NEW YORK—Britishers Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen were arguably the greatest war poets of World War I. Playwright Joseph Pearce has created a theater piece interweaving excerpts from these poets’ works, as well as those of other poets, in addition to his own original text.
Sassoon and Owen became fiercely antiwar after their bitter experiences in the trenches and expressed these feelings in their work. Sassoon fortunately outlived the war and went on to live until he was 80. Less happily, Owen was killed in the war just one week before Armistice was declared. He was only 25, yet left a legacy of deeply felt poetry.
Sassoon (Nicholas Carriere) and Owen (Michael Raver) meet late in the war, and they soon become friends, encouraging each other’s writing.
In the play, another character is been introduced: It is Death, portrayed by actress and dancer Sarah Naughton. Death is sometimes threatening, sometimes seductive. She sometimes cynically sings: “Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag, and smile, smile, smile.” But Sassoon, as nicely played by the nimble Carriere, always manages to escape her grasp.
