4:48 Psychosis

The title refers to 4:48 a.m., the darkest hour before dawn, and the theme is suicidal despair and psychosis, a state in which the normal boundaries between waking life and dream life, between the self and others, collapse. The play is composed of monologues and dialogues whose content includes exchanges between patients and therapists, notes about grief, mental anguish and psychological distress, caustic accounts of the therapeutic use of drugs and diary entries. Sarah Kane’s plays deal with themes of redemptive love, sexual desire, cruelty, pain, torture — both psychological and physical — and death, and are characterized by a poetic intensity, pared-down language, a bold exploration of theatrical form and, in her earlier work, the use of extreme and violent stage action. She sees the truth in love, brutality, and silence.