A Thousand Clowns (Themes)

Themes

Self-Concept and Selfishness

When Sandra discovers that Murray has been offered two jobs but has not accepted either of them, she expresses her disappointment in a line that expresses the play's central question: "Maybe you're wonderfully independent, Murray, or maybe, maybe you're the most extraordinarily selfish person I've ever met." The line between self-awareness and self-centeredness is the line that Murray must establish as he moves through the play, and it is this line that determines whether other characters find Murray enchanting or exasperating.

Murray is not close to many people. He is not married and seems to have no friends. He dates many women, but none for long. His sister Elaine is in Europe. His brother Arnold is kind and loyal, but Arnold's relationship with Murray seems entirely one-sided. Nick is a twelve-year-old boy. In Murray's eyes, he is independent and free, with no one telling him what he should be or do. He forms no attachments; he is not in debt to anyone for anything, and he does not ask for anything from others except to be left alone. Only by living this way, he believes, can he maintain his self-image, because intimacy with another person would create demands that would change who he is. And to maintain his uniqueness, he believes, is a high and noble calling. It is all he wants for Nick: "I want him to get to know exactly the special thing he is. I want him to know the subtle, sneaky, important reason why he was born a human being and not a chair." For Murray, it is more important to be true to oneself than to make compromises that please others.

To other people — those who love Murray and those who do not — Murray's striving to maintain his self-concept is mere selfishness. Arnold, who feels responsible for supporting his wife and children, challenges Murray's refusal to work. It is not a highly developed dislike of mediocrity that informs Murray's choices, Arnold claims, but simply "Other People; taking up space, bumping into you, asking for things, making lines to wait on, taking cabs away." Albert cannot understand why Murray is not "at all willing to answer some questions, to give some evidence" to support his case and ultimately finds him guilty of "libertine self-indulgence." Leo Herman, repeatedly humiliated by Murray, criticizes: "the way you brought this kid up, Murray, grotesque atmosphere, unhealthy, and you're not even guilty about it." These characters find Murray selfish, not a free spirit; they do not long for the unfettered life he leads. At the end of the play, Murray's choice is clear: If he loves Nick, he will hang on to his job with Leo Herman, whether he finds it personally satisfying or not. The question hanging in the air as the curtain goes down is: Will he do it?

Middle-Class Life

Large groups of people in a given class share values and beliefs as well as social and economic status. Sociologists describe, for example, a set of values and beliefs found in capitalist societies among the middle classes. The middle classes, they observe, are particularly driven by a work ethic, a belief that people's worth derives chiefly from the work they do. People meeting each other for the first time are apt to identify themselves by their jobs, rather than by other characteristics — it is normal and acceptable to ask a new acquaintance "What do you do?" For people who hold the work ethic, a person who does not work is strange, someone to be avoided or examined.

Other qualities embraced by the middle class grow out of the workplace and its need for structure and order. Middle-class values as they are commonly referred to include a preference for punctuality, an acceptance of hierarchy, including respect and submission to those higher up on the corporate ladder, and an acceptance that the schedules and demands of work will shape one's daily life. Accompanying these values are fear and suspicion of anyone who does not adhere to them.

Murray Burns's greatest fear is that he will join the middle class and lose himself. He loves Nick and wants to keep him, but not if it means, as he says, "being judged by people I don't know and who don't know me." He wants to live on his own schedule, create his own holidays, because "You have to own your days and name them, each one of them, every one of them, or else the years go right by and none of them belong to you." He worries that if Nick is placed with a normal family "He'll learn to know everything before it happens, he'll learn to plan, he'll learn how to be one of the nice dead people." The people who disapprove of Murray's way of life do not think he is evil or dangerous or unkind; they see that he is different, and they assume that different is bad. If he were independently wealthy or chronically impoverished, people around him might question less his decision not to work. In practical terms, Murray's struggle is not within himself but is rather a struggle to maintain his chosen way of life within and yet outside the middle class.

TOPICS FOR FURTHER STUDY

• The job of the New York Bureau of Child Welfare in the play is to determine whether or not Murray and Nick function well as a family. They seem particularly interested in the fact that Nick's birth parents were not married to each other. What different kinds of families do the people you know live in today? What are the qualities that make up a good parent or a functioning family?
• The Chuckles the Chipmunk television show seems to be about equal parts entertainment and advertisement for Chuckle-Chip potato chips. In that regard, do you think television aimed at children has improved or deteriorated since the 1960s? Are children's programs today intended more for providing entertainment or for selling products?
• A director of a stage play or a film works with the script on the page, but can guide the way an audience interprets a character by choosing who will play the parts and how they will deliver the lines. How would you cast a stage or film production of A Thousand Clowns? Which actors working today capture the essential qualities of each character as you perceive them?
• A few years after its Broadway opening, A Thousand Clowns was made into a film. Instead of confining the action to Murray's one-room apartment and Arnold's office, the film was able to move throughout the city of New York. If you were making a film version of the play, what scenes would you add or relocate to take advantage of this opportunity?