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Week 24 - The Island - Athol Fugard

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The South African playwright Athol Fugard is an existentialist. He loves asking, what he calls, the nagging questions that plague us all. Who am I? Why am I here? What’s the meaning of it all?

As he talks. though, there is little sense that you are in the presence of a man that feels lost. Far from it. He speaks with flair and confidence. His answers are clear and articulate. But for a man who is a self-confessed lover of words, this is to be expected.

From an early age he was drawn to language. He would listen to conversations the way some people listen to music. Identifying the subtle rhythms, the tones, the vernaculars of dialogue became an obsession, and eventually became a gift, something that has played a huge part in his success.

Raised in Port Elizabeth he considers himself very much a regional writer. Nearly all his plays, short stories and novels are based around this industrial city. In fact his breakout play, The Blood Knot, in 1961, is a gritty tale of two brothers living in the slums of an area where he grew up. The play went on to become a trilogy, with each part dealing with down-on-their-luck family members navigating through the underbelly of his hometown.

His ear for dialogue and eye for detail has brought him many awards and accolades, but it also brought unwanted attention. During apartheid there was a strict censorship on content and sometimes his depictions of non-whites were a little too raw, a little too honest. While his work was never overtly political there were always discreet themes of oppression within his characters.

In the 1970s the government passed even stricter laws. This time the mixing of black and white actors and audience members was forbidden. Despite these regulations Athol established an underground theatre scene. It thrived with people across all racial divides. Held in dingy clubs and back rooms, these productions were stripped, with little or no set designs. He described it to a friend as “bare stage, few props, great theatre.”

It was during this period that he wrote and directed The Island, one of his most influential works. The play tells the story of two inmates on Robben Island prison (the same prison Nelson Mandela was incarcerated for 25 years). In the story the two men discuss their life while rehearsing the Greek tragedy Antigone. It was a simple production with two actors and a blanket representing their cell. At the same time the story juggled hefty themes such as Isolation, separation and, of course, existentialism.

In his later years Athol delved into movies and he adapted many of his plays to the big screen. They had modest impact, but never packing the same punch as the live stage shows. The most successful reworking of his stories came in 2005 with Tsotsi, a movie based on a novel. But he was never wooed by the bright lights he was firmly devoted to the theatre. He couldn’t drag himself away from the “bare stage, few props, great theatre.”


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