The Glow

by Alistair McDowall

People find me. When it's dark.

1863. An asylum.

A woman locked in a windowless cell, with no memory as to who she is, or how she arrived there.

When spiritualist medium Mrs Lyall requires a new assistant, this nameless woman seems the perfect candidate.

But as the woman's past begins to reveal itself, so do new powers neither are prepared for.

Alistair McDowall's haunting new play The Glow was the 2018 Pinter Commission, an award given annually by Lady Antonia Fraser to support a new commission at the Royal Court Theatre.

This edition was published to coincide with the world premiere at London's Royal Court Theatre in January 2022.

Genres: Plays

136 pages, Paperback

Published February 14, 2022

Reviews

[Doug · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5, rounded down.

McDowall is certainly our most daring and innovative, if not always our most comprehensible contemporary playwright. I've enjoyed reading all of his previous theatrical endeavors, but this takes a gigantic leap forward in both inventiveness and thought provoking. As always, some of his stage directions seem a bit daunting, unless like the Royal Court, one has seemingly unlimited funds for such special effects as not only the titular 'glow', but having one actor biting off the nose of another and spitting it across stage, or one vomiting a river of lava into the mouth of another. Still, I'd rather a playwright's reach exceed his grasp, than be bored with kitchen sink naturalism. These reviews give good synopses of the plot, such as it is, so I'll defer to them:

https://theartsdesk.com/theatre/glow-...
https://thepolyphony.org/2022/01/31/t...
https://www.theguardian.com/stage/202...

[Harry McDonald · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love Ali McDowall, he's one if our most important and brilliant playwrights... but this doesn't wholly work for me. It skirts around the edges of being a really interesting play - the first half is much more compelling than the first. Probably not helped by a slightly lukewarm production - the text actually feels stronger on the page. The Afterword from "Professor Helen Cullwick" of the "University of Irwell" is maybe my favourite bit.

[Tanya · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even if everything else is stolen from me, I'll remember you. Always.
I'll chain you to my thoughts and drag you through time. [p. 90]

I saw 'The Glow' at the Royal Court Theatre in 2022, when it opened, and bought the playscript the next day -- not least for the additional material.

The play opens in 1863, with spiritualist medium Mrs Lyall selecting a nameless girl from the local asylum to 'amplify' her own mediumistic talents. Mrs Lyall's son Mason finds the girl disturbing, even before her first séance, when she begins to chant Latin amid unsettling crashes. After that, things become stranger and bloodier.

1979, and a dropout named Evan is telling the girl about a mysterious figure who appears in old manuscripts: 'She looks a bit different each time but you can always tell it's her.' His source is an obscure book of folklore or mythology, by Dorothy Waites, called The Woman in Time. (Excerpts from this imaginary book are included with the play text.) The Woman -- immortal, invulnerable, singular and infinitely lonely -- knows that love matters more than anything. Her story unfolds from 1345 to 346AD to prehistory and into the future: but some characters are constant.

I did find the Afterword, in which a fictional academic is rather scathing about Waites' book and McDowall's play, entertaining: it definitely fleshed out the underlying myth of The Woman, while poking fun at conspiracy theorists and ambitious young playwrights. But the text of the play works without any of that context, and even without the impressive staging I recall.

For the 'genre picked by someone else' prompt of the 52 in 52 (2025) challenge: Nina picked 'a play' for me.

brief review of the play, from 2022.

[Matthew Skelton · Rating 5 out of 5]

I need to read this again to review it properly

[Claire · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hmmmm. Hmmmmm