814 The American Century: Literature since 1945take anything too seriously. There is, it seems, bound to be a clash. What provokes it
is Stephen’s interest in his neighbor, Timothy, a middle-aged black man who begins
borrowing cigarettes from Stephen and then small sums of money. To complicate
matters further, there is the young black man Timothy lives with, his nephew
Shedrick, who deals drugs. Shedrick, or Shed as he is known, wants to escape from
the drugs trade but has not managed it. And Shed lets Stephen know that he resents
the white man’s charity and despises his homosexuality. Other characters add to the
rich mix of class, race, and gender issues and the intricate network of conflicts
created by these four characters. There is, for instance, a young English woman
called Lily also living in Timothy’s apartment, a white drugs supplier, Dave, who
likes to think of himself as being in touch with black idiom and life, and a young gay
Asian man who sees Stephen’s rejection of his advances as one more sign of his
having “no access” to society and being “totally ignored.” And through them, as well
as through a kaleidoscopic series of scenes and a variety of often overlapping
conversations, Shinn explores the state of the city and the nation at a critical moment
in the history of both.
During a crucial interchange in the play, Tyler, with some irritation, asks Stephen
why he wants to help his neighbors. Stephen’s reply is simple: “I live here.” Shed says
something similar to Stephen during another conversation. “You know how it is, we
all live together, we all neighbors.” Then, shortly afterwards, talking to Timothy and
Lily, Shed adds to that observation. “There’s things in life that go on,” Shed explains,
“like where you live, what you have, those things never go away.” Other things might
“go away,” he suggests, like “having sex” or “getting high.” But “this place gonna stay.”
So, “if you gotta focus on one thing in life you pick the thing that stays.” Where Do
We L i v e, as these remarks suggest, explores the ethics of place and community – not
in any traditional or nostalgic way but by seeing “where you live” as a site of multiple
encounters. The constant shifting of scene, the overlapping action and conversations
have a vital function here: they register the place where the play is situated as another
border territory, where people of radically different cultural, class, and ethnic
backgrounds meet, argue, and engage with each other. The threat to this place, it is
clear, comes from the forces of division: from terrorism to narrow nationalism, acts
of violence and attitudes of bigotry, bombs that destroy and social policies that cut
people off from one another. Where Do We Live is a subtle analysis of the state of a
city, and by implication a society, in crisis, its potential as a cultural interface and its
problems if that potential is ignored. The tensions at work here are caught in an
exchange that ends the play. One character, called Howard, celebrating the beginning
of the “war on terror” opts for nationalism, the imperatives of special mission and
Manifest Destiny. “A toast, what do you say?” he suggests. “To the USA!” Stephen
responds in a way that at once agrees with and resists that suggestion. “To where we
live,” he says.
In Pugilist Specialist Adriano Shaplin shifts the focus directly to the forces of
division. The major players here are four marines assigned the task of assassinating a
Middle Eastern leader known as Big ’Stach (for Big Moustache) and the Bearded Lady.
The fifteen scenes of the play cover the first military briefing of the marines, theirGGray_c05.indd 814ray_c 05 .indd 814 8 8/1/2011 7:31:47 PM/ 1 / 2011 7 : 31 : 47 PM