The narrator’s first speech ends with “for, while they were not exactly happy they were not exactly unhappy either.” I think this highlights the fact that people in society are happy with their daily life being very mediocre. We put up with this because we are afraid of change. We sit on the same seat on the bus every day; we have the same routine when we get back from work. There are so many examples of these day to day rituals because we are unimaginative.
The characters in the play are stereotyped defined by their language. Firstly we have the conservative view, “if it was good enough for my father it’s good enough for me.” People become trapped in a way of thinking and therefore are frightened of change. There are always people who just agree with what someone says, apart from when what they say is a totally new and abstract idea. This is because people are intolerant to difference, if we see something different we will either laugh or stay well clear of it.
Then there is the feminist who is totally stuck in her ways. She talks about the women’s vote and after the religious man had said “someone’s in charge up there…leave it to him”, she added the totally pointless comment “or her”. It’s like she’s still trying to get her feminist point across even after they had been given equal rights to men.
The author adds a nice little touch of comedy into the play with the typical ‘locals’ and their Scottish accents. Then comes a couple of totally far-fetched explanations for the construction of the wall. Such language like “There is no doubt that it was constructed in the Neo-plasticene Age by primitive tree-worshippers” satirises how when someone says something confidently and using difficult language we are quick to believe them. Like all of the scientists in the television adverts with their white coats, we don’t understand all the graphs and proof that the product works, we just take their word for it. However this nonsense vocabulary exposes this so called expert for what he really is. It is strange after this as there is a totally logical explanation but it is immediately dismissed because of the extra ‘enom’ added to phenomenom. This was totally unnecessary and the mispronunciation highlights his ignorance.
We have the ‘philosopher’s’ view also, which is equally satirical. He says, “ it’s a figment of our imagination, the wall only exists in our minds.” After several of these mind-boggling ideas the narrator takes the ‘ordinary person’s’ response, one of confusion but yet understanding. He ties himself in knots with sentences like “he took a flying leap at where it was, or wasn’t, and dashed his brains out. Or so it seemed.” When we hear these peoples views we think they are completely mad and regard them as frauds.
The mother figure appears as number three and raises the point that “there is enough nasty this side of the wall, never mind the other side of the wall.” This is a ridiculous idea in that if nobody ever explores then everything will stay the same and there could be some good on the other side. She is scared of change. Everyone has their different ideas as to what is on the other side of the wall but in the end the topic is brought to a close when the scientists add their “fifth dimension” and “ethereal vibrations” ideas into the equation. This is a good conversation stopper because the normal people are confused by the scientists but don’t have any better ideas so they leave it at that. Even the scientists in the end give up and just say it doesn't matter anyway.
The mother figure reappears as number two and she shows how; along with the father that childrens curiosity is always crushed because parents are always too busy to explain anything, “ask your teacher.” The point about television is quite funny as it is a satire of how we sometimes watch television just for the sake of it and how unimportant it is in our lives. In this scene a boy asks his dad what is over the wall. He replies with, “Can’t you see I’m watching the goldfish?” This is particularly funny as it states how watching television is as pointless as watching a goldfish. Then there is a list of lots of meaningless things one can do and say to ignore the question asked.
In the next scene the explorer character that desperately wants to know what is over the wall goes to see the doctor. He tries to explain that he wants to talk about his obsession with the wall but the doctor is too wrapped up in asking his routine doctor’s questions like “sleeping all right? Eating all right?” He cannot understand that the patient’s problem is not a physical one but a psychological one. It satirises how the doctors gives out the same old questions to all of their patients and don’t let the actual patients get a word in edge-ways. It shows how the doctors don’t care about what they are doing they just say what they have to say and give out a prescription.
The final scene is the launching of the explorer over the wall. As he goes up and can see over he suffers a heart attack… The locals “shook their heads or giggled, and went back to their beans, and their goldfish.” This is a complete anti-climax and shows how the locals just wanted him gone and they didn’t even feel bad that he had died, they just went back to their routines. His death symbolises how the wall was out of his understanding, like God and his mind could not comprehend what was on the other side.