Until the Flood

Dael Orlandersmith

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9781786828408
• eBook ISBN: 9781786828415
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Discrimination & Race Relations
• Index: Social Sciences

Missouri, 2014. Michael Brown, a black teenager, is shot and killed by Darren Wilson, a white police officer. In this gripping and revelatory drama based on interviews from the aftermath of the shooting, Dael Orlandersmith journeys into the heart and soul of modern-day America – confronting the powerful forces of history, race and politics, and embodying the many faces of a community rallying for justice, and a country still yearning for change.

LOUISA

PART ONE

LOUISA HEMPHILL, black, early seventies, retired school teacher. Talks to audience:

LOUISA

It was a nice service / real nice / that preacher really went at it didn’t he? He sweated – the way he sweated – real old school. I happen to like that though – the old-school preaching.

(Beat.)

The way he spoke about that boy’s death Michael Brown and all the stuff happening in Ferguson didn’t surprise me a bit. That whole race thing – that was a long time coming.

(Louisa sips tea.)

Back then when I was a young girl – no black policeman same as now… isn’t that something?

I mean if you were standing outside of your OWN home talking to somebody – they’d yell at you: (Does a voice) “Get inside.”… I mean you’re on your own property… or they’d pull black men over for no reason.

(Beat.)

It was always like that… cops doing that or white boys / these crazy / insane white boys in cars / drunk/sober looking for trouble / looking for something to Do / speeding past yelling out “NIGGER”… looking for something to do… my god.

And

Of course they – the whites – were protected by the law – especially the “sundown law.”

If you don’t know what that is… it was a law / AWFUL law that stated if you were of color or Jewish you could not be in certain towns after dark.

There were those signs: (As if reading a sign) “Don’t let the sun go down on you in this town nigger.”

(Pause. Back to audience:)

We all saw those signs

Read those signs

Saw those signs

(Pause.)

I saw those signs

There were those of us who did indeed abide by that law

And

Who lived by that law

But

Those signs angered me

Really angered me

And

I showed how it angered me

Spoke about it

Sometimes yelled about it

My family would hear me out

They understood

But

It seemed to me that they took IT

Took “keeping their place.”

It seemed to me that my family were passive racially

My father seemed like a man who did not “outstep his bounds.”

There was THAT racism as well.

Certainly there was the violence

But

There was also the UNDERSTOOD / quiet racism that did NOT include violence

Everyone knew their “place.”

The whites stayed in West County

And

We stayed in Kinloch back then and later Ferguson.

If we had to go shopping say in Normandy – it was understood we were there for JUST that / and the white folk there knew us by name and we knew them by name and smiles and even some conversation was had.

BUT

Then it was back to Kinloch

Back there before the sun went down

Back to OUR side of town

And

THEIR side of town

Back to keeping your place.

(Pause.)

I would NOT: (Sarcastically) “keep my place.” / I refused to “KEEP MY PLACE.”

(Beat.)

I graduated high school and went to City College in New York

By then it was the sixties

And

there were no race riots in St. Louis period

But

when I was in New York

I went to protests

I participated in boycotts

And

heard about the race riots in Chicago and Indiana – THOSE riots – my god!… put fire in ME

Yes

I was on FIRE.

(Pause.)

Sometimes when I came home to visit / I’d sense a hostility

Not with my family but from certain WHITE and BLACK people

There was a HATRED directed towards ME

Once I was in a store in Normandy to get my mother some fabric.

And

Again the woman – a white woman – I knew her all my life – Mrs. Wexton was one of the folk my family made small talk with when they came into her shop.

So this day I came in and by then it was 1969–70 – and she said: (Does her) “Oh Louisa! Haven’t seen you in such a long time.”

(Becomes self:)

And I say: (As if to her) “Well...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• LOUISA: PART ONE
• RUSTY
• HASSAN
• CONNIE
• REUBEN
• DOUGRAY
• PAUL
• EDNA
• LOUISA: PART TWO
• POET/PLAYWRIGHT