Spring Awakening

Spring Awakening

Samuel Williams

              On Friday, November 3 I went to see the school’s performance of Spring Awakening. The musical is about a German catholic school in the 1900s. The boys and girls are kept separate from a young age and only now are they starting to see each other again. This musical is about topics that were very antireligion, such as suicide, premarital sex and homosexuality, and how these things were repressed and shunned by their school. The purpose of the musical was to show how the Catholic schools, as well as society, at the time had very conservative views and how those views led to mistreatment of the students.

              The opening scenes showed just how competitive and vigorous the schooling was for the boys at the time. Learning consisted of route memorization and solely about performance. The one time that Melchior speaks up and contradicts an analysis on what they are memorizing, and instantly gets berated and told he was wrong. This kind of education can be effective in terms of knowing the material but it leads to no understanding of the concepts. Therefore, they would only be able to do things if presented in a certain problem set rather than apply concepts to new things.  Also, the way that the school was structured, in terms of only a set number of people can make it to the next level of education is harsh especially if one of the students, Moritz, did meet the necessary requirements. Then his expulsion from school leads to Moritz into a deep depression where he feels he has failed at life and has no purpose so he commits suicide. These two aspects of the education that these boys received are severe injustices to them, as their academic growth is stunted and their entire life hinges on one grade that their professors think they deserve. This will only lead to a sad life because eventually they will get a bad mark and as we learned true happiness cannot come from external factors, such as a passing mark.
              The other main topic of the play was focused around relationships. Obviously, a Catholic school at that time would preach abstinence until marriage, a marriage between man and woman. But rather than teaching them about sex to protect the young men and women from violating this belief, they are kept apart from one another and are not supposed to see each other alone while being told lies about how a baby is made. This results in poor judgment that ends with Wendla getting pregnant. If they were taught about sex and its implications, the possibility of Wendla getting pregnant would have decreased. A more minor relationship that occurred throughout the play was that two of the boys were homosexual and were in a relationship but no one ever really found out about them, so we all that can be assumed is that it was not allowed.

              After reading Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night I was astonished about how so much drama could be created in such a short period of time. He has managed to start a love triangle between Olivia, Viola/Cesario, and Orsino, without Olivia and Orsino even knowing that Cesario is not a man but Viola. On top of that, Malvolio is getting pranked into potentially losing his job. This all occurs in only two acts. When Viola reveals herself to Olivia and Orsino I have a feeling that she is going to get spurned by both of them, at the very lease Orsino. As a result of this spurning, I could see her doing some drastic measure that is very over the top and results in the death of someone. Also, I think that Malvolio is going to lose his job and find out it was all a joke played on him and get back at Maria and Sir Toby and Sir Andrew, as he already does not like them in the least.