Poof! Essay Questions

What is the significance of the title?

The onomatopoeic title comes from the word Loureen uses to describe Samuel's death by spontaneous combustion. Rather than a more charged word that evokes an explosion, there is a gentleness to "poof"—he was there, and now he's not. The emphasis is less on him dying and more on him disappearing from Loureen's life, everything changing positively for her in a sudden flash.

Why is dark humor important to the plot?

The humor in Poof! keeps the play grounded in reality despite the absurd event that starts the play. While “Poof!” deals with the serious subject of domestic abuse, Florence and Loureen's humor brings some levity to the situation. Their jokes and sardonic humor unite the two women despite their confusion about what to do after Samuel's death, and highlight the depth of the bond between them.

How does the relationship between Loureen and Florence change over the course of the play?

Loureen and Florence start the play on similar ground: both are neglected/abused housewives wanting to break free. After Samuel's death, we learn that they were united in a pact against their husbands, but it never moved past the hypothetical. While relieved for her friend, Florence is likewise concerned for herself (as she is still stuck in her marriage), and fears that she will grow to resent Loureen's freedom.

How does the play argue for uplifting marginalized voices?

The focus of the play is very specifically on Loureen and Florence, not on Samuel and Edgar. In fact, Samuel and Edgar don't get any stage time (except for Samuel's yelling at the very beginning, and even then the stage is dark). Furthermore, the play focuses not only on their suffering—which rightly is included, but isn't the center of the play—but on their freedom and their joy. The central concept of the play, that voices are powerful and should be wielded, responds directly to Nottage's belief in amplifying the voices of the marginalized.

How does the play explore hegemony?

Hegemony refers to the dominance of one group over another group. In this case, the ruling class of the play are the men, and the subordinate class are the women. The neglect and abuse that Loureen and Florence experience is not just a case of a few bad apples; it is systemic patriarchal violence, inflicted upon them in order to keep them in their inferior place. Their husbands don't want them to have freedom, don't want them to use their voices, because they don't want the "natural" order to be disrupted. When Loureen gets rid of Samuel, she is so shocked because she understands that it was more than just beating out an individual. It was a small revolution.

How does the play explore community as a means of survival?

Loureen and Florence are all each other has. When Samuel has turned violent in the past, and the police have refused to come, Florence's home has been the only safe space for her to go. When Loureen is panicking over Samuel's death, Florence comes to support her, and doesn't spook. Throughout their friendship, they have found solidarity in their hatred of their husbands, and have literally plotted a scheme to runaway. Without each other, Loureen and Florence would be completed isolated—their safety would be at risk, and they likely wouldn't be able to imagine their way out.

How does the play raise questions about the justice system?

The play begins with the note that half the women on death row in the U.S. are convicted for killing abusive husbands. This fact obviously troubles—angers—Nottage, and it's a hypocrisy that she wants to take on with the play. With our focus on Loureen and Florence, and seeing the extent to which they've both been trapped, manipulated, and in Loureen's case physically abused, our empathy is solidly with them. Samuel's death, we can see, is the only way for Loureen to be free, and if she calls the police they will surely convict her, and she will go to prison, and she very well might die. The whole thing, Nottage points out, is contradictory. Furthermore, when Loureen did try to go them, when she tried to get help from the police when Samuel was alive and she was feeling unsafe, they didn't even come.

Considering the production, how could the staging be used to elevate the ideas of the play?

Nottage says explicitly in the stage directions that the show should open in darkness, and the lights rise once Samuel has spontaneously combusted. In this instance, the spotlight truly is on Loureen—not Samuel, emphasizing the fact that this is a play about her liberation, not his violence. Furthermore, the staging of the house, just its interior, with Loureen and Florence inside it, would visually show that their safe space is when they are together. The ringing of the phone would be the only interjection, and it would sound harsh (evoking the harsh outside world that they're sheltering from) in their otherwise quiet space of their conversation.

Consider the form. What is gained by telling this story in a play, rather than a short story?

The immediacy of theatre allows this story to have its greatest impact. Importantly, the audience is experiencing this event at the exact time Loureen is experiencing it. Of course, this is primarily true when watching it, but still, even reading the script allows for an aliveness that is often hard to find in standard prose. That we can't rely on narrative description to learn background details or explore character's interiority means that the dialogue between Loureen and Florence is all we have; beautifully, it's all they have, too.

How does the play explore desire?

Both Loureen and Florence are not only in loveless marriages, they are in lives they don't want. A significant part of the cruelty of their marriages is that any desire the women have had has been crushed under the weight of their mistreatment and servitude. With Samuel gone, Loureen can finally imagine a life beyond. Still in her marriage, Florence can't muster up such imaginings. It's no small violence when you consider that to no longer want anything is, essentially, to stop living.