The Lamplighter

'One of Scotland's most celebrated living writers.' SpectatorIn The Lamplighter award-winning writer and poet, Scottish Makar Jackie Kay takes us on a journey into the dark heart of Britain's legacy in the slave trade. First produced as a play, on the page it reads as a profound and tragic choral poem. We watch as four women and one man tell the story of their lives through slavery, from the fort, to the slave ship, through the middle passage, following life on the plantations, charting the growth of the British city and the industrial revolution.Constance has witnessed the sale of her own child; Mary has been beaten to an inch of her life; Black Harriot has been forced to sell her body; and our lead, the Lamplighter, was sold twice into slavery from the ports in Bristol. Their voices sing together in a rousing chorus that speaks to the experiences of all those brutalised by slavery, and lifts in the end to a soaring conclusion.Stirring, impassioned and deeply affecting, The Lamplighter remains as essential today as the day it was first performed. A stunning work by one of our most beloved writers.