New South African Plays

Beverley Naidoo, Sibusiso Mamba, Mike Van Graan, James Whylie, Rehane Abrahams, Ashwin Singh, Charles J. Fourie

• Publisher: Aurora Metro Books
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9780954233013
• eBook ISBN: 9781910798898
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: African Drama
• Index: Literature

A collection of six plays dealing with the new South Africa, published in 2006 to celebrate 10 years of democracy post-apartheid. Plays about racial conflict, the impact of AIDS, power and corruption, the legacy of the past and female identity. Reprinted 2012, 2019.

The Plays

The Playground by Beverly Naidoo

"…it floats on a haunting, echoing raft of traditional South African harmonies that make watching it a joyful experience as well as a thought-provoking one…" Time Out Critics' Choice – Pick of the Year

Taxi by Sibusiso Mamba: Edinburgh fringe first winner

"a superbly written and produced play… A fine piece of work that's refreshingly free of cliches." Daily Mail, Pick of the Week

Green Man Flashing by Mike Van Graan

"…This finely crafted drama tears at the heart and soul of our democracy, and rips at the underbelly of corruption and political power through its astute writing…" Star Tonight

Rejoice by James Whylie

"… the cruellest irony of all is left until the end… the same one which has spelled the death of Rejoice… And millions more." Friends of BBC Radio 3

What the Water Gave Me by Rehane Abrahams

"tales that retrieve ancient magics and reveal contemporary terrors…" Cape Times

To House by Ashwin Singh: Finalist in the 2003 PANSA (Performing Arts Network of SA) Festival of Reading of New Writing (the country's foremost playwriting contest)

"To House is an important piece of theatre; in it people voice opinions that are uncomfortable and edgy. The cathartic and therapeutic value of hearing these things said aloud in a public place is part of our essential healing process and proves, once again, that art has the ability to go where angels fear to tread." Daily News, Durban

THE PLAYS

Playwright’s Note:

What the Water Gave Me is about my connection with the Mothercity, Cape Town and thus intimately connected with my relationship to the Sea. Cape Town is on a peninsula surrounded by Ocean, the Atlantic on one side and the Indian on the other. The Indian Ocean is particularly meaningful for me and not just because the non-white beach was there, but because it carried stories of where we came from. I grew up different within, in a Cape Malay (Muslim) community with a mother from outside (Johannesburg, Christian). Apart from being not white or black, I was different from the other Coloured kids and different from the other Malay kids. My family was reeling from the ‘forced removals’ fracturing of their traditional extended family structures for most of my childhood. The geography I inhabited was one of fissures, fractures, cracks like my grandmother’s body, scarred with the many keloids of open-heart surgery. My grandmother, Gawa Arend, held the stories of Cape Town for me. She told me Bawa Mera, Bawa Puti, which I later discovered was an old Javanese story Bawang Mera, Bawang Puti (Onion and Garlic). She told me that her people had come from the East, non-specific, mythic Java, Indian Ocean and Ships.

I believe that theatre can actively be used for healing. With this work, I put those beliefs to the test using my experiences of ritual and what I found to be common – the creation of sacred space, the invocation of the directions/elements and the closure or release at the end. I also attempted to work directly with my ancestors (particularly my grandmother) and began practically exploring Southern African shamanic techniques during this time.

Faced with the gruesome realities of sexual violence and abuse, especially against girlchildren and the constant awareness of violence in South Africa, this seemed the most potent means at my disposal. In Africa, these practises are not ‘New Age’, they are continuous, ‘Age’-less techniques for the restoring of psyche amongst other things. They are effective.

The associations of water with healing, sexuality, fecundity, release and purification were called on to effect a process using the performer’s body as point of contact/interdimensional interface/channel. It aimed to connect outward to the audience and community and inward to cellular memory and ancestral line.

Rehane Abrahams

WHAT THE WATER GAVE ME

Written and performed by

Rehane Abrahams

Produced by The Mothertongue Project. Directed by Sara Matchett. Soundscape by Julia Raynham. It was first seen at the Cape Town Theatre Laboratory’s Collaborations Festival at the Nico Arena in November 2000. The Mothertongue Project also presented the show in April 2001 at The Sufi Temple, a geodesic dome in a garden. The play enjoyed a further run at the Baxter Sanlam Studio in Cape Town, July 2001.

CHARACTERS

AIR – Storyteller

FIRE – Taxi Time-Traveller

EARTH – Hip-Hop-Head from Heideveld

WATER – Little Girl

Note:

We have not included specific stage directions, as we feel it should be left to the discretion of the director and performer to invent/create their own physical narrative that runs parallel to the spoken text. We have also left the transitions from character to character up to the discretion of the performer and director.

Use is made of Indian Classical dance, Physical Theatre and Storytelling as the action moves in all directions simultaneously interwoven. This is theatre with emphasis on transformation and the corporal. It is speaking the body/the body speaking.

The Set

The set is comprised of four ‘stations’ situated in a circle. Each ‘station’ is associated with an element and direction thus representing a medicine wheel. There are four characters and each one is connected to a ‘station’.

AIR – (East) is represented by a yellow circle (approx 1 meter in diameter)

WATER – (West) by a blue circle with an empty enamel bowl

EARTH – (North) by a white circle

FIRE – (South) by a red circle

The performer enters as the audience enters the space. She is singing a Yoruba Chant in honour of the Goddess Oshun and is dragging a cloth bundle filled with various props. She carries a long stick, similar to that carried by Indian Sages. As she sings, she circles the ‘medicine wheel’ in a clockwise direction. As she gets to the water ‘station’, she takes out a plastic Coca Cola bottle filled with water and pours the water into the enamel bowl. She also places a toy doll (without any clothing) at this ‘station’. At the next ‘station’ she empties a brown paper bag filled with earth onto the white circle and places a black woollen hat down; then she takes out a large candle and lights it at the Fire ‘station’ and places approx 30 unlit small birthday candles onto the red circle and a ball; finally she places a small tape recorder/dictaphone and lights an incense stick at the yellow circle. She places her stick down here and takes the cloth that was used to carry the props and winds it round her head into a turban. Thus transforming into the first character i.e. The Storyteller. At some points the props are interchanged between characters, thus creating a sense that the characters embody aspects of one another. Again this is left to the discretion of the d...

Table of contents

• New South African Plays
• Title
• Copyright
• Foreword
• Contents
• Introduction
• The Plays
• Useful links