4.48 Psychosis

Description

4.48 Psychosis was written throughout the autumn and winter of 1998-99 as Kane battled with one of her recurrent bouts of depression. On February 20, 1999, aged 28, the playwright committed suicide. On the page, the piece looks like a poem. No characters are named, and even their number is unspecified. It could be a journey through one person's mind, or an interview between a doctor and his patient.

Sarah Kane was born in 1971. Her first play, Blasted, was produced at the Royal Court Theatre Upstairs in 1995. Her second play, Phaedra's Love, was produced at the Gate Theatre in 1996. In April 1998, Cleansed was produced at the Royal Court Theatre Downstairs, and in September 1998, Crave was produced by Paines Plough and Bright Ltd at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh. Her last play, 4.48 Psychosis, premiered at the Royal Court Jerwood Theatre Upstairs in June 2000. Her short film, Skin, produced by British Screen/Channel Four, premiered in June 1997. Sarah Kane died in 1999, and is now recognised as one of the most influential voices in modern European theatre.

'Sarah Kane's 4:48 Psychosis is a magnificent record of the struggle between agony and ecstasy, life-force and death-wish, that marked her adult life, in a river of fractured poetry never assigned to any fixed number of speakers.' Scotsman (4 November 2008) 'Is it possible, asks the text, for a person to be born in the wrong body, at the wrong time? Yes, is the answer. But sometimes, from that agony, a great soul can wrestle something as beautiful and true as this remarkable play.' Scotsman (4 November 2008) 'A poetic evocation of the mind of someone in the depths of clinical depression. There are flashes of dark humour but the overriding mood is one of helpless despair.' List (13 November 2008)