The Visit Quotations

Friedrich Durrenmätt's drama The Visit (adapted/translated by Tony Kushner) For IB Lit HL Paper 2 Comparative

“life as I understand it has been cheapened by your visit”

Miss Covington: monetary metaphor, blame, personal power

“but no one really leaves, anyplace, anything, don’t you think?”

Claire: repetition, rhetorical question, familiar tone

“she’s more like one of the fates, less a Claire and more a Clotho”

Miss Covington: comparison by smilie, creation of Claire as an archetype in her own right, mythological allusion, assonance of “cl” sound

“I left and became hell itself”

Claire: metaphor, religious allusion, personification

“Jesus Christ Claire are you totally fake?” “aren’t we all?”

Ill, Claire: theme of artificiality, complexity of human relationships, facades, dual meaning of “fake”

“Justice, it, it isn’t for sale. Is it?” “I’ve bought it before”

Mayor Herckheimer, Claire: question shows fickle nature of town’s loyalty, repetition shows blustering unsurety (in contrast with cool confidence), contraction of commodifying an idea

“She hunted us down! She’s Artemis”

Koby: Claire as a mythological figure, feminine independence, hunting metaphor, predator prey dynamic, exclamation, powerlessness

“I’m memory. I am, or I will become, a myth”

Claire: characterisation through self-metaphor, awareness of metanarrative and its role as a parable, fusion of present and future