Valley Song

by Athol Fugard

The first post-apartheid play by one of the greatest playwrights in South Africa and the world, Valley Song is a coming-of-age story about a young girl seeking the courage to embrace the future while her grandfather searches for the wisdom to let go of the past.

Genres: Plays, Drama

60 pages, Paperback

First published January 22, 1996

About the author

Athol Fugard was a South African playwright, novelist, actor, and director widely regarded as South Africa's greatest playwright. Acclaimed in 1985 as "the greatest active playwright in the English-speaking world" by Time, he published more than thirty plays. He was best known for his political and penetrating plays opposing the system of apartheid, some of which have been adapted to film. His novel Tsotsi was adapted as a film of the same name, which won an Academy Award in 2005. It was directed by Gavin Hood.
Fugard also served as an adjunct professor of playwriting, acting and directing in the Department of Theatre and Dance at the University of California, San Diego.
Fugard received many awards, honours, and honorary degrees, including the Order of Ikhamanga in Silver from the government of South Africa in 2005 "for his excellent contribution and achievements in the theatre". He was also an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Fugard was honoured in Cape Town with the opening in 2010 of the Fugard Theatre in District Six. He received a Tony Award for lifetime achievement in 2011.

Reviews

[Ebubechukwu Oguaju-Dike · Rating 5 out of 5]

Athol Fugard is a grandmaster in stringing together words and stories that build a perfect play. A piercing story of a post-apartheid life, The Main character living with his granddaughter, overcome by the shadow of apartheid.
I recommend this play to anyone in need of a great read.

[Phillip · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked the conflicts set up in this play, though I feel like I've seen the old traditional man vs. young girl with a dream scenario several times before (Fiddler on the Roof, for instance). However, where Fugard's words got really beautiful for me was the devotion to the valley in which this play is set. I think that in South Africa there is something more poignant about a (black, colored, asia) man's devotion to and identification with a piece of land than we get with say white American farmers, because that South African could be kicked off his land at any time with no real political or judicial recourse open to him. Therefore the bond to the land is much more emotive for a black, colored, or Asian in aparteid South Africa because the bond is so fragile which is one of the central themes of this play.

The other element at work here that was very compelling to me was the dual casting of Buks and the Author, who are played by a single actor switching between the roles as the scenario demands it. This complicates our notions of the stage as a place of actors and off stage as the place of writers, and by extension complicates our notions of the separation between stage and reality or actors and spectators.

[James F · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another play by Fugard, one act, two characters, an old Coloured farmer and his teenage granddaughter in a town in the Karoo. The theme of the play is the need for letting go of your children to pursue their own dreams. Good, but not out of the ordinary.

[João · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't quite understand why there's so much hate around this play! I was forced to read it and really liked after all :D

[Sara Maria · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mais um livro lido para a disciplina de Inglês. Tenho pena de não o ter lido de uma vez - visto que era pequeno -, mas as férias deixaram-me muito perguiçosa.




Nunca tinha lido uma peça de teatro de uma ponta à outra. Prefiro, sem dúvida alguma, um livro normal. O facto de ser tudo à base de diálagos fez-me imaginar tudo a acontecer em cima de um palco. Não digo que isso seja mau, mas eu prefiro imaginar também todas as outras coisas. E, à falta de descrição, foi complicado.




Achei esta peça muito interessante. Retrata bastante bem o choque entre as gerações mais velhas com as mais novas, visto que estamos a assistir à relação entre um avô e a sua neta. Ele, feliz com tudo o que possui - mesmo que seja pouco - e ela sempre a sonhar alto e a querer mais. Dá-nos que pensar. Seguir os sonhos ou assistir aos últimos anos da pessoa que nos criou? Ir mais longe ou seguir a tradição? Esta peça, por mais simples que seja, faz-nos muitas perguntas. E depois há que seguir o caminho que escolhemos.




E tu, qual escolheste?

[Anthony D'Juan Shelton · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great Athol Fugard play (i co-directed it in 2000 at my old theater in California). The narrative is simple and Fugard, as he does with all of his plays, has the capacity to hook you with simplicity; in an age where narratives take twists to grab your attention, Fugard refuses to take this route. As a result, he has created over thirty near perfect plays.

[Kavya Srinivasan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gorgeous! Hugs to Ashwin's dad for loaning this gem to me. I'd like to perform this some day.