Tidings Brought To Mary, Dir. Peter Dobbins

Presented by the Storm Theatre and Blackfriars Repertory Theatre at the Paradise Factory, New York, March 2009.

Paul Claudel (6 August 1868 – 23 February 1955) was a French poet, dramatist and diplomat, and the younger brother of the sculptor Camille Claudel. He was most famous for his verse dramas, which often convey his devout Catholic faith.

Claudel was always a controversial figure during his lifetime, and remains so today. His devout Catholicism and his right-wing political views, both unfashionable stances among many of his intellectual peers, made him, and continue to make him, unpopular in many circles.

The most famous of his plays are Le Partage de Midi ("The Break of Noon", 1906), L'Annonce Faite a Marie ("The Tidings Brought to Mary", 1910) focusing on the themes of sacrifice, oblation and sanctification through the tale of a young medieval French peasant woman who contracts leprosy, and Le Soulier de Satin ("The Satin Slipper", 1931), his deepest exploration of human and divine love and longing set in the Spanish empire of the siglo de oro,