When there are war stories involving soldiers and women, more often than not the sexes are delineated. Stories of western female soldiers engaging with women of an indigenous population are not so common, but the cultural ramifications have a long-lasting impact.
Written by Bruntwood Prize winner Laura Stevens and directed by Charlotte Peters, By My Strength is a rich play, densely packed with layers of meaning, as well as plenty of interwoven anecdotes that reveal what goes through the heart and mind of a young female British soldier. With a tour de force performance by Larner Wallace-Taylor, this one-woman show has all the ingredients of an irresistible tale.
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Initially working in an estate agents after leaving school, Wallace-Taylor's 'Kat Crawford' is drawn to a life in the Armed Forces where every decision has meaning, every action has purpose.The issue of relationships is raised early on, as well as the public's perception of the 'morality' of being a soldier. Negativity from some quarters such as one example with a checkout till operator only reminds Crawford what she doesn't want out of life. In public, when wearing an army T-shirt, people assume it belongs to her boyfriend.
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Crawford's long-distance relationship with her boyfriend Isaac, (which wasn't planned as it began just before she joined the Forces) has its rough and smooth periods. Initially, efforts are made to be in contact with weekly phone calls, but over time the cracks begin to appear. In the case of Isaac, he looks for signs that being stationed in Helmand Province has changed her (which is true to a point), but finds it hard to listen to her talk about her job, especially the sense of satisfaction she derives from it.
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Living in a tent with four other male soldiers, space is of paramount importance to Crawford. While some behaviour is irksome such as other soldiers' belongings encrouching on her personal space, for the most part there is a camaraderie that extends from the private quarters to the public domain. As a sniper, Crawford is in charge of a very powerful hi-tech weapon and provides cover for the other soldiers who go out on patrol. As a woman she's not often put in a situation where she's in close proximity to the Taliban. It's bad enough for male soldiers who are captured, but for women... Let's just say it has crossed her mind from time to time...
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The opportunity to meet and talk with children and the general public in Helmand is something Crawford and the other soldiers like to do – a chance to feel like a person first and a uniform second, to make a connection with people. For Crawford, it allows her to also talk to the women there, to assauge their fears and show them that women can be anything they want to be. Submissiveness isn't the only way to live. While the Afghan men won't necessarily talk to Crawford, they are certainly curious and it's important to her that they see her peers in public treating her with respect, as an equal – a far cry from the status of their own women.
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There's so much more that the show touches on, but where it really excels is the details of the storytelling. Crawford as a character may not speak in RP or have a higher education, but she is observant – she picks up on details, no matter how small and she can articulate what she's feeling. Her extended story about the ambush and her first up-close kill is poignant, and in its own way poetic and rich with detail. Her bearing during and following this baptism of fire engenders an even greater respect from her comrades.
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Through the direction of Peters, the writing of Stevens and the stellar performance of Wallace-Taylor, we're privy to a piece of compelling theatre, a portrait of a real flesh-and-blood character who like the rest of us, struggles to make sense of life but tries to make a difference.
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© Michael Davis 2016
By My Strength runs at the Women And War Festival which runs at the So & So Arts Club until 31st July 2016.
Kat Crawford is a soldier. “You’re a freak,” some people tell her. It’s not something girls do. “You’re a murderer” she gets from some folk. She doesn’t usually go out in uniform and, as she’s telling all this, she gradually puts it on, and then her kit. She tries to remember why she wanted to join the army and goes on talking about life in the service, about being at war in Afghanistan.
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Standing in the queue at Tesco’s, she’d thought how shit was life stuck on the checkout. The estate agent receptionist job she got was better but not one interesting thing happened while she was there. When they asked would she like to train and qualify to be an agent, she decided she needed to do something that really mattered. She’s thought about the army, even visited a recruiting office to check things out.
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She fantasised once about declaring independence and setting up her own country: Crawfordstan. There would be equal share for everyone, a sort of communism, it would have a government and a constitution and an army to defend it: “I will make you safe by my own strength" was the Crawford family’s motto she discovered.
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That you sign up to kill or be killed doesn’t seem to have been part of her thinking. There is a graphic physical sequence of violent psychological and assault training but she says you don’t think about killing people or dying, though she does think about the possibility of rape.
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That’s obviously not in her mind when she’s sharing a tent with six blokes, blokes who encroach on her space with their stuff and draw cocks all over her things.
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It’s her gun though that she sleeps with. She’s a first class markswoman and loves her weaponry, especially her big gun with its 35lb shells and 17km range: that ‘s a thing of beauty.
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This is a fascinating piece of writing. It feels totally honest: one woman’s view of life in the military that in 80 minutes takes the audience to Afghanistan and back again. She is spirited and caring, misses her late grandad (“he was lovely but a racist,” pity about that but brought up with old attitudes). A little naive perhaps but interestingly she wonders whether the person who designed her gun just thought about making the mechanism work well or designed it to make it a more efficient killer.
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Larner Wallace-Taylor makes Kat so lively and engaging that this 80-minute play seems soon over, though it has packed a lot in. It is a marvellously sustained performance which Charlotte Peters' production supports with subtle lighting changes and a music and sound design by Tom Sayers. It is a fluid production that constantly refocuses attention and always sustains interest.
By My Strength is part of the Women and War Festival and performance times vary from day to day and may be at 1PM, 3PM, 7PM & 9PM in the So and So Theatre Space.