--------- Begin forwarded message ----------
From: Lemuel Johnson <eljay@umich.edu>
To: LEONENET@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Kpana & Sarjoh; CC, KMK , & The Leonenet Chorus
Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 16:09:07 -0400
Here are some program notes, Netters, for a Leonenet Production of *The
Merchant of Venice* as *The Debt Problem*. My collaborators, as
identified below, inform me that their agreed-upon subtitle for this=20
drama is "No Laughing Matter At All."=20
The Scene: A place "wrack'd on the Narrow Seas"; a "very dangerous flat,
and fatal, where the carcasses of many a tall ship lie buried."
KMK (as the Duke):
The Duke cannot deny the course of law;
For the commodity that strangers have
With us in Venice, if it be denied,
Will impeach the justice of the state,
Since that the trade and profit of the city
Consisteth of all nations.
One-More-Bride! KPANA (as Bassanio)
Tis not unknown to you ...=20
How much I have disabled mine estate,
By something showing a more swelling port
Than my fair means would grant continuance
Nor do I now make moan to be abridged
From such a noble rate, but my chief care
Is to come fairly off from the great debts=20
Wherein my something too prodigal [behaviour]
Hath left me gag'ed.
SARJOH (as reformed Duke of Morocco)
All that glisters is not gold
Oft have you heard that told!
CCONJOH (as Portia):
The quality of mercy is not strained...
BIG BAD BARCLAYS (as Shylock):
You have called me misbeliever, cut-throat dog
...Well then, it now appears you need my help...
What should I say to you? Should I not say,
"Hath a dog money? Is it possible
A cur can lend three thousand ducats?"
CC (as Portia to G7 or Paris Club or OAU):
Mercy is enthroned above the sceptred sway
...bid me tear the bond.
=20
Big Bad LENDERS (An IMF Chorus?)
Tell me not of mercy...
Jailer, look to him...
I'll have my bond; I'll not hear thee speak.
I'll have my bond, therefore speak no more...
I am sure the Duke
Will never grant this forfeiture to hold.
=20
CC (as Portia, fed up):
[S]eize one half of his goods; the other half
Comes to the privy coffer of the state...
Leonenet CHORUS (variously led by SAHR KPUNDEH, or ABDUL
KABBA): =20
[But] there be land-rats and water-rats, water-
thieves and land-thieves, I mean pirates... =20
----
Final(?) Act: The Foreign-Experts Scene
Or, How To Re-Cycle the Debt Problem (via *Macbeth*):
with JONAH* (as Malcolm):
I think our country sinks beneath the yoke:=20
It weeps, it bleeds and each new day a gash
Is added to her wounds. I think withal
There would be hands uplifted in my right;
And here from gracious England [my hope]
Of goodly thousands.
Leonenet Chorus:
O Scotland, Scotland!
***
Stay well; stay in touch.
Eljay
PS
JONAH*
I am a man, this character insists, to whom "taints and blames" are
"strangers." He is, so he insists, "As yet unknown to woman, never was
foresworn,/ [and] Scarcely have coveted what was not [his] own/."
Moreover, "At no time [ever] broke his faith."
Kelfala M. Kallon wrote:
=20
> Once upon a time, two Sierra Leoneans=96Kpana and Sarjoh=96each
receive=
d a >loan of $100 from Barclays Bank.
--------- End forwarded message ----------
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