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The Scent of Roses
You'd be surprised how a simple thing like locking up your husband in the same room as you, makes you aware of something. Of being alive.
The Scent of Roses begins with a wife who takes her husband hostage in order to have an honest conversation. This simple, transgressive act, and her demand for a straight answer, sparks a chain of conversations, interrogations, obfuscations and revelations, as they and those around them try to discover what is real and who they can trust in a post-truth world.
Zinnie Harris's The Scent of Roses premieres at the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, in February 2022.
- GenresPlays
160 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 2022
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About the author
Zinnie Harris
27 books17 followersZinnie Harris is an award-winning British playwright, screenwriter and director currently living in Edinburgh.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 21, 2022
The Scent of Roses begins with the premise of a wife locking her husband in with her to have an honest conversation. They haven’t been honest with each other for a while and this is her way of giving him a last chance. It’s a cry for help which causes a circle of help seeking and all sorts of revelations.
With a liberal understanding of punctuation and capitalisation, Zinnie Harris uses distinct voices and manners for each character which makes this play an easy two-hour read, although at points there are scenes that ask for a moment of rest. Most of all, when it comes to the play’s three central questions: Is consensual intercourse constituted by declared will or rather informed decision-making? What would the latter imply? And finally, how does a ‘post-truth society’ — as the back-cover calls it — treat facts and stories in interpersonal relationships? To say not too much: Following the characters, you feel as though you are trapped in one of Zizek’s philosophical jokes: Discourse is impossible, let’s talk about it!
As fitting as displeasing, the ending is a superb triumph. — After the final act I told a friend about the plot and asked whether or not it might be too constructed. He answered with a story similar to this plot that happened to him just last week and which was far less likely to happen and would even be less believable if seen on stage.
Horrible times deserve horror shows like this one here. Exceptionally delightful!
With a liberal understanding of punctuation and capitalisation, Zinnie Harris uses distinct voices and manners for each character which makes this play an easy two-hour read, although at points there are scenes that ask for a moment of rest. Most of all, when it comes to the play’s three central questions: Is consensual intercourse constituted by declared will or rather informed decision-making? What would the latter imply? And finally, how does a ‘post-truth society’ — as the back-cover calls it — treat facts and stories in interpersonal relationships? To say not too much: Following the characters, you feel as though you are trapped in one of Zizek’s philosophical jokes: Discourse is impossible, let’s talk about it!
As fitting as displeasing, the ending is a superb triumph. — After the final act I told a friend about the plot and asked whether or not it might be too constructed. He answered with a story similar to this plot that happened to him just last week and which was far less likely to happen and would even be less believable if seen on stage.
Horrible times deserve horror shows like this one here. Exceptionally delightful!
Displaying 1 of 1 review