Bailey Bows Out

An Open Letter of Resignation

I am writing my letter of resignation as Drama Editor of Salient as an open letter because I believe my reasons for resigning may be of interest to the readers. Little discussion has been made about the role of a critic and I hope my letter may stimulate some thought about it.

As a reviewer I have taken as my central aim to present my own personal reactions to a particular production, elucidating and justifying as best I could. Being a practitioner I have strong opinions on how theatre should work and what it should explore. Obviously this strongly clouded my reactions to shows. Was I thus doing justice to the performances? Originally I thought I was justified because dialogue is a valuable thing. If people disagreed they could write in and state their disagreement. By partaking of this activity people would hopefully grow in their appreciation of theatre as a social act and I would be able to gain new insights into what people were thinking. To achieve this aim I deliberately took a more extreme view than normal.

But instead of thousands of people writing in with their own opinions nothing has ever come in. Rather people have been disagreeing with my views sometimes quite violently, but never actually getting into a discussion. What I get from that is that people consider theatre a very personal thing and if you disagree with what they are doing or thinking then you are making a personal attack on them. The role of the reviewer is considered to be that of a journalist objectively writing an account of the performance so that people can make up their own minds about whether or not they should go to see the show and how they react to it without any influence from someone else. The cult of the individual.

If no one is prepared to get into a discussion about the show, this is probably the best approach to use, because it does the most justice to the performers. But if the aim is to develop a critically aware audience in New Zealand such an approach would be futile. Obviously a lot more work needs to be done in this area, a lot more battles must be fought before someone actually responds and a debate can be started.

As it is I feel it arrogant of me to continue pushing my own viewpoint without the leavening of an alternate one. As the situation stands I have no desire to become a journalist and am very unwilling to set myself up as judge and jury. Obviously the best place to express my ideas on theatre is to actually do things in theatre. In the original Greek 'drama' means doing acting performing. I no longer feel willing to write about theatre. I must do and then let the audience judge that.

So, Simon, I feel that I must resign as Drama Editor. I hope someone will come forward who is willing to honestly and without malice, criticise people's work, because it is an important task. My reasons for resigning have nothing to do with any dissatisfaction with the way the paper is being run, because I believe it is working well. It is simply a personal decision that, if I am actually to achieve what I believe in, I must make.

John Bailey