The Adventures of A Black Girl in Search of God

Djanet Sears

• Publisher: Playwrights Canada Press
• Year: 2003
• ISBN:
  9781770914797
• Topic: Littérature
• Subtopic: Théâtre

From Governor General's Literary Award–winning playwright Djanet Sears comes a beautiful and deeply moving story set in present-day Negro Creek, a two-hundred-year-old black community in Western Ontario. Rainey Baldwin-Jackson, a country doctor, struggles to come to terms with the loss of her daughter, the disintegration of her marriage, and an eccentric elderly father on an astonishing crusade.

The Adventures of a Black Girl
in Search of God

We, Africans in America, come from a people tied to the Earth, people of the drums which echo the Earth’s heartbeat.... People tied to soil and wind and rain as to each other...
—Aned Kgositsile; Part Of Each Other, Part Of The Earth

He destroys both the blameless and the wicked.
—Job 9:22

If this Being is omnipotent, then every occurrence, including every human action, every human thought, and every human feeling and aspiration is also His work; how is it possible to think of holding men responsible for their deeds and thoughts before such an almighty Being? In giving out punishment and rewards He would to a certain extent be passing judgement on Himself. How can this be combined with the goodness and righteousness ascribed to Him?
—Albert Einstein; Out of My Later Years

ACT I

Prologue

From a deep darkness, a dissonant chorus of naked voices rises up out of the morass of earth and water. As the lights come up, Lorraine (RAINEY) Baldwin-Johnson stands alone. Her face is wet with sweat, tears and rain, masking her tarnished gold beauty. Her feet are bare. She stares at the heavens.

A Chorus of souls approaches the stage from all corners of the space. The CHORUS slowly sings the sound of heavy rain pounding on the dark and deserted country road. The Chorus forms the surrounding woods and lush farmland and almost devours Rainey and the two lanes of asphalt road. Flashes of lightning turn night to day and the thunder roars l...