Cloud 9 [Paperback]

Caryl Churchill (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 1995

"Cloud Nine" is about relationships - between women and men, men and men, women and women. It is about sex, work, mothers, Africa, power, children, grandmothers, politics, money, Queen Victoria and sex.

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Reading the script for Caryl Churchill's 1979 play about sex and love is a special workout for the imagination. First, she asks you to imagine characters whose sexual identities and alliances shift constantly. Then she asks you to imagine that most of the characters make an impossible leap in time, from colonial Africa in the Victorian age to contemporary Britain. Lastly, she asks you to imagine some of the male characters played by women and some female characters played by men. Churchill likes to get things good and mixed up so all the audience's preconceptions about gender, romance, and "lifestyle" are scrambled, neutralized, and possibly even rebuilt. The title refers to the state of orgasmic and emotional bliss that everyone in this play seems to be striving for so desperately.

Review

...the play offered an interesting commentary on prescribed notions of gender and sexuality....
–Brown Daily Herald

...Miss Churchill has found a theatrical method that is easily as dizzying as her theme. Not only does she examine a cornucopia of sexual permutations--from heterosexual adultery right up to bisexual incest-- but she does so with a wild array of dramatic styles and tricks....Miss Churchill, as you might gather is one deft writer.
–Frank Rich, The New York Times

An examination of postcolonialism and gender issues doesn't sound like the kindling for a hot night on the town. But Brit playwright Caryl Churchill knows what she's doing when she uses these subjects as the launching pads for her absurd sense of humor and critical commentary. Her 1982 play Cloud Nine--a two act drama in which time and identity are not the rigid constructions we know them to be-is arguably the pinnacle of the playwright's career..
–Eye Weekly, Toronto

Miss Churchill has a highly original imagination, and if what she's got to say is familiar it's funnier and fresher than the last time we heard it said . . . [Cloud Nine] is succinctly sassy, elegantly insulting, written with a quill pen that seems to have been deftly dipped in ice water.
–Walter Kerr, The New York Times --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 88 pages
• Publisher: Theatre Communications Group; 1st TCG ed edition (April 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1559360992
• ISBN-13: 978-1559360999
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.1 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #45,561 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Moral Certainties and Uncertainties, January 15, 2002

By 

Rob Derida (Toronto, ON CANADA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cloud 9 (Paperback)

This play is an interesting approach to the question of morality in the 'modern' age. It contrasts two worlds, one of moral certainty in a Victorian colonial home, and one of complete amorality and uncertainty in contemporary Britain. It does however go beyond these issues to deal with other important issues like Gender roles and the general issue of both mental and physical 'colonization' of people by society. This play should be read by anyone even remotely interested in these themes.

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bridge Builder, January 17, 2004

By 

Little Old Me - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cloud 9 (Paperback)

Caryl Churchill's dark comedic play, "Cloud Nine" is a masterpiece. Though written in 1978, its commentary on gender roles and sexuality is quite compelling to our youngest generations. With the current controversey over homosexual relationships/marriage, Cloud Nine serves as window into the frustrations and fears of gay characters. People who have a hard time identifying with alternative lifestyles would have a lot to learn from reading through this play. In a way, Churchill's play is a bridge builder between the heterosexual world and the gay minority.

Cloud Nine follows the story of a family. The first act takes place on a South African plantation during the English Victorian Era, while in the second act, though the characters have only aged 20 years, the action takes place in London, England in the 1970's. Clive, the family patron, is the center of a male-oriented soceity and incourages traditional family and gender roles. For the first act, his wife Betty is played by a man, his gay son Edward is played by a woman, and his black servant is played by a white man. Immediately we learn that only Clive is satisfied with his station in life, where the other characters suffer many indignities to themselves that go unnoticed by everyone else (i.e. Edward is being molested by a friend of his father, who eventually attempts to seduce Clive as well). By the second act, time has moved forward and we watch the characters trying to adapt to an ever changing world in which parts of them is too withdrawn.

Chruchill's play is clever and intense with emotion. To connect with one character is to really experience the mental frustration and the indignities that we suffer from a judgemental society. I praise Caryl Churchill for this commentary in hopes that readers will gain a sense of sympathy for such people and in turn will promote tolerance.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Can a book with an orgy be that bad?, October 15, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Cloud 9: A Play (Revised American Edition) (Paperback)

I have just finished reading Caryl Churchill's infamous play "Cloud Nine". I found the book to be an amazing tool to present to the reader those social issues which we have so desperately tried to sweep under the bed. The book is actually a play through which her use of a Brechtian style of theater keeps the reader in a sort of shocked confusion and not very comfortable. At first glance you might say it is vulgar and rude, yet a deeper evaluation proves that this play is an effective tool to dredge up what society has sunk to the bottom of the river.