Cogitatio
Role: Writer
Performances: Guildhall School of Music and Drama (2016)
Collaborators: MA Collaborative Theatre, Oge Nwosu
I was asked to write a meditation by fellow-students at Guildhall on the MA Collaborative Theatre for their installation piece, making a space for quiet amid the end-of-term Guildhall Christmas chaos. With Oge Nwosu reading, it seemed to work for people.
One challenge of the piece was writing a secular meditation. Most models available were religious in nature, or clearly derived from religious philosophies. More particularly, a lot of ‘secular’ meditations seemed to be religious meditations without the bits about how to behave once the meditation-period was over. Which seem to be important in making people feel long-term contentment.
I hope I managed to write something that worked in that specific space, giving a sense of ritual, but one designed knowing that people would walk out to chaotic lives, essentially unchanged.
More of a respite than a deep meditation, but a fascinating challenge. I hope to return to it someday.
“Listen to the world.
Listen to the hum.
Listen.”
