Ariel Sharon Hovers Between Life and Death and Dreams of Theodor Herzl
Theodor Herzl, father of Zionism, went in his short life (he died at age 44) from being a self-hating Jew to the “Modern Moses.” He dreamed of a place where “weak European Jews” could be turned into “men.” Is Ariel Sharon the frightening culmination of Herzl’s utopian vision of a new kind of Jew?
…For a pdf of SHARON/HERZL, please contact David
*** See pictures of David's trip to Israel!
“A couple weeks back a guy named David Zellnik emailed me, asking me to come see a reading of his play: Ariel Sharon Stands at the Temple Mount and Dreams of Theodor Herzl. What a title! So crazily, breathtakingly ambitious—I knew I had to go. I was blown away. Last Thursday, the Epic Theatre Center staged a reading and “talkback” at the Beckett Theater on 42d Street, and I confess I was crying at its savage conclusion….”
…Read more of Phil Weiss’s article in the NY Observer
Hear an interview with Alisa Solomon on the WBAI radio show "Beyond the Pale" which includes actors doing 2 scenes (the interview with David starts ten minutes in).
Excerpt from SHARON/HERZL
Act 1 Scene 13.
Backstage at 1st Zionist Congress 1897 Basel; the Russian mother of a Delegate grows furious with Herzl’s obsession with elegance and political gesture at the expense of immediate solutions:
DELEGATE: In Russia - where you have never been - they take the first-born son, and when he dies they take the next, and when he dies the next. They ride into town demanding conscripts, and they serve in the Russian army like dogs for 25 years or until they die and last week your delegate from Grodno was drafted into the Russian army.
They beat us, they say 1/3 of us can stay, 1/3 of us can leave, and 1/3 of us can die. Have you seen the Pale of Settlement where the Jews are forced to live? Have you been to the East?
They say you grew up rich, in the house of the pharaoh, little yids out there impressed you speak high German, and wear good clothes. They put your picture up in shops, in squares, in synagogues! They say you are the new law. All over “Herzl will save us!” Your words, your pictures, your pamphlet - did you know this Dr. Herzl? And they say you have thrown all of it away for us, in order to lead your people. So are you Moses?
HERZL: If Zion needs a Moses, we shall find a Moses.
DELEGATE: Where?
HERZL: If we cannot find him, we will invent him.
DELEGATE: No! We were expelled for our sins. And if you are a false messiah, then it is a sin to follow! When the Messiah comes we will have Zion again but if we follow a false messiah then the world will end in war! That is what the rabbis say – misery and suffering and war and a corrupted people of Israel.
HERZL: How many sons have you lost to Russia?
Silence.
DELEGATE: All of them.
Silence.
HERZL: You have many sons of Israel. Come, let us go and I will speak to my people.
Herzl crumples up his prepared speech, takes the delegate's hand, and together they ascend the platform where Herzl will speak...