Wit Literary Elements

Wit Literary Elements

Genre

Drama

Language

English

Setting and Context

1995 - Unnamed University Hospital Comprehensive Cancer Center

Narrator and Point of View

Narrator is Vivian, and her point-of-view is also central.

Tone and Mood

Dramatic, Serious, Humorous

Protagonist and Antagonist

Protagonist is Vivian. Antagonist is Jason.

Major Conflict

Vivan is diagnosed with stage 4 ovarian cancer and chooses to undergo an experimental chemo treatment.

Climax

The chemo doesn't kill off the cancer in Vivian's body, it spreads until it eventually takes her life.

Foreshadowing

Vivian tells the audience she will be dead by the end of the play. This foreshadows...well, her death.

Understatement

It is understated that Ashford is still alive until she arrives at the end of the play.

Allusions

The play is an allusion to how living one's life is the greatest study of poetry, and the dangers of losing oneself in an academic career pursuit.

Imagery

Vivian reaching towards the light after shedding her hospital gowns creates the image of shedding the burdens of life and entering the freedom of eternity.

Paradox

Vivian is a scholar of Donne's Holy Sonnets; paradoxically, when given the chance to listen to one of his sonnets on her death bed, she begs Ashford not to do so.

Parallelism

The scene with Vivian and her father where she reads The Runaway Bunny is paralleled when Dr. Ashford comes in to read the same book to Vivian on her death bed.

Personification

Jason becomes the personification of sterility in the medical community towards patients when he attempts to resuscitate Vivian when she is DNR.

Use of Dramatic Devices

Vivian breaks the fourth wall to address the audience throughout the play as the narrator.

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