The Glass Cafe Poem Analysis

Tamara Al Ali
Rola Jaber
English 10
20th January, 2017
Compare and Contrast Essay
“If a group of people one day wills to live---fate (God) must answer its call---And the night must fade---And the chain must break” (Abou El-Kacem Al-Chabbi). Playwriting is one of the most famous ways to break the chain and express the writer’s feelings. Many famous writers use playwriting as a way of sending a message to people, and one of those writers is Sa’dallah Wannous. Wannous is an author who wrote many plays that discuss the issues and the conflicts of the Middle East. He expresses his anger and his sadness by using many different dramatic techniques, themes and literary techniques in his plays. The most prominent plays that he wrote are, The Glass Café

These two plays have many differences and many similarities, but they are similar more than they are different.

One of the differences between both plays is the theme. The theme in the Glass Café is that the nation will collapse if its people didn’t pay attention to the dangers that threaten it. Even death doesn’t make people aware of what’s going on around them. While the people in the café’ were busy playing their games, a man died in the café, they all satisfied their conscience by saying, "God bless his soul”. Wannous described their reactions saying, “No one takes any notice. All costumers are immersed in their own activities.” (Sa’dallah, 10). This quotation shows that people are careless about important issues around them and that they got used to see people dying around them, so they didn’t react that much when the man died. This shows how Wannous is expressing the reality of the Arab world. Not paying attention to such important

Wannous is sending an invitation for people to come to the theater, attached with a message that shows the reality of the Arab world, and beyond any delusional thoughts as some writers do. He is welcoming his audience to come to stage to see the stories of their reality. In this way, Wannous is making people become more aware, and he 's paving them to his aim of making the Arab world great again. Wannous used “Tragedy” in both plays to send certain messages to people about the Arab world. In The Glass Café, Unsi saw a crowd of children hitting the glass of the café. However, no on in the café cared about that, and they treated him as a crazy man. They’ve tried to make him calm down by serving him some tea with lemon; this sudden event will become a tragic event soon since no one cares about it. “You’re little tired, Mr. Unsi. My mother was the same. Do try to make things calmly, and quietly.” (The Waiter, 16). This quotation represents how Wannous is showing the audience how people nowadays treat intellectuals and whoever is trying to make the Arab world great again. Similarly, in The King’s Elephant, Wannous changed the usual way of organizing a play by starting a play with a sudden and tragic event or the “climax” instead of the exposition. “The voices grow louder, coming from behind the houses down right. The cries and laments of the women die down.” (Wannous, 1).