In Defense of Literature: Art, Life, and Edson’s Wit
Margaret Edson’s monumental play Wit is a short but impactful piece that deals with a number of different themes throughout the course of the single act. Looking at Edson’s one-act play in the context of Florence Dee Boodakian’s statement, “Literature goes beyond life. It is art; it is an imaginative creation that can tell truths gracefully, subtly through narrative, poetry, and the movement of characters on a stage. Any imaginative act suggests possibility, and this is another reason to continue studying literature” encourages the reader or viewer to use the contrasting themes of life and death as well as those of kindness and apathy to examine their values and come to a deeper understanding of both themselves and their relationship with humanity as a whole.
Wit tells the story of a woman who is suffering from cancer—or, perhaps more accurately, a woman who is suffering from cancer treatment. The main character, Vivian, is introduced at the beginning of the play as already being the victim of stage IV cancer (Edson). The doctor approaches her with the suggestion of a new, hyper-aggressive treatment for her cancer; he tells her that her prognosis is not good without the treatment, so Vivian agrees to the treatment in the hopes that it will save her life (Edson). This is where Edson begins to weave literature into the play: as Vivian suffers through her treatment, she begins to reconnect with one of her favorite poets, John Donne. Throughout the treatment, as she hovers somewhere between life and death, she finds herself fixated on lines from Death Be Not Proud, linking her own death with those famous lines spoken hundreds of years earlier (Edson).
At the beginning of the play, Vivian is presented to the audience as a rational, intellectual person. One of her first lines to the audience is, “It is not my intention to give away the plot; but I think I die at the end” (Edson). This invokes both the title of the play—it’s a witty quip—but also Vivian’s harsh realism at the start of the story. However, as she goes through the process of dying, she begins to see the artistry in life. Her harsh realism is eroded as she continues to speak the words of John Donne throughout her treatment; as she gets closer to death, she becomes less focused on the intellectual and more focused on the ephemeral and spiritual (Edson).
Perhaps most of all, Vivian comes to know herself through literature even over the short span of the play. She becomes enraptured with Donne’s poetry, and then begins to understand how much she values kindness, even over logic and reason (Edson). This is a distinct difference from how she used to consider her priorities—the importance of kindness was something that only came when she was truly able to connect with the literature and remain connected with it on a deeper, more emotional level (Edson). She begins to see her own life through the eyes of others, and she begins to see that there were truths in Donne’s poetry that she had never been able to see before, because she was so concerned with the logical and rigorous analysis of the texts.
Wit is a complex play that deals with many themes, despite being relatively short. It questions the meaning of life and existence; it gives the viewer an insight into the mind of a dying woman. It even demonstrates for the viewer the importance of engaging with literature and keeping literature alive in one’s life, because it has the ability to show us deeper meanings and paint more brilliant pictures than would be available without the existence of literature. The one thing that is incorrect about this quote is that there does not have to be anything subtle about the beauty or the impact of literature; some of the most important messages of literature are weighty and painful rather than subtle and artful.
Works Cited
Edson, Margaret. Wit. New York: Faber and Faber, (1999) Print.
