Eclipse

by Haresh Sharma (Playwright)

Eclipse takes an intimate glimpse into the historical partition of India and Pakistan through the eyes of three generations of men, as they embark upon journeys and grapple with their dreams and responsibilities. A young Singaporean man carries his father’s ashes and makes a trip to the latter’s birthplace in Hyderabad, Pakistan. In doing so, he retraces the original journey made by millions of people—including his parents and grandparents—in 1947, during the India-Pakistan partition.

This publication also includes a foreword by the playwright and Alvin Tan, Founder and Artistic Director of The Necessary Stage, as well a selection of photographs from the performance. It also includes an introduction written by Jo Ronan, the original director of the production.

63 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2014

About the author

Haresh is Resident Playwright of The Necessary Stage and co-Artistic Director of the annual M1 Singapore Fringe Festival. To date, he has written more than 100 plays. His play, Off Centre, was selected by the Ministry of Education as a Literature text for N and O Levels, and republished by The Necessary Stage in 2006. In 2008, Ethos Books published Interlogue: Studies in Singapore Literature, Vol. 6, written by Prof David Birch and edited by A/P Kirpal Singh, which presented an extensive investigation of Haresh's work over the past 20 years. A collection of Haresh’s plays have been translated into Mandarin and published by Global Publishing with the title '哈里斯·沙玛剧作选'.

Haresh was awarded Best Original Script for Fundamentally Happy, Good People and Gemuk Girls during the 2007, 2008 and 2009 Life! Theatre Awards respectively. In 2010, the abovementioned plays have also been published by The Necessary Stage in the collection entitled Trilogy. Most recently in 2011, 2 collections of short plays by Haresh entitled Shorts 1 and Shorts 2 have been published as well. Haresh was also the first non-American to be awarded the prestigious Goldberg Master Playwright by New York University's Tisch School of the Arts in 2011.

Reviews

[Jericho Eames]

This is the first time that I'm actually reading a play, but I have to say that I could feel the characters more and it was a pretty quick and emotional read that talks about loss through the generations. I liked it a lot.