I am writing this in response to several reviews of the play “The Book of Judith”. These reviews were published during the first week of the play’s run in the revival tent at 1001 Queen St. W. One review was on the CBC’s National Friday May 22, created by Sandra Abma. Other’s were published in Eye Magazine, Eye Weekly, National Post and more.
And then there are the members of the audiences who have been commenting and e-mailing in numbers at every performance. And the choir.
I cannot be objective. This play – my play? – has been and continues to be a wonderful, terrifying and funny journey, all at once. None of the reviews, even the ones like the National which took a real stab at doing more than simply describing the basics, have not come anywhere near the actual experience of creating, then living, The Book of Judith.
I am most surprised and moved by the stories that choir members have shared with me. Most members are volunteers who have been labelled with a “disability”. Throughout the performance they are the Greek chorus: speaking my words, directing the audience, supporting Rubenfeld’s character’s transformation. One by one, as they grew into their role, many choir members have told me tales of how this play is supporting their own transformation, deepening a personal sense of power, liberating sexuality, strengthening vision and dream.
This effect among cast members is in many ways an unexpected treasure for me. I have given my life to breaking open the cage that the myth of disabled and normal confines people in. Yet in this play, in this nearly messianic, religious revival, interactive and spoofy over-the-top musical, the cage is utterly evapourated!
Don’t get me wrong – audiences are being deeply moved as well. The journey is far from smooth. People are personally engaged – with each other as well as with the cast. Andrew Penner wrote original music for the play. His tunes are like a spider’s web. With Rubenfeld’s energy, Penner’s melodic seduction and the choir’s invitation there is no escaping the joy, annoyance and struggle of the engagement. Although some have complained, many are returning for a second experience, and several have spoken or written to me, Michael Rubenfeld, Sarah G. Stanley, Alex Bulmer, Andrew Penner and other cast members about how they were deeply connected and changed in the performance.
The Book of Judith is a miracle disguised as a play about miracles.
Judith
Friday, May 29, 2009
Friday, May 22, 2009
The Book of Judith
Well, I am deeply immersed in the play: “The Book of Judith.” I wouldn’t have thought that the play and World Peace through Inclusion were related a mere three weeks ago. Now I understand that they truly are and so I am reporting on the play and my experience of it in this blog. Anyone who might have a chance to come and see the play in Toronto will really, really get something out of it, so don’t miss your chance!
“The Book of Judith” has mainly been created by Michael Rubenfeld and Sarah Stanley. A subtext of the play is about my part in their co-creation, a part which seemed to end about April of 2008. It was at this point that I got sick and tired the advocacy flavour of the piece. I was also beginning to have serious thoughts about taking on World Peace through Inclusion as my main focus at that time, although it was several months before I would meet Gabor and we begin serious consideration about taking off for six months.
Some of you know how deeply I struggle with the concept of advocacy even though I am often thought of as an advocate. The root of the idea is to speak for someone else. It contains within it the ever present idea that people who are considered to be disabled require other people’s help in order to function as human beings. It is not so much that we need advocates, as we need listeners, since even those who have no voice are very good at communicating and even better at contributing. Given that, it is no great task to discover what their dreams are and to create ways for them to contribute even more fully in society. We do not need to advocate; we need to pay attention.
So I was burnt out, disgusted, and unwillingly to spend the time and energy it would take – or at least, so it seemed – to shift Michael and Sarah’s focus. In this play Michael reads the email where I clearly told him and Sarah that I was out of the picture.
Last January, when I had to come back to Toronto so that issues around the funding of my personal assistance could be resolved, I went to a reading of the play which at that time had minimal structure and was being formed as a musical with Alex Bulmar as choir leader and Andrew Penner as composer. It was evident that Michael, and no doubt along with him Sarah, had taken a major shift in focus, and that in fact Michael was prepared to express a vulnerable and moving shift in his understanding of me personally and the life experience of people who get excluded by being labeled.
Those who get to know this play will understand that I was conflicted at that moment. On the one hand it would require me to allow myself to be exposed and in some ways, deified, so that the play could be formed. In other words, every view that other people have of me would become fully expressed in public – odd, inspirational, wrongheaded, bullheaded, artistic, curtly articulate, and more. It was no small struggle to agree to have these images boldly displayed.
At the same time, Michael himself takes a personal beating in terms of his ego and reputation. I realized that he is not putting me through this wringer as some kind of sacrificial lamb to a great cause, but he and Sarah have uncovered a brilliant format to create the context that could blow all the stereotypes to the wind.
I agreed with some reluctance to participate in “The Book of Judith” and justified it to myself as necessary to make up for the fact that I had abandoned Michael and Sarah at a critical stage in their process and that I owed it to them, particularly Michael who had put so much of himself into creating our group in the first place. I came to the rehearsals with that attitude.
Two or three days into the rehearsals I began to realize the genius of the structure of the play. A few more days and I awakened to the brilliance of having it be a musical with a choir made up of volunteer men and women, many of them people with disability labels themselves. They are at times my voice and at times Michael’s voice and very much the voice of people whose voice and social presence is erased by the societal oppression we call disability. At times there are some very humourous moments where the choir affirms the amazing possibilities that lie within the personal experience of being someone whose abilities are considered “wrong”.
And so now I am having a bit of fun with the whole thing. I have also had a wonderful opportunity to meet many of the choir members on a personal level and have some moments of deep reflection on our common journey.
Perhaps the greatest learning for me has been how much I was, and probably still am, caught up in the mirage of disability. This play could never have come to be being if I had not thought that my current singleness was the “fault” of my being quadriplegic. I started and fuelled the entire cascade of errors and events by believing that it is my stillness that places an obstacle between myself and potential lovers, and not just the reality of my being busy, somewhat solitary, and Britishly inhibited! It’s an amazing thing to have a play open your eyes to your own foolishness.
But back to World Peace through Inclusion. “The Book of Judith” is an on-the-ground (or on-the-stage) exposition of the contributions that people can make when they are included. It is also a full exploration of the journey that it takes for people to go from seeing each other as strangers to having collegial and intimate relationships. It’s a full expression of how peace is created when people take on the struggle to work from diversity instead of from sameness. I will never have a better example of what I have been talking about than this play.
We are very much hoping to tour the show. Anybody who has some ideas about this, please let me know.
By the way it has been a long time since I told anybody how to get in touch with us and/or the World Peace through Inclusion Foundation. My email is: avalanche0809@gmail.com and my phone # is: 647-232-9344. Gabor Podor is at gaborpodor@gmail.com.
Videos and information about “The Book of Judith” can be found at: www.bookofjudithplay.blogspot.com. Enjoy!
Judith
“The Book of Judith” has mainly been created by Michael Rubenfeld and Sarah Stanley. A subtext of the play is about my part in their co-creation, a part which seemed to end about April of 2008. It was at this point that I got sick and tired the advocacy flavour of the piece. I was also beginning to have serious thoughts about taking on World Peace through Inclusion as my main focus at that time, although it was several months before I would meet Gabor and we begin serious consideration about taking off for six months.
Some of you know how deeply I struggle with the concept of advocacy even though I am often thought of as an advocate. The root of the idea is to speak for someone else. It contains within it the ever present idea that people who are considered to be disabled require other people’s help in order to function as human beings. It is not so much that we need advocates, as we need listeners, since even those who have no voice are very good at communicating and even better at contributing. Given that, it is no great task to discover what their dreams are and to create ways for them to contribute even more fully in society. We do not need to advocate; we need to pay attention.
So I was burnt out, disgusted, and unwillingly to spend the time and energy it would take – or at least, so it seemed – to shift Michael and Sarah’s focus. In this play Michael reads the email where I clearly told him and Sarah that I was out of the picture.
Last January, when I had to come back to Toronto so that issues around the funding of my personal assistance could be resolved, I went to a reading of the play which at that time had minimal structure and was being formed as a musical with Alex Bulmar as choir leader and Andrew Penner as composer. It was evident that Michael, and no doubt along with him Sarah, had taken a major shift in focus, and that in fact Michael was prepared to express a vulnerable and moving shift in his understanding of me personally and the life experience of people who get excluded by being labeled.
Those who get to know this play will understand that I was conflicted at that moment. On the one hand it would require me to allow myself to be exposed and in some ways, deified, so that the play could be formed. In other words, every view that other people have of me would become fully expressed in public – odd, inspirational, wrongheaded, bullheaded, artistic, curtly articulate, and more. It was no small struggle to agree to have these images boldly displayed.
At the same time, Michael himself takes a personal beating in terms of his ego and reputation. I realized that he is not putting me through this wringer as some kind of sacrificial lamb to a great cause, but he and Sarah have uncovered a brilliant format to create the context that could blow all the stereotypes to the wind.
I agreed with some reluctance to participate in “The Book of Judith” and justified it to myself as necessary to make up for the fact that I had abandoned Michael and Sarah at a critical stage in their process and that I owed it to them, particularly Michael who had put so much of himself into creating our group in the first place. I came to the rehearsals with that attitude.
Two or three days into the rehearsals I began to realize the genius of the structure of the play. A few more days and I awakened to the brilliance of having it be a musical with a choir made up of volunteer men and women, many of them people with disability labels themselves. They are at times my voice and at times Michael’s voice and very much the voice of people whose voice and social presence is erased by the societal oppression we call disability. At times there are some very humourous moments where the choir affirms the amazing possibilities that lie within the personal experience of being someone whose abilities are considered “wrong”.
And so now I am having a bit of fun with the whole thing. I have also had a wonderful opportunity to meet many of the choir members on a personal level and have some moments of deep reflection on our common journey.
Perhaps the greatest learning for me has been how much I was, and probably still am, caught up in the mirage of disability. This play could never have come to be being if I had not thought that my current singleness was the “fault” of my being quadriplegic. I started and fuelled the entire cascade of errors and events by believing that it is my stillness that places an obstacle between myself and potential lovers, and not just the reality of my being busy, somewhat solitary, and Britishly inhibited! It’s an amazing thing to have a play open your eyes to your own foolishness.
But back to World Peace through Inclusion. “The Book of Judith” is an on-the-ground (or on-the-stage) exposition of the contributions that people can make when they are included. It is also a full exploration of the journey that it takes for people to go from seeing each other as strangers to having collegial and intimate relationships. It’s a full expression of how peace is created when people take on the struggle to work from diversity instead of from sameness. I will never have a better example of what I have been talking about than this play.
We are very much hoping to tour the show. Anybody who has some ideas about this, please let me know.
By the way it has been a long time since I told anybody how to get in touch with us and/or the World Peace through Inclusion Foundation. My email is: avalanche0809@gmail.com and my phone # is: 647-232-9344. Gabor Podor is at gaborpodor@gmail.com.
Videos and information about “The Book of Judith” can be found at: www.bookofjudithplay.blogspot.com. Enjoy!
Judith
Friday, May 8, 2009
A New Phase Has Begun
(Written May 6, 2009)
As I am writing this I am waiting and wondering if the extremely intermittent internet service characteristic of Camphill Nottawasaga will come back on. It may be a day or two before I get to post this blog entry. I am sitting at my wall hung desk in the back of Avalanche, looking out at a pair of Camphill residents returning from work in the garden. It is nearly the exact experience from the days before Gabor and I left on the World Peace through Inclusion Tour during the week of Oct. 24, 2008 – a book end in time.
The World Peace through Inclusion Tour is finished. Well over but not entirely as there are bills to pay still. Essentially everyone involved has moved into a different mood and activity. Gabor will leave tomorrow to take up intensive preparation for the summer solstice festival, and to rest from his position as a personal assistant to me for seven weeks. Jason has been off for a week and will come back to work – double full time – tomorrow. I am establishing myself: hired a new staff person to spell off Jason, am completing the arrangements to hire my staff through CILT which will give me much greater flexibility, have made arrangements to live at Camphill Nottawasaga in Avalanche until October, and am preparing to move tomorrow to a campground in Toronto for three weeks to participate in the play “The Book of Judith” at the Workman Theatre until the end of May.
We came across the Canadian border on April 28. This moment culminated a truly intense three weeks of presentations given in and around Faribault, Minneapolis and Duluth, Minnesota. In a way the experience was like my giving the doctoral thesis defence that I have never untaken at a university. After decades of personal and professional research and reflection, and eight months of working with Gabor to discover and develop the model of Syncopated Transition we presented it to over twenty audiences. Our listeners were of very different groups, from city councillors and business leaders to musicians to school children. With one exception – a gathering of group home managers – Syncopated Transition sparked everything from interest to revelation – a true success.
Even at the very end two important realizations emerged. The first was that we knew what we were trying to learn at the very beginning. It was in awkwardly trying to describe the sort of process that with minimal resistance breaks down segregation
– what we are now calling a syncopated transition – that I first recognized what a valuable colleague Gabor Podor is. How archetypical is that – to only recognize that one has always known one’s home after a long journey away from its!
Secondly I realized how much in the presentations I was focusing on inclusion instead of peace. I had not freed myself from my identity as a professional advocate. In my last week in Minnesota I broke free of this and we focused our presentations on the potential of inclusion to create peaceful community.
A different sort of work lies ahead. We have decided to create the World Peace through Inclusion Foundation. Our next step is to invite a diverse working team to the Summer Inclusion Institute (www.inclusion.com/toronto2009.pdf) where participants will design the future of WPIF, expand our Syncopated Transition Model and map out its implementation. Out of this gathering will emerge an organization that will increase the body of research on Inclusion and Peace, create sustainable projects demonstrating Inclusion as a tool for peace and community making, and invent and pollinate a practical language of Inclusion to talk about community and diversity.
We are now inviting people and raising money for this July event.
I will also spend the bulk of the summer at Camphill Nottawasaga writing a book about this experience of nine months of preparation, travel and research. This blog will serve as notes in designing the themes of my next book.
We will continue this blog, but from this point on it is a body of work about the creation of the World Peace through Inclusion Foundation and the results of the work undertaken in this framework.
Judith
As I am writing this I am waiting and wondering if the extremely intermittent internet service characteristic of Camphill Nottawasaga will come back on. It may be a day or two before I get to post this blog entry. I am sitting at my wall hung desk in the back of Avalanche, looking out at a pair of Camphill residents returning from work in the garden. It is nearly the exact experience from the days before Gabor and I left on the World Peace through Inclusion Tour during the week of Oct. 24, 2008 – a book end in time.
The World Peace through Inclusion Tour is finished. Well over but not entirely as there are bills to pay still. Essentially everyone involved has moved into a different mood and activity. Gabor will leave tomorrow to take up intensive preparation for the summer solstice festival, and to rest from his position as a personal assistant to me for seven weeks. Jason has been off for a week and will come back to work – double full time – tomorrow. I am establishing myself: hired a new staff person to spell off Jason, am completing the arrangements to hire my staff through CILT which will give me much greater flexibility, have made arrangements to live at Camphill Nottawasaga in Avalanche until October, and am preparing to move tomorrow to a campground in Toronto for three weeks to participate in the play “The Book of Judith” at the Workman Theatre until the end of May.
We came across the Canadian border on April 28. This moment culminated a truly intense three weeks of presentations given in and around Faribault, Minneapolis and Duluth, Minnesota. In a way the experience was like my giving the doctoral thesis defence that I have never untaken at a university. After decades of personal and professional research and reflection, and eight months of working with Gabor to discover and develop the model of Syncopated Transition we presented it to over twenty audiences. Our listeners were of very different groups, from city councillors and business leaders to musicians to school children. With one exception – a gathering of group home managers – Syncopated Transition sparked everything from interest to revelation – a true success.
Even at the very end two important realizations emerged. The first was that we knew what we were trying to learn at the very beginning. It was in awkwardly trying to describe the sort of process that with minimal resistance breaks down segregation
– what we are now calling a syncopated transition – that I first recognized what a valuable colleague Gabor Podor is. How archetypical is that – to only recognize that one has always known one’s home after a long journey away from its!
Secondly I realized how much in the presentations I was focusing on inclusion instead of peace. I had not freed myself from my identity as a professional advocate. In my last week in Minnesota I broke free of this and we focused our presentations on the potential of inclusion to create peaceful community.
A different sort of work lies ahead. We have decided to create the World Peace through Inclusion Foundation. Our next step is to invite a diverse working team to the Summer Inclusion Institute (www.inclusion.com/toronto2009.pdf) where participants will design the future of WPIF, expand our Syncopated Transition Model and map out its implementation. Out of this gathering will emerge an organization that will increase the body of research on Inclusion and Peace, create sustainable projects demonstrating Inclusion as a tool for peace and community making, and invent and pollinate a practical language of Inclusion to talk about community and diversity.
We are now inviting people and raising money for this July event.
I will also spend the bulk of the summer at Camphill Nottawasaga writing a book about this experience of nine months of preparation, travel and research. This blog will serve as notes in designing the themes of my next book.
We will continue this blog, but from this point on it is a body of work about the creation of the World Peace through Inclusion Foundation and the results of the work undertaken in this framework.
Judith
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