[ATTACH A COPY OF THIS SHEET TO EACH OF YOUR ESSAYS] THIS FORM CAN BE PHOTOCOPIED

MIDDLESEX UNIVERSITY

English Literary Studies

ASSESSMENT COVER SHEET

Students must attach a copy of this cover sheet to every piece of assessment for ELS modules.
STUDENT NUMBER: M00466131

MODULE CODE: ELS1302

MODULE NAME: Reading Contemporary Literature DATE: 3.3. 2014

TUTORS NAME: Dr Colin Counsell

ESSAY TITLE:

What is the nature of human relationships as depicted in Shopping and Fucking?

PLAGIARISM DECLARATION:

I have read and understood the pages in the ELS Handbook explaining plagiarism.

I declare that the work in this assessment essay is my own, and written in my own words. The work of others is acknowledged by means of quotation, footnotes or bibliography.

SIGNED:

Peter Drole

DATE: 3.3. 2014

Please note that plagiarism is a serious offence, and the penalties for it are severe.

What is the nature of human relationship as depicted in Shopping and Fucking?

The author, Mark Ravenhill, wants to make the reader think about the human relationship in the modern world. The pristine human contact with one another is becoming a distant dream, with technological advances such as mobile phones, security cameras, and even potentially holograms. The products made for consumer society are meant for one person only, like Lulus ready meals. Society is standing at the edge of a cliff, just waiting to fall over the edge into abyss where the human contact and emotions are payable, but worth petty money. This essay argues that the play Shopping and Fucking portrays personal relationship as purchasable goods in the modern consumer society. The play is highly critical of the direction in which consumerism and wants to make the reader think about the life in this kind of society. There are many ways in which the author shows the decline of pristine human relationships. One of the biggest clashes is between the technology and human contact. This motif pops up in various instances during the play. It provokes the reader to think about how many times he checks the phone during the day, or how much time he spends in front of the computer. Inventions like mobile phones and computers made live personal contact almost redundant. They allow people to communicate over great distances, without the need to be in each others proximity. The world in which people are brought together by means of mass media and various modern forms of communications, is actually fragmentized and characterised by a constantly growing sense of alienations. (Kostid: 168) What is important to remember is, that these things are merely a means to communicate. In no way should they replace the real face to face talk, hug or kiss. This is what the play emphasises, especially when Gary

mentions holographs: Couple of years time and well not even meet *+ And then we wouldnt want to meet cos we might not look like our holographs. (Ravenhill: 22) It is the technology that is drifting the people apart. As if that fact is not enough, there is also a change in humans themselves. People no longer long for making love, having normal sex. They prefer to resort to any sort of derivations of sex: pornography, phone sex, or masturbation while watching videos of people getting stabbed. The whole idea of making love is portrayed as a thing - one that has many sorts, like the chocolate - that can be bought. Ravenhill wants to depict a world where the most beautiful and profound act of human relationship is commodified and traded for sad amounts of money. Mark has a habit of telling a particular story to Robbie and Lulu. It is about him buying Robbie and Lulu. In the beginning of the play, he is essentially making fun of buying people, and doing the transaction. But as the play progresses, the consumerism changes Mark. He is buying personal relationships and he is doing the transactions. He meets Gary, whose life fantasy is to be bought and owned. Gary is a part of the new generation, the one that has been born into the world without real relationships. He only knows the consumer society, the one where everything is for sale and where he can survive by offering his body. He acknowledges that he is sick and *he is+ never going to be well. (Ravenhill: 85) The end of the play escalates that when Mark is telling a story about the future. He describes a civilisation that only knows consumerism and nothing else. In that story, he buys a beautiful man and wants to set him free, but the man starts to cry and says he will die because he is not used to being free and having to take care of himself. This is a very bleak vision of the fate of the world devoid of personal relationships and only transactions left.

Each character avoids having a meaningful relationship in their own way. Lulu does that with the symbolic eating of ready meals, which she insists are really not made for sharing. She lives with a homosexual drug user, and does not look like she is ready to have a romantic or any other relationship. She admits that she only sees her family during Christmas. Mark has been to rehabilitation clinic, where instead of being treated for drug addiction, he was being rehabilitated for being emotionally dependent on people. In the play he often states that he cannot have personal relationships, only transactions. Robbie regularly uses drugs, which he calls little moments of heaven. (Ravenhill: 20) Mark later states that one cannot be sure whether ones feelings are true, or are they just drug induced. The drugs additionally diminish the possibility of pristine human relationships, because of their effect in producing fake feelings. There is hope for the characters at the end of the play, when they share the ready meal even though it is hard to share. They have learned from Garys case and do not want to end up like him. This play shows the commodification of human relationship. It depicts how the consumerism made human contact a payable commodity: phone sex, prostitution, drug-induced feelings. This very consumerism made sharing a meal almost impossible, because of the packaging. It is not expected of people to share a meal anymore. The sexual intercourse in modern society has been violated, and is not considered a personal relationship. The characters are all trapped in this crazy world, but the death of Gary makes Robbie, Mark and Lulu realise that they need to change in order to survive.

Primary materials: Ravenhill, Mark. Plays: 1. Shopping and Fucking (London: Methuen, 2001) Secondary materials: Kostid, Milena. Pop culture in Mark Ravenhills plays Shopping and Fucking and Faust is Dead. Brno studies in English. http://digilib.phil.muni.cz/bitstream/handle/11222.digilib/118129/1_BrnoStudiesEnglish_37-20111_13.pdf Accessed 28.2.2014