Moving drama of pain and memory

Lotus War
By Julie Janson
On Soundstage, ABC FM February 20
Reviewed by Brendan Doyle The stage version of this outstanding radio play will open shortly at the Adelaide Fringe Festival, and hopefully will move on from there to other capitals. It is a play that deserves the widest possible audience, dealing as it does with the war in Vietnam as it affected the lives of individuals. Author Julie Janson, one of many Australians who fought to end the war in Vietnam, was moved and inspired by a recent visit to Hanoi. Lotus War grew partly out of that experience, but also out of much research and an admirable act of dramatic imagination. Set in the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum in Hanoi, the play tells the story of Hien, a guide and former liberation army fighter. John, an Australian tourist and former conscript whose platoon captured and tortured Hien during the war, visits the museum. John only slowly comes to realise who she is. Hien, however, recognises him right away. We hear her inner voice: "Are you the rapist? I know you." From there, the play develops in three strands. First, there is the guarded conversation between the two former enemies in the echoing hall of the museum. Then there are Hien's memories of the war, which come to us via her inner voice. This is the most powerful element of the drama, with telling details such as the way she placed petals on the shallow grave she dug with her hands for her friend, killed in battle. Finally, there is her imaginary identification with the Trung sisters, warriors who drove the Chinese invader our of Vietnam in the first century. The essential dramatic conflict arises out of John's gradual realisation of who she is, and whether he had in fact raped Hien along with his drunken mates, and rises to a crescendo with John weeping as he screams, "It wasn't me!". However, the play ends in uncertainty. Hien has not forgiven him and probably does not believe him. There is no nice conclusion to this aftermath of war. Valerie Berry is outstanding as the sensitive, passionate Hien. Allen Lyne is convincing as the guilt-ridden vet. Produced by Mike Ladd for Soundstage, with musical director Dang Thao, Lotus War is a feast for the imagination, a moving drama of the personal tragedies of war.