Taking long walks in Shakespeare country
Although the place is quite large and has many shops, offices, other utility centers and pubs etc., it somehow does not look a town or a city. The place is too quaint, too old-world and far too charming to call it anything but 'Shakespeare Country' or, simply, Stratford-on-Avon. During the season there are many tourists but one never sees any cheap souvenir shop, touts or hangers-on, in this beautifully preserved place. There are no Shakespeare cloaks, buttons or quills on sale. The Bard is certainly not on sale here not even on display. It is simply that in the atmosphere, in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, in the various exhibition rooms, in the Avon river, in the hills and dales, in the entire place, he is present.
Yes, we had long walks in the mornings and mostly in the evenings [before going to the Theatre]. Elaine most often hired a bicycle for her jaunts. Agnes loved walking and it was she and I that joined for the long walks over the lovely hills and dales of the place. One cannot say in ecstatic enchantment Ah, yes, this surely is the place that inspired this man to be a poet, a writer of plays and a master of dramatic strategy. But one can certainly sense why a brooding, restless young man, who is dreaming of a larger and perhaps, a more varied world, would want to leave the place for more adventurous pastures ! Although, in the summer, the hills and dales are lush green pouring its sap as it were from every blade of grass, in the winter, one could imagine the place would have been dark and forbidding, where witches and ghouls roamed, where the Bard would have seen and met his Calibans and Ariels, his Oberons and Bottoms, and his Antolycuses and Titanias and other ethereal characters. I realized one thing for certain. Or, rather, I was able to have a glimpse of one of the Bard's consistent characters the earthworm. It is present here in abundance. It raises its uncertain head from under the springy sods as you step on them, surveys the source of its disturbance in disgust and squirms in once again into its slimy home. At other times a little head of it appears on its own, just above the sods, surveys the world lazily, catches the sun in its blind eye and disappears into its own lair. Worthy tribute Let me quote some of references to the worm by the Bard graciously supplied to me by our own expert on Shakespeare, Ms. Gwen Herath :- Poor worm, thou art infected - The Tempest Vile worm, thou wast overlooked - Merry Wives Like a worm in the bud, feed on. - Twelfth Night Is but a humour, or a worm? - Much Ado About Nothing Thus, to reprove these worms - Love's Labours Lost Tombs do worms infold - Merchant of Venice Civil dissension is a viperous worm - Henry VI The smallest worm will turn - Henry VI when I shall dwell with worms - Henry VIII Hast thou the pretty worm of the Nilus, makes a very good report of the worm, Most fallible, the worm's an old worm, I wish you all joy of the worm. That the worm ill do his kind, The worm is not to be trusted, there is no goodness in the worm - Anth. And Cleo. Not half so big as a round little worm - Romeo and Juliet. And so, the 'worm' had his DAY with none other than the greatest playwright and poet the world has ever known. The main event of the Season, the bill of Shakespeare plays was performed at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre by the side of the shimmering river Avon. The Theatre is a truly worthy tribute to the Bard, imposing and unassuming. The theatre-goer here has come a long way from The Pit and The Globe and there is Jan Kott calling Shakespeare 'Our Contemporary'. Who knows, the Bard himself might have preferred the 'Groundlings' of his own day ! And so, here I was in Shakespeare country sharing accommodation owned by two spinster sisters and shared by four women from four parts of the world France, Germany, America and Italy. The girls or rather, the women, were accommodated upstairs in a long dormitory like room. The two sisters shared a room downstairs and I was put away in a kind of small office room downstairs with an ancient spring bed which had the habit of creaking to the high heavens at the very least movement of its occupant. I often wondered whether it had been there from the Bard's time, but dare not ask the question. In any case it is very unlikely there were 'springs' during his time ! I did have my problems with the brood of women no, certainly not any problems of 'association'. I would say they were rather, problems of the 'clothes line' in the backyard. I too had to air my shirts and vests etc. and dry my underwear in the same clothes line. But every time I approached the line it was loaded to its very gills with all kinds of women's wear mostly, ahem, women's lingerie, frilly pants and other similar items the likes of which I had never seen before. That did not matter. What mattered was that I had no space there at all to dry my own bits of stuff. I hatched a plan. I found an old piece of thin card board and painted a message on it. "This space is reserved for Henry" it said. I hung it on the clothes line reserving about two or three feet of its space. It worked, I must say with a few friendly frowns from the women of the dormitory and a couple of guffaws from the two spinsters. A couple of days later when I joined the breakfast table as the last person, I read a little notice encircling my plate-area on the table. It said 'The entire space here, except what is marked as under belongs to us Elaine, Maria, Agnus and Gugumus.' I did not even look up as I took my normal place at the table, but I could certainly almost hear the suppressed giggles. I took the notice as nonchalantly as I possibly could, strapped it around my forehead and started attacking my breakfast of the very English bacon, eggs and toast. There were puzzled looks all around until it hit them. According to the new placement of their notice, from now on, except for my head, the rest of me belonged to 'Elaine, Maria, Agnus and Gugumus'! The first squeal, as to be expected was from the beautiful Maria of Italy. It was followed by lesser squeals and grunts and whatnot from the other women duly surpassed and submerged in the hearty laughter of the two elderly women. I had won the battle of wits.! 'Well, not a bad beginning for a birthday'! I announced as I finished gobbling down my breakfast and reaching for the inevitable coffee. There were more exclamations from the table. 'That could not be true. That must be another gaaaga'! Elaine was the first to protest. 'Oh, Henry that is a lie is not it? Responded the beautiful Maria with her mouth making a perfect. 'Are not you joking, Henry ? School marmish Agnus joined in looking as correct as she possibly could, in this impossible situation. The French Gugumus only smiled one of her unfathomable 'Francois Segan' smiles. Amidst the hullabaloo I had finished my breakfast and excused myself from the table getting up very slowly, in a kind of dramatic 'slow motion' using all the powers of the 'actor' in me. 'Yes, it does happen to be my birthday, my dear ladies. And thank you for the very warm birthday present.' Said I indicating the notice still strapped to my forehead and smiling as innocently as I could. Actually I was going to throw just a little party tonight for the occasion. Well....? What can I do if you don't believe me?. Said I once again as nonchalantly as possible. Elaine, as usual, was the first to respond. She pushed her chair back and came running with outstretched arms. Happy birthday, Henry. You mad cap, you little Charlie Chaplin!. She exclaimed as she kissed me on both my cheeks her lips still wet with bacon, butter and lipstick ! The others followed. Agnus treated me with a very proper and very school-marmish kiss on one of my cheeks while Maria placed rather loud and buttery kisses on both my cheeks. Gugumus extended a slender hand with just a touch of her thin lips on my left cheek. The two sisters shook my paw till it hurt, smiling their broad toothy smiles. It was, in fact my birthday the 6th of July, and what a better present than to be in Shakespeare country and be kissed and wished by six women on such a day ! Thought of the week Two years ago, one of our foremost dramatists, Parakrama Niriella, launched a new concept into our Theatre 'Jana Karaliya'. The idea was to take theatre to the real people not just to a few hundreds that would fill a conventional theatre hall. Jana Karaliya, headed by Parakrama and aided be veteran man of the Theatre, H.A. Perera , filled that void. With some foreign aid they actually built a very attractive and extremely functional 'Travelling Theatre Tent' had a soft opening ceremony here in Colombo at the Nomads grounds and moved away. They have since performed a bill of around five new plays in Jaffna, Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa, Kantalai and Puttalam. They visited Jaffna in Sept. 2005 and followed up in other places, spending an average of two months in each place. They had very enthusiastic audiences wherever they took their plays [some Indian, some local] including the majority Muslim community in Puttalam. They have now come back to base at 25/1, Vidyala Jn., Malwatte Road, Hokandara South, for a breather and perhaps also the preparation of a new bill of Theatre Fare. Jana Karaliya is also to launch a new tabloid devoted entirely to Theatre and the Stage, by the same name. Both Parakrama and H.A. Perera are quiet men, working on their dreams without much fuss. They have done something that none of us in this thing called Theatre, never undertook to do. I call them brave men. It needs a lot of guts, planning and energy to carry on with a Travelling Theatre. I wish the two of them and the entire Jana Karaliya group many more years of good Theatre, good relations and all the energy they need. |
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