Pat Perrin's Blog, page 7
June 7, 2017
The Cave of Euripides on Salamis Island (poem)
written for the dedication of the William S. E. Coleman Studio Theatre, June 18, 2016 But were you ever really here? Did you sit here brooding upon this cave’s sullen lip gazing over the bay of doves, a shrouded exile from lies and war and treachery, holding your worlds within? Did you come away from […]
May 5, 2017
The Throne and the Mirror: Elizabeth and Shakespeare after Essex’s Rebellion — a short play
Characters: Queen Elizabeth I William Shakespeare The scene is the queen’s privy chamber in the Palace of Whitehall, February 1601. A table is scattered with books and papers; a crown is on the table, and a scepter leans against it. Queen Elizabeth sits at the table reading. Across the table from her is an empty […]
April 3, 2017
From “The Shackles of Liberty” … Four Ideas about God
Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear. Thomas Jefferson wrote this in a famous letter to his nephew, Peter Carr. So how did this unorthodox Christian react when his daughter Patsy decided that she wanted […]
February 12, 2017
Listening to the stones
In September I called this piece Stone Songs. It hung around our house, sounding more like a guttural chant than a song. It was really about patterns, debris, water-polished stones in a stream. Now it’s renamed Streambed and described this way for my entry in the 2017 North Carolina Artists Exhibition sponsored by the Raleigh Fine Arts Society: Streambed expresses […]
December 28, 2016
The Song of the Hole in the Sky
lines written for the inauguration of President Donald J. Trump January 20, 2017 Ask me no questions, I’ll tell you no truths: That’s a motto I’ve tried to live by. But up yonder there’s a hole in the sky; And you want to hear how it got there. I’ll tell you now—but don’t expect The […]
September 29, 2016
… a subtle energy …
Wim and I both write—for a living and for the joy of it. From time to time I go nonverbal, back to my roots in visual art. These works spring from their own stories and communicate their own messages only partly expressible in words. This recently finished fiber piece, Stone Songs, is an appreciation of a natural world full of […]
June 21, 2016
… Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness …
The word happiness shows up a lot in my award-winning new play The Shackles of Liberty. This isn’t surprising, considering that one of my characters wrote some famous words about it. For almost two and a half centuries, “the Pursuit of Happiness” has been a treasured ideal of American life. We’re so used to the […]
June 10, 2016
Sally, Maria, Patsy, and Tom …
Why did I write a play set in Paris more than two hundred years ago? I know, I asked the same question in my previous post. But I don’t think I fully answered it. I’ll give it another try … It’s something of a cliché that Thomas Jefferson was a contradictory man. In his Declaration […]
June 8, 2016
The Shackles of Liberty
Pat and I are excited! My full-length play The Shackles of Liberty has won this year’s Southern Playwrights Competition. The Jacksonville State University Department of Drama will give the play its world premiere as part of its 2016-2017 season. It’s a wonderful honor. The Shackles of Liberty is a fictionalized account of Thomas Jefferson’s last […]
August 22, 2015
THAT Soliloquy — Is It About Suicide?
“To be, or not to be—that is the question …” … but what is the question, really? What is Hamlet actually talking about? I was pretty slow as a teenager, so when I asked a high school English teacher this question, of course he told me, as teachers always do … “Hamlet is contemplating suicide.” […]
