Bible story takes centre stage

Buy photos » Stephen Boxer (William Tyndale), Oliver Ford Davies (Andrewes). (s)

Written On The Heart

RSC Swan Theatre

Stratford

IT seems fitting that as champions of Shakespeare, the RSC should turn their attention to the other great book of the English speaking world - The King James Bible.

Veteran playwright David Edgar wields the pen in an examination of the evolution of the best-selling book in the English language on it's 400th anniversary, with Gregory Doran in the director's chair, and for the most part it proves a splendid pairing.

The translation of a book may not at first appear the most compelling subject for a stage drama, but Edgar/Doran's staging is intriguing and not without humour.

A brief history of the genesis of the Bible is helpful but not essential, as Edgar takes a circular journey from the eve of publication back to Flanders in 1536 where early translator, and the man ultimately responsible for the Bible, William Tyndale, played with passion and zeal by Stephen Boxer, is imprisoned, before returning to 1610 via Yorkshire in 1586.

For Edgar the story of the Bible's birth is intertwined with the seismic shift this sceptred isle underwent went during the Reformation. The two go hand in hand. This is emphasised by the change in the attitude towards the translation of the Word of God in just 80 years.

Tyndale is persecuted for literally putting the fear of God into the Church by daring to try and take away their hold over the masses by giving them the Word of God in a language they could understand, and so putting the clergy out of a job as they saw it. He was eventually tried for heresy and executed.

It is all very different post Reformation as the Bishops and clerics gather to discuss details of the translation, the audience having witnessed the failure of the fundamentalist Puritans with a stop-off in Yorkshire.

In a clever twist, conscience-wrestling later translator Bishop of Ely Lancelot Andrewes (Oliver Ford Davies) comes face to face with the ghost of Tyndale to chew the fat over the translation - with the brilliance of the translation of the King James version emphasised in their discussion of the word 'surface', which becomes 'face', implying 'mirror', as in God's face reflected in his creation...

Written On The Heart runs until March 10. For tickets visit www.rsc.org.uk