Heartbreak House
Heartbreak House
“A Long Garden Seat on the West”
Nature, invention, human vileness, and Creative Evolution all conjoin in Hector’s speech in Act III: “Heaven’s threatening growl of disgust at us useless futile creatures. [Fiercely] I tell you, one of two things must happen. Either out of that darkness some new creation will come to supplant us as we have supplanted the animals, or the heavens will fall in thunder and destroy us.” It is uttered in the garden, toward which the whole play has been moving, with the backdrop of nature (“heavens”), the theme of invention (“some new creation”), the revelation of the vileness of human invention when cut off from nature (“us useless futile creatures”), and the suggestion of Creative Evolution (“will supplant us as we have supplanted the animals”). In brief, the passage summarizes one of the play’s themes: the baseness of human invention when alienated from, and contrasted with, nature’s creativeness, as symbolized by the garden and nature.
Keywords: Nature, Invention, Human vileness, Creative Evolution, Windows, Symbolism, Landscape, Poses, Reification, Merchandizing
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