wesker or Mark Ravenhill or Pam Gems or Kwame Kwei-Armah has to say, but because I'm interested in it, not because they took the time to write a piece for the Guardian. I mean, it's terrific that these writers are given a place to talk about things political and meaningful in their lives, but only so far as it applies to my own life. As soon as they bore me or I spot something of interest on MTV, these guys are out the window as far as I'm concerned. And while it's all well and good to know the respective sources of Gregory Burke's and Naomi Wallace's new plays, the information only moves me or engages me when it does. As for how Ms Wallace feels about the war in Iraq - well, she can keep her lovely images of war ghosts that "our governments" have created to herself. Who asked for her opinion, anyway? Certainly not me, just like nobody other than some editor holed up in the Guardian is asking for mine now. Because someone asks doesn't mean we always have to answer.
I guess, in a sense, that is the real act of terrorism I'm proposing here: strapping bagfuls of verbs and nouns inside our jackets, heading down to the public square and, for once, not letting it rip. Because that's all we are in the end, anyway. We writers. We're lingustic terrorists on the political or social or personal landscape, constantly looking to strike a match and light things up. Walk into a nice, quiet pizza parlour and blow the place to bits with our pontificating. We've always got an "opinion" about something, no matter what subject under the moon you happen to bring up. See an injustice on the world stage or down at the supermarket? Make a speech or drone on at a cocktail party about it so everyone can hear what we have to say.
Don't like what's going on in the Middle East? Write a letter or lead a rally or make a cutting remark in the Times about it. So what? Big deal. Bully for you. As far as I'm concerned, if you don't have The Crucible or Via Dolorosa or Pentecost up your sleeve, keep your damn ideas to yourself.
Anyway, who really cares what I think? I mean, I barely do, and I'm talking about myself. Imagine how low my opinion of everybody else's opinions must be. Dramatists are the "divine wind" of writers as far as I'm concerned, kamikazes who believe so much in this or that cause that they are willing to plow into their targets head first. Sometimes they hit, and often they miss, but they do it with such sturm und drang that you can't help but notice. We write about the personal but we always want it to resonate as a "universal" truth. We live through other people - our characters, actors, directors, critics, the audience - but we want to be seen as the "voice of our generation".
Hey, man, get over it. If you're lucky, your work matters for the two hours that I'm sitting through it. If you're really gifted, I think about it all the way to McDonald's on my way home. The greats end up on my bookshelf, and every so often I feel lousy for not finishing the last act before I fall asleep. We take ourselves way too seriously for the most part, and want others to take us even more seriously than that. Well, the day of reckoning is at hand. Don't get me wrong, I would fight to the death to protect your freedom so you can keep blathering on about all the boring crap that interests you, just keep your voice down when you're out at dinner so I don't have to listen to it.
Every so often I see a good play, less often a great one. When I do, does that make the author a god, or a saint, or even worth crossing the street to meet? Not usually. I once saw David Mamet standing in the bar of the Donmar Warehouse and thought about going over to introduce myself. Then I figured: "Forget it, why ruin it now?" I like him for what he has written, what it has done for me and my own work, but he's not here to chat with me. Nor me him. I don't really care what he thinks about this production (even though it was his play, Boston Marriage), I'll make up my own mind about it, thanks very much. The first time I met Harold Pinter, he asked me where the toilet was in the basement of the Royal Court. Now that I liked. That's the perfect Pinter story, as far as I'm concerned. Admire - make that revere - the guy for 20 years, then bump into him by accident and point out where the john is. It probably didn't mean a thing to him, but it made my whole year. No exchange of ideas, no arguments about aesthetics or candy-wrappers, just two men looking for the loo. I love Pinter's One For the Road as a tight little political fable that plays like a firecracker on stage. Do I care what the man personally thinks about the Falklands or Rwanda or Chechnya? Not much.
In the end, I think writers should do what they do best. Pick up the pen or put fingers to keypad and get to work. Keep their mouths shut and leave something of worth behind. Opinions are like sphincters, everybody has one - except those unlucky enough to be born without, of course, and to those people I silently bow my head and ask forgiveness for reminding them of God's little inconvenience. And that's about as political as I get.
Great pieces of dramatic writing, however, are something else altogether. We've been around for a fairly long time now, us westerners, and we have precious little to show for it. Euripides, Shakespeare, Bond. A couple of others. Well, guess how many "letters to the editor" are extant and attributed to the Greeks? That would be zero. Number of articles about "political theatre" written by Shakespeare (or Bacon or Marlowe or whoever was behind those plays)? Nil. OK, so Bond has jotted down a few books on the stuff, but he is awesome and tough and has been true to the spirit of his writing to the end, so I forgive him.
In 1900, Chekhov wrote a letter to Gorky, pleading with him to: "Write, write, write!" He told the younger playwright that failures would soon be forgotten, but a success, however slight, would be invaluable to the theatre. Like Gorky, the rest of us need to step back, sit down, zip it and get to work. We need more plays, not more speeches.
www.theguardian.com/arts/politicaltheatre
