Building Jerusalem

by Michael Redhill

Building Jerusalemtakes place on New Year’s Eve, 1899, in the Grange, one of the grandest houses in Toronto. Now the home of the celebrated writer Goldwyn Smith, it is to be the scene of a New Year’s party for four auspicious guests. When their host is delayed, the guests are entertained instead by his beautiful young niece, Alice. Little do they know what surprises await as the century creeps closer.

Genres: Plays

80 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

Aka Inger Ash Wolfe.

Michael Redhill is an American-born Canadian poet, playwright and novelist.

Born in Baltimore, Maryland, Redhill was raised in the metropolitan Toronto, Ontario area. He pursued one year of study at Indiana University, and then returned to Canada, completing his education at York University and the University of Toronto. He was on the editorial board of Coach House Press from 1993 to 1996, and is currently the publisher and editor of the Canadian literary magazine Brick.

His play, Building Jerusalem, depicts a meeting between Karl Pearson, Augusta Stowe-Gullen, Adelaide Hoodless, and Silas Tertius Rand on New Year's Eve night just prior to the 20th century.

Reviews

[Lucile Barker · Rating 5 out of 5]

198. Building Jerusalem by Michael Redhill
Set on New Year’s Eve in 1899, in the home of the writer Goldwyn Smith (The Grange), this play brings together four real life characters who never did meet in real life, along with a fictional character to hold things together. They are very different: Karl Pearson is a scientist and into rationality, Darwinism and eugenics; Adelaide Hoodless is a campaigner for milk pasteurization, young women to learn domestic science, but not receive the vote (she also founded the Victorian Order of Nurses); Silas Tertius Rand is a fundamentalist missionary who is anti-progressive and calls his charges “savages”; and Augusta Stowe-Gullen, a suffragette doctor who is the daughter of the first female doctor in Canada. Smith does not show up and the guests play parlour games and sing songs to pass the time and speculate what New Year’s 1999 will be like. And midnight is coming, along with the future. This play may not appeal to people who don’t have a background in Canadian history. It takes effort. For me, it was worth it, but for others, some research may be necessary.

[Randy Cox · Rating 5 out of 5]

My college staged the US premier of this play way back in 2003. For all I know, it might even be the only US production this play has seen, which is a shame. It reads like a less abstract version of No Exit, with several bickering guests trapped at a party waiting for the host to arrive. In many ways, it feels like the world as it is today.