Insight

Last week I left off at the point where I was still in secondary school and decided I didn’t enjoy acting but wanted to be a theatre producer. I then produced several short plays, which went down well. At school one of the masters was trained to give career advice. I remember one of my …

We have, thus far, explored different reasons for writing; such as writing to persuade, to inform, to register a complaint, and to narrate a story. But writing could achieve so much more. Today we focus on activist writing; writing dedicated to achieving a specific cause or to the attainment of a certain goal and realisation …

Last week I embarked on a multi-part essay titled “Treading the Boards”, an insider’s perspective on making theatre. This week I’m interrupting the flow of that piece, because there is recent political news I urgently wished to share with my readers. The headline quoted as the title of this piece beggars belief, but it seems …

Two weeks ago I embarked on a multi-part essay in which I talk about my experiences of doing theatre — as an actor and as a producer. I broke off last week because I urgently wished to discuss a current news item. So, not exactly on cue, I now pick up the thread of “Treading.” …

In today’s piece our focus is on joining or combining sentences. So in a way, our focus today is on a very important aspect of English language. Let’s get down to business! Let’s begin with two sentences. There is some creativity and finesse in handling language involved. Here are the two sentences;

Has it ever occurred to you that when you read, you are engaging in creative and participatory learning? I have in mind active learning, not passive learning. Isn’t it true that when you actively engage with a text, when you immerse yourself in it, you figuratively, as it were, also contribute to the creation of …

Over the next four or five weeks I’m going to be writing about my experience of doing theatre, as an actor and as a producer. The point of this is not to indulge in autobiography, but to try to give some idea of what doing theatre is like especially when things go wrong.

In her insightful and shocking article on the Sudan humanitarian crisis, Azhar Sholgami asks, “Why do certain lives hold more value in the world of humanitarianism than others?” Why is it that “the black man’s needs, regardless of how critical they may be in comparison to other emergencies, are always put last?”