To remember is to descend into the deepest caverns of failure and sorrow

The only one really remembered in Jan Wolkers' novel 'The Peach of Immortality' is former resistance fighter Ben Ruwiel. On 5 May 1980 in Amsterdam, the entry of the Canadians from 35 years earlier was celebrated. The crowds, not far from where Ben lives, fill him with disgust. It is unreal. People, wrapped up by welfare society, have no idea what the liberation really was and what preceded it. Ben has never been able to find his bearings after the war, nor has his wife and fellow resistance fighter Corrie, who lies, probably daily, lazily in her bed.

When I saw announced that Stichting Swarte Kunst would come up with a theatrical adaptation of Wolkers' novel, I was surprised. Theatre-maker Rieks Swarte and Jan Wolkers: these are completely different worlds. Swarte's performances, in which all kinds of other means besides acting have a place, such as puppetry, visual art and object theatre, have sometimes been raptly described as 'toy performances. Wolkers' baroque grimness, his deeply empathic portrayal of what goes on from minute to minute in Ben Ruwiel's head, the juicily formulated sorrow, what would survive of this in Swartes' light, naive style, in which he refreshingly steps out of the story each time, with the message: it's not all real, it's only a game, don't have the illusion that you can be dragged into this drama.

Rieks Swarte regularly enters the stage to place furniture or bring the dog Snoet to life like a puppeteer. He is emphatically filming his drawings and models, so that Ben Ruwiel's wanderings through houses and streets are projected on the backdrop. They are sketchy drawings, certainly not intended to accurately represent reality. The message is no more than: this is roughly how it was. Accompanying sounds, the puddling of urine, or the spinning of a bicycle wheel after Ben's corncock and Corrie's actual lover Henk has been shot by the Germans, are imitated by a Geräuschmacher in a way that is often funny, hidden from no one.

These means make the performance sparkling, a pleasure to enjoy in detail, but they also put things into perspective. Might that not get in the way of Wolkers' intense narrative style?

At first, this thought gets in my way. Actor Ali Çifteci portrays Ben Ruwiel lightly and endearingly. The wide-eyed fatalism with which Ben Ruwiel drags himself through the day in Wolkers' novel is not seen in Çifteci's friendly appearance. When the district nurse comes, he does have an eye for her feminine beauty, but the abundant horniness of Wolkers' dilapidated hero is missing.

Yet Çifteci evokes a lot of sympathy, and the further that 5th May 1980 progresses, the more I am drawn into the drama that this man has been carrying around all alone, for 35 years, with this day as proof of his ultimate loneliness. The Wolkers/Swarte combination turns out to work surprisingly well. Along the diversions of naive playfulness, 'The Peach of Immortality' pulls you fully into Ben Ruwiel's personal drama.

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The gulf between Ben and the fake entry, the misunderstanding of those around him, Ben's isolation: slowly it becomes clear that real remembrance is not that superficial celebration, but something that can only take place in solitude. To commemorate is to descend into the deepest caverns of failure and grief, an area deep inside you that no one else can reach. Ben wanders weightlessly through the streets where it all happened in the war and where 35 years ago, the moment when the masses ran off with the fruits of resistance, the meaning of his life disappeared. That sense of having vanished imposes itself strongly on me in Swarte's performance. Where Wolkers arouses my poignancy and sympathy by dragging me through a morbid swamp with humour, Swarte Art makes you feel the loneliness in a light, comforting way. You float along with the protagonist through the streets where there is only a cold echo of who and what was there during the war.

Meanwhile, Çifteci gets wonderful counterpoint from Margje Wittermans. She plays all the other characters. The nurse, the neighbour, a Canadian, an attendant, a passer-by, a shopkeeper, Wittermans plays them all. Her strength is that she does not turn them into characters, but steps into them unobtrusively and naturally and then steps out again. With all of them, she manages to precisely strike a chord that they are involved with the tragic old man, but at the same time remain unreachable for him.

What moves me in Çifteci's play is how underneath Ben Ruwiel's disillusionedness, a huge reservoir of love remains palpable, love he has nowhere to express. He goes out to buy a new moped for Corrie and for the dying dog Snoet he buys tripe, even though the latter will hardly have the energy left to eat it, let alone enjoy it. Ben's action is empty, empty, powerless, but it is love.

Swarte's version of 'The Peach of Immortality', as sketchy and unpolished as it is, is a performance worked out in detail. The music, the sounds, the film footage, the story excellently reworked into theatrical text: everything works together to carry you through all the ugliness, sadness and misunderstanding to a hushed, utterly desolate end, and to feel peace with it.

See also Thea Derks on this performance: https://cultureelpersbureau.nl//2015/05/less-is-more

PLAYLIST:

Di 5 to Sat 9 May & di 12 to Sat 16 May (premiere Wed 13 May)

Toneelschuur Haarlem 023-5173910 toneelschuur.nl Di 19 May Stadsschouwburg Utrecht Utrecht 030-2302023 ssbu.nl

Season 2015-2016

Fri 2 Oct De Meervaart Amsterdam 0900-4107777 meervaart.nl

Za 3 Oct Schouwburg Kunstmin Dordrecht 078-6397979 kunstmin.nl

Do 8 Oct Schouwburg De Meerse Hoofddorp 023-5563707 demeerse.nl

Za 10 Oct Natlab Eindhoven 040-2946848 natlab.nl

Di 13 Oct Theater aan het Spui The Hague 070-3465272 theateraanhetspui.nl

Wed 14 Oct Grand Theatre Groningen 050-3140550 grandtheatregroningen.nl

Do 15 Oct Groene Engel Oss 0412-405504 groene-engel.nl

Fri 16 Oct De Cirkel Heemskerk decirkelheemskerk.nl

Za 17 Oct De Harmonie Leeuwarden 058-2330233 harmonie.nl

Wed 21 Oct Schouwburg Arnhem Arnhem 026-4437343 mssa.nl