3.2.1.6The text at a glance
Enid, who came to London from Jamaica, takes her daughters Del and Viv to the spiritual reader Mai. Del rebels against her mother and becomes pregnant; Viv, the academic success, questions the path laid out for her. Enid's cheerfulness gives way under the strain of work, remittances home and a mother she has not seen. Del turns towards Mai and begins to learn from her.
First performed in 1987 and set in 1980s Britain. It was the first play by a Black British woman to be produced at the National Theatre, in 1994, and won the George Devine Award. Many of the Windrush generation intended to return to the Caribbean and did not.
- obeah
- a Caribbean system of spiritual practice and healing
- the myth of return
- the intention to go home that is deferred indefinitely
- remittances
- money sent back to family in the country of origin
3.2.1.6Characters
Enid's cheerfulness is maintained deliberately, which makes its collapse more affecting. Her own upbringing in Jamaica explains how she parents.
Del and Viv respond in opposite directions to the same pressure, which separates character from circumstance.
Mai stands outside the family, which lets her say what a relative could not. Her own doubts about her gift complicate any reading of her as simple wisdom.
3.2.1.6Themes
Identity and belonging run through the title's double meaning of departure and permission. The generational gap is audible in how each generation speaks. Motherhood is examined across three generations, so patterns become visible as repetition rather than as individual failings.
Common mistake
Reading Del's rebellion as simple rejection. She ends by apprenticing herself to Mai, which is a turn towards the inheritance rather than away from it.
3.2.1.6The writer's methods
Two interiors, Enid's front room and Mai's flat, divide the play between the life Enid has built and the inheritance she has kept at a distance. Characters are repeatedly shown arriving and leaving, enacting the title, and no scene is set in Jamaica, which keeps the homeland as memory only.
Worked example
Answer:
- The title means both departure and permission
- Three generations make the patterns visible
- Jamaica is never staged, only remembered
- Del's rebellion circles back to inheritance
AO1-AO4How this text is examined
This text is examined in Paper 2, Section A. The question is worth 34 marks and two essay questions are offered on your text and you answer one; no extract is printed, so quotations must come from memory. Allow about 45 minutes.
The marks are divided as AO1 12 marks, AO2 12 marks, AO3 6 marks, AO4 4 marks. AO1 rewards a clear argument supported by well-chosen references. AO2 rewards analysis of how the writer achieves an effect, which means writing about choices rather than about events. AO3 rewards context used to deepen a reading of the text.
Common mistake
Retelling the plot. Narrative summary earns nothing under any assessment objective, however accurate it is. Every paragraph should be making a point about how or why, not about what happens.
Four of the marks are for AO4: vocabulary and sentence structures used to control meaning, and accurate spelling and punctuation. These are the cheapest marks on the paper and the easiest to lose by rushing the final paragraph.