Lives of Iraqi women portrayed in play

sire and every seat was filled. A friend and I settled down in the front row, anticipating the next hour and a half to be filled with emotional and passionate performances. The concluding event of Davidson’s series “Voices of Middle Eastern Women: Women’s Lives in Arts and Cultures” fused nine different Iraqi womens’ stories. The women differed in age, class and personal struggle but all offered insight into their individual situations.
Davidson’s production of Nine Parts, which Heather Raffo originally wrote to be a one-woman play, was divided into nine separate monologues. Despite this division, though, the performance cohered because the women all wore the same black abaya, the traditional garment worn around the heads of Iraqi women.
In Raffo’s vision, the actress would wear the abaya in a different fashion to indicate which of the women she was at the time—the young Iraqi girl would pretend the abaya was long, luxurious hair; the doctor used the abaya as a hand towel. Sharon Green, the Davidson director of the play, chose for the abaya to establish unity as one actress handed it to the next after each monologue.
Amy Sinclair ’12 found this theatrical device particularly innovative. “As the abaya was continuously passed on from scene to scene, the play unveiled for me a subject matter that authors often attempt to depict on paper,” she said. “The passionate performance of each actress and the convincing set opened my eyes to the hearts and experiences of Iraqi women whose reputations are often confined to unjust stereotypes.”
The diversity of the cast really stood out to me. It ranged from a freshman giving her first Davidson performance, to a senior theater major, to a faculty member from the English Department. Even if you were like Naa Amerley Amarteifio ’13, who came simpy to watch her friends perform, Nine Parts taught many lessons.
“I went to the play just to support my friends, but I was really affected by the role of the American and the constant love her Iraqi family showed her even amidst their own turmoil,” said Amarteifo.
Individually, the stories of the Iraqi women are moving in their own way, but together they counteract the many stereotypes of Iraqi women that exist in American minds. As Green comments in the director’s notes, “These women’s stories are rarely heard… Raffo’s play continues a feminist performance tradition of reclaiming the marginalized stories of women by making them the subject of cultural production.”
Each actress gave a heart-felt and compelling performance. A traditional Iraqi song, “Che Mali Wali,” accompanied the passionate monologues. The song, composed by Elinor Landess ’10 and Christa Johnson ’12, employed the sounds of the oud, an old Middle Eastern guitar-like instrument.
The message of the play, as Green puts it, is one from which we can all learn: “This play is about the experiences of nine women in the wake of the U.S. involvement in Iraq,” she said, “but it is also about the strength, intelligence, and courage of these women, which allows them to survive loss and grief and live on.”
 

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