JAMIE BRITTON recommends that we all buy at least two copies of a remarkable book of poems
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Poignant reflections on being Jewish
SIMON PARSONS recommends a production in which experiences of war and life as an immigrant become horrifyingly contemporary
WARMTH AND VITALITY: Maureen Lipman as Rose
[Park Theatre]
MARIA DUARTE goes down a bilingual rabbit hole with an impressive Jodie Foster
DAVID HARVIE recommends a selection of Harry Cleaver’s writing that documents working-class activism and offers a method, and a way of understanding and investigating the world
DAVID YEARSLEY is fascinated by the account of four composers who transformed their experiences of the second world war and the Holocaust into deeply moving works of art
PETER MASON thrills to the sound of south London-born Yussef Dayes, and the galaxy of musicians drawn into his orbit
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Rose
Park Theatre
London
MAUREEN LIPMAN is the perfect actress for Martin Sherman’s outstanding monologue. Her two-and-a-half-hour narrative is a powerfully captivating account of Rose, an 80-year old Jewish woman and her journey through some of the harrowing events of the 20th century.
Sat on a bench throughout the show, honouring the Jewish tradition of mourning for a close relative’s death (shivah), Rose’s personality, sense of humour and her remarkable life story engage the audience from the outset.
Her epic journey from a Russian Ukrainian village childhood to survival in the Warsaw ghetto, British rejection from Palestine and a financially successful if emotionally damaged married life in US with reflections on her troubled son’s life in an Israel that no longer recognises her relevance, has recurring echoes throughout.
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SIMON PARSONS applauds an artist who rescues and rehumanises stories of women, the victims of violence, from a feminist perspective
MARY CONWAY becomes impatient with the intellectual self-indulgence of Tom Stoppard in a production that is, nevertheless, total class
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