Via Dolorosa

Description

'My whole life, it's been assumed, Western civilisation is an old bitch gone in the teeth. And so people say, go to Israel. Because in Israel at least people are fighting. In Israel, they're fighting for something they believe in.' Via DolorosaIn 1997, after many invitations, the 50-year-old British playwright resolved finally to visit the 50-year-old State of Israel. The resulting play, written to be performed by the author himself, offers a meditation on an extraordinary trip to both Israel and the Palestinian territory, which leaves Hare questioning his own values as searchingly as the powerful beliefs of those he met. Accompanying Via Dolorosa is the 1996 lecture When Shall We Live?, which also addresses questions of art and faith. Originally given in Westminster Abbey as the Eric Symes Memorial Lecture, it attracted record correspondence when an abridged version was published in the Daily Telegraph.

David Hare is one of Britain's most internationally performed playwrights. Born in Sussex in 1947, he had a long association with Britain's National Theatre, which produced eleven of his plays successively between 1978 and 1997. A trilogy about the church, the law and the Labour Party - Racing Demon, Murmuring Judges and The Absence of War - was presented in repertory at the Olivier Theatre in 1993. Nine of his best-known plays, including Plenty, The Secret Rapture, Skylight, The Blue Room, Amy's View, The Judas Kiss and Via Dolorosa - in which he performed - have also been performed on Broadway. David Hare's most recent play, The Breath of Life, premiered at the Theatre Royal Haymarket, London, in October 2002.

"Hare has written a piece that, in a modest, moving way, illuminates not only the Arab-Israeli conflict but also some of the other confrontations that keep the world on bloody edge. . .it is a very particular recollection, written by a playwright attempting to give theatrical fiction a new dimension of reality. . .Via Dolorosa has such an astonishing abundance of stories, characters and ideas that, when you leave the theatre, you feel as if you have lived through some crazy, continuing epic." --New York Times "It reinforces one's faith in theatre as a means of communication. . .a deeply moving theatrical mosaic." --Guardian