The Jasmine Road

Synopsis

Written in light of the murder of Rachel Corrie in the West Bank, this play looks at the everyday brutality of twenty-first century Palestine.  It follows the friendship that is built up between Rowan, a worker with the International Solidarity Movement and Adham, a Palestinian man who lives in Britain. Rowan is travelling across to Palestine to see the situation for herself and asks Adham (though he has changed his name to Ziad) to explain the truth.  Eventually he agrees to talk and tells his story. He describes the beauty of Palestine, the smell of the jasmine and the song of the birds. However the story is also filled with death, the destruction of homes, bombings, fear and the dividing of families. Rowan is captivated by Palestine and meets the surviving members of Adham's family. However, like Rachel Corrie, she is crushed by a bulldozer and her name is added to the list of dead in Palestine. As playwright Ghazi Hussein relates, "I could not be silent and see the wrongs, the awful mess around me...I don't write about politics and governments; I write about my people and their pain" (The Scotsman 9 October 2003). This is a timely, affecting play that focuses on the plight of individuals in this dangerous and tragic area.  As Corrie Mills says, "Hussein's poems are unable to prevent the demolition of a house, but they pinch at our numbness and leave a mark" (The List 16-30 October 2003). This play was also presented at the No Limits festival in Berlin 2005 (http://www.no-limits-festival.de/nolimits2005/intro.html). Ghazi Hussein has written another play for Theatre Workshop, One Hour Before Sunrise (2006), which also focuses on Palestinian experience.