Links about Fugard

We were trying to break a conspiracy of silence that had hit the country

Yes. There came a point in my early years as a writer when the situation in South Africa had become so depressing and desperate that I in all honesty thought that making bombs would be better than writing plays. Fortunately, I never surrendered to that moment of despair.
 

Fugard masters the code - Athol Fugard Issue
Twentieth Century Literature by Gerald Weales, Winter 1993

A long overview.
 

Fugard-ontdekkingstog by Temple Hauptfleisch (Afrikaans), 27 Apr 2004

...staan Fugard nader, 'n veel gemakliker, rustiger mens as die intense en asketiese figuur wat ons oor die jare in foto's en op die verhoë leer ken het. Dalk ook 'n bietjie voller om die lyf soos baie van ons, hoewel hy nog merkwaardig fiks en aktief voorkom.

En toe begin hy praat - of eerder, voorlees uit sy joernaal wat hy tans vir publikasie voorberei. Soos ons uit ander voorbeelde weet, is die joernaal van enige skrywer 'n merkwaardige dokument, wat op die beste van tye aan ons 'n toegang bied tot die unieke prosesse en teenstrydighede wat in die gees van 'n skrywer woed op pad na die volgende werk. In hierdie geval word dit veel meer; dit word 'n belewing van die stryd.

Soos hy lees, práát Fugard met ons, bespreek hy, daar voor ons, met 'n stem vol passie, genot, pyn en trane van deernis of woede, oor enkele dae in sy lewe, daar ánderkant aan die kus van Kalifornië - en sy geestelike lewe hier, by ons, oor ons en ons mense.
 

(link has gone) photo's from a production of The Island

Whenever I see a person in uniform, especially a policeman, it frightens me.

Timebends, Arthur Miller's magisterial and deeply moving autobiography. Essential reading for anyone interested in the work of this great playwright and the story of theatre in the second half of this century

...Benson refuses to pigeonhole Simon's or Fugard's plays simply as protest theatre. As she says, "Barney said it so beautifully, in an interview he gave in Sweden. He said we should be going into people's lives, their souls, their ways of life. And if it brings in aspects of the struggle then that's okay. But it's good if it can go beyond just protesting against the horrors, and inspire people to function constructively."

Fugard said from San Diego in California that "they spent some glorious hours together".

He also said: "Mary Benson was my oldest friend, particularly when I look over my life. We were close friends for 40 years. We stayed constantly in touch, also with my wife, Sheila, and my daughter, Lisa. She was at the very first performance of my first play, The Blood Knot, in Johannesburg."

Fugard disclosed that whenever he wrote a new work he would first send it to Benson for her "criticisms ... A few days ago she got hold of me about my latest play about South Africa, about a returning exile, Sorrows and the Journey. Mary phoned me to say that she had read it and gave it her seal of approval."

When celebrated American playwright August Wilson first saw Athol Fugard’s Sizwe Bansi is Dead way back in 1976 at the Pittsburgh Public Theatre he was blown away. “I thought ‘This is great. I wonder if I could do something like this’,” he says. Two Pulitzer prizes later he still cites Fugard as a major influence.

The playwright Athol Fugard is now taking his manuscripts and notes away from the admirable National English Literary Museum in Grahamstown after receiving an offer from the United States he can't refuse. Stephen Gray has done likewise.

White South Africans should consider themselves one of the luckiest groups of people on the face of the earth," said playwright Athol Fugard. "In spite of our terrible history, we weren't torn apart by the violence disembowelling countries like Yugoslavia.

Robey theatre company is named after Paul Robeson and their mission is "to explore and develop relevant provocative, and innovative new plays written about the Black experience, as well as to reinterpret established works. Robey creates a nourishing environment of understanding and support in which multi-cultural theatre artists are compelled to take risks in the search for artistic fulfilment."

Robey was founded in December 1994 by Danny Glover and Bennet Guillory.

One of the first white playwrights to collaborate with black actors and workers, Fugard writes of the frustrations of life in contemporary South Africa and of overcoming the psychological barriers created by apartheid.

Convinced she was going blind, reclusive artist Helen Martins drank caustic soda and killed herself more than 20 years ago.

Martins was virtually unknown during her lifetime, shunned by many of her South African neighbours in New Bethesda, where she was regarded her as eccentric or insane. But now the surreal legacy she left behind has become a lifeline for this desert town where she was born and died.

Nieu Bethesda (Mecca), with very good photos