The American Revolution has always fascinated me, because it was a moment that a people rose above its apparent practical self-interest to launch and win a fight for a visionary future. The key struggle was more moral than military. Arnold sold out, but, miraculously, most of his fellow Continentals did not. That miracle carries a message of real hope and challenge for our kind. It dares us to be great.
-Robert Zubrin
Dr. Robert Zubrin is an aerospace engineer and one of the leading experts on and advocates for manned Mars missions. He's written hundreds of technical papers and several books on Mars exploration, testified before Congress and founded the Mars Society. He'd seem to have a pretty full plate. But over the past couple years he's turned his hand to fiction and now bids fair to become a Renaissance man.
Mr. Zubrin first fictional turn was, not surprisingly, a science fiction novel, First Landing, about a trip to Mars. It sported cover blurbs from the likes of Kevin J. Anderson, Kim Stanley Robinson and Gregory Benford and got good reviews. For his next effort he stuck to science fiction, but departed quite radically from the subject of Mars. The Holy Land is a delicious dystopic satire that does to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict what Orwell did to the Russian Revolution. If the topic was unexpected, even less predictable was the deft touch he demonstrated for comedy. You couldn't help but admire the courage and skill with which he exposed the inherent absurdity of such a deadly serious situation.
This time around Dr. Zubrin has been even more adventurous, offering up not just a tale of the American Revolution and the archetypal traitor but he's rendered it as a play to boot. The tragedy of Benedict Arnold has always fascinated--a genuine hero of the revolution for his roles at Fort Ticonderoga, Saratoga, and the assault on Quebec who, physically wounded in combat and psychologically embittered after quarreling with the Continental Congress about rank and money, eventually tried to surrender West Point and George Washington and his staff to the British. The plot was foiled when Arnold's British "controller," Major John Andre, was captured with incriminating plans on his person. Arnold defected to the British and served them ably fighting against the Americans, but Andre was hanged.
Dr. Zubrin does take some liberties with history, mostly for purposes of sketching in the various characters' motivations. He makes Peggy Shippen the key to the whole affair. A friend of Andre's in real life, Dr. Zubrin makes her Andre's paramour and a devoted Loyalist, her marriage to Arnold little more than part of a grand nefarious scheme. In addition, Andre is at least implied to have been General Henry Clinton's lover as well as his chief of intelligence--he was certainly closer to the difficult Clinton than most. Arnold, meanwhile, is played as a man insecure about his modest social background --Shippen refers to him contemptuously as a drugstore "clerk" -- and strongly attracted to the more stylish and aristocratic "Tory Girls" than the homier and homelier "Patriot Girls." Shippen and Andre use this and his disappointed ambition to ensnare him in the plot. Historical purists may be upset and, in truth, while some of these interpretations can at least find some support in the record others are pure speculation. Nonetheless, you do require some motives to drive the drama and Dr. Zubrin makes these serve well.
As always in a historical fiction characters are called upon to explain the setting and the events of the day, which can be pedantic and unnatural but is pretty much unavoidable. George Washington has a walk-on in which he's impossibly noble, except that we know of the instances where he acted just so in real life. There are a fair number of asides to the audience and it's not altogether clear how they'd work out on stage, but they do help reveal the internal thoughts of the dramatis personae. One nice touch is the presence of several period songs (though sadly not my favorite, Chester). Best of all, Dr. Zubrin once again demonstrates a real facility with comedy. In particular, he gives Peggy Shippen such a sharp tongue that several of her comments are laugh out loud funny.
The leaders of the Revolution were themselves shaped to some considerable degree by works like Joseph Addison's tragedy, Cato. How fitting then of Dr. Zubrin to pay them tribute with a play of his own. It's delightful.
(Reviewed:13-Jun-05)
Grade: (A)
