by erin thursby scopes1925@msn.com
What: Typewriter
When: September 15th @ 7:30 pm
Where: Jacksonville University’s Swisher Theatre
For an evening of original dance, music and art by Altered Dance and Music, come out to see Typewriter, held at Jacksonville University’s Swisher Theatre.
The typewriter is much more than a dinosaur of the printing era. It is a machine that had its place in history, playing it admirably. For women of the late19th century through the 1970s, the typewriter was one of the few means of independence. Three professors at Jacksonville University—Barry Wilson, Cari Coble and Tony Steve, began discussing the role of women from the 1950s to today. After reading an article on the typewriter as a means of economic freedom in the early 20th century, they decided that both the typewriter and women needed to be represented on stage.
The title of the piece has a double meaning. Typewriter can mean the actual machine, but in the earlier part of the 20th century, it was used to refer to the typists themselves, the type writers.
So the woman is, in effect, the typewriter and so is the machine. At some point, women stopped taking dictation, writing what they were told to write, and they began using the power of words on their own. With the death of the manual typewriter and the advent of the Internet, words have become freer and the power of the printed word now belongs to everybody. As society changed, a woman’s accepted role changed. As technology changed, so too did the typewriter. You might argue that it disappeared, but as I write this on a QWERTY keyboard, I can only think that it hasn’t died, it’s just evolved to survive.
Barry Wilson, a Jacksonville artist who teaches printmaking at the school, had his own private collection of antique typewriters. He provides the videography that plays behind the dancers.
Tony Steve, assistant professor of contemporary/world music, wrote the score for the piece, putting together live music that he says is “sometimes a little sarcastic.”
Cari Coble, the last of the trio, choreographed the dance, interpreting their vision through movement.
The jumping off point for their vision was two-fold: an article on the role and extinction of the type writer and a list called “The Good Wife’s Guide” which has widely circulated the Internet. It’s purported to come from a Ladies Home Journal article or a home economics textbook from the 1950s, but Snopes.com debunks it as a fraud. Even if the exact text never existed, the attitudes and sentiments within are certainly believable as part of 1950s wifely ideals, if only because the ideas are found throughout printed materials of that time.
Pieces of the text from this list are projected as part of the videography, as the dancers act out parts of the text. At one point, when the projected text says: “Minimize all noise. At the time of his [the husband’s] arrival, eliminate all noise of the washer, dryer, or vacuum. Try to encourage the children to be quiet.” In response, composer Tony Steve wrote a cacophony of sound, instead of a soothing piece.
Typewriter is a multi-faceted production, designed to do many things at once. It tells us where we’ve been and how we’ve changed, how the idea of what a wife should be has changed and how all of that is tied to the history of a machine, inexorably linked to the women that once used it as a ticket to independence.
You can see Typewriter at Jacksonville University’s Swisher Theatre on Saturday, September 15th at 7:30 pm. Tickets are $10 for adults, $7 for seniors, $5 for general students and free to JU students with the proper ID. For more info call (904) 256-7374 or visit arts.ju.edu.
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