ALEX HALL is disgusted by the misuse of ‘emotional narratives’ to justify uninformed geo-political prejudice
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Top-notch biblical folk-tale
SIMON PARSONS recommends a musical retelling of the Old Testament story of the sexual awakening of a young childless bride
UNHAPPY MARRIAGE: Ofra Daniel and Matthew Woodyatt in Song of Songs
SUE TURNER welcomes a thoughtful, engaging book that lays bare the economic realities of global waste management
JOHN GREEN welcomes an insider account of the achievements and failures of the transition to democracy in Portugal
SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic
PETER MASON is enthralled by an assembly of objects, ancient and modern, that have lain in the mud of London’s river
MICK McSHANE rubs shoulders with Mod legend Steve Craddock and joins in with the joyous Glasgow choir
DENNIS BROE sifts out the ideological bias of the newest TV series offerings, and picks out what to see, and what to avoid
Song of Songs
Park Theatre, London
INSPIRED by the Old Testament book also known as the Song of Solomon, this award-winning musical play sets out to explore the themes at the heart of the biblical collection of erotic love poems without the religious context.
The simple plot, told as a traditional folk story by the mad, wandering poetess of love is that of a young woman Tirzah, forced into a loveless, unfulfilling marriage who is only awakened to the intense power of desire with the arrival of mysterious love letters that spark her sexual liberation and empower her as a woman.
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