Summary And Analysis Of Morris Panych’s Play Seven Stories

Morris Panych’s play Seven Stories unfolds the story of a man who contemplates the meaninglessness of his existence on a seven-story high building ledge. The Man is interrupted by the residents who are already too caught up with their own lives to even notice the man or to question why the man is on the ledge of the building. While he is interrupted, he interacts with many individuals in the apartment that stalls him from jumping with snippets of their own incongruous lives.

The man receives some insight on each of the residents that appear in the story but who is this man? The protagonist of the story but does not say much towards the end. Throughout the play, there are many observations to be made about the man. These next paragraphs will be a detailed observation about the “Man”. “The Man stands on the ledge, in state of perplexity, contemplating the depths below.”

To start off, the Man is in a very fragile state.

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He is confused and disturb. The Man has forgotten the meaning of life and has lost all faith. It started off when he woke up and notices small things in life like the fact that there are boundaries for everything he does. His fingertips are flexible but only to the boundaries of its own flesh, his shoes were a little prison for his feet and no matter how many miles he could run there is no escape with them on, and the fact that his mind could expand into infinite space and still never change the size of his head.

“I saw a condemned man, serving a life sentence inside his body.” The Man believes that there is no freedom even in his own body. In his car on the way to work, his instrument of liberation is not freedom, it is only an idea of freedom, bound in metal. While entering a town, the Man see that there is another car in his parking space, or so the thought. After ramming the car and taking his spot back he soon realizes that he has gotten everything turned around and has no idea where he is. This causes him to go into the first building he sees to get a better perspective of his situation from above. His work schedule is thrown off and it led him to feeling lost and questioning his own life. While standing on the ledge, now wanting to jump, the Man is delayed by many interruptions.

The Man did not care that much when the residents were interacting with him but with the snippets of the characters’ lives, it is obvious that they are all attempting to escape their limitations as well. When he speaks to Lillian and listens to her absurd story, he recounts his own moment when he lost faith. He recognizes that he has forgotten his own story and “flew on the wings of someone else’s.” Meaning he is struggling to find the meaning of his own life. Lillian's advice to the man is to fly. Metaphorically, to rise above his limited and negative thoughts. For example, Lillian’s room in which she has not left in 50 years can considered very large because freedom is a state of mind and it depends on how you perceive it.

Throughout this story, the Man is trying to find the meaning to life. He is perceived as a confused and fragile person that lost his way when things in his life did not go as planned. After his encounters with the resiant, he realizes limitations and freedom are the state of mind and is dependent on how you see it. This Man is a man who is just going through an external crisis and soon feels free again.