[Jaime Kibben]
L'auteur - The author
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L'oeuvre de Tobias Wolff, auteur consacré, fait alterner fiction et réalité. Ses textes les plus connus sont autobiographiques : This Boy's Life (1989) - adapté au cinéma en 1993, avec Robert DeNiro et Leonardo DiCaprio - et In Pharoah's Army: Memories of the Lost War (1994). Mais il est d'abord un maître de la nouvelle. De son premier recueil, In the Garden of the North American Martyrs (1981), Raymond Carver a dit: "Ces nouvelles concernent des êtres vrais, des choses vraies. [...] Elles sont morales sans être moralisatrices ni didactiques. Certaines sont amusantes, d'autres font froid dans le dos. Mais toutes, sans exception, traitent de la condition humaine". Tobias Wolff a fait ses études aux Etats-Unis et en Grande Bretagne, il a servi au Vietnam puis a travaillé comme reporter. Il a dirigé des ateliers d'écriture dans trois universités (Arizona State, Syracuse, Stanford). |
Tobias Wolff is an award-winning author of both fiction and non-fiction. Although his memoirs This Boy's Life (1989) - adapted for film in 1993, with Robert DeNiro and Leonardo DiCaprio - and In Pharoah's Army: Memories of the Lost War (1994) are perhaps his best known works, he is considered a master of the short story. Describing Wolff's first collection of stories, In the Garden of the North American Martyrs (1981), Raymond Carver said: "They are about real people and real things. [...] They are moral stories, but they are not didactic or cautionary. Some of them are funny. Some are chilling ... and not one doesn't in some way speak to the human condition." Educated in the United States and Great Britain, Wolff served in the Vietnam War and later worked as a reporter. He has taught creative writing at Arizona State University, Syracuse University, and Stanford University. |
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Tobias Wolff grew up in the Pacific Northwest (the setting for his boyhood memoir, "This Boy's Life"), had a checkered educational career at the Hill School in Pennsylvania, and served four years in the Army including a tour in Vietnam (the source for his second memoir, "In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War"). He completed his undergraduate degree at Oxford University, and received an M.A. from Stanford University, which he attended with a Stegner Fellowship. He subsequently taught at Stanford for two years, and for seventeen years at Syracuse University in upstate New York. Five years ago, he returned to Stanford University where he currently directs the Creative Writing Program. Mr. Wolff's work includes three collections of short stories, "In the Garden of the North American Martyrs", "Back in the World", and "The Night in Question", as well as a novella, "The Barracks Thief", which won the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. "This Boy's Life" was a finalist for the National Book Critics' Circle Award and received the Los Angeles Times Book Award. It was made into a film in 1991. "In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War" is considered by some to be the finest book published about Vietnam, and was a National Book Award finalist.
L'oeuvre - The work
"In the Garden of the North American Martyrs" first appeared in "Antaeus and Macmillan's Winter Tales" (anthology) and is in Tobias Wolff's collection "In the Garden of the North American Martyrs", published by The Ecco Press/HarperCollins.
Le résumé - The summary
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Dans le jardin des martyrs nord-américains Professeur d'histoire, Mary s'était silencieusement soumise à l'autorité depuis si longtemps que les mots pour exprimer "ses opinions personnelles [...] s'estompèrent au fil du temps [...] comme un vol d'oiseaux s'évanouissant à l'horizon". Tout en cultivant des airs d'amusante excentrique, elle se conforme prudemment à l'idée qu'elle se fait des attentes d'autrui. Mais soudain, son université se voit contrainte de fermer ses portes et l'existence protégée de Mary, si méticuleusement construite, prend fin. Sa vie, professionnelle ou personnelle, se pourrit lentement. Aussi, lorsqu'une ancienne collègue lui propose de se porter candidate à un poste prestigieux, réagit-elle avec enthousiasme, convaincue que, lors de l'entretien, elle saura à nouveau "se faire apprécier, ou, à tout le moins, elle ne leur donnerait aucun motif de déplaisir". Une déception s'ensuit, mais qui forcera Mary à affronter, enfin, son passé de soumission. Grâce à une sauvage analogie historique - l'exécution, au Canada en 1649, par les Iroquois, de deux Jésuites, les fameux 'martyrs nord-américains' - elle finit par trouver les mots correspondant à sa pensée longtemps refoulée, et elle s'exprime au cours d'une explosive conférence publique. |
In the Garden of the North American Martyrs Mary, a history professor, had submitted to authority in silence for so long that the words to express "her own thoughts [...] grew faint as time went on [...] like birds flying away." While cultivating the appearance of humorous eccentricity, she carefully conforms to what she thinks is expected of her. However, the sudden closure of the university puts an end to Mary's safely constructed existence, and her life slowly sinks into professional and personal decay. So when an ex-colleague invites her to apply for a prestigious position, Mary responds enthusiastically, confident that in the interview she can once again "make them like her, or at least give them no cause to dislike her." Though disappointment follows, it will ultimately force Mary to face her submissive past. Drawing a fierce historical analogy - the execution by the Iroquois of two Jesuit priests, Canada's "North American Martyrs", in 1649 - she finally finds words for her own long-suppressed thoughts, which she expresses in an explosive public lecture. D.G. |
La troupe - The Company
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Message de Word for Word (17/03/03) Hello friends,We at Word for Word are eagerly preparing for our France visit. Rehearsals for "In the Garden of the North American Martyrs" begin this week. We have a Bon Voyage Performance on March 24th before we leave. The clock is ticking, we are all excited, anticipating another wonderful tour. We have a mission from our benefactor, The Florence Gould Foundation, "to promote French-American amity through cultural events." This year as we face this threat of war in Iraq, we take that mission very seriously. In that regard, Sue has asked me to forward to you a web page my friend, Mark Gunion and his wife cb have created, to give impressions in text, photos, and sound recordings, of the February 16th March for Peace, here in San Francisco. My husband Luke and I were there, as were, 200,000 others. Mark has captured the feelings, sights and sounds of that day. I hope they will give you affirmation that many, many of us, here in the US are doing all we can to "wage peace." Please go to this site: http://home.earthlink.net/~markandcb/rally2.htm Warmest wishes, see you soon. |
"Forget books on tape.
Word for Word puts books on stage, and does so with a skill, intelligence
and insight that live up to the group's slogan:
'We bring literature to life.'"
-- Robert Hurwitt, San Francisco Examiner.
Word for Word is a professional theatre company that stages short stories, performing every word the author has written, and thus preserving his/her voice and honoring the writer's intent. Literature is brought to life through inventive staging and exciting visual effects. Word for Word states its goals as being "to excite people about the written word, to inspire them to read more, to create new audiences for the theatre, and to share the world's diverse cultures and stories". As one of their company members says: "It's like being read to. While it's fully literary in content, it's completely theatrical in form."
Word For Word: 1999 Best Ensemble Award from Bay Area Critics Circle.
Word for Word: 1998 Special Achievement Award from Bay Area Critics Circle.
Margo Hall: 1998 Black Box Award for Direction, Word for Word's Joy Ride.
(also "Friend of My Youth" Director)
Founders and Artistic Directors : Susan Harloe & JoAnne Winter.
[San Francisco Chronicle]
Director ....................... : Sheila Balter
Assistant Director ............. : JoAnne Winter
Performers :
- Susan Harloe * ............... Mary
- Nancy Shelby * ............... Louise
- Mark Phillips * .............. Roger, Ensemble
- Paul Finocchiaro ............. Dr. Howells, Ensemble
- Joel Mullennix * ............. Provost, Ensemble
- Delia MacDougall * ........... Student, Ensemble
- Rudy Guerrero * .............. Young man with pipe, Ensemble
Stage Manager .................. : David
A. Young *
Assistant Stage Manager ........ : Coree Thompson
Costume Design/Wardrobe Mistress : A. René Walker
Sound Design ................... : Drew Yeris
Choreography ................... : Andrea Weber
Vocal consultant ............... : Jeffrey Crockett
* Denotes member of Actors Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers.
Leur tour de France
est financé par la Florence Gould Foundation et Air France pour le
transport.
This production is funded by the Florence Gould Foundation; travel support by Air France.
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