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Drama Analysis - The Sandbox


            Edward Albee's short drama, The Sandbox, is a great example of drama humor and also has a twisted way of explaining death. The main plot revolves around the grandmother, who is just named "Grandma" in the drama. She is taking care of what seems to be her son and his wife. Oddly, they are given the name "Mommy" and "Daddy." The setting is at the beach where Mommy and Daddy dragged Grandma into a nearby sandpit while a young man is working out for no particular reason near the background. The young man in the story is later identified as the angel of death. Grandma playing in the sandpit like a young child can be metaphorically compared to her lying in her deathbed. The theme in The Sandbox by Edward Albee explains the death stage of an individual and how people treat the dying elderly.
             Grandma serves as a distinctive character in Edward Albee's short drama. She represents the elderly by expressing herself in a couple of drama asides. She states in an aside, "when you get old, and you can't talk to people because people snap at you. That's why you become deaf, so you won't be able to hear people talking to you that way. That's why old people die, eventually" (Albee). Grandma explains she is deaf because would rather pretend she can't hear than be yelled at by people. Elderly people are known to lose hearing with age, which makes having a conversation with them difficult and frustrating at times. When talking to the old, the level of patience seems to lower, and the tone of voice is raised.
             In another aside by Grandma, she says, "what a way to treat an old woman! Drag her out of the house. stick her in a car. bring her out here from the city. dump her in a pile of sand. and leave her here set" (Albee 1147). The denotation meaning of Grandma's aside means to literally take a human being and drag them in a car to be dumped in a pile of sand. To get a full understanding of the Albee's drama literary meaning, the connotation meaning of Grandma's aside needs to be known.


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