The City They Burned
Attic Erratic
6 September 2014
Cavern Table Performance Space
to 23 September
 |
| Photo by Sarah Walker |
Attic Erratic's The City They Burned is a re-telling of the Genesis story of Lot and his family. I remember learning about godly Lot at my Anglican school: Lot is told by God and his angels to get out of town, Lot's selfish wife looks back at their town of Sodom and God turns her into a pillar of salt for questioning his will and valuing her materialistic life.
Like slabs of the Old Testament, the understanding of what makes a good person is subjective and bits of the stories are often missed in the telling. When I drew Bible story pictures at primary school, they didn't include gang rape, incest, incest-rape and God generally being a dick by destroying everyone, except Lot, with a rain of fire. And we didn't discuss how Sodom gave us the word sodomy.
This tale is from books – the story of Lot is also in the Quran and the Torah – that continue to control so many people's lives, morality and decisions. As long as these stories keep being told, we need to keep looking at them to try to understand and continue to question why they are still at the core of so much in our society.
Writer Fleur Kilpatrick says that she wants to question the concept of bad or evil. What did the people of the city of Sodom do to deserve being wiped off the face of God's good earth?
What would happen if God were removed from the story?
Is a godless world compassionless and devoid of hope? Is it any different from a God-loved world?
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The full review is on AussieTheatre.com and will be published here in a few days.
