Theatre
Blodeuwedd
Saunders Lewis · 1948
Synopsis
A magician makes a woman from the flowers of the oak, the broom and the meadowsweet, to give her to a man whom a curse prevents from marrying a mortal. Her name is Blodeuwedd and she has no parents, no past and no reason to obey. She meets a hunter crossing the estate. She explains to him that no one has ever asked her opinion, and that she wants to choose, just once.
Context
The play takes up the fourth branch of the medieval tales of Y Mabinogi, but from the point of view of the woman made of flowers: the old tale condemns her, the play gives her a voice and asks what one could expect of a creature of whom nothing had been asked. Written in pieces between 1923 and 1925, it was revised and given in full in 1948, twelve years after its author's imprisonment. Since then, the successive stagings of this story have served historians in measuring the changes in Welsh theatre.
Who it is for
A long one-act play in Welsh verse, never translated into French. It is better to know the medieval tale it comes from, which the text does not explain.
Prizes and reception
Together with another play by the same author, it is considered the canonical example of Welsh-language theatre, and remains the usual gateway to the medieval tales.