Confessions of an English Opium Eater
[Tt was quite by chance that I tuned in to 2YA last Friday in good time for Trial by Jury and heard "Confessions of an English Opium Eater’-a 15-minute dramatisation of the life of De Quincey. Seldom have I heard a radio play so eloquent or so moving as this-the tragedy of a man who, to quote the script-writer, "lived for the mind alone, and yet knowingly and deliberately set out to destroy the mind." Passages from the "Opium Eater" are.
as they stand, ideal radio drama and in this case skilful commentary and dialogue enhanced and heightened the effect. A nightmare theme such as the gradual domination of the conscious mind by the phantoms of the unconscious is difficult. to | present visually without bathos, and mere reading is powerless to evoke, the full horror, But here radio comes into its own. To hear the gasping anguish in the voice, the agonised prayers for deliverance, that last stsangled cry from the heart, "I will sleep no more!". without seeing the dreamer or the material form of the visions, is an emotional experience that can be provided only by radio. And in this case radio has fulfilled its obligations, both to De Quincey and to the living.
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19460614.2.21.10
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 14, Issue 364, 14 June 1946, Page 11
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212Confessions of an English Opium Eater New Zealand Listener, Volume 14, Issue 364, 14 June 1946, Page 11
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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