Synopsis
Dark Sun
Published by Dramatists Play Service
4 Male 1 Female
In the ensuing chaos one survivor, Lydia De Jager, a white woman in her forties, escapes and is sheltered by Simon Kgoathe (a Sowetan in his late forties, early fifties)
This single compassionate act may doom him - a fact he quickly realizes. Any hope of utilizing his meager options are thwarted firstly, by Lydia's fear and her recklessness
And then by his discovery that she is a South African, by events outside and, finally by the intrusion of a young black man, Sipho, who may or may not be a government informer and who is also urgently in need of Simon's help
As Simon tries desperately to survive in the increasingly dehumanized environment of a country without hope and a township seething with rage, he strives also to hold onto his humanity
Isolated in what is, for Lydia, both a fragile haven and a frightening cage, these two people, so vastly different in character and experience, struggle through mistrust and prejudice towards a tenuous understanding
As the night progresses, Simon's main hope of survival becomes his secret underground "cubby-hole." But, from Sipho's entrance, events spin out of control and the play is propelled towards a powerful and moving conclusion
This powerful drama set in the black South Africa township of Soweto, on the edge of change, centers on the fate of a black man and a white woman thrown together by force of circumstance