"How does one craft sturdy happiness out of something as important, as complicated, as unrepeatable and as easily damaged as a life?"
Extract from The Ghost's Child
The Ghost's Child
Steamworks Arts Productions
The Ghost's Child is a novel by Sonya Hartnett to be adapted for performance by writer/director Sally Richardson.
The Ghost's Child is an enchanting, fable-like tale of haunting resonance. Framing the story is an encounter between 75-year-old Matilda, who lives alone with her scruffy dog, and a solemn-faced boy she finds in her sitting room. Who this visitor is, and why he's arrived, become apparent as Matilda, or Maddy as she was known, tells him about her life.
The parents of the young Maddy resemble archetypes from folk or fairytale: a materialistic mother who "seemed to teeter forever on the crumbly threshold of fury", and a father preoccupied with money. Posing the question "What is the world's most beautiful thing?" the father reveals a kindlier side as he and Maddy travel the world, sating themselves with marvels. Maddy finds no definitive answer, that is until she sees a young man holding a pelican on a beach, and believes him to be her soul-mate.
Matilda's guest squirms as she relates falling in love, and setting up home with Feather, as she calls her unworldly new partner. But the price Feather pays for Maddy's happiness is to live conventionally, and joy soon fades from their union. The conception of "a nymph, a little elf, a tiny fay" promises a rekindling of love, but the child dies unborn. Left alone, grief-stricken but resourceful, Maddy embarks in a small boat on a long, eventful voyage in search of the remote island where Feather has found sanctuary. She has a question to ask, that only he can answer. Although she understands that "Bit by bit some of your sorrow changes into joy. And that's how you go on living", Maddy must learn to acknowledge that this separation is final.
"Imagine a poem, only instead of being a page long this poem is a 176-page novel. And like a poem, almost everything in the book is written in metaphor. For instance, there's the love of her life that is described as a bird and small creatures that help and talk to Maddy as if they are acting as her conscience. Very few authors can pull off this kind of writing style and still keep the reader's attention. Harnett does this beautifully and as a reader you really feel for Maddy and want to know what happens next while simultaneously wondering what happened in her past to bring her to this point. While not strictly a mystery, The Ghost's Child does possess a slightly mysterious feel to it in that you don't really know what is going to happen." Cindy Hanikmann.
Writer/ Director Sally Richardson Designer Richard Jeziorny Composer Melanie Robertson Dramaturg Chris Bendal courtesy of Deckchair Theatre.
The Ghost's Child is an enchanting, fable-like tale of haunting resonance. Framing the story is an encounter between 75-year-old Matilda, who lives alone with her scruffy dog, and a solemn-faced boy she finds in her sitting room. Who this visitor is, and why he's arrived, become apparent as Matilda, or Maddy as she was known, tells him about her life.
The parents of the young Maddy resemble archetypes from folk or fairytale: a materialistic mother who "seemed to teeter forever on the crumbly threshold of fury", and a father preoccupied with money. Posing the question "What is the world's most beautiful thing?" the father reveals a kindlier side as he and Maddy travel the world, sating themselves with marvels. Maddy finds no definitive answer, that is until she sees a young man holding a pelican on a beach, and believes him to be her soul-mate.
Matilda's guest squirms as she relates falling in love, and setting up home with Feather, as she calls her unworldly new partner. But the price Feather pays for Maddy's happiness is to live conventionally, and joy soon fades from their union. The conception of "a nymph, a little elf, a tiny fay" promises a rekindling of love, but the child dies unborn. Left alone, grief-stricken but resourceful, Maddy embarks in a small boat on a long, eventful voyage in search of the remote island where Feather has found sanctuary. She has a question to ask, that only he can answer. Although she understands that "Bit by bit some of your sorrow changes into joy. And that's how you go on living", Maddy must learn to acknowledge that this separation is final.
"Imagine a poem, only instead of being a page long this poem is a 176-page novel. And like a poem, almost everything in the book is written in metaphor. For instance, there's the love of her life that is described as a bird and small creatures that help and talk to Maddy as if they are acting as her conscience. Very few authors can pull off this kind of writing style and still keep the reader's attention. Harnett does this beautifully and as a reader you really feel for Maddy and want to know what happens next while simultaneously wondering what happened in her past to bring her to this point. While not strictly a mystery, The Ghost's Child does possess a slightly mysterious feel to it in that you don't really know what is going to happen." Cindy Hanikmann.
Writer/ Director Sally Richardson Designer Richard Jeziorny Composer Melanie Robertson Dramaturg Chris Bendal courtesy of Deckchair Theatre.