Memory

Memories belong to the individuals portrayed within The 7 Stages of Grieving and also to the collective. Some memories like the stories go with Nana, some are passed from generation to generation; a timeline of pain and grief from 1788 until the present. Collected like photographs in the suitcase, stories of family, tradition and culture are held in the memory with the pain of the past.

Even when characters escape the situation, the link to the past is still present. Aunty Grace returns from England and although she holds out for some time eventually succumbs to the shared memory of the family and land, emptying her own belongings from the case and filling it with red soil. The only reflections that bring relief are fond memories that involve family: trophies and pendants from sporting achievements that array the room, photographs of birthdays, weddings and fun occasions that adorn the walls. Memories serve as a constant reminder, a testimony to good times, that it is not all bad, there is always family.

Memory impacts the present and torments the protagonists. Each have their own painful memories: death of immediate loved ones, injustices to themselves and those around them. The play depicts the idea of a collective memory passing from generation to generation like stories with individual memories, value-laden and having an impact on the next generation.

Memory Quotes

‘I miss my grandmother. She took so many stories with her to the grave.’  Scene 4

A collection of images appear, depicting the phases of aboriginal history.. Dreaming, Invasion, Genocide, Protection, Assimilation … Scene 18

Grief

Individual and collective grief shapes the narrative of The 7 Stages of Grieving. Emblematised through the woman who lays sleepless among the sacred things after her children have been stolen, the play shows that grief is as much about loss of culture and tradition as it is about loss of life. When a person passes there is obvious and understandable grief shown by the family. They gather and grieve but the dead person is free to go on, not to be recalled through photographs or mentioning of their name, able to pass, respected, to the next life. However culture is lost forever, like the arm destroying the sand piles representing the irreversible damage of colonialism on Indigenous culture.

The grief about loss of culture follows generations. In a similar way, one small event is shown to trigger grief across many. The protest marchers are silent, grieving, after another death in custody. A collective grief is driving them from events that have been imposed upon their culture and life since 1788. Eventually the woman ends the play with the effect of grief overcoming her. ‘Nothing, nothing, I feel nothing.’

The ultimate message conveyed from the exploration of individual and collective grief in the play is the cumulative impact of grief. Years of individual grief and generations of collective grief have all taken their toll: physically, emotionally and culturally. The play concedes that grief is a shared human experience and emphasises the compounding impact of power imbalances, racism and cruelty on grief.

Grief Quotes

‘I lie painfully sleepless. In a landscape of things I know are sacred. Watching unsympathetic wanderings.’ Scene 9

‘Our cultures that have been denied us. But we have been taught to cry silently.’ Scene 22

‘Grief, grieving, sorrow loss death pain.’ Scene 2

Equality

The 7 Stages of Grieving covers a struggle for equality that spans hundreds of years. It involves presenting a series of events that highlight inequality such as when it is expressed through racism, as discovered by the Murri girl when getting a dress – ‘special attention’ security and police keep an eye on her based on her ‘black skin’. It involves a fight for equality in education, with the commentary that reconciliation can only be achieved when all people can actually spell the word. Ultimately, as conveyed in the play, equality is not about assimilation or sameness but the equal right to practice culture and one’s own traditions.

The play presents a world so historically entrenched in inequality that it shows little hope for equality. The exceptions seem to come from individuals, such as when the woman presents the suitcase to the audience offering them a chance to consider equality.

Equality Quotes

‘Have you ever been black? You know when you wake up one morning and you’re black?’ Scene 11

‘The one thing that I find comforting about death is that other people die too.’ Scene 6

Family Relationships

Family is an integral part of life in The 7 Stages of Grieving. The family is large and extended. Hundreds appear when it is time to say final goodbyes to Nana, even Aunty Grace returns from overseas. It is a welcomed relief to the grief of the moment and the ongoing hardships. There is affection for family, enjoying the younger ones who grab a video or play outside, and a genuine caring for brothers who have interactions with the law and fathers who are tired and unwell. Family bails a son out of lock-up and there is care about where he will end up. There is a unity in family, extended family, as the woman marches with parents, brothers, sisters and Nana. They share the grief, they fight together. There is also sadness as family reflects on life’s impediments and the impact of colonialism. Children are lost to authorities that walk through front doors with violent intentions. Racism is experienced by family members. Sickness and death take loved ones.

Family is the last bastion of equality and often the only refuge in oppressive circumstances. Relationships may be fragile but are usually kind and well-intentioned, with strong bonds that are able to hold members together in the midst of trying circumstances. The significance of family is emphasised as a response to oppression from without, solidifying it as a source of safety and survival not only for its individuals but as a place where culture can flourish.

Family Relationship Quotes

‘The woman makes a circle around a pile. And this one here is about culture, family, song, tradition, dance. Have you got that?’ Scene 16

‘My family were in mourning for a month. All of us together in five houses.’ Scene 4

Education

Education is presented as vital to promoting Indigenous culture as well as to achieving equality in the relations between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australia.

Stories in The 7 Stages of Grieving, like those shared by Nana, are a special form of education in Indigenous communities. In a similar way, the woman prefaces the lesson on the moiety system with the fact that she is telling the story like it was told to her, the oral tradition continuing. She also questions the importance of education with regards to reconciliation; the reality that some people struggle to spell reconciliation being the very indicator of the education gap that exists between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians and a barometer of progress towards reconciliation and equality.

Education Quotes

‘What does it mean when some people can’t even read or write the word?’ Scene 21

‘Now I want to tell you a story. I’ll tell you how it was told to me.’ Scene 15

Power and Resistance

The play highlights power structures that have impacted the daily life of Indigenous Australians as well as the ways in which power has been exerted: physically, emotionally, individually, systemically, through the removal of lands and culture. Colonial/government power, police power and individuals are all complicit; boats arrive and take up too much of the harbour, men visit a home and violently seize children, excessive police handling results in a death in a custody. The notion of institutionalised power is raised in the scene ‘Story of a Brother’ wherein a brother is involved in a misdeanour and consequently spirals from receiving a fine to struggling with payments and access to support, highlighting a system that is inherently discriminatory.

Individual and collective responses to power form an integral part of the play. The woman’s performance in the play itself is posited as an example of resilience with the woman stating she can do little else but perform. Speaking up individually or in groups can be hazardous. Resistance is displayed through a prominent march to protest deaths in custody, providing individuals an opportunity to unite and stand against injustice. However, the protest brings disdain from the public for blocking roads. Many such displays are noted as having characterised the Indigenous experience, with the woman exclaiming they have been fighting for years. The option to flee is presented, as in the case of Aunty Grace, but her grief at Nana’s funeral shows the price she has paid: loss of family and culture. The sign on the grave ‘for sale’ indicates that the red earth in which the grave is placed, and indeed all the lives which have been displaced by colonial expansion, have come at a great cost.

Power and Resistance Quotes

‘One took a handful of my hair.. the other washed his face in my blood … My children stolen away …’ Scene 9

‘Don’t tell me we’re not fighting. Don’t tell me we don’t fight most of our lives.’ Scene 14

Freedom

The 7 Stages of Grieving discusses freedom from a philosophical standpoint in that the aspects of Indigenous life that are discussed vary from complete deprivation of freedom to various limitations on freedom. Further to topics discussed such as stolen generations in ‘Invasion Poem’ and deaths in custody in ‘Mugshot’ which demonstrate a fundamental lack of freedom, the play also presents the reality of subtle limitations on freedom. These can be seen by the discrimination in ‘Murri Gets a Dress’ and ‘Story of a Brother’ where the stories shared outline characters that are imposed upon racially. The freedom to have and practise culture is limited.

The play explores the complex narrative that freedom can be taken from a group or an individual. It explores certain limitations to freedom which have been placed upon individuals as well as the responses of those individuals. Resistance is presented as an option but in most cases the reality has been a long and arduous fight.

Freedom Quotes

‘… and sometimes the joy of being there was enough to forget, even for the briefest moment, the reason.’ Scene 4

Hope

Hope in Mailman and Wesley’s play looks toward the future: ‘everything has its time’ (Scene 5). The hope for reconciliation is metaphorically packed in a suitcase and will wait for the right time. Hope is garnished by family despite the circumstances. Family and unity, meeting and marching brings hope to individuals and the community. Resistance and perseverance has prevailed when hope has been betrayed. In concluding, the actor places hope in the audience by laying the suitcase at their feet, symbolically asking them to participate in reconciliation.

Despite vivid descriptions of the hardship and bleak circumstances of colonisation, continued oppression and racism, the play still presents hope. Hope is depicted as surviving through family, through maintaining cultural ties in storytelling and, ultimately, in individuals who may not have power and position but can still make changes.  In The 7 Stages of Grieving hope is placed in the audience.

Hope Quotes

‘Everything has its time.’ Scene 5

The woman places the suitcase at the feet of the audience. Scene 22