Bond’s The Sea Character Analysis
The Sea is a tragicomedy. It is written by the British dramatist, Edward Bond, and the play was published in 1973. Through this play, Bond shows his readers how various social evils affect the lives of people in a town while centring the sea in the drama such as upper-class unfair control and worldwide cruelties. In today’s post, you will learn about the analysis of the major characters of The Sea so that you can understand them effectively.
Analysis of the Major Characters:
The analysis for each major character of the play, The Sea, is presented one by one below.
Willy Carson Character Analysis:
Willy Carson is shown as sympathetic, strong, and optimistic, etc. in the play.
Willy is a brave man who loses his friend, Colin, during the sea storm but strives to recover from the shock he gets from his drowning.
Also, Willy is shown as deeply connected to/deeply emotional about Colin. He weeps when he visits Evens on the beach on remembering Colin even after several days of his drowning.
Willy has a strong connection to rationality. He remains rational even in extremely difficult circumstances. He doesn’t let his negative emotions overcome his rationality. For example, when it comes to Hatch’s paranoia that caused Colin’s death in the scene one of the play, Willy doesn’t lose his rational approach and doesn’t become hostile towards Hatch whose behaviour he couldn’t understand in most parts of the play.
Willy also gets close to others easily and cares about them. For example, his connection with Rose shows the reader that he is a good man and doesn’t require a lot of consideration to be in a significant relationship with the opposite gender. He begins to love Rose without spending several months with her. Therefore, he is prepared to leave the town with her for a new start in their life as a couple at the end of the play. Willy, as a good friend, also motivates Rose to move on in life with a positive mind in the middle of the play before the part in which he decides to leave the town with her as a lover.
Willy has a great philosophy of life as well. According to his philosophy, one should strive to find positivity in life despite the oppression and suffering that people experience/observe in this world. Everyone should remain hopeful to live their life meaningfully.
Plus, when Willy asks Evens near the end of the play about whether he should work hard or not to become a mayor in the town to bring positive changes to the area, Evens suggests him to move to the advanced parts of the world to find more answers related to life and find ways to end the cruelties and suffering of the world. This shows how ambitious Willy is.
So, through Willy’s characterisation, one can say that Willy is a character of high rationality, optimism, bravery, emotional strength, personal growth, humanity, and love.
Rose Jones Character Analysis:
Rose Jones is a character who is shown in deep grief at the start of the play, is emotionally vulnerable in the middle of the play, and becomes hopeful near the end of the play. Her relationships with Colin, Willy, and Mrs Rafi are significant to consider to completely understand her character.
First of all, her relationship with Willy is friendly. She understands Willy, and Willy understands her. Rose and Willy first become friends. Then, they become lovers near the end of the play. Willy is an optimistic and brave person who encourages Rose to move on in life after Colin’s death. Her grief for Colin is so deep that she doesn’t find any positivity or meaning in life. So Willy suggests that she should strive to move on in life and find positivity in life despite her grief and the oppression and suffering already prevalent in the world. The world has its positive and negative sides. So one should strive to find positivity in one’s life on one’s own. Rose becomes influenced by Willy’s suggestion in the drama and is impressed by his wisdom as well. The friendship between the two gradually develops into love with Willy’s positive influence and Rose’s growing resilience. Therefore, near the end of the drama, she agrees to move out of the town with Willy for a new chapter as his lover.
Regarding the relationship between Rose and Colin, the reader can sense that they had a great relationship as lovers and an engaged couple. Colin loved Rose with all his heart, and Rose also loved him with all her heart. After Colin’s death in the drama, Rose says that she sees him in her imagination struggling in the sea to save his life, but she does not see him drown because she has not seen him die in real life. So she says that her life is stuck because she has not experienced his death, and she still remembers him as if he is in the middle of life and death. She also praises him a lot. She tells Willy that Colin had dark eyes, was very handsome overall, and was like fire to her. The fire here most probably means highly energetic. Therefore, the relationship between Rose and Colin was very strong.
And as far as Rose’s relationship with Mrs Rafi is concerned, she has a complex relationship with her aunt because Mrs Rafi is a lady who doesn’t show much regard for others’ feelings, even when it comes to the feelings of her own family. For example, Mrs Rafi doesn’t consider Rose’s feelings at a high level when she is in the house of Mrs Rafi, and the old lady conducts the rehearsal of the play that is to be performed to raise funds for the coast guards of the town. Mrs Rafi doesn’t feel embarrassed noticeably in the play during the rehearsal, even when Willy sees her rehearsing in the house at a time when Colin’s death is recent. And his body is still missing.
So we can say that Rose symbolises love, emotional vulnerability, resilience, hope, and grief in the play, The Sea. Her transformation from an emotionally vulnerable girl to an emotionally strong one with Willy’s positive contribution is remarkable within the play.
Hatch Character Analysis:
Hatch is a character who is shown as crazy, negative-minded, and fearful in the play. He is neither a full victim nor a complete villain. So his personality is quite complex in the drama. We can understand the complexity through his various interactions in the play.
For example, when it comes to Hatch’s interactions with Willy, we see Hatch’s belief related to Willy being an alien agent is so strong in his mind that he is unable to comprehend Willy properly throughout the play. As a matter of fact, Hatch persistently believes that Willy is an alien agent and has come into the town to assist aliens in dominating the town. So he does not help Willy save Colin from drowning during the sea storm on the beach. Consequently, Colin drowns in the sea. From that accident to Hatch’s final scene in the play, his belief about Willy being an alien agent remains intact. Hatch even becomes so hostile towards Willy in the drama that he attacks Colin’s corpse with a knife by mistaking the corpse for Willy and cuts its throat after stabbing the corpse multiple times. Actually, he is an illogical person who, because of his paranoid nature, is negative towards Willy throughout the play. After one of his interactions with Mrs Rafi, when she rejects the curtain cloth of Hatch’s shop and doesn’t pay for the order she placed because of Hatch’s carelessness that caused Colin’s drowning, Hatch becomes extremely hostile towards Willy. He attempts to kill him on the beach by mistakenly attacking Colin’s body in place of Willy because he thinks, in his insanity, that Willy is hidden underneath the jersey on the beach.
And when it comes to the interactions between Mrs Rafi and Hatch, we come to know that Mrs Rafi, in her domineering manner, usually suppresses him in his drapery shop. She rejects his multiple samples in the shop, and when she ultimately accepts a sample for which she places an order, she takes the sample with her outside the shop to pass the final judgment before paying for the order. She intends to judge the ordered piece by matching the quality of the sample with that of the ordered curtain cloth to ensure she can pay for the order without any issue. So we see that Hatch is socially oppressed by authoritative figures like Mrs Rafi in the town. He is not rich and is a struggling man in the town. In other words, he is having a difficult life financially there. So we can say that his disturbed mental condition is partly caused by the oppression he faces from authoritative figures like Mrs Rafi. But obviously, the negative mindset and paranoid nature are also contributors to his psychological issue that we see at a serious level in the middle of the play.
Therefore, the financial fear, paranoid nature, and negative mindset are those factors that play a huge role in making Hatch completely insane in the latter parts of the play. When we say that Hatch is fearful, he is fearful for two main reasons in the play. For example, he has a fear that aliens will take over the town if he doesn’t spy on Willy and Evens and handle them properly. Then, he is fearful because he thinks that Mrs Rafi’s rejection of the order that she placed will cost him such a heavy monetary loss that he cannot bear it financially. His first fear related to the aliens is illogical, but his second fear is logical because Mrs Rafi’s order is quite expensive that she rejects because of Hatch’s negligence-based involvement in Colin’s drowning. Based on Mrs Rafi’s order rejection incident, one can say that Hatch should not have accepted her costly order in the first place through an excuse (a false one), which should have appeared true to her, when he could not bear the loss because he already knew about her domineering and strict nature. In this way, he could avoid the loss, but his impulsive nature didn’t let him make a good decision in his shop. Plus, Hatch’s verbal and physical fight with Mrs Rafi, which comes soon in the play after her order rejection, highlights how a heavy financial loss leads Hatch to full insanity. So we can say that Hatch is neither a complete villain nor a complete victim because, despite his socially oppressed condition, his mental condition is also affected due to his paranoid nature, negative mentality, and logical financial dread in the play.
In other words, Hatch symbolises paranoia, a negative mindset, and madness in the play, The Sea. His transition from a semi-mad person to a fully insane person is also striking in the drama.
Mrs Rafi Character Analysis:
Mrs Louise Rafi is a lady who is shown as domineering, insensitive, class-conscious and overconfident in the play. Her interactions with others in the play, including her family member (Rose) and friend (Mrs Tilehouse), show a lot about her character.
First of all, through Mrs Rafi’s interactions with Rose (her niece), it is clear that Mrs Rafi does not regard others’ feelings, including her family’s feelings, much. For instance, in the case of Colin’s death (who was Rose’s fiancé), Mrs Rafi doesn’t regard Rose’s feelings much while she is in her house and conducts the rehearsal of the play (Orpheus) that has to be performed to raise funds for the coastguards in the town. Through her decision to conduct the rehearsal, it appears that Colin’s recent death and his missing body do not bother her much. The reader can understand Mrs Rafi’s insensitive nature very well through her confident conducting of the play’s rehearsal in such difficult family time as she rehearses with others for the play’s performance as if there is no recent tragedy.
Regarding Mrs Rafi’s domineering nature, there are multiple instances in the play. For example, Mrs Rafi tells Willy that he should inform her about what exactly happened the day Colin drowned because she would like to complain to the army’s chief if the gun firing is responsible for their boat’s turning over and Colin’s consequent drowning. Through her lines, the reader can understand that she uses her aristocratic power to exploit even the high authorities. Actually, she doesn’t even regard the fact that the army has already stated that the specific area shouldn’t be covered by any boats where Willy and Colin entered on the day of Colin’s death in their boat. But a more interesting fact is that she tells Willy in Scene 2 that she intended to complain to the army’s chief soon before meeting Willy. By coincidence, Willy meets her in Hatch’s drapery shop and tells her that the boat turned over due to the sea storm, not the gun firing. That made her refrain from complaining. She shows her intention of the complaint based on her mere suspicion that the gun firing might have turned over the boat and caused Colin’s drowning. This proves how overconfident she is. But the complaint to the army’s chief regarding the gun firing within the forbidden area is irrelevant, in fact, interfering, here. We can sense her domineering and overconfident nature through this instance completely.
However, the best example of Mrs Rafi’s overconfident nature in the play is in the scene where she rehearses with others for the play, Orpheus. During the rehearsal, she shows that she can neither act nor lead the play’s rehearsal properly. She behaves as an immature actor and an immature director during the rehearsal. She adds a song in the play that makes no sense for the play’s scene. Then, Mrs Rafi adds an extra character in the play for the darkness scene. She also forcefully adds Mrs Tilehouse to the scene to act as the extra character. Through her dictatorial and overconfident style during the rehearsal, the reader can infer how people like her can affect others and even the arts at a high level. Though the play’s rehearsal is shown as comic by Bond, Mrs Rafi’s behaviour during the rehearsal shows that domineering and overconfident people like her do not know how to properly take care of people and even the arts.
Afterwards, when it comes to Mrs Rafi’s interactions with Hatch, the reader sees that she behaves strictly with him as he is a member of the lower class. Mrs Rafi goes to purchase clothes in Hatch’s drapery shop. But when we see her dealing with Hatch, she bullies and browbeats him for his stock and finally places the blue velvet order for her curtains. Then, on some other day, she does not pay for that order because of Hatch’s negligence-based involvement in Colin’s drowning. She even declares in front of him that no one will ever visit his shop under her influence because of his negligence on the beach as a coast guard that caused Colin’s death. We see through her interactions with Hatch that she is very harsh towards the people of the lower class. Mrs Rafi doesn’t care about them at all when their behaviour is highly objectionable to her, even if the matter is of their livelihood. Her rejection of the blue velvet cloth is something that is ethically wrong and shows her proud or class-conscious nature.
In short, the character of Mrs Rafi proves to the reader how aristocratic people like her, who should do social work at a prominent level and lead by example in front of the public to promote moral values, actually cause disturbances for various people in their society with their highly objectionable words (spoken) and actions.
Evens Character Analysis:
Evens is a character who is shown as a rational, optimistic, and deep-thinking old man in the play. His interactions with Willy tell us the core messages of the play. Even though he remains drunk and is waiting to die on the beach or living a devastated life due to his irritation with the oppressive nature of his society, his opinions about human life and suffering are meaningful.
When we see Evens’ interactions with Willy in the play, we come to know that he guides Willy in finding the answers of his questions by moving to the developed parts of the world to end the worldwide suffering and violence and make the world a better place for everyone. According to Evens, the oppression caused by humans can be ended if people strive to end the oppression. He believes that life will ultimately defeat death. He means to say that people with a revolutionary mind can end the cycle of oppression and suffering in this world.
Evens also suggests Willy to remain optimistic as it’s a stupid idea to lose hope in the world. According to Evens, the world’s negativity caused by oppression should not make anyone hopeless. Also, he admits that he cannot be helped and is waiting for his death on the beach as he intends to avoid the duality of his society based on oppression. But the young man, Willy, should travel and explore life to find his answers and improve the world by taking a strong stand against oppression.
Evens also tries to guide Hollarcut to stay away from Hatch as he is not a good man to follow, but Hollarcut does not change his path because he is a stupid person. Bond shows through their dialogues in the drama that some people simply cannot be guided because their minds are unable to properly process the differences between good and bad things and people.
In other words, Evens is a strong philosophical character like Willy who, despite being an alcoholic and wasting his remaining days on the beach away from the people, is a strong voice of rationality and an optimistic outlook on the world of violence within the play.
Conclusion:
So that is all what I have to share with you regarding Bond’s The Sea character analysis. I hope you found my post beneficial. And if that’s the case, then please share it with your connections online and offline. In this way, they can also learn the character analysis of The Sea in detail. Plus, if you want to share your feedback with me for my post, then comment below, email me, or submit a form on my site (through the contact form available on “Contact Me” page). I shall respond you for your message shortly.