ABSTRACT
What is there special about the sound medium of storytelling that offers devices, themes, and techniques in ending plays more effectively? Does the sound medium and process of listening mean that an end will work better in emotional climax, resolution, or reflection in ambiguity? Can a sound play tantalise and ratchet up tension in the style of Hollywood cinema whereby there can be two, three, four, or even five endings each spiralling the suspense and excitement to the next level? Is there a need for sound clarity? Can sound play endings have a satisfactory finishing point by holding back information and leaving the curiosity and intrigue to the listener’s imagination? Indeed, how much should the writer end for the listener rather than leave the listener to end for him or herself? This chapter includes analysis of the following radio plays:
Make Like Slaves by South African novelist and playwright Richard Rive, Family Spear by Ugandan playwright Elvania Namukwaya Zirimu, and Station Street by Sudanese writer Khalid Almubarak Mustafa. Further detailed discussion is centred on the endings in Lucille Fletcher’s plays The Hitchhiker and Sorry, Wrong Number, Caryl Phillips’ The Wasted Years, Richard Durham’s The Heart of George Cotton, The Trumpet Talks, Anatomy of an Ordinance, Bertolt Brecht’s The Trial of Lucullus, and Morten Wishengrad’s The Battle of the Warsaw Ghetto.
