Category: Portsmouth

PONTINE THEATRE PERFORMS 

 

SOJOURNER STORIES: 

New Englanders in Nature

14 – 30 March  / Portsmouth, NH 

 

 

PORTSMOUTH NH:  Pontine Theatre’s 24-25 Performance Season continues14-30 March with SOJOURNER STORIES: New Englanders in Nature.  This production includes three stories by noted New England authors: “A White Heron” by South Berwick, Maine’s Sarah Orne Jewett, “Farmer Eli’s Vacation” by Hampton Falls, NH’s Alice Brown and “The Star-Splitter” by Robert Frost. 

 

Sarah Orne Jewett was a novelist, short story writer and poet, best known for her local color works. Her short story, “A White Heron,” published in 1886, is a coming of age story about a young city girl, Sylvia, who comes to live with her grandmother in the country. She meets a young ornithologist who is hunting a rare bird he recently spotted in the area. Sylvia wants to please the young man by revealing the heron’s location, yet doesn’t want him to take its life. In the end, she embraces her passion for country life and the natural world around her.

 

Alice Brown’s short story “Farmer Eli’s Vacation,” published in 1895, tells of a parochial farmer who lives within an easy drive of the ocean, but has never seen it. His wife plans a week-long excursion to the shore to satisfy her husband’s life-long ambition, but the vastness and strangeness of ocean and shore prove foreign for his sensitive spirit.

Robert Frost’s “The Star-Splitter,” published in 1923, explores the conflict between societal expectatireons and individual passions. A farmer’s pursuit of a telescope leads to the loss of his farm and home. This loss initially evokes ridicule from the townspeople. However, their subsequent contemplation reveals the importance of forgiveness and understanding. Frost uses the image of a telescope, “a star-splitter,” as a symbol of the farmer’s “life long curiosity about our place among the infinities.”

The cast of Sojourner Stories features Pontine Artistic Co-Directors, Marguerite Mathews and Greg Gathers. Mr. Gathers creates all the sets and properties for Pontine’s productions. 

 

Pontine’s venue, the 1845 Plains Schoolhouse theatre is located at 1Plains Avenue in Portsmouth NH’s West End.  The intimate performance space is fully accessible with free parking located onsite.  Purchase tickets at Pontine’s website:  www.pontine.org.  Performances are scheduled for Fridays @7pm, Saturdays @3pm and Sundays @2pm.  For more information contact Pontine Theatre:  603-436-6660 / info@pontine.org

This production is supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts.