Advanced Voice Styles (372-0-20)
Topic
Radio Drama: Alice in Wonderland
Instructors
Linda H. Gates
Meeting Info
Wirtz Center STRUB: Tues, Thurs 1:00PM - 2:50PM
Overview of class
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass are two of the most celebrated children's books of all time. The critic Harold Bloom put them on his list of 100 Great Books of Western Literature. The familiar characters: Alice, The Mad Hatter, the March Hare, the Cheshire cat, the Caterpillar, the White Rabbit, the Queen of Hearts and the Duchess are all part of our collective cultural awareness. Somewhat less familiar is the language of the book, especially in relation to the characters and the story. "Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end: then stop;" or "Take care of the sense, and the sounds will take care of themselves;" or "Why sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." Or "If you don't know where you are going, any road will get you there" are all a part of our literary cultural awareness and regularly encountered in political discourse, journalism, critical writing, and literature, According to Harold Bloom: "satire, allusion, and symbolism weave deeper and mysterious meanings, lending a measure of immortality to Carroll's remarkable fantasy.
This class will present Alice in Wonderland in an adaptation from the original text as a radio play which will be performed and recorded in partnership with Neil Verma an associate professor in Radio/TV/Film and co-founder and director of the MA program in Sound Arts and Industries in RTVF. There are at least 38 characters in Alice in Wonderland including people, animals and fantastic creatures as well as a Narrator who all speak in a dialect of English of the Victorian period: British RP, Irish, Cockney, Yorkshire and others. As this is a radio play, students will have the opportunity to play a variety of characters using a variety of dialects and voices.
Registration Requirements
The only prerequisite is Theatre 170 Voice for Performance and it will receive credit as a Senior Topics class.
Email Prof Linda Gates lhg984[at]northwestern[dot]edu to request a permission number
Class limited to 16 students