Colleen Murphy’s “The December Man”

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Thirdly, the neglect by the three members of the family made Jean’s mental condition get worse. He starts hearing voices and screams of the people in the structure he built and that is why he cannot finish building it. ̏They’re running around inside my buildings… […] What buildings… (points the structure)...that one?- No-the ones in my head. Sometimes I mentally take the roof off and tip the structure upside down to shake the people out…but they’re stuck ̋ (Colleen 28). The relationship between Jean and his parents is dead. Missing a lot of classes get Jean’s marks very low and this makes her mom disappointed. Jean is not able to overcome that feeling of guilty and he decides to take his life away in scene four. Both the structure and the family is abandoned. Kate and Benoit feel guilty for Jean’s lost and they start arguing very often until they both decide to take their lives away. What once was a beautiful united family has become dust, just like the structure at the beginning of the play ̏ A structure of what may have originally been a model of a highrise, sits on a piece of Plexiglas that is perched on a small table that stands in one corner. The structure is bottom-heavy, dusty, and held together with masking tape ̋ (Colleen 3). Having neglected Jean’s mental problem slowly destroyed the family’s future.

In conclusion, the structure is symbolic of Jean's family and the toll that the massacre takes on that family. At the beginning everyone was doing their best to be united, and Jean was motivated to get his degree the structure is looking good and it has a good base, just as the family. Second, Jean’s starts having trouble to forget what happened the day of the massacre and he starts missing classes, he starts to forget about the structure. Thirdly, because Jean did not had a good support from their parents he killed himself, the structure was left in the corner an then destroyed, just as Jean’s family. Parental support is very important in a child life. Trust between the members of the family is very important to keep the family united.

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Works Cited

Murphy, Colleen. The December Man. Toronto: Playwrights Canada Press Toronto, 2007. Print.