Tom
Stoppard,
“If you’re Glad, I’ll be Frank”, a play for Radio in one act, Faber Paperbacks,
1969, London.
The play sets in London, next Big Ben (pag.8) and it is written in 14
scenes.
The main characters in the play are Gladys, Frank and the First
Lord of a Post Office.
Gladys works in the Post Office receiving phone calls to
say the TIME. She is the speaking clock. Frank is a
bus driver and the First Lord is the “responsible for the lot,
with especial attention to the Telephone Services”; “TIM,
dial-the-speaking-clock” (pag.10: 1st Lord).
Frank and Gladys have a frustrated
relationship. They are separated (scene 4) and they try to meet but he only get
communicate with Gladys when he asks her “what’s the time
now?” (pag.14: Frank).
Frank attempts to squeeze a few minutes out of his
schedule to rescue Gladys from the Post Office. Every time Frank
stops the bus, the conductress go after him (pag21: Conductress: “Frank-we’ll
get behind time!”; “I ask you to remember the schedule!”).
Through Gladys, Tom Stoppard shows us several visions or concepts
about the TIME. It’s a philosophical thought about the influence
that the TIME has over our lives and ourselves:
1.- TIME understood as
something arbitrary. “time is something they invented, for
their own convenience” (pag.11: Gladys).
2.- TIME trappes the individual. Gladys is
trapped at her desk metering out ten seconds intervals (pag.23: Gladys: “…demanding
a different answer every ten seconds.”; pag.25: Gladys: “Oh-Frank! Help
me!…”),1st Lord is trapped at the TIME itself (pag.10: 1st
Lord: “We can’t afford to lose track of time, or we’d be lost.”) and
Frank is trapped looking for his wife (pag.25: Frank: “Right, let’s not
waste time…”).
3.- TIME means a certain order. Repetitive
rhythm of the speaking clock during all of the play ( “At the third stroke
it will be eight fifty-nine precisely”, “At the third stroke it will be eight
fifty-nine and ten seconds..”;...).
4.- TIME. Dizziness (pags.12-13: “if you
can’t look away you feel sick”; “time viewed from such distance…reducing the
lifespan to nothing”).
5.- TIME. Silence. (pag.18: Gladys: “Silence
is the sound of time passing”).
6.- TIME. Unstoppable*** (pag.18: Gladys: “It’s
only the clock that goes tick tock and never the time that chimes. It’s never
the time that stops.”).
7.- TIME. Unrepeatable. (pag.20: Gladys: “You
could set your clock by him. But not time-it flies by unrepeatable…”).
With all of named aspects, Tom
Stoppard shows us how the pressure of the established order (the time with the
clock) trappes and limits the individual actions.
The autonomy of the individual, the individual liberty is limited by the
order of the universe what produces frustration and comfort at the same TIME.
It remembers me the naturalistic vision that the naturalists writers
have about the universe.
In my opinion, the play is a very deep thought about the relativity
of the time and its influence over the human beings.
On the other hand, I think that to interpret this play is necessary
having quite patience and a philosophical predisposition.
The play has been quite difficult to understand for me in a first
reading. Later I have to read it very slowly.