Attempts on Her Life

by Martin Crimp

Attempts on Her Life by Martin Crimp is at turns hilarious and shocking, a rollercoaster of twentieth century obsessions from pornography to ethnic violence and terrorism to unprotected sex.

Genres: Plays, Theatre, Drama, British Literature, Contemporary

96 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

About the author

Martin Andrew Crimp (born 14 February 1956 in Dartford, Kent) is a British playwright.

Crimp is sometimes described as a practitioner of the "in-yer-face" school of contemporary British drama, although he rejects the label. He is notable for the astringency of his dialogue, a tone of emotional detachment, a bleak view of human relationships – none of his characters experience love or joy – and latterly, a concern for theatrical form and language rather than an interest in narrative.

Reviews

[صان · Rating 2 out of 5]

با خوندن مقدمه متوجه می‌شدی که با یک نمایشنامه معمولی طرف نیستی.

۱۷ تکه یا اپیزود که هرکدوم حول مساله‌ای می‌چرخیدن. دیالوگ بود اما شخصیت‌ها اسم نداشتن و می‌تونستی هرجور و هرجا که می‌خوای تصورشون کنی. بعضی تکه‌ها بیشتر ارتباط برقرار می‌کردن و توی بعضیا کمتر. اول دو ستاره دادم چون فرم متفاوتش، ارتباط برقرار کردن باهاش رو برام سخت کرده بود ولی الان تبدیلش می‌کنم به سه ستاره چون چیزهایی ازش توی سرم به هم متصل شدن. گاهی شعر می‌شد و موزیکال و گاهی فقط یه سری کلمه رو پرت می‌کرد. شبیه کار آخر سارا کین (سایکوسیس ۴:۴۸) بود. از نظر فرم و تیکه‌تیکه بودن و تعویض شیوه اجرایی که از دیالوگ به خوندن یه سری کلمه یا شعر عوض می‌شد.

دغدغه‌ش توی بعضی اپیزودا جنگ بود، خودکشی بود، هنر مدرن و از همه بیشتر جامعه سرمایه‌داری بود. گاهی انتقادها طنز می‌شد، اما طنزی که با خشونت و سیاهی همراه بود.

[Diana · Rating 3 out of 5]

آقای لام‌تاکامی سوءقصدهارو بهم قرض داد. منم دقیقا هفته‌ی بعد ساعت هشت صبح، برش گردوندم.

[Gloria · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm still confused. I'd really like to see this in performance, I think it needs to be *done* not read

[Talie · Rating 4 out of 5]

“No one will have directly experienced the actual cause of such happenings, but everyone will have received an image of them.” -Baudrillard
نمایشنامه شکسته و تکه پاره است و هر تکه اشارتی است و هجویه ای. اشارتی به خشونت و نژداپرستی های پنهان. هجویه ای است بر صنعت سرگرمی، هنر و پورن و ...

[Szymon · Rating 4 out of 5]

She says she's not a real character, not a real character like you get in a book or on TV, but a lack of character, an absence she calls it, doesn't she, of character.

Crimp's highly experimental modernist play is an exploration of narration. Providing no direction, or even any distinct speakers, 17 vignettes describe Annie: the supposedly central character of this play. The actors and actresses within the play continue to describe Annie. In one vignette, she's a car, in another a child sex worker, in a different one the naive mid-20s lover of a politician.

Crimp's play, the way I understood it in my reading, is an interesting take on the complexities of female representation. For all the things that Annie supposedly is in this play, what her character boils down to is a bunch of cliches. The feminine mystique, and the intended subversion of it by making her 'brainy', which in itself is a cliché. When she's old, she's a mother, or a regrettable spinster. When she's young, she's sexy, but coy; romantic but tragic, the girl next door, but a sex worker.

I'm excited for the lecture series on this play. It was the first play I read that was this experimental and I enjoyed the confusion it caused. If you're into plays that divulge into the topic of gender and feminism, this might peak your interest.

[ianthe · Rating 3 out of 5]

perfect example of a great play that was unfortunately written by a man

[audrey r · Rating 4 out of 5]

anne, annie, anya, annushka, oh this play! crimp really makes you work and think to try and understand what’s going on, but it’s a great commentary on our perceptions of others and the snap judgements we make. everything’s up to interpretation, and our own perceptions shape how we come to terms with this play and it’s messages

[Caitriona · Rating 1 out of 5]

??????????????????

[Harry McDonald · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't really understand it but I think it's sort of brilliant. I could see it 20 different ways and I don't know if that would make it twenty times clearer, or twenty times more incomprehensible.

[Mahtab · Rating 5 out of 5]

«و چیز ترسناک اینه که، که اون زن می‌تونه یکی از ماها باشه.»

[vani.cloudy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I go through this play not via the usual route of leisure reading. It’s part of my reading list in the literature course that focuses on the concept of ‘Retreats of Realism’. Thus, to me, the confusion that everyone talks about makes sense. ‘Attempts on Her Life’ is a postdramatic theatre text. This means that it ruptures and goes beyond the normal, traditional definition of dramatic theatre. As dramatic theatre plays are presented on stage, they try to mimic life, to create their own fictional yet realistic world. Characters are built with backstories, names and personalities. Plots are presented with cause-effect link. Everything that happens in the play leads to a closed, explainable, resolved ending. In postdramatic theatre/plays, however, the idea is that reality, or real life does not happen on the basis of cause-effect link, is not presented in understandable ways all the time. Life is full of surprises and there might be things happening that we cannot explain, or solve, or make sense of. In this sense, what is considered ‘mimic life’ and ‘realistic’ in traditional, well-play dramatic theatre is actually not realistic and does not mimic real life.

‘Attempts on Her Life’ does actually what I just discuss. The play gives us a world where life is delineated through the fragmented representations, the unexpected, the chaos and unresolvable aspect. Life here is not linear, not a plot, and people are definitely not born in dramatic theatre. The play is telling us that it takes more than just lines and backstories and stage direction to understand and cut clear of people’s lives. This character, or actually characters, is mysterious, questionable, unrealistic, difficult to make sense, but that is life. As we take the walk of life and have people pass our life, we are given information just the way the speakers give to us, and then it’s up to us to figure out and try to make sense of someone, but what we think will never actually be who they are, or have the ability to define a person. It is this rejection of everything we know about normal, traditional theatre that creates the beauty of ‘Attempts on Her Life’, and leaves us wonder, ponder, and question after the play, keeping it real and true to life’s core.

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I get and can kind of understand what Crimp is trying to do with this play, but ultimately I didn't really like this. It's getting two stars because although it's confusing and generally just blah, I think that's what Crimp intended? Maybe? I don't know. The whole thing wasn't a great experience, but it's post-modern and experimental and I suppose you've got to just kind of go with it. This probably would have made a lot more sense had I seen it rather than read it because on paper, it's just way too weird.

[Mohammad Mallaki · Rating 2 out of 5]

با یه شیوه متفاوت نمایشنامه روبروییم ، جایی که شخصیت با تعریف عمومیش خیلی متفاوته و به اون صورت همیشگی وجود نداره! من به شخصه ترجیح میدم خود نمایششو ببینم تا اینکه بخونمش! برای مطالعه پیشنهادش نمی‌کنم

[Nazanin Banaei · Rating 2 out of 5]

تاریکترین جا همیشه زیر چراغه.

[Romina]

فکر نمی‌کنم فهمیده باشمش، شاید تلاشی هم نکردم برای فهمیدنش، ولی دوسش داشتم.

[Jorė · Rating 5 out of 5]

After watching the play, reading the play and going through a number of reviews, I'm still unsure. It is, probably, a very good play

- Some of the strange things she says...
- Some of the strange things she says to her Mum and Dad as a child: 'I feel like a screen.'
- 'I feel like a screen.'
- She's lying there, isn't she, with the tube in her poor thin arm, looking terribly pale, whiter in fact than / the pillow.
- 'Like a TV screen,' she says, 'where everything from the front looks real and alive, but round the back there's just dust and a few wires'
- 'Dust and a few wires.' Her imagination...
- She says she's not a real character, not a real character like you get in a book or on TV, but a lack of character, an absence she calls it, doesn't she, of character.

[Victor Morosoff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Crimp est un artisan doué de ce monde schizoïde. C'est la deuxième pièce à lui que je viens de lire, et toujours cette impression d'acuité et de terreur. Comment une petite fille sage qui joue avec les Barbie peut un jour devenir terroriste ? Comment cette même fille peut vivre en paix avec elle et les autres, mère d'une famille heureuse ? Va savoir, c'est ce monde qui rend tout possible et plausible. 4,2/5

[Sadeq Elmi Mousavi · Rating 1 out of 5]

تا صد صفحه اول خوندم و به جز دو نمایشنامه اول چیزی از باقی نمایشنامه‌ها دستگیرم نشد.
شاید خیلی تخصصی باشه شاید هم درک بالایی می‌خواد، به نظر می‌رسه که بدون پیش‌زمینه نمیشه چیزی ازش فهمید.
بهرحال تا همینجا باشه شاید یه روز برگشتم و باز خوندم و نظرم عوض شد.

در کل بنظرم روی صحنه بسیار جذاب‌تر خواهد بود، ایده‌های زیبایی زیر نمایشنامه حس می‌شد که قابل لمس نبود!

[Reyhaneh br · Rating 3 out of 5]

شیوه‌ی روایت این نمایش‌نامه بسیار متفاوت است با اکثر نمایش‌ها. در ابتدای آن تیتری که شخصیت‌ها را معرفی کند وجود ندارد. شخصیتی نداریم. دیالوگ‌ها با خط تیره مشخص می‌شوند. مهم نیست که آن‌ها را که می‌گوید.
«آن» در همه‌جای کتاب هست و هیچ‌جای آن نیست.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

I want to see it. I really do. Because I'm definitely intrigued, but I really just don't understand. Maybe I'm not supposed to...

[Louise · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I 'get' what Crimp was trying to do, but I just disliked the play as a whole.

[massmarketbareback · Rating 4 out of 5]

it’s as great as everyone said it is

[Irina Vasile · Rating 3 out of 5]

Crimp manages to create such interesting experiments with his plays. This one reminded me of an improvisation exercise in acting class, where someone would write a statement on a piece of paper, then pass it to another person who does the same, until a whole text is created. "Attempts on her life" gave me the same sensation. There isn't really a story, although you feel as if there is, as it feels authentic and real. It is, in my opinion, more of a creative experiment, aiming to prove how we create characters in our minds, similarly to the way a painter sketches out a portrait.

[Jenny Gladheim · Rating 4 out of 5]

til masterforum.

[Federica · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5⭐
ma super super interessante!! assolutamente da vedere in scena

[sof · Rating 3 out of 5]

enjoyable reading

[ivan · Rating 2 out of 5]

i recently have read this for a subject and i think it must be so much better when it is represented

[Cat]

I just can't get behind this play.
The seventeen scenarios themselves are, on the whole, individually compelling but as a complete piece it feels repetitive and meandering. You could, as some performances seem to, remove any number or the scenes in any combination, and the audience reaction and takeaway would barely differ.

Admittedly, there is always the argument that plays should be performed rather than read, but I would only watch a performance out of curiosity for if staging this play makes it any more interesting to consume.

[Mark Friend · Rating 4 out of 5]

Teaching Note: I found Martin Crimp’s ‘Attempt on her Life’ through its reference in 100 Great plays for women.

I understand this unusual play-script, without conventional characters or a dramatic arc, can both excite and/or challenge readers with questions on how and why to stage it.

As a sequence of 17 scenarios, each offering different perspectives of the central entity Anne. Are these attempts at different explanations on a life?

The phrase ‘attempts on her life’ brings up numerous connotations, but the play is also exploring the idea of identity, on our attempts to judge, explain, reconcile or pigeonhole the words and actions of others around us into the construct on character or identity.

These 17 short scenes/ scenarios could also offer students a stylistic model for dramatic action, to inspire and generate their own play-building work.

This script offers us numerous opportunities for a Drama class. I can see myself making use of individual scenes as extracts, along with referencing the whole play.

[Maisie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm confused but I like it