Blog post 5

After watching Oleanna, thoughts of abuse, perfectionists and the ideals of bettering oneself to obtain a better future came to my mind. To me, the young girls hasn't had many social interactions and can easily misconstrue what appears to be friendly gestures by a somewhat very sociable and eager teacher whom only wants to help out a student. Because of such a discrepancy, this young girl not only took serious measures to ensure he would pay for such actions.

 In the beginning of the story it seemed as if it were just a regular student wishing to understand the basic material of a college course. As a teacher with a bright future(recently acquired tenure) whom had just bought a house and was under some pressure due to personal problems, it was understandable for the audience to agree that the pupil should arrange an appointment in order to seek help. After going out of his way, avoiding his wife and family and even resorting to sleeping in a hotel just to find ways to deal with this student the pressures reach him and he finally snaps due to realizing the student  he tried so hard to teach accuses him of rape.  ]

Though towards the ending of this play the social roles switched in when the role of teacher and student were reversed, in which Carol begins to give John speeches and criticism on his books while he is basically just trying to understand what she has become and why she is doing this when he stats "Why are you doing this?" and her rebuttal to be "You ask me why I came?  I came here to instruct you." .


Overall this seems to me as a sadistic story of a young girl whom was gifted with book smarts and upon not being able to comprehend the class, took measures to make sure she passes the class, banned the book the professor wrote and overall ruin the life of the teacher who taught the course.