Monologue for English

One thing about English this year that was different from grade 9 English is that we have a lot more creative writing pieces.  Which I find amazing, as I love creative writing.

This was a monologue on fear, after reading a creepy story which involved someone possibly drowning/dying, and claustrophobia.  Both are different types of fear, so we had to do an artistic representation of any fear.

You could draw, sing, paint, etc, but I obviously chose writing, because that's what I do creatively.  :)

Fear Monologue

“I have no way to overcome fear. Not now, not then, and I’m sure I never will in the future. Sure, take deep breaths, think calming thoughts – those are all stress related. Fear itself is not stress. It’s one’s body, preparing for a fight, or a flight. Increased breathing, heartbeat hammers; fear courses through my body. I cannot stop it. All I can do is wait, wait for it to pass and for me to be able to breathe again.


Others may fight. They may stand up and face their fears. How, I do not know. Because when I am scared, my brain turns off. Whatever it is, a stage, a performance, a line; it all fades away until all there is left in me is fear, clouding my mind and choking all my hopes and dreams.


Did I once dream of succeeding? Fear makes that disappear. Logic, pure and simple logic, is as alien to me now as a day without stage fright. It’s impossible to see logic when all my body is showing is failure; fear causes failure.


So when I stand there, on the stage, alone or with other people, singing, dancing, talking, I do not know logic. I only know fear, so terrifying I feel as if I’m about to die; that my body will shut down and leave this earth, somehow, in some way.


But there is a point, that when a person is scared, they begin to stop caring. The adrenaline for fight or flight, the heightened senses, the brain moving a thousand miles a minute, they all help in the end. I remember my lines, I move around the stage like I should have all those times in practice, and I do succeed.


No one knows why I do it. They ask me why I am performer; they ask me how I can do so well on stage, when moments before my hands are shaking, and I’m sweating buckets just behind the curtains.


I tell them that there is a difference between being on stage, performing, and off stage, ready to perform. But the other people are brave, and they have dealt with their fear in different ways. They do not understand my way, because everyone deals with fear in a different way. And until they find out how, the only thing they should fear is fear itself.”

- An Actor

S a r a h