The audience: Friend, foe, or innocent bystander? Or, questions about the intersection of art and community

By Leila Buck, member of the 2008 Emerging Writers Group

I think a lot about the audience when I write. In fact, I’m thinking about you right now. Well maybe not you specifically, but my ideas of who you might be. What made you start reading this? Are you a creator of theater? A part of its audience? Both? Do you like me – I mean, my blog post – so far? Will you keep reading? Why or why not? Do you prefer wit or sincerity? (I can do both, I swear…) How much should I base what I say about audiences on what I think may or may not interest you?

I’m also wondering: Will you judge me if I use “they” instead of “it” when referring to the audience? Do I need to prove that I understand it’s a singular noun but really it refers to a group of people and I don’t like talking about people as “it”? And come to think of it, doesn’t that say a lot about our dilemma with audiences (did you notice how I snuck in the plural there to avoid the whole it/they thing?): When should we treat our audience as an “it” -- an object or recipient of our work, and when a “them” -- a group of living, breathing beings whose active participation in that work makes it possible?

Which brings me to the real question on my mind right now: How can I stay true to my own voice(s) in creating my work, and actively committed to engaging others in that process?

I am thinking about this question in particular these days as I have recently been offered an opportunity for my first real commission - to develop my latest play, HKEELEE. The commission supports the development of projects at the intersection of critical citizenship, creativity, and civic dialogue --work that asks a question to which the public’s response directly affects the creation of the work itself.

Asked to articulate how I would like to develop this piece in dialogue with communities, I find myself grappling with questions that I feel – or hope – resonate beyond my own personal choices:

How can we engage not just the audience that comes to our shows, but the wider communities that rarely do?
Is it possible to remain committed to real community engagement without compromising our integrity or needs as professional artists – whatever they may be?
And what do our responses to these questions say about what we do and who we are? You know – details.

Let me be transparent here: My beliefs about the intersection of art and community are shaped by many years of training and work as a teaching artist based in the philosophies of Augusto Boal. Boal saw and practiced theater as a “rehearsal for revolution”. (Yes, I’m a lefty. Go figure.) I won’t try to describe his many processes here, as they are complex, and many of you, I’m sure, know them well. The elements of his work I think most relevant to this discussion are:

a) the use of theater as a space for exploring different responses to injustices or problems in our daily lives.
b) the role of audience members as “spectACTors” in that process–partners with professional actors, whose active participation changes the course of the performance itself, with
c) the ultimate goal of sparking dialogue between audience and performers about how to move that change beyond the theatrical space and into their lives.

My own practice of these ideas has evolved over years of work with students and teachers of all ages in the NY public schools, followed by some burnout, some break time, and more years of teaching as a guest artist in a range of communities from here to Australia and back again. The one thing that has emerged as constant for me in my teaching is the balance between owning that I have something unique to offer those gathered, and opening to what they have to share with me. And it is that same balance I find myself seeking in my creative work and process.

I began my writing career, as many actors do, by creating and touring a solo performance about my own life. I developed my commitment to the audience as partner through years of performing that work in community settings – universities, conferences, cultural centers -- even one high school auditorium back in the day, complete with bells going off mid-performance as bags were fetched from lockers. Some of my best moments on stage and off occurred in shows and talkbacks from the International School of Beijing to Dickinson, South Dakota’s second annual diversity conference.

My favorite aspect of these experiences was the opportunity to engage directly with the audience both during the show and afterwards. One blessing of performing one’s own work is the chance to sense how your words are landing in the moment, and if you choose to, change them on the spot (much to the chagrin of those operating one’s sound cues) to speak more directly to the energy of the people in the room. After all, in solo performance your only partner out there IS your audience. And when it clicks, that connection is unlike any other. The vulnerability and honesty of sharing a deeply personal experience with a roomful of strangers can be profoundly beautiful, powerful, even - dare I say - spiritual.

So why did a part of you cringe when you read “solo performance”? (Admit it, it’s ok. I understand.) Because too often writer/performers get swept up in the catharsis of telling a story that means something to us, and forget to ask ourselves the most basic acting question in deciding which parts of that story to tell and how: Why am I saying this? What do I want from you, the person – or in this case, people – I’m saying it to? And what do I hope YOU will gain in the process?

To stay engaged with the importance of these questions, as I began developing my second full-length solo piece, I would make sure there was a discussion with the audience after every reading or performance, since I wanted to know how the play was affecting people and have a chance to dialogue with them.

The story was a very personal one - about my experience with my husband in Lebanon during the 2006 Israeli-Hezbollah war – a subject about which, not surprisingly, many people have strong opinions. Most of the audience members who stayed to talk afterwards would share what moved them or their own connections to my experience. But some were hurt, shocked, even angered, by what they saw. In spite of my best efforts to include a range of voices and viewpoints-- in particular the genuine warmth, humor and caring of my Jewish in-laws or Israeli friends -- some audience members felt my story to be one-sided, biased, even irresponsible, and asked, suggested, or demanded that I alter it to include perspectives beyond my own and that of my Lebanese family and friends. Other audience members, and many friends and colleagues, even those who didn’t necessarily share my political or personal opinions, would tell me to ignore those demands and stick to my own voice: “Just tell your story.”

I soon realized that what I wanted, and needed, to do lay somewhere in between – and that the struggle to find that balance was both the conflict, and the heart, of my play.

So for the better part of three years, I experimented with ways of writing that journey into the piece. I tried representing everything from voices in my head to angry audience members literally interrupting what I had to say. Many other voices helped me along the way -- an incredible team of actors, dramaturgs, EWG and other writers, countless generous artists and audiences far and wide, all with the constant guidance and insight of my incredible director Shana Gold. After more drafts than I think any of us can count, we finally settled on a combination that felt like it worked. But even with three other actors now representing multiple viewpoints on my story, I soon realized it was impossible to write something that represented even a fraction of the many perspectives on the Arab-Israeli conflict– or for that matter, how they had shifted according to what happened in the world that day.

So since my audiences and collaborators had already helped shape so much of the play, I decided to let them do the rest of the work for me: I turned the second act into a staged talkback. Partially scripted based on past audience responses, it has built-in moments for audience members to ask questions, share responses, and challenge the actors in role, the play itself, and the political and personal issues it raised. The result is part storytelling, part theater, part town hall, and part structured improvisation, and it continues to evolve each time we perform. It’s messy, and terrifying, and doesn’t always fully work. But I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Because it reminds me, every time, of what I love most about what we do – the thing that makes it so unique, and powerful, and bold: The fact that performer and audience are in the same space, at the same time, together, sharing all the discomfort and danger, beauty and possibility of that interaction.

In the end, isn’t it this very relationship with the audience, this sharing of space together, that makes theater what it is? I mean, if a tree falls and no one unwraps a candy… Yet at times I have felt myself, and other theater artists, take a kind of pride or refuge in the inaccessibility of our art form -- The idea that it is a loftier art because it is not a medium for the masses like our more mainstream competitors, film and TV. Or we feel torn between catering too much to our audiences, producing more successful or lucrative but sometimes less fulfilling work -- or too little, producing work we love that is not seen as widely, or paid as well.

Recently I’ve been excited to see more and more work experimenting with audiences in new, direct, provocative ways. I’m also inspired by artists and companies who successfully balance their work in professional theatre with an ongoing engagement with students and communities. But there remains a division between works created in community, outside the mainstream theatrical establishment, and those created and performed in more traditional or “professional” settings. And in all the work produced outside of community spaces (that I know of), including my own, the audience’s role is primarily in response to a story or experience, rather than actively shaping it.

So it seems then that the larger issue is not whether it is possible to truly engage our audiences in a fulfilling creative process that produces successful work. It’s how to convince both audiences and artists that there is something to be gained in doing so.

And from there, new(ish) questions arise:

Is it possible to approach communities of strangers not as audiences but “spectACTors” -- integral parts of the creative process – and create work that will be seen beyond those communities? By doing so might we expand those audiences themselves – forging new alliances with communities that do not otherwise feel connected to what we do?

Could making our audiences more active participants in our creative process help to broaden and deepen not only our connections to communities, but the relevance and immediacy of our entire art form?

I believe the answer to all these questions is yes. The challenge for me is HOW. That one, I’m still working on.

So in the spirit of collaboration and connection (and because I just need some help thinking about this), I’d love to hear your questions, ideas, and challenges in response to what I’ve shared. How do YOU navigate or respond to the questions raised here? What are your ideas on how we might rise to these challenges? Do you even feel that we should?

Whatever your response, thanks for reading and engaging. I hope this little post will be just one small part of an ongoing conversation between us and beyond.



Leila Buck has thought far too much about what to say to you here. Her play, IN THE CROSSING will be produced by the Culture Project in Fall 2012. Her latest piece, HKEELEE, an exploration of language, memory, and what it means to be(come) American is produced by MAPP International Productions and commissioned by The America Project, to be developed developed in community dialogues across the U.S. and internationally with support from the Ford Foundation and Nathan Cummings Foundation. Please spare her choosing what else to say by visiting http://www.mappinternational.org/artists/view/496/ (for the brave in URLs) or www.leilabuck.com.

This post is part of a weekly series from the Emerging Writers Group community of playwrights. The EWG is two-year playwriting fellowship at The Public Theater seeking to target playwrights at the earliest stages of their careers. In so doing, The Public hopes to create an artistic home for a diverse and exceptionally talented group of up-and-coming playwrights.

PUBLIC FORUM ONLINE: America’s Wars, a Year Later

On December 14, 2010, The Public Forum considered “Afghanistan After America, America After Afghanistan.” Hosted by Alec Baldwin, the evening featured a tribute to Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, who had died the night before, by David Rohde, the journalist whose release from Serbian captivity he had negotiated, and who was later kidnapped by the Taliban; a roundtable of development experts on the future of Afghan society; and a conversation among young veterans of the Afghan war about the future of the U.S. military.

The Forum recently caught up with two of these veterans to talk about the last year in America’s wars: the death of Osama Bin Laden, the announcement of the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, and their own efforts to readjust to civilian life.

Matthew Hoh served as a Marine Corps captain in Iraq, then joined the State Department in Afghanistan, resigning his post to protest U.S. policy there. He is now a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy. Matt Pottinger left a journalism career after 9/11 to join the Marines, serving a combat tour in Iraq and two in Afghanistan, and receiving the Bronze Star. He is now the CEO of the advisory firm China Six LLC. Their conversation was moderated by Jeremy McCarter, the director of The Public Forum. An edited transcript follows.



JEREMY McCARTER: Seven months ago, Navy SEALs killed Osama Bin Laden. Matt Pottinger, you were supposed to have breakfast at Windows on the World [at the top of the World Trade Center] on the morning of 9/11. How did you react to the news that he was killed?

MATT POTTINGER: I got a text that night saying that he was dead, so I immediately walked down to the World Trade Center site, because I’d heard that people were congregating there. It was surreal: I ended up bumping into David Rohde.

JM: No way.

MP: It was bizarre. He’s there reporting, he’s taking notes, and I remember saying to him, “You know, out of this huge crowd of people here” -- of young people especially, there were a lot of college kids there who were little kids when 9/11 happened – “you and I are probably two of the people whose lives were most affected by 9/11”. It sent both of our lives in completely different trajectories from the direction we would’ve gone in.

I was glad Bin Laden was dead. His would-be followers have to ask the question, “What did Bin Laden achieve?” He killed thousands and thousands of people, most of them Muslims, but what strategic goals did he achieve? He didn’t turn over any governments. People who demonstrated in Tahrir Square and other Arab Spring states accomplished more through relatively peaceful protests than through his idea of terrorism.

So it was surreal to be there, but the jubilation I saw around us, I didn’t share in that. I had a real sense of how much was sacrificed over the previous ten years in trying to stop and kill him.

JM: The way that we’ve conducted that war has shifted lately. You famously quit the Foreign Service, Matt Hoh, because you objected to our strategy in Afghanistan. Have we gotten any smarter about what we’re doing there in the last year?

MATTHEW HOH: Well, I think collectively we have, because we’re recognizing that it makes more sense to go after terrorist organizations as they exist. Understanding them as groups that share an ideology, but that operate as individuals and small cells – I think we’ve seen that shift collectively. I think everyone points to the Bin Laden raid as the right way to do it.

But in terms of the big picture, Afghanistan is worse off now than it was a year ago -- in terms of the fracturing of the country, in terms of how far we are from a political process to end the war. Our relationship with Pakistan has been continuously deteriorating over the past year. We had that terrible incident a week or two ago where we killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. So now we’ve gotten to the point where the Pakistani troops on the border have missiles that can shoot down an aircraft, our aircraft, that are patrolling over an unmarked border, and miscommunications happen, etc., etc. So now we’re in this situation where, my God, the Pakistanis may shoot down one of our aircraft. And what level will that take us to next in our relationship with the Pakistanis?

MP: The way that I’ve been talking about this with friends is that the best-case scenario now is what we termed the Soviet defeat in the war. That was the Soviet Union pulling out of Afghanistan but leaving in place a government that was able to survive for a few years.

JM: Let’s talk about the other war: Iraq. U.S. military involvement is supposed to end in a couple of weeks. You both saw combat there – what does it mean to you that we’re leaving?

MP: It’s amazing to me that we’re going to be completely gone. What was the grand strategy for going into Iraq? As it was explained to us, it was to transform the Middle East. Now that transformation has happened, but I don’t think it had anything to do with our going into Iraq.

MH: This isn’t a period that we should just walk quietly away from and try to forget, as much as I would like to forget it, and I know Matt would, and lots of other guys would, and lots of families. I mean, this is a war that, when you stretch out the consequences to Americans, it’s pretty astounding, you know? 4,500 dead, over 30,000 physically wounded, a rate of PTSD [post-traumatic stress disorder] somewhere in the range of 200,000, and that’ll only get worse with time. And that doesn’t even begin to touch on the suffering that the Iraqi people sustained.

This week you had that terrible suicide bombing in Afghanistan, and The New York Times ran a very vivid, very stunning photo of a child standing amidst the carnage. It shocked a lot of people in the U.S. And I was shocked by it too, even having seen that stuff in person. But the fact that it was shocking ten years into this war shows the level of shielding that Americans have had from the conflict. The fact that most Americans don’t know anybody who has served, the fact that less than 1% of the country has served in the military during this time, that the war just doesn’t really come through on our television sets that much -- that’s another thing we should look at: how involved and how connected we as a public, as a community, as a nation are to these wars that are being waged overseas in our names.

MP: My proposal for that would be to get more veterans in the government. I’d like to see way, way more vets of these wars in Congress, in the White House as advisors, just trickling up through the executive branch and the legislature. I’m disturbed by the disconnect between the country’s military and the people that it is protecting.

JM: All right, so which – or both – of you guys is going to run?

MP: I would support Matt!

MH: Same thing– I will go door-to-door for Matt Pottinger any day.

JM: So if you feel like talking about it – okay if you don’t – but you were both in some hairy situations over there, as we discussed last year. How are you guys feeling now, just personally, about what you went through?

MH: I’m certainly a different person. I was overseas 7 out of 10 years, and when I was “home”, it didn’t really count. By the time I came back from Afghanistan the third time, I knew what it was like to come back. A friend invited me to go to a U2 concert, but I’d only been home for about 10 days, and I knew I couldn’t handle being in a building with that many people in it. A couple months later I was fine.

You know, I struggle with PTSD. It comes back every now and again. The best way I can describe what PTSD is like is it’s this wave that comes over you that puts you in a place of despair and depression that you’ve never dealt with before, and that’s very difficult to work through. But what I find is that those waves come far less frequently. It happened for me, over the last year, maybe once or twice. But I also know it’s going to continue to happen for the rest of my life.

I don’t like opening up what’s happening inside of me. That’s not a normal thing for me, or for most guys who joined the Marine Corps, but if it helps some guy or gal who’s reading this. . . . And I do think talking about it does help me. It still sucks, there are still things that hurt. Mine is all guilt-based.

MP: The PTSD that people feel, more often than not, is related to feelings of guilt.

JM: Survivor guilt?

MP: That’s definitely part of it. And other forms of guilt, about things that would’ve seemed inconsequential when the stakes weren’t really high. But whatever emotions you feel when your brain is bathed in adrenalin and stress hormones get hard-wired into you, and it becomes much harder to deal with what should, in hindsight, seem like minor incidents. Those cling and haunt you for a long time as well, the feeling that you failed at something.

MH: That’s exactly it. In my case, it’s a feeling of guilt based on my perception that I failed. Men are dead now because of that, in one specific instance, and every once in a while that comes up. You’re a guy, you’re a captain in the Marines, you don’t think you’d ever let people down, and then you find out that you do. And whether or not that was actually the case, that’s how I perceive it. I look at it objectively, and know I did everything that I could, but emotionally, that’s what I’m tied to.

It’s a whole gamut of different reasons why men and women suffer from it. But regardless, it’s nothing to be ashamed of, it’s a wound from going to war that warriors have experienced forever. You can get past it, you can make yourself whole, and you can continue the mission -- whether it’s still in the military or outside of it.



THE PUBLIC FORUM is a high-profile series of lectures, debates, and conversations, now in its second season. Curated by Jeremy McCarter, the Forum features leading voices in politics, media, and the arts. Alec Baldwin, Anne Hathaway, Cynthia Nixon, Sam Waterston, and NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman have hosted its programs, which have featured the insights of Kurt Andersen, Carl Bernstein, David Brooks, Arianna Huffington, Bill Irwin, Tony Kushner, Suzan-Lori Parks, Francine Prose, Stephen Sondheim, and young veterans of the war in Afghanistan -- plus performances by Anne Hathaway and Michael Cerveris, among others.

The Artistic Identity: The Intersection of Art, Spirituality and Social Justice

by Bridget Kelso, member of the 2009 Emerging Writers Group

Who am I? Why am I here? Artists use their gifts to explore these questions and more, but the issue of identity can still be complex. I have struggled with my various identities, like someone dressing for different events: Today I’ll wear the mother outfit; tonight I’ll wear the writer’s hat; tomorrow I’ll be an actor... What about the teacher, friend, political activist? How can I fulfill all of these roles? Can I be more than one at a time?

I realize now that my art, spirituality and desire for social justice are not mutually exclusive. My interests/identities are interdependent, fluid, working together, lending and borrowing as necessary.

My responsibility as an artist is reflected in my social justice outreach efforts, which are in turn an extension of my spiritual practice. Let me explain the “artist’s responsibility” thing. Many years ago, I went to a workshop/lecture featuring Ossie Davis Jr. He talked about many things, but what stood out was this: Art, and in this case he meant acting, should be connected to social justice. His life was an example of this. His work as an actor was intimately tied to his efforts within the Civil Right Movement. He instilled in us the idea that if you’re going to call yourself an artist, then you have a responsibility to advance the cause of social justice.

Whether it’s the Occupy Movements going on across the country or voter registration drives – find an outlet that suits your gifts. It’s your responsibility as an artist. I believe it grounds you, and makes your art that much more creative and fulfilling.

I am no longer surprised at how easily the different parts of my life blend together. My interest in slave narratives finds its way into my discussions with my son on the train, and with my students in the classroom. My passion for social justice (i.e. access to basic services for everyone, providing arts education for young people, helping those who have the least), also dovetails with my spiritual practice. My church is very involved in social justice issues, so I often find myself engaged in conversations about political issues and events, and strategizing, on a Sunday. My poetry has been used as an opening prayer for various church services, so naturally one of my new plays, Leah’par, tells the story of Lucifer’s fall from grace from the perspective of a newly arrived slave on a plantation. The picture of who I am, and what I have to offer – in effect, what I am here for – would be incomplete if even one of these pieces was diminished, lost, or ignored.

The playwright Suzan Lori-Parks said writing is “holding the hand of God.” I hold onto that hand as well, and keep my eyes on the world around me. It is at that crossroads – that intersection of art, social justice and spirituality – that I am most fulfilled. Join me there and let’s change the world.

Bridget Kelso has been active in the Living Wage Campaign at her church, First Corinthian Baptist Church, and is a teaching artist for Judith Sloan’s EarSay Project at the International High School in Queens, which helps Immigrant Youth by transforming trauma into art. She is currently working on a solo performance piece entitled SLIDE SHOW: THE EVOLUTION OF RADICAL FEMINIST THEOLOGY.

This post is part of a weekly series from the Emerging Writers Group community of playwrights. The EWG is two-year playwriting fellowship at The Public Theater seeking to target playwrights at the earliest stages of their careers. In so doing, The Public hopes to create an artistic home for a diverse and exceptionally talented group of up-and-coming playwrights.

A Big Wet Kiss

By Deen, member of the 2009 Emerging Writers Group

In a recent email, I told a friend of mine off-handedly that I had writers block. (She's the lead guitarist and songwriter for her band, the Scamps.) In reply, she described her own experience of being abandoned by the muse:

“It can be the worst. Nothing makes me question myself more than that. To me, it feels like less of a block and more of a spiraling pit of self-loathing – the harder it gets to write, the more I doubt anything I write is any good...”

I thought that was a pretty spot-on description. I once heard Kate Winslet in an interview say that at the beginning of every new project she felt a terrible anxiety that finally everyone was going to realize she had no idea what she was doing. I can relate. It is sheer faith that reminds me that I've done this before, that leads me to consider the possibility that I am not actually an abject failure and impostor.

I have begun to wonder of late if I don't in fact hate writing now that I have become a Writer. There was a time when writing was my solace and my redemption, and more than that, a blessing: Through the transformation of my own struggles, others could also find refuge. Now that I am a Writer, it is the struggle to write that brings me misery. I must produce constantly (or at least be miserably dedicated in the attempt) in order for me to deserve the luxury of not working a soul-sucking job, deserve the title of Writer, deserve even the very air I breathe. So where does a Writer turn for comfort when the act of writing is no longer a balm for the soul? If you're me, you bake a lot of bread. (If I was a professional baker, I'm certain I would have “bakers block” and be a prolific writer. ... though I do make a lot of dough.)

So here I am, a Writer (with a capital W). I'm sitting at my desk with my laptop to my left and my pad to my right, an assortment of pens in front of me on top of my journal, and I'm thinking to myself: What do I want to write about? Well, I definitely want it to be meaningful. And political. And important. And also good. Something new, something to broaden my horizons a bit... There's the inequity of wealth in this country and the Occupy Wall Street movement – I've marched a few times, I could write about that. Or there's the horror of being entangled in family court (I worked a day job there for a year, I have an insider's perspective). Or there's Africa and child soldiers and genocidal wars. The poor treatment of the lowest castes in India or the Hindu-Muslim riots (I am from India after all). I've always wanted to write about whales...

It's about at this point when I get up, move to the kitchen, and start tossing flour in a bowl to feed my pet yeast.

This may be controversial to say, but I am not convinced that plays change the world. I am not convinced that seeing a play makes anyone change the way they act towards other people. I cannot think of one single play I've seen that's changed my behavior about anything. I have seen plays that have made me think about slave labor in China, but I have not stopped buying the products that employ that labor. I have seen stories about immigrants, people with AIDS, and 30-something people with relationships issues – and I still have sympathy for those with AIDS, still believe in immigrant rights, and still think 30-somethings with white privilege who moan about life being hard are spoiled.

I don't think I have ever seen a play that has made me change the way I live. What I do think plays do is open our hearts to possibility, and this is no small thing. Because we are exposed to different people, human fallible people who struggle against overwhelming odds, we are moved, we are opened just enough... so that when a comparable life experience happens to us, we are in a place to receive it and to be changed by it. But make no mistake, it's the life experience that changes us, that changes the course of our life and of this world.

Writing is something I do, but I sometimes mistake it for who I am, for the most important part of me. When I'm sitting at my desk, I often think my greatest contribution to this world is the play that I have yet to write, the one that will change everything, the play that will make me famous and be taught in colleges around the country. But this is a mistake.

I once wrote a story about an architect who ended up homeless and living on the streets. He was loved by all who came into contact with him and he even changed the life of a young boy, giving him hope when there was none. Yet the homeless architect died thinking he was a failure.
I wrote the story, but I find myself learning that lesson over and over and over again. The best thing I have to offer this world is me, the plays are secondary. The play I write is a projection of how I see the world, a picture of what is possible – but it's me, this person writing this now, I am the virus that infects this world for good or ill, to spread rage or beauty. Do I want to spread self-loathing and despair (because I can't get past my writers block), or do I want to spread something else?

So this is my humble advice to other writers with writers block: Be a good writer, but be a better human being. What we write about is the human condition, but how tragic if we aren't fully living it. How tragic if all we can see is the script we are not writing and nothing else. Our characters aren't loved and remembered and embraced because they're Nobel Prize winners – they're loved because they are flawed and because they struggle, and they do so with others. That's life – the messiness of human relationships, the difficulty of figuring out how to be in this world when everyone is focused on what to do.

Every time I get writers block, I must die again to remember who I am. Over and over and over. It's like I have a very thick skull or something. How to let go of something I am grasping not with my hands, but with my very being – this sense that in order to be worthwhile, I must be successful? How ironic is life that in order to have something, we must let go of it.

If you will indulge me, I'll end in the manner of an old Sufi poet I'm fond of:

Deen says, go ahead, challenge God to a duel like I did. He'll knock you on your ass for sure, but He'll pick you up with a big, wet kiss.



Deen hopes you had a splendid Thanksgiving and ate lots of pie. His solo play, DRAW THE CIRCLE, will be produced at InterAct Theatre (Philadelphia) in early April 2012. For more info, please visit: deentheplaywright.weebly.com.

This post is part of a weekly series from the Emerging Writers Group community of playwrights. The EWG is two-year playwriting fellowship at The Public Theater seeking to target playwrights at the earliest stages of their careers. In so doing, The Public hopes to create an artistic home for a diverse and exceptionally talented group of up-and-coming playwrights.