Edward Albee; Adoped Talent

Adopted Talent:
The Edward Albee Story

Submitted by
C. Clennan

Passionate. Driven. Persistent. Clever. Leader. Resentful. Shaped by life experiences. These are some words and phrases that could be used to describe the famous playwright, Edward Albee. Through living his life, and examining everything about it, Albee has learned how to understand how he really feels about issues that effect both himself and the people that he shares the world with. Albee enjoys writing by the philosophy that a playwright should always strive to, initially entertain an audience but, they also need to have their own opinion on social living, and they should give their critic on social structure through their work (Moritz 1).

As we examine Albee’s plays, and the central themes that they express, we see the close connections that the works have thematically. We notice the constant criticism that Albee displays, through his work, on the values of American living. This shows that he obviously strives to have a political voice and he wants to get that voice out there. He has strong feelings about the “American values” and he continuously mocks them in his work. Not exactly to the point of anarchy, but it’s plain to see that he feels strongly about the false persona that the “American dream” describes (Evory 19).

One thing that Edward Albee has grown a strong opinion of is his viewpoints on nonconformity. He believes that we live in a time where everyone believes that everyone is a conformist; that everyone has the exact same ideas and opinions as the next guy. “Conformity has become a dirty word” (Albee 15), Albee stated in an essay on nonconformity. His personal opinion is conformity and nonconformity are inexistent; they are simply more groups for people to place other people in. Albee constantly brings up the point that people are alienated; therefore they have their own ideas their own thoughts, their on opinions, and so forth. People aren’t nonconformist by...
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