Heaven Opens Its gate.... Late

By Falah Shaker

It is often said that dramatists of the Arab world are generally speaking more politically oriented than their European counterparts, and this is certainly and hardly surprisingly true of the modern Iraqi dramatists. Indeed, given the extreme political and military turmoil that has riven their country for the past several decades, it is hard to imagine that any serious dramatist would not be centrally occupied with political questions. Anyone wishing to gain an insight not only into the remarkable cultural resilience of that tortured country, but into its attempt to articulate its recent experience, will find his work an invaluable resource.Like in most of Falah Shaker's plays, "Heaven Opens its Gates Late" is essential a dialogue between two characters, in this case a returning husband and his long-abandoned wife. Their generic names (Prisoner and Wife) indicate the commonality of their dilemma. Its single long act is divided into six scenes, which Shaker calls "paintings." In the course of them both the wife and prisoner resist recognizing their former spouse, confused between what they remembered and what they anticipated. The ambiguity is perfectly captured in an impressionist portrait of the prisoner that hangs on the wall of the home, one that "looks like him and unlike him at the same time." A hint of the absurdist theatre can be seen in a third character, Youssef, whom only the prisoner sees and who may or may not actually exist. Falah Shaker is one of the leading contemporary dramatists in Iraq. His works have received many major awards, and have been translated and performed in English, German, French, Swedish, Dutch, and Kurdish. He was born in Anbar, Iraq in 1960 yet he lived most of his life in Basra, in the south of the country. He studied philosophy and applied arts at the University of Baghdad during the 1980s. During the 1990s he became one of the best-known dramatists in Iraq. In 2006 he left Iraq for Syria and subsequently for the United States, where he currently resides.- prof. Marvin Carlson the Sidney E. Cohn Distinguished professor of theater, Comparative Literature and Middle Eastern studies at City university of New York.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1973568292
• ISBN13: 9781973568292
• Release Date: December 2017
• Publisher: Independently published
• Length: 125 Pages
• Weight: 0.48 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 0.3" x 5.5"