Purpose/meaning for Johnna in AOC?

[BwayTday]

Posted: 9/24/09 at 7:20pm

It seems as if she has a hire purpose or some kind of symbolism in the play. Does she, or am I just over analysing this?

[adamgreer]

Posted: 9/24/09 at 7:59pm

SPOILERS........

Well, the most obvious purpose she serves is, by the end of the play, she's the only person Violet has left. Despite the fact that Johnna insists she's there because she "needs the work," it is assumed that Beverly arranged for her to stay so Violet wouldn't be alone. Johnna was someone whose presence Violet resented ("the Indian!") and couldn't stand all along, but in that final (powerful) moment, it is Johnna whose arms she falls into.
Updated On: 9/24/09 at 07:59 PM

[Bettyboy72]

Posted: 9/24/09 at 8:08pm

Johnna really does have an ethereal quality to her, representing something the Westons never had. She has an angelic, protective quality.

[ljay889]

Posted: 9/24/09 at 8:10pm

I believe she becomes Violet's next "victim."

[BwayTday]

Posted: 9/24/09 at 8:11pm

^^^^god I hope not.

[saveusmike]

Posted: 9/24/09 at 8:34pm

**SPOILERS***

I always got that vibe that Beverly knew he was going to kill himself but didnt want Violet to be left alone.

I also felt that as tough and evil as Violet truly is she didnt want to be left alone. She said throughout the play that she didnt need anybody yet towards the very end after all her daugters have left, she embraces her "enemy". Fearing that she was all she had left.

thats just my interperatation.

[ColorTheHours048]

Posted: 9/25/09 at 1:27am

I've always thought of Johnna as a kind of angelic presence looking over the Weston house. She's always perched at the top of the house, even in lengthy scenes where she doesn't actually say anything.

[scott68]

Posted: 9/25/09 at 1:39am

a. Higher.

b. Personally, I never thought of Johnna as an "angelic" character. Rather, she seems to be the only one truly rooted in reality. She knows what the world's like and she's had a hard life. The whole Weston family has its problems, but they're all rooted in their own sense of reality, none of which are accurate. Every other character (with the possible exception of Mattie Fae's husband, whose name I don't remember right now) manage to have histrionics about their own problems without any sense of relativity in terms of their impact on the real world.

Johnna's an outside presence in their home. She gives Jean a glimpse of life outside her family, she brings Steve out of his fantasies (with a frying pan to the head), and she eventually grounds Violet in real life when she's been left by her entire family.