Booking and details
Dates & TicketsDates Sat, Feb 8 at 3:30pm
Venue Folger Library
Tickets Free, Registration Required
Duration 90 minutes
Workshop and Community Read
Join Whose Democracy? Artist Fellow Camille Simone Thomas for a workshop and community read of her speculative historical fiction play Sweetblood, set in 1727 Jamaica. Participants will learn about the rare materials that inform Camille’s work, as well as how she incorporates archival research into her writing process.
Throughout the program, discussion will explore colonialism as a power play, form of social climbing, and mechanism for greed, as well as how we can critique this history from a modern viewpoint.
About the Artist
Camille Simone Thomas
Camille Simone Thomas is a 5th generation Detroiter through her father’s side and a first generation Jamaican through her mothers. It’s important for her to name this because her work most often interrogates cultural legacies, familial healing, spirituality + ancestral wisdom, and the general kicking and screaming of how Black folks get free despite the oppressive forces of colonialism, capitalism, and white supremacy. Her plays have been workshopped and performed at The Connelly Theatre, New York Theatre Workshop, Playwrights Horizons, Sanguine Theatre Company, Blackboard Playwriting series, Lime Arts Theatre company, American Slavery Project, The Obie Award-winning Harlem9 and Detroit Public Theatre Company, Dixon Place, Workshop Theatre, Barter Theatre Company, The National Women’s Theatre Festival, The Brick, and more!
About the Play
Sweetblood follows three free Maroon women in 1727 Jamaica as they struggle to thrive in a world on the brink of the sugar revolution and the horrors of chattel slavery. These women must decide what they are willing to do to survive the encroaching British invasion of their land, how far they are willing to go to fight the disease of colonialism, and what it really means to be a revolutionary. Weaving together the intersecting themes of Blackness and womanhood, resistance, and the indomitable spirit of a people, Sweetblood invites audiences to reflect on how we withstand the oppressive forces of history.
Content transparency
Sweetblood includes potentially sensitive subjects. Expand below for a full list of content.
- Enslavement
- Colonialism
- Racist language
About Folger Institute
The Folger Institute is a center for early modern research at the Folger Shakespeare Library that brings public audiences together with researchers to explore the cultures and legacies of the early modern world. Learn more.
You may also like
Cocktails and Conversation with Luis Carazo
Mixology: Game Night
See what our Artist Fellows are researching
Drinking with Shakespeare: Early Modern Tavern Tokens
Artistic Fellow Leah Hampton showcases the Folger’s collection of Early Modern bar tokens
There's the Short and the Long 'ſ/f'
Artistic Fellow Krysten Fikes explores the long ‘s’ in the context of her project on Black American Ebonics and Elizabethan English.
Flamboyant Plants
Artistic Research Fellow Amy Reid explores the queer history and meaning of plants using the Folger collection in an audiovisual project.
Mariam Rising: A Short Closet Play by Jay Eddy
Folger artistic fellow Jay Eddy presents a closet play combining early modern drama with current events.