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To include

What are the key ideas


Explain your monologue [character, key ideas, how it links to the rest of
the play, techniques]
How Michael Gow uses theatrical conventions
o Lighting
o Symbolism
o Blocking
o Music
o Inter-textuality references to other texts
Historical influences
What makes the play significant and effective
Conclusion why its an important and valuable play and what an
audience can gain from it
Death drowning represents death and represents that Tom is dying and at the
start of the play he is in a form of purgatory, a place of suffering
Healing Coral is having marital troubles due to losing her son in war but
meeting Tom heals her It is my love who must be saved. She must return to
dry land. Better I am unhappy for eternity than she suffer another moment
Shows how Coral is suffering and how she was chasing after the dead but
meeting Tom allowed her to move on.
Acceptance This monologue tells of a sailor who died and was forced to wonder
the high seas forever until he atones or makes up for what he did. Near the end
of the monologue the sailor says, I shall leave this place. This signifies that
Tom has accepted that he is going to die.
Blocking
Used to represent how Coral is turned into a mermaid and then turned
back signifying how she was healed by Tom stage directions: He
removes the towel. Coral contemplates her legs a moment then covers them
with her kaftan.

Clothing
* Sailors cap
Helpful notes from worksheet
Alter-ego Puck
Mentor to characters in crisis
Social engineer of play
Ironically, given his impending death, he becomes a source of life and
radiance
Tom represents Everyman dreams, fears, aspirations of Australian
youth today

Time-bomb
In both Shakespearean and classical Greek drama and in Away, the
purpose of each characters journey is to gain self-knowledge
Tom is referred to as a Chips Rafferty by both his headmaster and his
father, that is, he is regarded as an accomplished thespian. In this way
Gow elevates an average teenagers life into that of a hero, a character
who will impact on others behaviour and change them, for the better
sacrificing his own life in return.

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