Ruined

"War!  What is it good for?  Absolutely nothing!"
                                      Edwin Starr, "War"

A war rages on in excess of a decade in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Africa's third largest country,

Citizens ponder - Who are the good guys?  Who are the bad guys?  What are we fighting for?

Women and girls are savagely raped for a cause no one can truly name.

Ruined women will endure the emotional and physical scars of their vicious violation every day of their lives.

Women - vulnerable, unprotected and regarded as fungible and wholly expendable.  Their sole purpose - to serve men.

Hundreds of thousands of ruined women are a country's walking dead.

Ruined women cannot return home.  They can sell their bodies.

But life goes on.

Men succumb to social pressure and mob action to perform despicable act against women who resemble their mothers, aunts and sisters.

Husbands are rendered inert unable to defend their wives from brutal rape.

Men without purpose seek solutions in violence and drown their rage in palm liquor.

Men are traumatized and humiliated by their inability to bring safety and sanity to their villages.

A senseless, seemingly endless war that dehumanizes all in its wake.

But laughter goes on.

Ruined Sophie continues to read and dream and hope in a place where only hopelessness should thrive.

Entrepreneurial Mama, selling wine and women at her bar, manifests the cold art of survival.

Josephine, a chief's daughter is brought low.  No one is safe.

Poetry-quoting Christian offers a new definition of manhood.

Soldier Fortune seeks to reverse the terrible mistake he's made that traumatized the woman he loves.

Salima dares to long for the simple joy of family and community.

Pain and loss are ubiquitous.

Yet love endures.

Life is fragile.  War is futile.

Women.  Men.  Deeply wounded.  Not entirely broken.

All that lives cannot resist the urge to survive.

We scratch and scrape to find a sliver of dignity.

We will not be broken.

We will foolishly dream for a brighter future - or at least, just one more day.

Ruined, another beautiful work, by Lynn Nottage, shows us human dignity, the will to survive, pathos and humor in the face of extraordinarily brutal circumstances - the 10-year war in the Democratic Republic of Congo in which rape has been used as a weapon of war.  As usual, the Goodman brings us incredibly moving performances and a beautiful, effective set.  Priced at $10-39, the tickets are a steal.  With your extra pocket change, please consider a gift to help the brutalized women of the DRC.  To help, go to Ruined Organizations.  

- Lauren
Comments?  E-mail me at: Lauren@so-LAZE.com  
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