The purpose of this essay is to identify the significant themes in Murmuring Judges by David Hare and to show how these themes have been presented to the audience.
David Hare graduated from Cambridge University in 1968; that same year he co-founded the Portable Theatre Company with his friend Richard Bicat. Ironically he was to launch his writing career because the Company was left in the lurch by a playwright just four days before rehearsals were due to start. Hare jumped into the breach and penned a short satirical piece on the unlikelihood of revolution in Britain. This rather hasty first attempt at writing turned out to be a resounding success; which inspired Hare to further writings. …show more content…

Hare reinforces this notion that to the men of the Judiciary, people like Gerard are insignificant, in a conversation between Sir Peter and Cuddeford. Cuddeford is ribbing Sir Peter about losing his case, while Sir Peter belittles the situation and tells Cuddeford that it was not worth his trouble but he owed a friend a favour. Sir Peter refers to the case as a “silly sort of warehouse robbery” once again reinforcing to the audience that this man is not at all attuned to reality.
Having given the audience a dramatic climax as an opening to the play; he now serves the audience with and explanation of how Gerard came to be in court in the first instance. Hare’s intention is of course to link the Judiciary system with the police force expounding his belief that both are fundamentally flawed. Sandra a WPC talks directly to the audience, Hare has given her something of a tirade to relate, the elliptical speech contains two semantic fields one of crime, the other of drugs, in effect summarising the job done by the police. Sandra is Hare’s personification of correctness; she is the voice of truth and reason within the police station. She comes across as a straightforward no nonsense kind of girl; she works hard and has ambition. Hare describes her as “in her mid twenties with neat, dyed blond short hair. She is quite small and tidy.” It would seem that he intends the audience to like her; she is easy on the eye and looks