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Susan’s Bookshelves: The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah

Published in 2022, this book became a runaway, international best seller and I can see why. It tells a devastatingly gritty story rooted in real events and the characterisation is wonderful. Very loosely it visits the same ground as The Grapes of Wrath, one of the most powerful novels of the entire 20th century but, unlike John Stenbeck’s masterpiece, this one ends on a note of (tearful) hope.

Elsa is the daughter of a prosperous family in a small town in 1920s Texas but, partly because of a childhood illness she is cruelly marginalised. When she sneaks out for a liaison with a glamorous young American Italian and the inevitable happens her parents reject her completely. Rafe’s farming family take her in and slowly they become the family she has never had – stronger than ever when Rafe leaves and she is abandoned with two young children.

The real action, however, kicks off in 1934 when Texas is hit by, what turned out to be, several years of drought, dust storms and devastation on top of the disastrous economic effects of the 1929 Wall Street Crash. In the end, in desperation, Elsa takes her children away from the “Dust Bowl” to California in search of a better life. But, of course, things get ever worse. The downwards spiral is relentless.

The novel is very good indeed at evoking the smells, sounds and sensations of life in those places at that time. I could feel the gritty dust between my toes, hear the howling winds destroying farm buildings and taste the lovely food Elsa and her Italian mother-in-law cook together before things get too bad. And as for the experience of a shower or bath after months without, I was in the water with them.  I also learned a lot of geography.

Hannah’s novel is partly about injustice. In California greedy farm owners are exploiting migrant workers to pick their cotton. The pay rate keeps going down. The workers – if they’re fortunate enough to be housed on site – are effectively slaves because they have little cash and are obliged to buy over-priced food on credit from the owner’s shop. All this is well documented in history.

So is the movement which rebelled against the cruelty of the system. The authorities regarded the “Reds” who were trying to get the workers to strike, as pernicious and there was a lot  of violence. Hannah’s character Jack, who epitomises all, this is beautifully done: sincere, charismatic, decent.  And he becomes the first person ever to recognise Elsa’s true worth. When you’ve been conditioned from infancy to regard yourself as unattractive and useless, self esteem is a very fragile thing.

Immigration is still very topical in 2026. People leave their homes because life, for whatever reason, has become untenable. So, in their thousands, they risk everything to travel to somewhere they believe to be better.  In many part so the world they are then met with hostility, prejudice and exploitative practices. I thought a lot about things which are going on now while I was reading The Four Winds,

A major theme in this fine novel is the relationship between mothers and daughters. Elsa’s birth mother disregarded and then disowned her. Her mother-in-law Rose becomes the mother she has never had. And Elsa’s daughter Lareda, pubescent at the point they leave for California, is central to her life. She’s a troubled, angry young woman, given to screaming in frustration at her “failed” mother but Elsa loves her unconditionally and, eventually,  mutual understanding and respect develops.

It doesn’t end as I expected (hoped?) but you reach the final page, knowing that, thank goodness, there’s some positivity for the future.

At another level this fine novel is a real page turner. I gobbled its 460 pages in less than three days. I shall now explore the author’s other novels.

Next week on Susan’s Bookshelves: Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

Edward II

Christopher Marlowe

Directed by Alex Pearson

Alex Pearson Productions with Glass Splinters

Jack Studio Theatre

 

Star rating 4

 

It’s quite unusual to see a classic Elizabethan play in a pub theatre, especially when it isn’t Shakespeare. And done as well as this, it’s a  treat. It’s also an original take on Marlowe’s play because it’s an all-female cast of six with the text pared down to 90 minutes run without interval so the tension never flags. Every word is clear with the meaning skilfully rammed home and the story telling as clear as it could possibly be,

Famously, it’s a play about a power struggle. The titular Edward (Natalie Harper) wants his beloved Gaveston (Elinor Machen-Fortune) at his side. His barons think otherwise. It’s a tragedy so it doesn’t, of course, end happily for anyone.

Harper delights as Edward gradually losing his authority and blindly in love with Gaveston but cruelly dismissive of his wife Queen Isabella (Alison Young – good) referred to as a “French strumpet” at one point. The villain of the piece, really is slippery Mortimer (Srabani San) who wants the power for himself. San excels in this role. She does glittering cunning, exasperation and ruthlessness often disguised as reasonableness with terrific, chilling conviction. And like everyone else in the cast her active listening is a pleasure to watch.

There is a great deal of doubling in this show and it works well with lots of different accents. Machen-Fortune’s Gaveston is charismatic. You can see why Edward is so drawn to him. She is also good as the young Prince Edward (real tears at the end) and as the crusty Bishop of Coventry. Victorias Howell is strong as very mannish men such as the calculatedly political Lancaster, the loyal Spencer and several rough soldier types. And Emma Louise-Price demonstrates seamless versatility as she switches from Warwick, the King’s brother, jealous and objecting, to low life characters such as Baldock.

Eve Oakley’s set makes pleasing use of the Jack Studio’s rather limiting space by creating an upstage alcove with a chaise longue and net curtains which eventually come down. Personally I could do without the dry ice because it makes me cough but I suppose it adds to the atmosphere.

There are many fine dramatic moments in this production. It will be a while before I forget the murder of either Gaveston or Edward. Director Alex Pearson evidently agrees with the Greeks that you get the best effects but doing these things off stage and allowing audience imagination to do the work.

This is definitely one to catch if you can. It runs until 18 April.

 

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

William Shakespeare, edited by Robin Belfield

Directed by Robin Belfield and Rachel Bagshaw

Co-produced by Unicorn Theatre and RSC

Unicorn Theatre

Runs until 10 May

 

Star rating: 4

 

Definitely edited, rather than “reimagined” Robin Belfield’s  90-minute take on The Dream with a cast of eight runs entirely on Shakespeare’s text apart from a few pronoun changes. Moreover it includes some beautifully spoken verse – especially by Chris Jared as Theseus/Oberon and Josephine-Fransilja Brookman as Puck. And the story telling is as clear as I’ve ever seen it. As an introduction for young audiences it ticks all the boxes with panache

Lily Arnold’s geometric set has more than a whiff of Peter Brooke’s groundbreaking 1970 white box production for the RSC – for anyone old enough to remember it.  Here we’re in a large white space with sliding transparent vertical boxes, tyres suspended from ropes and high level quasi walk-on shelves accessed by ladders. It means, for example, that Oberon and Puck can look down on the action. And Titania’s bower appears in the centre of the back wall on the same high level. Sometimes we just see heads through windows. It’s all rather magical with bird song and summery sounds (Holly Khan) – as promised by voice at the start requesting that mobile phones be switched off.

There is stunningly imaginative work from Will Monks too. His video and captions designs project every word spoken on stage on to the back wall but fonts change in style and flavour and it moves about. It’s a long way from conventional, functional captioning, becomes part of the action and feels like a conversation in itself.  Projection tells us where we are too: Athens, Another part of Athens or A Wood near Athens. And in the interests of impeccable clarity each new character is briefly framed in a doorway with a caption above him or her announcing who they are. And when it’s the mechanicals (who double with the lovers) they carry and use the tools of their trades so we’re in no doubt. It’s all charm-packed fun.

Emmy Stonelake is outstanding as a gloriously Welsh Bottom being as pushy and exuberant as required but tempering it with a bit of self doubt.. She’s also good value as the grumpy, bossy Egeus and there’s a bit of improvised stage business with her stuck-on moustache which is very funny.

It’s a good idea to open a  child-friendly production like this with Puck rather than with Theseus being stilted with Hippolyta (Amelia Donkor – good) and plotting daughter-suppression with Egeus. Brookman comes in from the back of the auditorium and speaks Puck’s first speech which works well. So does the use of the semicircular aisle between the stalls and the front block of seats. It makes the production feel immersive especially when Theseus and Hippolyta are watching Pyramus and Thisbe.

In a pleasing production, featuring eight strong actors, highlights include an especially frantic, nicely choreographed fight between the four outraged lovers before Oberon utters the pivotal words which trigger the move back to reality. The bergomask after Pyramus and Thisbe is entertaining too with, Theseus and Hippolyta joining in and the four rustic characters congering off cheerfully at the end.

There were many children (it’s billed for 7+) in the audience I saw it with.  Most were engaged and there was a lot of spontaneous laughter. Ergo this is a production which more than achieves what it sets out to do.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Book by David Greig, based on novel by Roald Dahl

Music by Marc Shiman

Directed by Pippa Duffy

Cambridge Operatic Society

Cambridge Corn Exchange

 

Star rating: 4

 

It’s a fluid story with a seemingly unlimited shelf life like the best chocolate. There have been adaptations of all sorts since Roald Dahl’s novel published in 1964. This one is a cheerfully updated version of the one I saw based on the Warner Brothers 2005 film  at Drury Lane in 2013 with Douglas Hodge as the mysterious Willy Wonka and a year later with Alex Jennings in the same role. It’s timeless in the tradition of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker and, yes, they do have something in common.  Both have second acts staged in a land of confectionery.

Cambridge Operatic society runs with this skilfully in the vast space of the corn exchange – flat seating in the stalls does not make for great sightlines, and this is the first time in decades I’ve seen an actual cloth curtain swished across by hand.  Nonetheless it’s a flamboyant production with all the special effects (including the glass elevator) and glitzy costumes you’d expect and only one or two tiny lighting glitches. It was almost sold out on opening night and the audience, including many children on Easter holiday, was gratifyingly and justifiably exuberant.

Luke Thomas is outstanding as Willy Wonka, the eccentric and charismatic chocolate factory owner. And it’s a huge role. Thomas has a perfectly intonated tenor voice, a magically expressive face and top-notch acting skills. He would grace any stage anywhere although this is a community show so he has a completely different day job. Also splendid in role is Tia Lake as Charlie Bucket’s impoverished, hard working, always kind,widowed mother. She too sings like a seasoned pro and lights up the stage whenever she’s on it.

Of course, at base this is Roald Dahl so all the unpleasant characters come to a sticky (literally) end and all the likeable ones are richly rewarded. And that’s partly what makes it satisfying. It is, though, a streak of narrative genius to devote much of the first act to a series of scenes introducing the four children, who have won golden tickets to visit the factory – all horrible in their different ways and flanked by a parent. It allows different musical styles and plenty of fun. Then in the second act they are eliminated one by one until only Charlie remains. It’s a neat, symmetrical device which never fails.

The children in this show do a fine job. On opening night it was Team Candy which meant Arthur O’Brien as a heartrending Charlie with a nicely modulated boy’s singing voice. Hugo Mitton offers a very convincing performance of gluttonous August Gloop for ever stuffing his chops. As Veruca Salt. Hope Stoneley Gradwell, really runs with the spoilt ballet-loving brat and Charlie Blackmore is strong as the rude, obnoxious, dismissive Mike Teavee.

Best of all, though, is Aeva-Jessica Mensah who is is a stage natural.  As the entitled Violet Beauregarde she creates a fine rapport with her father (DeJay – good, and I loved the gold teeth!) and sings with maturity and technical accomplishment of someone twice her age.

Famously the production features Charlie’s four grandparents who have plenty to say but, apart from Grandpa Joe (Leslie Wheeler – good), they never leave their bed. It’s good fun, witty and the stage crew get them on and off slickly

The ensemble, both adult and junior – many rapid costume changes  – works hard and supports everyone on stage. The Oompa Loompas always go down well and director Pippa Duffy makes good use of a stage left balcony over the auditorium. The choreogapny (Katy Graham Clare) is colourful and imaginative.

And behind all this is twelve-piece live band, led by Nicholas Sheehan on keys. They are out of sight somewhere off the stage left balcony but they make a magnificent sound and Sheehan supports every singer so that the sound is cohesive.

It runs until Saturday 04 March. Well worth catching

Published in 2024, this heart-warming novel was recommended by a friend whose reading tastes are nearly as eclectic as mine. Nick Bradley’s story of cross-generational relationships is set in Onomichi, a small town in the Prefecture of Heroshima. And it comes as a novel within a novel. The framing story gives us Flo Dunthorpe, a young American in Tokyo. Her Japanese is fluent and she is a professional translator with one book under her belt. In need of a new project she starts to translate Sound of Water by Hibiki into English and is enthralled by it. But she doesn’t have the (anonymous) author’s permission or her publisher’s agreement. Flo’s translation constitutes the backbone of Bradley’s novel with seasonal dives back to Flo and her progress or lack of it along with her anxieties. In some hands it might be clumsy. Here it flows as smoothly as the Sumida River.

Kyo has failed the exams he needs for entry to medical school. So he’s sent. aged 19, by his busy, arguably neglectful, doctor mother to stay with his paternal grandmother. Ayako livwa nearly 500 miles to the south west in Onomichi. The train journey is interesting because he opts for the slow route rather than the Bullet Train – lots of local detail including Fujiyama and an overnight stop in Osaka.   He must now attend what Brits usually call a crammer so that he can resit his exams. Kyo’s father, a war photographer died by suicide when Kyo was a baby. Their shared loss ought to be something they can bond over but Ayako – strong, irascible, forthright, hurting, determined to be strict and very keen on traditional Japanese courtesy and respect –  will not discuss her lost son. The novel explores the ebb and flow of that dynamic as, very gradually, an understanding begins to develop between grandmother and grandson.

Because it’s a small town everyone knows everyone else, and Ayako, who owns a coffee shop, is central to the community. There are lovely cameos of, for example, of the railway station manager and a man who owns a CD shop. Everyone, including the girl Kyo meets on the train journey from Tokyo, is pleasant, welcoming and supportive although, initially he misses the bright lights of the city and feels pretty resentful.

Kyo is an exceptionally talented artist.  He sketches all the time, creates cartoons and his real, deep-seated ambition is to be a  professional manga artist. His absentee mother, however, has never let him think of anything but medical school. So there’s conflict – except that the Japanese mindset does not support young people rebelling against the adults who are responsible for them. And this novel is, in many ways, a celebration of Japanese culture, from the food, drinks, kimonos and language to, of course, what Heroshima stands for. The section when Kyo and Ayako visit the city is very moving.

Also central to this story are the street cats Ayako feeds and her favourite, the one eyed Coltraine (sot of) moves in with her, strictly on his own terms. At the end of the novel back in the framing device, we meet the nice old cat who inspired the creation of Coltraine.

And as if that weren’t enough there are a couple of gay relationships  gently woven into the mix. Flo’s American/Japanese girlfriend has returned to New York for work and they drift apart because Flo wanted to stay in Japan  although she has many conflicted feelings. The other relationship is between men and comes peacefully at the very end of the novel when Flo finally visits Onomichi.

I found it an engaging, thoughtful read and I learned a lot about Japan.

Next week on Susan’s Bookshelves: The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah

In the Print

Robert Kahn and Tom Salinsky

Directed by Josh Roche

King’s Head Theatre

 

Star rating: 3.5

It’s another tight, entertaining, political play from the creators of last year’s Gang of Three. And for many audience members the events of the controversial 1980s move of Robert Murdoch’s News International from the Spanish practices of Fleet Street to the efficiency of Wapping are within living memory.  Astonishing as it might seem to younger people, this was an era in which trade unions wielded enormous power and their leaders were household names on a par with cabinet ministers. The Wapping dispute, which of course Murdoch won, was the last great battle.

Brenda Dean (Claudia Jolly) led SOGAT (Society of Graphical and Allied Trades), the first ever woman leader of a trade union. Dean was formidable and her confrontations with Murdoch (Alan Cox) lie at the heart of this play, along with her dealings with other trade union leaders amongst whom there is much self-interest, rivalry and back stabbing. Jolly makes Dean, attractive and personable as she speaks direct to audience, tackles the men who oppose her, deals with her own doubts, fights for justice and jobs and eventually has to compromise. We believe in her integrity. It’s a warmly charismatic, convincing performance.

Cox’s Murdoch, complete with gentle Australian accent, is snake-like in his reasonableness. “I just want to print newspapers” he says with repetitive disingenuity. He and Jolly work pleasingly together and director Josh Roche ensures that everyone makes good use of the square space with seating on three sides. The production also does imaginative things with the two, angled aisles through the audience which gives the piece a sense of inclusive intimacy – because it’s entirely based on conversations. We are never inside a print room.

Four other actors play everyone else in this complex story. Basic costumes – coats and so on – hang on hooks on the back wall to support rapid role change. Alasdair Harvey’s slimy Andrew Neil gets a laugh every time he emerges because, of course, Mr Neil is still very much with us. Joan Harrison excels as dispassionate lawyer Georgia Landers, along with several other contrasting characters. I admired Jonathan Jaynes’s versatility as Bill Sargent and other roles. And Russell Bentley’s gor-blimey Kelvin Mackenzie making ruthless tabloid decisions is hilarious – when he’s not being Murdoch’s put-upon, loyal but ultimately dispensable side-kick.

It’s an interesting, if rather wordy, 90 minute play which ultimately allows you to see every point of view. Of course, the job losses and the effect on families were devastating. On the other hand you can’t run a profitable industry on ancient machinery (the old print presses) in an unsuitable environment (Fleet Street) in which too many people are paid big money for obsolete roles. And, owing perhaps to digital development, all nine national newspapers which dominated the 1980s arguments. have survived, albeit with much reduced circulation. The play neatly sets out the tensions and leaves the audience to choose a side.

 

 

The Protecting Veil

Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra

Conductor: Joanna MacGregor

Violin: Ruth Rogers

Cello: Guy Johnston

Brighton Dome, 29 March 2026

 

Born of profound religious conviction, John Taverner’s The Protecting Veil (1989), which gives this concert its title, is a mysterious, haunting, moving work whatever your point of view. It is, in a sense, a cello concerto in eight movements, telling the story of the Virgin Mary’s journey from birth to death. The cello represents her voice. Taverner regarded it as an ikon in sound.

I first interviewed Guy Johnston, with his brother Magnus (now concert master at Royal Opera House), for The Times  when he was 16. It was  before he won BBC Young Musician of the Year and the day after an appalling disaster had hit his family. I have followed his sparkling career ever since and it’s always good to see him, now 44, in action.

Guy opened and ended the piece with those strange high register notes which he made sing out ethereally. He played the lament with brooding reverence, coaxing mahogany tone from the 1692 Stradivari cello he plays, He is, as ever, an unshowy performer. The passion – and there was plenty of that – is invoked by fingers and note quality rather than by flamboyance. His quietest possible harmonic at the end came with silvery sadness and he and MacGregor on the podium,  managed to hold the silence after the final note for the best part of a minute.

Otherwise, this concert was a showcase for the considerable talents of BPO’s strings. It opened with the always popular Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis by Ralph Vaughan-Williams.  MacGregor drew a pleasingly rich sound, especially from the cellos and there was plenty of warmth in the string quartet section with particularly lovely work from Caroline Harris on viola. The piece requires a “second orchestra” to accommodate the complexities of its scoring and it was a good idea to stand these nine players  round the back of the main body of the orchestra. The balance worked  well.

Max Richter’s responses/homages to Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons are always worth hearing. This concert gave us two movements of his The Four Seasons Recomposed. His Spring and Winter were played, more or less attaca, after Vivaldi’s originals. The versatile Ruth Rogers, who usually leads BPO, popped out to don a bright green frock for this part of the concert. She played the famous violin solos and MacGregor conducted from keyboard set to harpsiechord.  while Nicky Sweeney ably led the orchestra. The palpable rapport between MacGregor and Rogers was, as usual in BPO concerts, a powerful driving force.  These mini concerti were slick, imaginative, thoughtful and fun.  And full marks to harpist Elin Samuel, whose input was required for the Richter sections.

Translations

Brian Friel

Director: Allan Hart

Tower Theatre, Stoke Newington

Star rating: 3.5

Translations (1980) is probably Brian Friel’s best known play partly because it has long been a curriculum favourite which means that many people have studied it at A Level. Its fame is also due to its universal, timeless message which it speaks at so many levels. Language and culture lie at the heart of identity and any attempt to dent them is profoundly, dangerously disruptive. Think of the Taliban, the Russian war with Ukraine or even “woke” vocabulary manipulation in the UK.

Translations takes us to Ireland in the 1830s when the colonising British are constructing an ordnance survey map, Anglicising (“standardising”) place names and setting up National Schools where attendance will be compulsory and everything will be taught in English. Friel is clearly linking the annexing of his country by the British with later “Troubles” which were rife when the play was written. The setting is a “hedge school” run by an elderly man and his son, at which adults can learn Latin, Greek, mathematics and more.

This production delivers the message as movingly as any professional take on Translations I’ve seen in the past – staged on Max Batty’s all encompassing set with a homely room complete with manger and stairs at the back. Grassy steps at stage left suggest the outer entrance. It’s an imaginative use of the Tower Theatre’s triangular playing space. The incidental Irish folk music (Colin Guthrie) is suitably atmospheric too.

The cast of ten are generally good with an outstanding performance from Oscar Gill as Owen. He is the worldly son who has come home from England to his father and brother. Pally with the army, he has a foot in either camp, acts as a translator and Gill gives him real depth. There is also impressive work from Varvara Barmpouni as Sarah, an elective mute, gradually learning to speak again. Her role is predominantly active listening and she makes it work powerfully. I liked Allan Maddrell’s work as the gentle, kind, troubled Manus too.

I was less convinced by Robert Pennant Jones as the elderly Hugh. Everyone else in the cast speaks with an Irish accent (some better than others) which is why the voices of the two British officers (Charlie Patterson and Peter Molloy – both strong) come as such an intrusive shock.  But Pennant Jones sounds like a rather mannered, slow-of-speech Etonian and it grates. This is a play about language. Friel’s skilled script allows us to believe that most of the cast are speaking Gaelic most of the time although the play is written in English. Hugh, although very well educated and erudite, needs to be as Irish as everyone else. Pennant Jones also makes him seem very hesitant, doddery almost, and it is stretch much too far to think that the British would even consider this man to run a National School.

Overall, though, this is a pretty pleasing, thought-provoking take on a play which has acquired near classic status in the 46 years since it premiered.