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LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Bald Soprano, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Bald Soprano satirizes the pretensions of the middle class. The first words of the play are the stage directions, “SCENE: A middle-class English interior, with English armchairs.” The play ruthlessly undermines this world of bourgeois comfort—of armchairs, slippers, and pipe-smoking—by presenting its inhabitants as grotesque and clueless fools who nevertheless retain a smug sense of self-importance. At the beginning of the play, Mrs. Smith recounts how she abstained from having wine with desert “because [she] did not wish to set the children a bad example of gluttony. They must learn to be sober and temperate.” By the end of the play, though, she’s frantically shouting, “Such caca, such caca, such caca […].” This total collapse of “sobriety” and middle-class manners in such a short span of time shows the flimsiness of such pretensions. Mary, the maid, is the only halfway sane character in the play, but the Smiths deem her display of affection for the Fire Chief “[a] little too exhibitionistic” and drag her off stage. Ionesco delights in skewering these prim bourgeois standards, revealing their absurdity by having the middle-class characters who uphold them unravel into insanity and degradation.
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Societal Expectations and Middle-Class Values ThemeTracker
The ThemeTracker below shows where, and to what degree, the theme of Societal Expectations and Middle-Class Values appears in each chapter of The Bald Soprano. Click or tap on any chapter to read its Summary & Analysis.
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The Bald Soprano
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Societal Expectations and Middle-Class Values Quotes in The Bald Soprano
Below you will find the important quotes in The Bald Soprano related to the theme of Societal Expectations and Middle-Class Values.
The Bald Soprano Quotes
MRS. SMITH: There, it’s nine o’clock. We’ve drunk the soup, and eaten the fish and chips, and the English salad. The children have drunk English water. We’ve eaten well this evening. That’s because we live in the suburbs of London and because our name is Smith.
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The play opens on a “middle-class English interior,” where Mr. and Mrs. Smith sit comfortably after their evening meal. Suddenly, the clock tolls 17 times, triggering Mrs. Smith’s long monologue recounting the meal they’ve just eaten, which begins in this passage. From her first words, something already seems awry in the world of the play, as she takes the bizarre 17 strokes of the clock to indicate that it’s 9:00 p.m.—a perplexing deduction, considering that clocks don’t chime so many times and considering that, even if they did, 9:00 p.m. would be 19 chimes (in military time). The clock will Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia
MR. MARTIN: Don't you feel well? [Silence.]
MRS. SMITH: No, he's wet his pants. [Silence.]
MRS. MARTIN: Oh, sir, at your age, you shouldn't. [Silence.]
MR. SMITH: The heart is ageless. [Silence.]
MR. MARTIN: That's true. [Silence.] MRS. SMITH: So they say. [Silence.]
MRS. MARTIN: They also say the opposite [Silence.]
MR. SMITH: The truth lies somewhere between the two [Silence.]
MR. MARTIN: That’s true. [Silence]
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When the Smiths return downstairs, the Martins angrily chide them for keeping them waiting outside for four hours. After this brief outburst, however, the group falls silent and only gradually strikes up conversation again in the awkward and stilted manner on display in this passage. Mr. Smith’s apparent pants-wetting makes a mockery of the group’s prim bourgeois manners, foreshadowing their descent into carnal animality at the end of the play. Mr. Smith’s absurdly pseudo-philosophical defense of his actions—“The heart is ageless”—also foreshadows the avalanche of meaningless proverbs at the play’s end. Mr. Smith attempts profundity in his assessment of truth Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus v
Well, then! [He coughs again in a voice shaken by emotion:] "The Dog and the Cow," an experimental fable. Once upon a time another cow asked another dog: "Why have you not swallowed your trunk?" "Pardon me," replied the dog, "it is because I thought that I was an elephant."
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With the doorbell debate apparently settled, the Fire Chief reveals that he’s come on official business: he’s searching for fires. Disappointed on this front, he prepares to leave, but the group prevails on him to stay and regale them with some stories. Shy and reluctant, he nevertheless caves to the pressure and tells the group a series of bizarre, nonsensical animal fables, with this passage being the first of them. His description of the story he tells, “an experimental fable,” seems to apply to The Bald Soprano itself; the fable is a microcosm of the absurd and illogical drama playing Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim
MR. MARTIN: If that is the case...dear friends...these emotions are understandable, human, honorable...
MRS. MARTIN: All that is human is honorable.
MRS. SMITH: Even so, I don't like to see it... here among us...
MR. SMITH: She's not been properly brought up...
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Mary, the maid, reenters the scene, interrupting the Smiths’ conversation with the Fire Chief about their clock. Upon seeing one another, she and the Fire Chief recognize one another as former lovers, and Mary leaps into his arms. Their open canoodling disturbs the Smiths and Martins, who in this passage attempt to work through their powerful reaction to the amorous display. The Martins’ contention that “all that is human is honorable” recalls the mock-weightiness of Mr. Smith’s contention that the “heart is ageless” when he peed in his pants. It also ironically foreshadows the descent into madness that the Smith Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus vo
The polypoids were burning in the wood
A stone caught fire
The castle caught fire
The forest caught fire
The men caught fire
The women caught fire
The birds caught fire
The fish caught fire
The water caught fire
The sky caught fire
The ashes caught fire
The smoke caught fire
The fire caught fire
Everything caught fire,
Caught fire, caught fire.
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Upset by Mary’s conduct with the Fire Chief, Mrs. Smith asks her to excuse herself and go recite her poems quietly in front of a mirror somewhere. Mary agrees to recite a poem, but she does it loudly in front of the whole group: it is called “The Fire,” which she dedicates to the Fire Chief. The poem begins with a surreal image of “polypoids,” perhaps some kind of sea-anemone, “burning in the wood”—a physical improbability. The poem starts to sound more realistic as it proceeds, though, describing some more conventional objects catching fire, before returning to surreal impossibility as Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque
MRS. MARTIN: Bazaar, Balzac, bazooka!
MR. MARTIN: Bizarre, beaux-arts, brassieres!
MRS. SMITH: A,e,i,o,u, a,e,i,o,u, a,e,i,o,u, i!
MRS. MARTIN: B, c, d, f g, 1, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w, x, z!
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After Mary recites her poem about the fire and is wheeled off stage, the Fire Chief turns to go as well, leaving to attend a fire across town. As he leaves, however, he asks a question about “the bald soprano,” and this, compounded with the poem recital, seems to flip a switch in the Smiths’ and Martins’ mind and plunge them into total madness. For several lines, they exchange nonsensical, non-sequitur fake proverbs, until Mr. Smith cries, “To hell with polishing!”, which initiates an even steeper decline into vicious nonsense. The members of the group begin shouting strings of words Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error
