Imagine if the future could be foretold. If all the wars, conflicts, and deaths – if all could be predicted, but you could not change a thing about it.
What would you do?
On 20th March I got an opportunity to visit Cambridge and see Cassandra, a play, which was written by an iconic Ukrainian writer and poet Lesia Ukrainka, performed in its new English translation by Nina Murrey. The play was produced and presented by Live Canon and the Ukrainian Institute London, and its Cambridge and Oxford tour is a part of the UK/Ukraine Season of Culture. The production was directed by Helen Eastman and will be touring from the 20th to 22nd of March in Cambridge, and from the 23rd to 25th of March in Oxford.
Cassandra is a story of the Trojan war, retold from the perspective of Cassandra, one of the children of King Priam, Troy’s ruler. After she rejected god Apollo’s advances, he cursed her with the ability to predict the future, yet to never be believed by anyone.
Cassandra could foresee all the deaths, the fighting, the threats, unnecessary bloodshed, attempting to convince others of the danger coming, to only be met with disbelief and criticism. “It is all Cassandra’s fault” is the line that you can hear consistently throughout the play, resonating in the space of the enclosed circled dimension of the church in which it was performed. The words echoing into the ceiling and spreading from person to person, leaving the sensation of Cassandra’s desperate cry for understanding and change.
Cassandra is the truth fighter – a role that not many of us are ready to bear. She faces her twin, Helenus, who chooses to placate the people around him and pretend to prophet things that they want to hear. To soothe the wound without investigating its roots or trying to heal it. To resolve it. To prevent infectious disease.
The poignant, penetrative and sharp words in Ukrainka’s verse and syntax resonate with many as the message that the world needs to finally hear – we cannot hide from the truth. In the words of the Ukrainian Institute London: “One year since Russia escalated its eight-year long war to engulf the entire country, it is high time not only to listen to ‘Ukrainian Cassandras’ but to also lift the curse of disbelief in their knowledge”. We cannot continue ignoring the Cassandras of the world, pretending that things can be soothed and resolved without fundamental change.
If you are keen to learn more about Ukraine and Ukrainian culture or are craving an excellent piece of theatre with an opportunity to visit the two beautiful historic English cities – Cassandra is just the one for you.
