While reading Luigi Pirandello's play, The Six Characters in Search of an Author, one paragraph in the first act stood out to me. On page 29 in Pirandello's play, the Father, one of the six characters, struck a chord with me with this quote...
"This is the real drama for me; the belief that we all, you see, think of ourselves as one single person; but it's not true: each of us is several different people, and all these people live inside us."
The difference between an actor and a character is that an actor is just a derivative of the character; the actor is just an illusion. Without the character, the actor would be out of a job. Without the actor, the character will still continue to live on forever. If Brad Pitt did not play Achilles in the movie Troy, we would still know the character Achilles because of the author, Homer, and the character will continue to exist as along as we think about the character.
Sometimes we don't realize how different we act in different situations with different people. When I am with my mother, I act differently then I would if I was at work or hanging out with my friends. But what we don't notice is that we are not just "acting" life different people when we are around different people; we are different people.
One of Pirandello's points in this play is that we are made up of multiple people with multiple personalities. Those people, all put together make up one whole person. Like Shrek says, "Layers! Onions have layers. Ogres have layers. You get it? We both have layers."
I really like your comparison of human qualities to an onion. The way that we act differently in different situations can almost be comical at times. But I got to thinking about the onion reference. If each layer represents a different "appearance" or "side" of us when we are with a certain person or group of people, just how do all these different sides of us relate back to our true self, or inner-most layer? I know I can have completely different appearances but somehow they have to be related. I don't maybe they don't. Just got me thinking.
ReplyDeleteI also am intrigued by the idea of each appearance being a layer of our personality.. This sort of implys that somewhere in each of us we have an innermost layer. Or maybe not. possibly we all have an infinite number of layers that change and adapt to each new situation. And since no two situations are the same, then no two layers are the same.. Lots of thoughts, few answers
ReplyDeleteI really like your comparison of humans to onions. It is crazy when you think about how quickly we shift our personalities and the way we act depending on who we are around. In a second we can go from being with friends to meeting your grandmother or someone else in your family and immediately and subconsciously, we shift the way we are acting. It is a strange thought that we are actors of different characters in this life.
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