Leah Flashcards
“Do I disgust you”?
Presents Leah as the stereotypical teenager at the beginning of the play obsessed with her own looks, and how she is judged by others as shown by the hyperbolic use of “disgust” and rhetorical question
“I am admitting I talk too much so shoot me so kill me. Phil call the police lock me up, rip my teeth with a pair of rusty pliers”
graphic images of teeth and pliers . lexical field of social control. (Shoot, police lock )suggest she is willing to accept the consequences of her violence. 
“i’m just the only one saying it the fear that everyone hear lives in”
devises an image of a dystonia society, ambiguity of what fear it is
How is Leah presented in the beginning of the play?
Insecure
“The tiniest change in the DNA”
leahs bonobo speech
“tiniest” suggest that the smallest of differences which is a metaphor for the way that the changes that need to be made are not biological, but more psychological and social
“empathy, that’s what bonobos have” bonobos speech
bonobo symbolise a more compassionate and caring society, one that which Kelly hopes to promote, especially for the younger generation
Leah is being used as a mouthpiece for Kelly’s key ideas to try and convince Phil and the group, and therefore the audience to be more empathetic and compassionate towards one another. He is showing us that we are all pure and have the ability to revert back to the state of being whenever we wish to, as innate
“It’s Jerry, I killed him… I put the point of a screwdriver on his head and hit it with a hammer”
Leah’s desperation to get Phils attention, shows her inability to maintain her confidence and reverts back to her typical teenage persona, where she is concerned with fitting in and belonging, as opposed to standing up for what she believes is the moral thing to do
The grotesque description of how she killed Jerry shows how desensitised to violence they both are as this is something that she thought would bring her close to Phil, and in real reality, he does not care
how is leah presented in the middle of the play?
Morally complex
“she puts the sweet in her mouth and begins to chew suddenly she stops chewing, and spits the sweet out. Gets up stares at Phil ,storms off.”
Leah is no longer desperate for /reliant on the affection of Phil. By the end she is confident which is shown through her decisive actions of stop spits stares and leaves. she is finally confident enough and will no longer stand for the immorality of phil or the rest of the group
How is leah presented at the end of the play?
independent 
