Blog Post #2

Myriam Al-jizani:

In the Shape of things the artist challenges and criticizes the concept " Don't judge a book by its cover" that is relatively used in todays society as a metaphor to express the importance of not judging a person by their looks because they could end up being a really good person. In this play Adam is the book being manipulated by Eve, and judged by his peers.

In the beginning of the play Eve compliments Adam by calling him cute, and yet soon after make a small critique on his persona. Adams self esteem is boosted a notch and then immediately questioned with doubt, which is the first trial and success for Eves conscious manipulation on Adam.

The artist constantly tried to make the reader focus on how characters reacted and commented mostly on Adam's physical improvements and changes. When Jenny realizes Adam has "changed" she makes it understood she meant mostly on his looks.

Another example scene, is when Phillip realized Adam had been wearing a new jacket on, instead of the old raggedy jacket he had been wearing since high school. Stating that the old jacket had lost them both many dates due to it and how he would still not take it off, demonstrating the amount of importance the jacket was and validating his anger. Although Adam was still the same person personality wise, Phillip focused on Adams "cover' [looks] and assumed because he had changed his look he had changed into a completely new person with questionable mortality.

The Artist reveals  at the end how hypocritical the human race can be. People say "Don't judge a book by it's cover" to make themselves feel better because they consciously know that they unconsciously do judge others by their looks before knowing their personalities. The metaphor is a way of saying "yeah I know I do it, but you shouldn't do it' makes shitty people think they are less shitty by saying fake nice things. The truth is if you are a shitty person, no matter what you say or do to try to cover it you are still shitty, and you consciously know it.