Sleepless night

Late night conversation with a friend who studies dance, drama and who also takes some writing modules . She raised a few interesting questions about my ideas and intentions. Not only has the discussion made me think about why I'm making the decisions I am about my piece, but it's also generated new thoughts, connections and inspirations.

I've put the conversation into a Q&A format and elaborated slightly on my answers.


Why is it set in a railway station?

Train station because it's a place of transience. This is a station where she's the only traveller, and trains come and go but she never does.

We don't know really where she's come from or where she's going, but there'll be hints to that in the piece.

Why not an airport, bus terminal etc.

Well. At a train station you're reliant on a system to get anywhere, in many ways it's out of your control whether a train turns up, or not, and so to have a character at a station, ready to go, but not going anywhere...

I mean it could be a bus station, but I want the announcements - this other voice in the piece. I find train stations much more evocative. I write a lot on trains and meet a lot of interesting people. For this piece I've already spent some time at stations for research taking phrases from people's conversations which I may build into the character and the script.

There's something a bit more...emotional about a train station, in my mind.

What time is the piece set in? Are they steam trains or modern trains?

I want the piece to be timeless although it'll have an aesthetic which will lean more to the past. A sense of the old. This is mainly because of personal taste and an element of romanticism for the 1930's/40's.

Why head in a suitcase?

Head's in suitcase because basically this place is her home. It's strange, but to her completely natural. It takes the piece into the surreal and hopefully adds a comic element.

I want the feeling to be reminiscent of Waiting for Godot, in a sense. Though I'm no Samuel Beckett.

You mean it's a piece where nothing really happens but it means a lot?

Yes. She's waiting, but she's not. It's never said that she's waiting. Hence the first thing she says is "yes"...it's just matter of fact, positive. It could be in response to the station announcer, maybe not.

I almost want to make the script a bricolage, with lines from other texts, some Beckett, some Eggers, and then lines of my own. I want it to be poetic and beautiful, but abstract and full of depth. There'll be an element of intertextuality from all the things that have inspired me.

I might address the audience. I quite want this woman to be talking to them, so it feels uncomfortable, like she knows them...but they have no idea about anything. To the character everything she's doing is completely natural, this is her way of life.

Like Godot, will you be saying similar things at the end as you are at the start?

Yes. I have a passion for all things cyclic. I like stories to come back around, for things to be closed off but in a way which doesn't give you complete satisfaction...it ends as it began...and could carry on that way forever...