Mikael's Blog #3

Question 3: After seeing the physical transformation between Carol's choice of clothing between the acts, it seems that she was using her earlier clothing to make John think of her a certain way.  In this case, she was trying to make him think of her as the silly girl who didn't know what she was doing.  It's interesting that we were talking about John's inherent dishonesty in the intentions of asking her to his office multiple times.  We saw that he was only interested in getting her off his back, so he could continue the path to tenure.  However, as the play progressed, John's visage continually became more shabby and unprofessional.  As Zach mentions in his blog, by the third act John lights up cigarettes and drinks alcohol in his office.  This in itself shows the great amount of stress that's being pushed onto John in this small space of time.  He is a defeated man, and I could only wonder if there was any modicum of guilt in his actions.  While he may have been inviting her in to get her off his back, he was still begging her to let him go.  It's easy enough to think that the entire situation wasn't effecting him at all, but he did spend two days in a hotel thinking about it.