Fugard, Athol (Vol. 14) | Edith Oliver
EDITH OLIVER
If ever there was a born dramatist, it is the South African Athol Fugard…. ["Nongogo"], one of his earliest, was written and performed in South Africa in the late fifties…. Mr. Fugard appears to have found his subject and, to a large extent, his talent immediately. Himself a white man, he has written play after play about the various races—singly and in combination—imprisoned in his racist country, but in doing so he has never stooped to propaganda or case history….
The small touches in the play and the excitement they generate—the whipping of the bright cloths on and off the table, for example—more than make up for its occasional awkwardness. If the plot seems melodramatic and arbitrary, and its hopeless ending forced, it is because the playwright has not yet learned to conceal his hand, but he has learned—or is on his way to learning—everything else of importance. The characters, their feelings, and the lines they speak (when...
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