The series of literary, artistic and cultural performances in the Guyana Prize for Literature Literary Festival ends tonight with the staging of Sauda by Guyanese playwright Mosa Telford, performed by the National Drama Company (NDC) and directed by Ayanna Waddell. Curtains open at 8.00 pm at the National Cultural Centre.
This is the final act on a day that also features the Guyana Prize Literary Exhibition mounted by the University of Guyana Library. The display of books has been on show throughout the three days of the festival which started on Friday. Other major features on this afternoon include the Edgar Mittelholzer Memorial Distinguished Lecture, by Prof Evelyn O’Callaghan, and a public reading by four renowned writers in the Caribbean, the Commonwealth and the UK. Such presentations have characterised the festival which, among other things, celebrates Guyanese literature.
The literary festival was first held in 2014 at the same time as the Guyana Prize Awards Ceremony with the promise of enhancing and expanding the prize and Guyanese literature along with it. But this was interrupted when the prize and festival were discontinued. Their revival is now celebrated as both are expanded with novelties and additions.
The festival incorporates the Awards Ceremony and Reception, the Martin Carter and the Edgar Mittelholzer Lectures, workshops and public readings, including the opportunity for the public to hear selections of the prize-winning works read by their authors. This year, the new additions include the National Poetry Slam Finals, readings and activities for youths, story-telling performances and the production of Sauda, for which Telford won the Guyana Prize in 2012. The drama is now getting a rare opportunity to be performed before a local audience. This is a deliberate effort by the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport to introduce alternative brands of theatre onto the local stage and to promote the plays that have won the Guyana Prize. These are rarely ever produced. The ministry intends that these plays will lift the quality of what is seen on stage locally.
For that reason, Minister of Culture Youth and Sport Charles Ramson has taken the initiative to have the Department of Culture fund the production of four plays that are Guyana Prize winners each year. They will be chosen and produced by local dramatists, and different groups can express their interest in producing one of the plays. The government will fund the production costs and the group which stages it will keep the gate receipts from ticket sales.
The first play in this initiative is Sauda, which was recommended after consultation with the local dramatists, directors and producers. Also out of this consultation, the NDC was asked to produce it. This is then, the second time that the NDC will stage this play. Director Ayanna Waddell was able to reconstruct quite a bit from the previous production including two members of the original cast. But most of what will be seen on stage tonight is new. There are cast changes and new ideas in the design of the play, the form and the set.
In the spirit of cooperation and inclusiveness, the NDC invited practitioners from the wider community to join the cast and team. Prize-winning producer/director and actress Sheron Cadogan-Taylor will play the role of Dolores, while producer and prize-winning actress Simone Dowding is an assistant director and production team member. Dowding had the role of Dolores in the first staging of the play.
The history of the drama is that it was first entered in the National Drama Festival (NDF) directed by Tivia Collins. Then it was selected by the NDC to be performed at Carifesta XII in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti in 2015. That was also supported by the Guyana Prize which took the playwright Telford to Haiti in order to promote the literature prize and one of its dramatic products. One of the amazing factors was the way the performance overcame the language barrier and was well received by the locals in Port-Au-Prince. That production was directed by Waddell with Tashandra Inniss in the lead role as Sauda. Sonia Yarde, Keon Heywood. Nicola Moonsammy and Toneisha Robertson were the other cast members.
For this renewal of the play Waddell, who has won prizes in the NDF, and is an executive member of the NDC, has re-engaged Inniss, current president of NDC and a past winner of Best Actress awards, in the role of Sauda. Also retained is Yarde, multiple prize winner, including many Best Actress accolades. Mark Luke-Edwards plays Esmond and LeTisha Da Silva takes the part of Rhonda. Both Luke-Edwards and Da Silva are past winners of Best Actor and Actress prizes and bring that talent to this performance.
Dancer/choreographer, NDC executive member and prize winner Esther Hamer is stage manager and co-designer of the set alongside Waddell. Dancer Jonathan Hamer is choreographer for this play and also plays the role of one of “the Shadows”. Joining Hamer as Shadows are new NDC members and recent National Drama School (NSTAD) graduates Deandra Daniels and Allia George. Keon Heywood completes the four Shadows and is jointly responsible for creating the music for the play. The other musician is Kimberley Samuels who, like Heywood, has been a prize winner for acting in the NDF. Kimberly Fernandes, who has also won an NDF prize, manages the props while Akbar Singh is a stage assistant. To round off this illustrious list, one of Guyana’s greatest actresses Margaret Lawrence, who is Registrar of the NSTAD and director of Merundoi, gives production assistance.
The design and style of performance draw on different forms, including the post-modern and the traditional. All the music is performed live with no use of recordings, and is mostly drawn from the traditional. The main source is the folk form kwe-kwe whose songs and concepts are borrowed by the director to inform this production. Additionally, the play benefits from modernist movement with the choreography also based on the dance form of the kwe-kwe.
There are also innovations in the building and use of the set. This production can demonstrate some of what the NDC tries to do to shape theatre and stage artistry. There is a role assumed by this company to try the frontiers of stagecraft as examples of what can be possible in local theatre. All of these celebrate and advance Guyanese literature in different ways. Drama as part of the literature is thus showcased, along with other types. The play, Sauda, makes comments on colourism in Guyanese society and attitudes to blackness. It covers self-contempt as well as aspirations. Very strong is the theme of identity and self-discovery against the tragedy of fractured family relations.
The focus on youths will assist in setting off training sessions, like the workshops to hopefully improve the quality of Guyanese writing. Additionally, there is expected to be an increased interest in literature and literary activities among young aspirants. The story-telling features Guyanese folk tales including myths which can be kept alive with performances like these.
The Poetry Slam offers the growing popular art of spoken word and performance poetry. It brings this literary form into the mainstream, recognising it as part of the national culture and literature.
A comprehensive coverage of the literature is evident in the book exhibition. The UG Library has been the custodian of the entries in the Guyana Prize and is able to exhibit winners as well as the shortlisted works. But the exhibits have been extended to include a sweep of Guyanese literature and writers. It can therefore inform the audience of the development of Guyanese writing over 30 years.
This festival, however, has an international flavour. One of the places to find this is in the public readings by international writers and prize winners. There are four authors from different nationalities, all of whom have won international prizes. It is a rare opportunity to hear the poetry and prose of Nigerian Funso Aiyejina, Trinidadian Celeste Mohammed, Stephanos Stephanides, a Greek Cypriot and David Dabydeen, a Guyanese British.
Rounding off today’s programme are readings by local Guyanese writers, a masterclass in fiction writing, and a masterclass in the writing of non-fiction.
