The Fever Chart
Collection Description
Subtitled “Three Short Visions of the Middle East,” this collection includes three thematically related short plays, A STATE OF INNOCENCE, THE RETREATING WORLD, and BETWEEN THIS BREATH AND YOU, collectively entitled THE FEVER CHART. Vision One, A STATE OF INNOCENCE, is set in Rafah, Palestine, and features a Palestinian woman, an Israeli architect, and an Israeli soldier. Vision Two, THE RETREATING WORLD, concerns an Iraqi bird keeper from Baghdad and his address before the International Pigeon Convention. Vision Three, BETWEEN THIS BREATH AND YOU, takes place after hours in the waiting room of a clinic in West Jerusalem, where a Palestinian father confronts a nurse’s aide, a young Israeli woman, about the meaning of the loss of his son and the impact it had on her life. These multifaceted works explore the urgency and complexity of the Middle East’s political landscape through the voices and bodies of the people who inhabit it.
Plays in This Collection
- Reviews
- About the Author(s)
- About the Book
Press Quotes
“Real political theater as I understand it: challenging, disorienting, and thought provoking.” —Nehad Selaiha, Al-Ahram Weekly
“Wallace refuses to judge her characters, choosing instead to explore the possibility of humanity in the most inhumane conditions. THE FEVER CHART is the best theatrical production of the year.” —Joseph Fahim, Daily News Egypt
“In Naomi Wallace’s THE RETREATING WORLD, the ghosts are so recent that you feel you might lean forward in your seat and touch their fingertips … THE RETREATING WORLD is the kind of short, stark and simple play that reminds us why we need theatre at a time like this, what the playwright can achieve that the journalist cannot.” —Lyn Gardner, The Guardian
“Extraordinarily powerful, it is a privilege to attend such a theatrically excellent event.” —The Independent
“Absolutely compelling theatre.” —The Evening Standard
“The theatrical event of my week. It brings home the meaning of war, makes it personal, refuses to let it slip into unreality … a taut, beautifully written elegy and it reaches out to us now like a prophecy.” —The Observer
Author(s)
Naomi WallaceNaomi Wallace is a playwright from Kentucky. Her plays — which have been produced in the United Kingdom, Europe, the United States, and the Middle East — include IN THE HEART OF AMERICA, SLAUGHTER CITY, ONE FLEA SPARE, THE TRESTLE AT POPE LICK CREEK, THINGS OF DRY HOURS, THE FEVER CHART: THREE VISION OF THE MIDDLE EAST, AND I AND SILENCE, THE HARD WEATHER BOATING PARTY, THE LIQUID PLAIN. Her stage adaptation of William Wharton's novel Birdy was produced on the West End in London. In 2009, ONE FLEA SPARE was incorporated in the permanent repertoire of the French National Theater, the Comédie- Francaise. Only two American playwrights have been added to La Comédie's repertoire in 300 years. Films: Lawn Dogs, The War Boys, Flying Blind (co-written with Bruce McLeod). Awards: Susan Smith Blackburn Prize (twice), Joseph Kesselring Prize, Fellowship of Southern Writers Drama Award, Obie Award, and the 2012 Horton Foote Award for most promising new American play. She is also a recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Arts development grant. In 2013, Wallace received the inaugural Windham Campbell prize for drama and in 2015, an Arts and Letters Award in Literature.