Elliot, a Soldier's Fugue

The Elliot Trilogy #1

by Quiara Alegría Hudes

Back home in Philadelphia, Elliot Ortiz, a nineteen-year-old Marine, contemplates his return to Iraq for a second tour of duty after being seriously wounded. In this “simple, poignant and achingly evocative play” (TimeOut New York), three Ortiz family members recount years of service to their country in wars in Korea, Vietnam and Iraq, and the effects their service has had on the individual, the family and the community they live in. Melding a poetic dreamscape with a stream-of-consciousness narrative, Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue takes us on an unforgettable journey across time and generations. This Pulitzer Prize finalist is the first installment in Quiara Alegria Hudes' The Elliot Trilogy, which continues in Water By the Spoonful (Pulitzer Prize-winner) and concludes with The Happiest Song Plays Last.

Genres: Plays, Drama, Theatre, War, School, Fiction, Historical Fiction

72 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Quiara Alegría Hudes is a writer, barrio feminist, and native of West Philly, U.S.A. Hailed for her work’s exuberance, intellectual rigor, and rich imagination, her plays and musicals have been performed around the world. They include a Pulitzer-winning drama, Water By the Spoonful, and a Tony-winning Broadway musical, In the Heights (co-authored with Lin-Manuel Miranda). Her screenplay adaptation of In the Heights opens in movie theaters nationwide this June.

Along with her cousin and a dedicated circle of volunteers, Hudes founded and runs Emancipated Stories, a collection of pages written by people who have been or remain incarcerated.

Reviews

[Kenny · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Green things, you let them grow wild. Don't try to control them. Like people, listen to them, let them dow their own thing. You give them a little guidance on the way."

Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue, Quiara Alegría Hudes



Quiara Alegría Hudes, I love your writing. You are the future of drama in this country. I read her Pulitzer winning Water by the Spoonful earlier this week and loved it. I think Elliot, a Soldier's Fugue is an even better play.

The structure of this play is musical. Characters move forward and back in time sometimes narrating, sometimes inhabiting characters. The play takes place over the course of three generations of soldiers. It is both poetic and musical. The action is divided into 14 numbered scenes that are defined either as fugues or preludes and it is beautiful.

We start with Elliot. He is 18 and is heading off to war. He is full of life and hope. His father, mother, and grandfather help narrate his days in boot camp. As he ships off to Iraq we slip through time to 1966. The fugues are layered. The characters are music and these four parts create beautiful harmonies. They come together and tell this story rhythmically.



In the preludes we discover things. They’re monologues or scenes between two people. They describe how these characters see the world and see themselves within their world. Sometimes the characters write home. Grandpop, Pop, and Elliot all experience physical trauma over the course of the play. They try to make sense of war. They head out and imagine the glory days they’ve always heard of. They all struggle to understand the horrors of war. Each generation reaches to the past, hoping to end the nightmares that have over taken them. But that doesn’t seem to be the case for any of these men.

Elliot, a Soldier's Fugue is gorgeous and poetic and should be read and more importantly, seen. I'm excited to read the conclusion of this trilogy and more of Hudes' work.

[Cori · Rating 3 out of 5]

(Play discussion group script #16)

[Yari · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked up this short play because it is about a Puertorican family whose generations have served in the military at the Korean, Vietnam and the Iraqui war. For the exception of the few prose sections, the rest? way too abstract for my taste. Did not enjoy at all. Glad it was short.
I have to, however, give credit to the writer for her clever use of the word Fugue, both meanings- musically and the dissociative psychological state of awareness. It came across in the play. Well done. And one line really resonated with me, "...A seed is a contract with the future. It's saying, I know something better will happen tomorrow..."
I still am hopeful and looking forward to Quiara's other books.

[Mariana Tesch · Rating 3 out of 5]

peça indicada ao pulitzer de 2007. essa autora ganhou uns anos depois com outra peça que não lembro nome, não-sei-o-que-spoon. inspirada em histórias de um primo e do avô (acho. rs. comecei a ler dia 25 de novembro e já esqueci), ela segue os relatos de guerra de homens de 3 gerações - filho (o elliot do título), pai e avô. eu curti bem a forma. é criativa e casa com o conteúdo daquele jeito que você fica parabéns, moça, tem conceito aí. deve ser boa de ver. o duro pra mim foi o papinho. parece uma tentativa de não romantizar a guerra romantizando pra caralho. ¡pero qué sé yo! tinha que ter nascido americana (deus me livre e guarde) pra me emocionar

[Bobby Sullivan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Didn't really care for this one. I understand what the author was going for: war is the same, yet very different for different generations. But it didn't land with me, maybe because I've never been to war. Still, it's a good setup for the second play in the trilogy, WATER BY THE SPOONFUL, which I like very much.

[Sam Oxford · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an outstandingly emotive memory play that makes me really really wish pandemic wasn't a thing.

[Laura Sackton · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't love this quite as much as Water by the Spoonful, but it was still incredible and now I really really want to see the play.

[Lauren · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Pulitzer Prize Committee has recognized several plays that center around the 2003 Invasion of Iraq. This is the third one I’ve read, and while it has moving moments, I found it the weakest of the three.

The play tells the story of the similarities between three generations of the same family going to war, and the play reads more like anti-war propaganda than literature. I’ve read a string of political plays recently, and they fall into two general categories. This one falls into the group of those focused more on the message than the characters or plot. As someone who prefers storytelling over preaching (even when I agree with an author), I found Elliot already feeling dated a decade later. That’s not to critique the powerful message of the play: I just wish the message had been subtler and relied more on the mechanisms of storytelling. Quasi-recommended.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quiara Hudes has crafted an excellent piece about the heritage of war and its effect on the men and women who serve their countries. By examining a far-off conflict through the eyes of one Philadelphia family, she is able to personalize both the brutality of armed combat and the pressure that minority families feel to take one of the routes most open to them in America.

Told through three generations of veterans (each in their own way), Elliot: A Soldier's Fugue takes its story down surprising avenues. Young Marine Elliot returns home to heal from a combat injury before returning to Iraq, and his grappling with the horrors he's experiencing is mirrored in his grandfather's letters and his mother's compassion for his father during the Vietnam War. These stories meld together via musical movements and climax in a gorgeous, heartfelt sequence during which Elliot's mother fights against the decay of war by wrapping her son in the garden vines that also represent the barbed wire that created his injury.

A brilliant play that deserves to be read and seen. Full of teeming humanity and hard questions.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not a huge fan of abstract theatre, so I'm sure a lot of this was lost on me. I get what Hudes was trying to do with the stark, bleak stage, but that type of thing is just not for me.

Elliot, a Soldier's Fugue, tells the story of Elliot Ortiz, who is deployed to the Iraq War a 2nd time after earning a Purple Heart at the age of 19. His Pop and Mother both served in Vietnam and met in a hospital there. His Grandpop served in the Korean War. These four characters' stories overlap as they relate their personal experiences, joys and tragedies. I read Water by the Spoonful first, so was interested in the back story, but think they can be enjoyed independently of each other. It was definitely moving at times, and took a step at dramatizing the Iraq War, which is a not-so-distant memory for many people. I preferred the Prelude sections to the Fugues, but I'm thinking if I knew a little bit more about Bach, this pattern of the Preludes & Fugues would make sense to me.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Joe Bobb. Wake up, man. Tell me about your gang from Kentucky. What, back in the Bronx? Yeah, we got ourselves a gang, but not a bad one. We help people on our street. Like some kids flipped over an ice cream stand. It was just a nice old guy, the kids flipped it, knocked the old guy flat. We chased after them..."

As my son talks for the first time about a war, in the abstract between dragons and monsters, I'm reading this abstract play that runs like a poem between Korea and Vietnam and Iraq and Puerto Rico. The fugue is over before you know it, and the real work is to go back and pick it apart and try to balance out the sex and the death and the rot and the soldier's mindset.

The soldiers in this play are for the most part hostile witnesses, with their girlfriends and nurses and mothers and civilian reporters trying to piece together the story of what happens in war. Is it accurate? I have no idea. Is it lyrical and ugly? Yes.

[Max · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a fairly good and interesting play. It deals with three generations of Puerto Rican men and their experiences as soldiers. The content of the play is fairly good. While Elliot gets the bulk of the character development, his mother, father, and grandfather are fleshed out to an extent. The play is told in a disjointed, nonlinear way, but I think this works fairly well, since it reflects the trauma of war. The plot, such as it is, centers on Elliot's decision whether to go back to Iraq for a second tour or not. What I really enjoyed was the format of the play. In addition to being told in a nonlinear fashion, individual scenes often bring different family members together to show how their experiences parallel each other. Also, characters often narrator their own actions, which is interesting. All in all, this was a really interesting and well done play, and I wish I could see a performance of it.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

First play of a trilogy, and I can see why it was on that list for the Pulitzer. Hudes' play is honest and accessible, but also so incredibly well structured and metaphorical, so incredibly simple and yet dwelling in layer upon layer of thought. The story of a nineteen-year-old veteran returning from Iraq and just beginning to understand not only his own trauma, but the traumas that his father and grandfather both experienced -- and never shared with him. "You see all the shit you can't erase. Like, here's who you are, Elliot, and you never even knew" (59). True for these men, and true for most of us. So insightful. The music symbolism was powerful to me, a non-musician, and I wish I knew more about music so that those ideas would be even more meaningful. I would like to share this one with students some day, and am in the process of reading the other two. I highly recommend reading it and can't wait to see a version next spring here in Denver at the Curious Theater .....

[Mae Waldron · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely beautiful. Truly a symphony all throughout. The concept of the scenes as fugue was incredibly successful with all of the layers, repetitions, and developments throughout. This play was aptly named and the concept was well conceived and laid out. Each character is an instrument and the language and story is so beautiful. It is an absolute work of art that still is able to tell a story that feels truthful through its artistic nature. I go to the orchestra, and reading this felt how I feel going to the orchestra. Do yourself a favor and please read it. But don't just read it, live in it. Fully allow yourself the immersion into this play that is necessary to see the surroundings and hear all of the music laid within her words. It's there if you lend yourself to it.

[Rachelle Urist · Rating 3 out of 5]

Goodreads describes the play thus:
"Tracing the legacy of war through three generations of a Puerto Rican family, the play focuses on nineteen-year-old Elliot, a recently anointed hometown hero who returns from Iraq with a leg injury and a difficult question: Will he go back to war a second time? While on leave, Elliot learns the stories of his father and grandfather who served in Korea and Vietnam before him."

Hudes draws on family members to tell her - and their - stories. She weaves their stories together and conflates them into fine, enlightening stage fiction.

[Jeff Arena · Rating 4 out of 5]

This fugue is more of a prelude as the first movement of a trilogy of plays. The action is mostly internal; the mood lyrical. The theme drawn out in content and form is the impact of war on soldiers and the impact of returning soldiers on communities. The characters feel real, all well-meaning yet lost or struggling. It sets up the next play, Water by the Spoonful, in an eloquent, meaningful way.

[Kaion · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like aspects of this play, but on the page at least, it feels very student-y. The experimental aspects don't really add much to what is essentially a bunch of monologuing. I do like Ginny quite a bit though, and her garden speech would make a good audition piece if one is so inclined.

[SmarterLilac · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great. The intimacy of thoroughly modern, colloquial dialogue as well as a believable and heartrending family struggle with war make this one of the best plays of my reading career. Plus, as I found this immediately after reading Water by the Spoonful, it was nice to see Mammi Ginny 'resurrected' in this piece.

[Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is more of an overture than a play. As the first play in a trilogy (of sorts) it stands alone, but is tonally similar to exactly what it calls itself: a fugue. It will whet your appetite for the next play, and it will do so quickly. This play is over before you know it.

[Andrew]

I hate to say that I found this play drivel. I wanted to like it but it simply didn't keep my attention.

[Marc · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 - enjoyed - it's confusing at first because of the way it's written, back and forth between characters playing other characters etc.

[Jake Stillwell · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little more abstract than the two sequels that followed it, Elliot, a Soldier's Fugue is a trancelike play about a Puerto Rican family reckoning with their history of military involvement.

[Cary S · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lyrical. But it sort of leaves you wanting something you can't quite articulate...

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome

Overall book carried its plot and was good. A bit difficult for some but very interesting to look at the different perpectives

[Geoff Wyss · Rating 3 out of 5]

I suspect that most, like me, will read their way back to this one from 'Water by the Spoonful.' 'Water,' which I've taught for several years, gets better with successive readings and deserves the Pulitzer it got. So it's possible that my expectations were too high or that I read 'Elliot' for the wrong reasons--i.e., wanting to fill some of the unfilled gaps in 'Water.' ('Elliot' + 'Water' are the first two plays in a trilogy.)

To other readers like me: Close to none of those gaps get filled. Odessa (Elliot's birth mom) is never mentioned. Thus, the scene of his sister's death is not mentioned. The character of Ginny is not filled out except in the thinnest sense (= how she met Pop). The confrontation in Iraq that so haunts Elliot (= his killing of a man attempting to repossess his passport) in 'Water' is not addressed. We do learn how Elliot's leg was injured, but there is no mention of his addiction to pain meds, which is so important in 'Water.' His ambivalence to Puerto Rican culture, so important in 'Water,' is not part of his character in 'Elliot.' Yaz does not appear and is not mentioned.

In terms of structure, 'Fugue' is apt because (most dissatisfying) this play contains very few what might be called scenes. Instead, we get interpenetrated impressions and moments across three generations of men (Elliot, Pop, Grandpop) who fought in three different wars. As such, we don't get enough of any one thing (time, place, or character) to anchor the play and give it the kind of substance the subject matter deserves.

[Jack Reynolds · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hudes is such a strong character builder. The parallels between Elliot, his father, and grandfather's experiences off at war were engrossing. There's a loss associated with war the playwright captures perfectly. At the same time, there's also gains. Community, whether in New York, Puerto Rico, and on the base come alive. Ginny as a narrator also helped cement her direct involvement in the story as the play continues. The staging also allows the characters to interact with each other in a way direct stage directions wouldn't allow. It makes Hudes's connections stronger.

The grandfather's memories felt absent for portions of the play. Thinking back on it, that have may been intentional. His story is more of an undercurrent to the bond Elliot and his father have, one the former feels should be strengthened because of his decision to enlist. At the same time, his character won't be something that sticks with me like the other three. Elliot, a Soldier's Fugue is stil la great piece of work despite that minor quip. I'm excited to experience this world again (even if it's only re-reading Water by the Spoonful) with new perspectives and get a chance to see it performed whenever the opportunity arises.

[Erin Cleary · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am finally getting around to reading the whole of Quiara Alegria Hudes' trilogy, after reading and loving Water by the Spoonful in high school, and then diving deeper into it in my college directing class. In the first installment of the trilogy, we meet Elliot, a reoccurring character across all three plays, connecting them all together. We also meet Ginny, a character only mentioned post mortem in Water by the Spoonful. I always enjoy Hudes' writing style, it's vivid and personal, I can easily picture the set in my mind's eye. Even though this installment was majorly in retrospect, I could follow the timeline quite effortlessly. One thing I couldn't grasp as well was imagining this in production. It felt very much like a prequel story, so I was shocked to learn it came out before its successors. I think from an audience perspective, this would be a hard sell, without running it in tandem with the rest of the trilogy. I also think it would be hard to follow without the previous consumption of Water by the Spoonful. I understand its commitment to showcasing Elliot's story, but craved more from the supporting characters. A short exploration of a developed world and future story waiting to be told.

[Nancy Millichap · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first play in Hudes' trilogy, but it was the second I read: our club began with the Pulitzer-winning second play, and we read the first and third for a later meeting. Our process was to read sections of it aloud, with assigned parts, at our meeting. As someone who acted in plays in high school and college and who majored in literature, with a fairly heavy undergraduate concentration of drama, I was reminded by this experience of the high degree to which, for me, the effectiveness of a play rests in hearing it aloud. Hudes has the ability to catch the tenor of contemporary voices, including those of both men and women, and to imbue her characters with entire back stories in just a few strokes of dialogue. The plays are very much "of their time," but her gifts as a dramatist will enable them to be read decades from now and convey universal ideas about obsession, family, and human bonds.

[Jordan Muschler · Rating 5 out of 5]

The kind of play that sucks you in immediately and impresses both with its lack of form and intensely clear structure, all of which enrapture you in the unique theatrical world it builds out. Its characters are well defined without being the focus, and the overall style and ideas of the piece are its clear victory as a play which will (unfortunately) stay relevant for years and decades and centuries to come.

[Addie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not sure exactly what this is, but it was moving in a way. I think seeing a performance of it is necessary to fully grasp it; it deals with the difficulties of being a soldier, and the uniqueness of the generations of war our country has been through since 1950, but without putting down the military. It shows the humanity of soldiers very well without making the war the Thing, but the catalyst for who these people eventually become. Very interesting.