Themes in Sticks and Bones
by David Rabe (1972)

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Themes

• War movies and popular culture images are important themes in SH5 and Cuckoo=s Nest. In Virginia Woolf, George uses steroetypical science fiction images to describe the negative conformist future he imagines Nick represents. How are images of the media and popular culture used in this play?

 
• Sports become a major concern in this play. How does the attitude towards athletics compare and contrast with the briefer allusions to sports in other works we have read?

 
• This is very much a play about racism and the Other. What are some of the racial prejudices the Nelson family has about Vietnamese people? To what degree are these prejudices projections of flaws in themselves that they cannot accept?
• home/ changes/ transformation -- "You can never go home again."
• values -- Oz counting all his possessions;  products rather than process