The Soap Opera: Theatre of Love
The Western dramatic heritage comes from the ancient Greeks who saw theatre as a competitive, conflicted and cathartic spectacle. Each new generation becomes trapped in the never-ending theatric cycle of character, plot, conflict and history. Western love poetry arises out of the allegorical dilemmas of mind, body, and soul. Since the ancient Greeks, love poetry is how personality defines itself; we have not learned in 2,500 years to take our minds off the rhetoric and poetry of love, sex, power, conflict, frustration, and violence. In reading the poetry of love, many questions arise as to whether the language is personal and private or intended for public view.
Many of the dreams found in the International Institute for Dream Research interpretation section address and speak about the various poetic aspects of humanities dreams - their expressions, repressions, and complications. For the modern soap opera, the centre of every plot is love and the erotic. American soap operas such as As the World Turns (view video trailer), The Young and the Restless (video trailer), and All My Children (video trailer) have been telecast for over thirty years. The romantic montage of Dream Vision story-lines vary and include rivalry, marriage, weddings, rape, motherhood, illegitimate children, love triangles, loss, drugs, prostitution, adultery, homosexuality, funerals, abortion, murder, rape, abuse and forgotten lovers.
Are these fantasies vehicles for solving the conflicts of loving or are they forms of escape? Can all problems be solved through love? To answer such questions, we look to our dreams and their reflection in film and romantic literature, as dreams provide insight into the theatre of love and its complications.