Our Country’s Good (Masterplots II: Drama, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Lael Louisiana Timberlake Wertenbaker
- First Published: 1988
- Type of Plot: History
- Time of Work: 1787-1789
- Setting: Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
- Principal Characters: Captain Arthur Phillip, Major Robbie Ross, Captain Jemmy Campbell, Captain David Collins, Reverend Johnson, Second Lieutenant Ralph Clark, Midshipman Harry Brewer, Duckling Smith, The Aborigine, John Arscott, Black Caesar, Robert Sideway, John Wisehammer, Mary Brenham, Dabby Bryant, Liz Morden, Ketch Freeman
- Genres: Drama, History play
- Subjects: Acting or actors, Prisons, Colonies or colonization, Crime or criminals, Exile or expatriates, Human rights, Eighteenth century, Punishment, Ships, Theater, Australia or Australians, Societies, Plays or playwrights
- Locales: Sydney, Australia
The Play
Our Country’s Good takes place in two acts, each with short scenes that are titled. In a production the titles are usually announced or flashed onto a screen. The first scene, “The voyage out,” takes place in the hold of a convict ship bound for Australia in 1787. The stage is in semi-darkness with a group of convicts huddled together. Robert Sideway is being flogged offstage on the deck as Lieutenant Ralph Clark counts the lashes. When Sideway is thrown into the hold and collapses, the other convicts begin to speak longingly of the England from which they...
[The entire page is 2013 words long]
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