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tHEATRE

Protest

Written by Hannah Lavery. Directed by Natalie Ibu

Running is Alice’s happy place. She’s the best runner at her school and can outrun everyone, even the boys…but she’s struggling to prove her worth.

Jade is being tested. Racist bullying and history classes that tell a one-sided story sets her on a mission to find out about her heritage and those who came before her.

Meanwhile, litter is piling up in the local forest. All over the world an environmental crisis is looming, the threat of disorder and division is growing. Chloe is determined to make a change, starting with the town.

Three girls prepare to challenge the status quo and tackle injustices in this new play exploring the power of friendship, activism and the believing in your own voice.

A new play by Hannah Lavery.

Directed by Natalie Ibu.

Co-commissioned and co-produced by Fuel, Imaginate and Northern Stage in association with National Theatre of Scotland.

Developed and supported by the Scottish Government's Festivals Expo Fund and Imaginate’s Accelerator programme. Accelerator is supported by the PLACE programme, funded by the Scottish Government (through Creative Scotland), the City of Edinburgh Council and the Edinburgh Festivals. Supported by the Binks Trust.

Part of the Edinburgh International Children’s Festival and touring throughout Scotland in May-June 2023.

Reviews for Protest

Sharply written and packed with youthful promise, Hannah Lavery’s drama, directed by Natalie Ibu, is an uplifting ode to the power of hope and community activism. **** The Stage

This show for young audiences builds to a stirring drama of waking up to injustice and trying to right it. **** The Guardian

It is necessary viewing for any family who wants to teach their children they can be resilient and capable of change. The Shields Gazette

Lament for Sheku Bayoh

Written and Directed by Hannah Lavery

A young black man lost his life. Seven years ago. In police custody. In Scotland.

Soon after 7am, on a Sunday morning - May 3rd, 2015, Sheku Bayoh, a 31 year-old gas engineer, husband and father of two died in Police custody on the streets of his home town – Kirkcaldy, Fife.

Bayoh’s family launched a campaign seeking justice and in 2019 a judge-led inquiry was announced to determine the manner of his death and whether ‘actual or perceived race’ had played a part in it.

Lament for Sheku Bayoh is an artistic response to this tragedy, an expression of grief for the loss of the human behind the headlines and a non-apologetic reflection on identity and racism in Scotland today.

Lament for Sheku Bayoh asks the urgent question, is Scotland really a safe place?

A National Theatre of Scotland, Edinburgh International Festival and Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh co-production.

Lament for Sheku Bayoh was originally commissioned and presented as a rehearsed reading by the Lyceum Theatre, supported by the Edinburgh International Festival as part of the 2019 International Festival’s You Are Here strand.

Development work supported by the Stephen W Dunn Creative Fund.

Reviews for Lament for Sheku Bayoh

URGENT, INTIMATE... DEMANDS OUR ATTENTION

****The Times

A PAINFUL AND BEAUTIFUL MELDING OF IRONY AND HOPE...

****The Scotsman

Timely and necessary

***The Stage 

a voice in the dark it is impassioned, poetic and alive with political import

*** The Guardian

Buy Playtext Here

Eavesdropping

Written by Hannah Lavery and Sarah MacGillivray

Part of the Walk This Play® series by ThickSkin, in association with the Traverse Theatre.

Don your headphones and get ready to eavesdrop in this latest solo audio experience from ThickSkin. Celebrating the stories and people who are the heartbeat and spirit of Edinburgh, Eavesdropping asks who gets to define a city, who gets to be it’s guide and who’s story matters.

Eavesdropping takes audiences on an adventure through familiar and unfamiliar streets of Scotland’s capital, revealing new sides to and stories of the people who (may) live here. This location-based walking audio play by Hannah Lavery and Sarah MacGillivray, the latest in ThickSkin’s Walk This Play® series, will encourage audiences to look differently at the rich tapestry of people you may walk past every day, whether you notice them or not.

Reviews for Eavesdropping

**** – The Guardian.
“It does, though, build a vivid collage of the life around us. Written with wit and imagination by Hannah Lavery and Sarah MacGillivray…slickly put together by director Jonnie Riordan, with a heightened sound design by Finn Anderson, it makes for a colourful walk in the company of strangers.”
Read the full review

**** – The Scotsman
“brilliantly life-enhancing”
Read the full review

**** – The Stage
“a witty and compelling cross-section of Edinburgh – and an engrossing exercise in imagining the lives of others”
Read the full review

Jekyll & Hyde

Adapted by Hannah Lavery.

Hannah Lavery's new adaptation to retell Stevenson's classic Victorian tale, Jekyll and Hyde from the perspective of the women who occupy the peripheries of the original story.

Performed as a monologue by Alicia McKenzie and directed by Pitlochry Festival Theatre's Associate Director Amy Liptrott.

Hannah Lavery's new adaptation of Stevenson's novel exposes the duality of human nature, between innocence and violence, friendship and deceit, reputation and reality, of what it is to be truly human.

Playwright Hannah Lavery said:

"Reading Jekyll and Hyde again, I was struck by the women at the edges of the story, and I began to wonder what would happen if these women were to tell the story, their story. If his cook, his servant, his victim, his landlady, his witness, were to be given the space to speak. And as this adaptation was to be a monologue, I was keen to show the women take their form, manifest in front of the audience, giving voice to these previously silenced women, and thus allowing me to explore the good and the evil, the duality of this good man, from the perspectives of the women who stood watching him, fearing him from the shadows and the edges of his life and his world."

Reviews of Jekyll and Hyde

Jekyll and Hyde takes a contemporary approach, and At the gnarled and twisted heart, this re-telling of Jekyll and Hyde remains faithful to the original – the same setting, the same plot, the same characters, but shifts the direction of view to the skirted corners .. droves of a distinctive new light to draw the monstrous classic into modern light. Corr Blimey ****

Hannah Lavery’s new adaptation of Jekyll And Hyde is transformational in any case, delivering a solo one-hour retelling of the tale from the point of view of the many women who witness Jekyll’s own transformation and the violent rampages of his alter ego Mr Hyde, and who eventually become his victims. Most are domestic servants, as wise as they are vulnerable; and all are played with terrific knowing force by Alicia Mackenzie of the Pitlochry ensemble. Joyce Macmillan,The Scotsman ****

Life and Times of Santa Claus

Adapted by poet and playwright Hannah Lavery from the short story by L. Frank Baum (famously known for writing The Wizard of Oz), The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus is a family friendly Christmas tale suitable for all ages including the very small.

Reviews for Life and Times of Santa Claus

The story is told well. There are short snippets of actual storytelling by Fairy, between the story being played out by the other characters, as we see them in the forest and valley that is being described to us, which is good for keeping younger audience’s attention. It is also a short piece (approx. 35 minutes), which again keeps children entertained in the same way as reading them an actual story. **** West End Best Friend

Lavery adapts the piece remarkably well given the thirty-five-minute run time, condensing the text while still capturing clarity in the narrative. **** Corr Blimey

The Raven

Positive Stories for Negative Times is an international participatory project by Wonder Fools in association with the Traverse Theatre.

Welcome to Season 2, which is all about coming together, embarking on new processes and changing the way we think about theatre for young people. Wonder Fools have commissioned some of the UK’s most exciting voices to create new work for those between the ages of 6 and 25. Artists include Bryony Kimmings, Douglas Maxwell, Hannah Lavery, Debris Stevenson, The PappyShow, Wonder Fools and Traverse Young Writer Ellen Bannerman.

The Raven by Hannah Lavery

A play full of adventure and an exploration of what shapes and what divides us, exploring issues of blended families, bullying, overeating, depression and isolation. Ages 11+

Buy Playtext here

THE DRIFT

WRITTEN AND PERFORMED BY

Hannah Lavery

My sweet forgetful Caledonia

The Drift is a journey through history, through Scottishness, through belonging, and through grief.

An autobiographical, poetic spoken word show, The Drift sees writer and performer Hannah Lavery exploring her legacy of being “mixed” in Scotland left to her by her father and mother and their respective journeys. A beautiful story of love, loss and bereavement, as well as a searingly honest portrayal of growing up mixed-race in Scotland, The Drift challenges us to see Scottish history and our public memory in a different light.

Reviews of The Drift

“Lavery is a spellbinding performer, and an expert at negotiating the tension in the room. Moments of pitch-black humour burst forth in unexpected places, but more often she holds her listeners at the cliff-edge, forcing her majority-white audience to face the legacy of brutality and rape that has formed her, a mixed-race Scot. But she's also seeking a post-mortem redemption for her father, sourcing his failures and violence in this brutal inheritance, and the racism that she and her young sons now also face as 'exotic others' in their own home. Few works of Scottish theatre confront the hypocrisies of Scottish nationalism and identity so bluntly, and so well. Lavery lyrically acknowledges the conflicting emotions of love and resentment she feels towards both her father and her homeland, but does not attempt to stamp out one feeling in favour of the other. They should – and must – find a way to co-exist, just as the nation too must allow for more than one story of Scotland to be told.” - **** The List

There’s something so essential, and so moving, about Hannah Lavery’s text that it absolutely demands attention. Lavery’s subject – dealt with in layer after layer of complexity – is the experience of growing up black or mixed-race in a Scotland that often prides itself on its inclusive approach to citizenship, but is still profoundly unused to dealing with real-life racial and cultural diversity. - **** The Scotsman

… rather than a preaching lesson to an audience, Lavery uses a spoken word which is pure artistry. Humorous, flowing and precise in commentary, The Drift conveys a story of Scotland’s history through Lavery’s history with her father.-***** Reviews Hub, Scotland

“Evocative, progressive and steeped in pathos, the repition in writing adds substance to Hannah Lavery’s piece. The Drift highlights the blacks, the whites and the greys in the complexities of life…Lavery’s performance within the setting of a simple home, rug and armchair, and box of old photos, is powerful, bold and yet the subtle vexations in her demeanour render this work relative”-***** The Fountain

“Solo shows depend much upon the solo performance and here Lavery is such a complex presence to behold. She takes you in, slaps you hard and tenderly drags your agreement in return. The text was filled with poetic devices and clearly the love she feels for her father was ever present but also the ability to make connections was incredibly well drawn in her grace, well directed glances and looks and the set which was clearly set up for a story with abundant twists.” - Highly Recommended, The Fringe Review

“The Drift is a beautiful exploration of complicated family relationships told with warmth and care.”

- **** Broadway Baby

“This uneasy history is never delivered in a heavy handed fashion, with a bigger past framed by the all too real legacy of a father who doesn’t know where he belongs and a son being racially abused in the playground. Lavery stands between the two, protecting both even as she deals with a lingering hurt

While never soft-soaping things in any way in Eve Nicol’s nuanced production, Lavery’s righteous anger takes a gentler and more vulnerable approach. Despite this, a part of her will forever be the furious sixteen-year-old in Doc Marten boots having to deal with an absent dad along with everything else that helped shape her at such a volatile age.

Despite this, a conciliatory tone pulses Lavery’s writing in a way that falls somewhere between eulogy, purging and laying her father to rest. Her artistic act not only keeps his restless spirit alive, but immortalises her memory of him in this fragile, heartfelt and painfully honest tribute delivered with a raging calm.”

- **** The Herald

 Books & Pamphlets

Blood Salt Spring

Debut Collection from Edinburgh's Makar.

Shortlisted for the Saltire Award. One of Poetry Society’s Books of The Year.

In a moment that is demanding you to constantly choose your side, how do you find your humanity, your own voice, when you are being pushed to find safety in numbers?

Blood Salt Spring is a meditation on where we are – exploring ideas of nation, race and belonging. Much of the collection was written in lockdown and speaks to that moment, the isolation and the traumas of 2020 but it also looks to find some meaning and makes an attempt to heal the pain and vulnerabilities that were picked and cut open again in the recent cultural shifts and political wars.

Organised into three sections this book takes the reader on a journey from the old inherited wounds, the trauma of tearing open again these chasms within recent discourses and events, to a hopeful spring, where pain and trauma can be laid down and a new future can be imagined.

In this collection, the poet has sought to heal these salted wounds, and move out of winter and into spring – into hope. 

‘Hannah Lavery’s Saltire-shortlisted debut, Blood, Salt and Spring, is a must-read collection. As you’d hope from Edinburgh’s Makar, here are sharp, tender, poignant, hopeful and often funny poems about Scotland today, beautifully crafted yet demanding the country holds itself to account for many sorts of belonging, always with a keen eye for nuance and double-think around nationhood and racism. ‘

Jay Whittaker

‘Here is all the struggle of nationhood and identity, everyday racism, and anxieties both global and domestic in scale; but at its heart, this is a book rich in hope and love’

Laura Waddell, The Scotsman

An absolutely amazing collection . . . it blew me away. It feels monumental and fleeting at the same time’

Denise Mina

‘Hannah has been crucial in carving out spaces and stages for writers of colour in Scotland, and her own debut collection is a triumph’

Michael Pedersen

‘Hannah Lavery’s debut collection shows her deft ability to marry the personal with the political’

The Skinny, Andres N. Ordorica

‘Blood Salt Spring offers a personal response to wider cultural conversations from national identity to personal autonomy, divisive politics to mothering during lockdown. Its terrain is vast. Its perspective unequivocal’

The National

‘With much of the collection written in lockdown, it’s poetry that feels both of the moment while reaching out and attempting to find meaning, to move forward, and find hope’

Books From Scotland

‘A terrific debut poetry collection’

BBC Radio Scotland

Buy Here

Pamphlets

Finding Seaglass: Poems from The Drift

Exploring bereavement, belonging and rage, Hannah Lavery’s Finding Sea Glass: Poems from The Drift is a eulogy for her father and searingly honest portrayal of growing up mixed-race in Scotland. The pamphlet consists of poetry selections from The Drift, Hannah’s National Theatre of Scotland show.

Hannah’s voice is often quiet and loving, but she pulls no punches writing about both sides of the parent-child relationship, how we inherit and pass on race, and how Scotland constructs race and national identity.

“A vibrantly intimate, tender and furious pamphlet with language fizzing in Lavery’s native Scots tongue, Finding Sea Glass is an absolute must read from the newly re-established Stewed Rhubarb Press. Lavery’s language is a revelation for spoken word poetry. Deeply emotive yet expertly crafted, it evokes much more than the story of one family’s experiences.” - **** The Skinny

“The emphasis on Scots words in this pamphlet is essential in communicating Hannah Lavery’s message, with phonetic spelling and colloquialisms used to create a voice. So in ‘St Andrew’s Day, 2014’, she writes: ‘He hadne made it. I was what? No bothered? Aye.’ The tone is conversational throughout. This informality bonds the reader with the poet, helps us assume the perceived role of confidant. As a result, her outpouring of pain, grief and loss becomes more personal, more deeply understood.” -Sphinx Reviews

“Edinburgh’s Stewed Rhubarb, meanwhile, excel in giving textual permanence to the performative dynamics of poets such as Hannah Lavery. Her Finding Sea Glass, excerpted from stage show The Drift, explores questions of belonging through the intersecting lenses of race, nationhood and family, with an often body-blow immediacy that is humorous and heartrending by turns.” - Gutter Magazine

Buy Here

Rocket Girls

“The Rocket Girl was all set, yet at final checks she was stalled by Mission Control.”

Rocket Girls is Hannah’s debut pamphlet of flash fiction. In it she explores the lives of a series of women and their fights, both their victories and defeats, to find and to use their voice, their power, and their freedom. The short short stories cover many of the themes around growing up, belonging, motherhood and mental health in short wee glimpses and in side-way glances.

“And she has to remain here, his stay-at-home deity. Throwing her screams into neon plastic tumblers. Celebrating victories one removed, whilst they create marks on her like tree rings.”

‘The excitement and confusion of growing up is distilled right here; the fitting in, the falling out, the winning, the losing, the longing to belong. Love, loss and love again are revealed in Rocket Girls in blinding glimpses and heart-breaking snippets told in language rich and mesmerising.’ —Catherine Simpson

Buy Here

Anthologies

Neu Reekie #UntitledThree

‘Described in Kevin Williamson’s Mission Statement as ‘a selection of poetry that reflects our own curiosity about the world and everything in it’, #UntitledTwo takes you through politics, sex, death and washing machines. It’s like an evening in the pub with articulate friends.’ Skinny ****

‘Hannah Lavery’s tale of glorious revenge in ‘Post-Truth’ is few words but offers ideas for the disgruntled.’ God is in the Tv

Buy Here

Makar to Makar (edited by Jackie Kay & Winifred Brook Young)

Twelve poems for Christmas, curated by Jackie Kay’s Makar to Makar series.

With the Covid lockdowns closing literary festivals around the world, Jackie Kay, the Makar, the National Poet of Scotland, was inspired to curate an online festival to offer a new way of engaging with music and poetry, while ensuring paid work for writers and performers. We have chosen twelve poets from Makar to Makar to each donate a poem for the twelve days of Christmas.

Moving, elegiac, angry, witty, these poems capture the light shed by Makar to Makar during dark times.

BUY HERE

 DIGITAL & RADIO

FINDING SEAGLASS (COMING SOON TO BBC RADIO FOUR)

Finding Seaglass is an Almost Tangible and National Theatre of Scotland production for BBC Radio 4. Poet Hannah Lavery offers a searingly honest portrayal of growing up, and raising children mixed-race in Scotland. A beautiful story of love, loss, bereavement and hope, Hannah’s story challenges audiences to see Scottish history and our public memory in a different light. Written and performed by Hannah Lavery and directed by Niloo-Far Khan. Airing on BBC Radio 4 in Summer 2023.

THE IDLER - BBC RADIO FOUR’S POET AND ECHO SERIES

Poet, essayist and activist, Alice Moore Dunbar-Nelson was a mixed-race American born in Louisiana a decade after the Civil War.

Hannah Lavery takes inspiration from her poem about an idle man to create a moving and timely meditation on the value of taking life at a slower pace.

Listen to The Idler

FEARING - BBC RADIO FOUR’S UNITED KINGDOMS SERIES

A groundbreaking five-part series from exciting new writers celebrating and revealing life across the United Kingdoms in short, sharp drama, comedy, news reports, song and poetic monologue. Stories, lives and voices making a kaleidoscope of now.

Each episode features five short dramas by different writers - a total of 50 writers and 100 actors have been brought together, showcasing new writing and performing talent from every corner of the United Kingdom.

Episode 1: Fearing – a moving and powerful look at 21st Century United Kingdoms.

• MUSSELBURGH - An exhausted woman retires to bed for three days and reflects on her failings, only to realise they are a key to hope not fear.

Musselburgh written by Hannah Lavery
Performed by Nalini Chetty
Produced by Kirsty Williams

LISTEN TO FEARING

THIRTEEN FRAGMENTS

‘There was that year. That year that never ended.’

Thirteen fragments of love, death, exhaustion, anger, and hope. Fragments given physical life through body and camera movement. Fragments given voice in poetry, soundscape, and music.

Thirteen Fragments is an artistic response to the Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) Post Covid-19 Futures Commission addressing how Scotland can emerge from the pandemic as a more equitable society.

Rooted in the experience of the last year as a woman of colour, this intimate digital artwork brings artforms together to explore the meaning of female resilience in Scotland today.

An accompanying digital panel discussion event involves Hannah Lavery in conversation with Talat Yaqoob and Zinnie Harris, Their discussion, which takes the film as starting point, focuses on some of the themes that the work highlights including the impact of Covid on women and wider society and the role that art and creativity play in the pandemic.

Written and Directed by Hannah Lavery

National Theatre of Scotland and The Royal Society of Edinburgh co-production.

The project has been commissioned as part of the RSE Post Covid-19 Futures Commission and will be premiered online during the RSE’s summer events programme, Curious 2021 running from 9th to 27th August.

WATCH THIRTEEN FRAGMENTS HERE

LAVERY'S POETIC MONOLOGUE IS AS BEAUTIFUL AS HER DELIVERY

Broadway world ****

A PIERCING, POWERFUL PORTRAYAL OF PANDEMIC LOSS AND TRANSFORMATION

Meeting of Minds UK

BLOOD SALT SPRING VISUAL ALBUM

National Theatre of Scotland and Push The Boat Out are delighted to present Blood, Salt, Spring – a visual album from one of Scotland’s most exciting and challenging voices - Hannah Lavery, Edinburgh’s new Makar and Associate Artist at the National Theatre of Scotland (The Drift, Lament for Sheku Bayoh). This poetic digital meditation explores ideas of nation, race and belonging.

The album features visual poems written and performed by Hannah Lavery with new composition performed by the late award-winning musician Beldina Odenyo and is presented for online audiences in a digital album created by filmmaker Beth Chalmers in collaboration with Natali McCleary. The project is a continuation of the themes explored in Thirteen Fragments, a digital artwork created during the pandemic, in association with the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Blood Salt Spring – a visual album reunites the original creative team.

Blood, Salt, Spring - a visual album is a lyrical and powerful digital accompaniment to Hannah Lavery’s recent debut collection of poems Blood Salt Spring, published by Polygon, and was originally shared visually as part of Hannah’s performance piece Blood, Salt, Spring during the Push The Boat Out Festival in 2021.

Intergenerational trauma, in particular the legacy of colonialism, racism, and the reality of living through 2020's political and cultural shifts and shocks, slowly makes way for healing in Lavery's work. She has learned how to heal the salted wounds and move out of her winter and into spring - into hope.

Hannah Lavery, lead artist said

This album is based on poems from my debut collection, Blood Salt Spring, with a soundtrack from the late Beldina Odenyo and visuals from film maker Beth Chalmers in collaboration with Natali McCleary.  

We had all first worked together making the film, Thirteen Fragments, and this was in some ways a continuation of that project- a deeply personal piece but yet speaking to a wider experience for women and especially women of colour in Scotland.  In making the work we talked a lot about the power of art to inspire and demand empathy- that empathy is the first step to change. This audio-visual album is then, an invitation to sit with us, but it is also a provocation- who gets to speak and who gets listened to?" 

View Blood Salt Spring Visual Album | National Theatre of Scotland (nationaltheatrescotland.com)

EDINBURGH IS A STORY - EIF AT HOME SERIES

This is an old place being forever remade. This is a new place forever being born.

Edinburgh is a Story, Hannah Lavery

Taking to Edinburgh’s winding streets and closes, Lavery traverses the City from Old Town's Mylnes Court and Dunbar’s Close Garden to the Shore and the historic Victoria Swing Bridge in Leith, using her poetic meditations to address race, community, history, and a sense of belonging in the festival city we all call home.

Inspired by the way in which Lavery captured the city, we decided to name our digital programme after the poem. We commissioned Glasgow-based production company Forest of Black to produce Edinburgh is a Story, five short films which come together to create a beautiful journey through the city. Each is filmed in an iconic Edinburgh location and creates an intimate portrait of an artist featured in this year’s Festival. This film is the first in the series.

WATCH EDINBURGH IS A STORY HERE

DISCO WITH MUM - SCENES FOR SURVIVAL

Isolating in their separate homes during lockdown and coming to terms with a recent bereavement, a mother and daughter reflect on happier times while contemplating an uncertain future for their family. The online video call to plan the playlist for a virtual disco becomes a cathartic exploration of grief, defiance and hope, and a celebration of the healing power of music. Julie Graham and Saskia Ashdown star in this lyrical and inspiring new piece from writer Hannah Lavery, directed by Julie Ellen.

Written by Hannah Lavery
Directed by Julie Ellen
Performed by Saskia Ashdown and Julie Graham

Produced in association with Macrobert Arts Centre

Scenes for Survival is a National Theatre of Scotland project in association with BBC Scotland, Screen Scotland, BBC Arts’ Culture in Quarantine project and Scotland’s leading theatre venues and companies, with support from Hopscotch Films.

Written by Hannah Lavery and directed by Julie Ellen, this all female team brings us a beautiful look at the mother daughter bond. Simple, yet sophisticated, the show creates the sense of a normal modern family as the daughter (Saskia Ashdown) wanders around her kitchen, dressing for a disco, as her mother (Julie Graham) tries to broach a far more serious topic than Spotify playlists. The scene carefully contains deeper political issues including the disproportionate number of BAME deaths from Covid-19 within the NHS, but by placing it in the private sphere this doesn’t feel unnatural and allows you to see the true emotional cost these losses have. 

Younger Theatre ****

EARWIG

SONIC THEATRE PODCAST

Creator/Composer/Sound Designer – Danny Krass
Director – Finn den Hertog

The premier season of Earwig presents six new audio drama podcasts by Scottish based playwrights, commissioned especially to explore the possibilities of sonic theatre. Designed to be listened to on headphones, incorporating text, sound design and music, Earwig seeks to challenge, inspire, envelope and embrace its audience, inviting you deep into the inner world of its characters, placing you, the listener, at the centre of the drama.

Episode 2: Wednesday 3rd February  – There is still something yet to discover by Hannah Lavery
A walk in the woods like no other, haunted as much by momentary domesticity as perennial darkness. Motherhood, Personhood, and the intervention of a mythical creature emerge.

Hannah Lavery’s There Is Still Something Yet to Discover is an elliptical evocation of Baba Yaga, the supernatural figure from Slavic folklore. Slippery and impressionistic . . . it’s beautifully done, its themes about the responsibility of motherhood and the insidious threats of racism and homophobia made ominous by Julia Reidy’s glacial guitar and Krass’s rumbling score. Guardian ****