"Poetic Justice" at The Marsh San Francisco

Starring Julia McNeal and Charles Shaw Robinson, this double bill features You Must Change Your Life and Divine Madness – one-act plays written by Lynne Kaufman. The evening begins with You Must Change Your Life, revealing the creation of Rainer Maria Rilke’s timeless masterpiece, Letters to a Young Poet. Torn between becoming a writer or an officer in the Austro-Hungarian Army, 19-year-old Franz Kappus writes a poem for Rilke in 1902, asking for feedback. A single letter turns into a series of correspondences. After Rilke’s death, Kappus compiles and publishes Rilke’s letters to him. But what about his letters to Rilke? A recent discovery provides a surprising answer. Divine Madness recounts the love story of poet Robert Lowell and writer Elizabeth Hardwick, who were famously divorced when Lowell, who suffered frequent debilitating bouts of manic depression, left Hardwick to marry an English heiress. He then documented the end of his marriage in a volume of poetry, The Dolphin, that scandalized the literary world and won him the Pulitzer prize. Divine Madness follows the couple as they consider reuniting and invites audiences to explore the questions: Is art worth that much? Can love survive madness and betrayal?