doubt

One of the things I love about the school where I work is that every teacher gets to take his/her class to see a couple of productions at the local theatre in Burlington. A lot of these kids would probably never opt to see a play in their life, so I like it that the school offers this kind of opportunity for them. The theatre offers a whole student matinee series, and each spring we get to pick the plays that we will take our students to the following school year. This year I chose "Doubt"; and something called "4-ISH Extreme Sports/Hip-hop Extravaganza."

We saw "Inspecting Carol" in October and it was surprisingly fun and funny. I had a few VOCAL nay-sayers in one of my classes, but for the most part the students seemed to enjoy the show.

Last week we went to "Doubt." Here's the description from the theatre's web site:

“What do you do when you’re not sure?” Father Flynn asks in the opening
line of this riveting mystery, a gripping tale of moral uncertainty set in a
Bronx school in 1964. When Flynn’s colleague suspects him of wrongdoing with
their school’s first African- American student, she faces a grave dilemma:
openly accuse a higher-up without firm evidence or bury her suspicions and leave
room for doubt? A tough and timely examination of the line between gossip and
truth, justice and compassion, certainty and doubt, this intriguing play won the
2005 Pulitzer Prize, and the Tony, Obie, and Drama Desk awards for Best
Play.

It was an interesting play to take the students to. The audience never finds out if Father Flynn did in fact do anything inappropriate with the student, as one of the nuns suspects, and that's what makes it so compelling. I was struck by how much that's like life. Hard situations rarely have a tidy ending, with every question answered and every doubt resolved.

The students found it maddening that the answer wasn't more clear. I, however, found it maddening that they couldn't seem to see the truth in such an uncertain ending. If only they could see how they are constantly caught in the morass of untangling truth from fiction, and how they blame and bite each other based on rumors and gossip.... never resolving anything in the neat and tidy way they longed to see on stage.

But I suppose none of us is really that good at seeing our own limitations (or doing anything about them if we do!). And I like to think that taking them to this play and then engaging them in discussion afterward planted some kind of seed of thoughtfulness that might one day grow up to be self-awareness. Maybe that's too much to hope for??? :)