To look back and forward in anger.

Look Back in Anger, sets its plot in the middle of the 20th Century, in a post-war England. Sunday evening, and everything is marching as usual: Killing the time reading the newspapers, giving no contribution to the universe at all. Jimmy Porter, our main character, is starting to feel bored about this, and he wants so hard to step aside this dull routine, yet he doesn’t seems to be followed by neither his friend, nor his wife.

As soon as you start this play, you can give the name of Jimmy Porter to any of the national current events: The difference between socio-economical classes, the fight for a better education, movements against corruption, and so on. Events that, as well as Jimmy, shout for enthusiasm, scream at your face to stand up from your chair and do something. They may be strong and violent at some point, but sometimes violence is the catalyst for a major upheaval.

But basically, these events mentioned can be summed up in one word: Anger. Anger from the oppressed to the oppressor, from the needy to the spendthrift, from the middle low class to the middle high class and its privileges; and how sad is to think that the same anger shown in this play can be seen almost 70 years later.

And you should be angry too, otherwise you are not paying enough attention of what is happening in our country. And as the title invites, we should look back in anger; we should look back of all the awful things that have happened (which is a long list) and review how many things have changed. We have to encourage ourselves and the rest, as members of the class with restricted privileges, to raise our fist and voice against the small group which pulls the strings.

I would have liked to write only about Jimmy and what I think he represents, but it is funny to think about Colonel Redfern and what he may represent in our society; the old fashioned way to behave in front of reality, the “I’m too old for this”, the “every past was better”, the bourgeois who has all the answers. There are plenty of people like him, and they should also be the target of our anger.

Anyway, does both of them can represent another issue, by any chance?