Nicolas Barber joined the group of actors after the death of Brenden; a former actor of the group. Martin suggested that the group should perform the play of Thomas Wells, who died about a week prior.  The players are poor and hungry and had no other way to fill their stomachs except to agree to this proposal. The play of Thomas Wells is a non-biblical, out-of-the-box play, unlike any other.

In passage 1 Unsworth presented us with the traditional method of thinking, which could also be implied as how narrow-minded people thought. In medieval Europe, the church was one of the largest influences. The church represented God, and God was the biggest and most important of all. God was considered more powerful and far superior to anything. This was also the reason why Popes had more power than Kings.

          Nicolas Barber was a former Priest who aligned with God, God’s will, and God’s meaning. Although now a player, in passage 1 Nicolas clearly showed support for God by saying that no story had a meaning unless God had given it a meaning. If you wanted a story to have a meaning it would have had to somehow go through God. Therefore everything in the bible would have had meaning which in-turn is why many plays are those of biblical stories.

          After Nicolas Barber stated his argument in passage 1, he thought: “[I knew that my argument would fail. They were in some fear perhaps, but it was not fear of offending God.] (Unsworth, 74) Before Nicolas was able to express his side of the argument, only Martin wanted to perform the play of Thomas Wells. The actors dwelled for a moment on what he said, and rejected his thoughts. Passage 2 is a dialogue of the reaction to Thomas Wells’ argument. They concluded that, “Men can give meaning to things.”(pg74) As a result of their poverty, the players would have starved to death before they finally reach God’s meaning. So they decided that they had to perform the play of Thomas wells in order to earn money for food to keep themselves alive. Passage 2 is an indication of change. In this passage the players thought about the pros and cons of doing the play of Thomas Wells, and ended up agreeing with Martins idea.

This group of actors made a change to medieval Europe and the world since prior to that, plays had always been those of biblical stories. Although the players changed the plays for their own self-survival, they did not realize that they were making a change to the future world. Through the argument of passage 1 & 2, the players realized that they didn’t have to dwell in the past and were willing to risk trying a new story, which would only benefit them. By doing the new play, the players have also broken out of the mindset of the Medieval Ages.

          Unsworth has given us two sides to the situation, one side representing the religious aspect and one side representing humanism. Nicolas Barber on the side of God, thinks that it would be sinful for men to give meaning to things when God has not given the permission while the other actors think otherwise. This is an example of faith and how people looked at the world. The conflict between Nicolas and the rest of the group is an example of individual Allegiance. 

Bibliography:

Unsworth, Barry. Morality Play. New York: Bantam, 1996.