The Recipe
By Armin Wiebe
Recently, Christiane and I and friends Dave and MaryLou Driedger went to see Armin Wiebe’s play, The Recipe. I admit I was confused by this play. I wanted to love this play. I was eager to love it. But sadly, my ardour was cool.
Friends had lauded it. To me the reality of the play undercut the desire to love it. I was frankly confused by it. I missed something. This is probably true in more than one sense. I have a hearing deficiency that is not overcome entirely with modern hearing aids. When the actors turned away from me, I had a hard time hearing them. Their voices were loud enough but not clear enough. I heard the crowd laughing at lines, but I failed to understand the joke. So, perhaps, the fault lies with me, and not the play. I hope so. After all Armin Wiebe is a brilliant writer. Half the crowd gave the play a standing ovation, but by Winnipeg standards that is not rousing success, but mediocrity.
The play was inspired by an earlier book by Wiebe, The Salvation of Yasch Siemens which I loved.
I thought the idea behind the play, embodied by Oata, a grand if not magnificent female character, was that women can be independent of men and triumph over their attempted subjugation, though it is difficult and challenging. After all, we live in a deeply patriarchal society that has taken centuries to become entrenched and won’t easily be dislodged. Yet, in the end, after a passionate embrace, Oata succumbs to the blandishments of a weak and wobbly man who lusts after her skinny rival Sadie and also Oata’s recently inherited property. That is hardly a grand triumph. It was pipsqueak at best.
I invite others to tell me why I am wrong. I still want to love it.
There is no wrong or right. Reading in a highly distracting environment, or listening to music, or watching a movie with the person behind you chattering on their phone… all lead to a diminished experience. Your hearing problems must have contributed to your overall take. I am sorry you have to deal with that and I suspect it’s more than a little annoying. Also, likely something that will visit an auditory canal near me, soon.
Still—no right or wrong. I re-read a few chapters of Yasch Siemens before I went to the play. I had been further prepped by Armin’s melodious reading of the flowing lava of Menno-titulation (the sex scene dressed in metaphorical sheep’s clothing) at the Times Change(d) bar a few nights earlier. All this contextualizing had placed in my head various issues of gender, apple-eating guilt, Heaven and Hell, and patriarchal ass-hats with well-heeled papas (a category I might be assigned to by others more objective than me).
I saw many allegorical offerings, where Yasch, Oata, and Sadie had to reckon with what had been taught and believed versus what was practical in the hard-ass world of bigoted and/or misogynistic Vannapaggers and the legal system and social constructs built upon the three things—power, money, and fame—the Bible tells us specifically to avoid. Then comes the urge to belong. The drive to be independent and self-reliant, along with the simultaneous desire to cleave to what had been taught and to the apparent simplicity of faith and family and farm. (All anything but simple!)
And what about the question of salvation? Oba.
Anyhozel… the allure of the prairie sky backdrop, the nostalgic cawing of crows and lowing of cattle, the many (familiar) cracked-egg-syntax sentences, the brazen under-dash lighting (not to mention Sadie’s long legs) and the clever sashaying farmhouse kitchen all seduced me and laid bare my Menno soul; made me open to criticism and acceptance; ready to empathize and to self-analyze.
We need a group discussion!