Vitality & joy of life are the keynotes to this new translation of the 16th century Cornish language play, Beunans Meriasek. In it, Camborne's noble patron saint, Meriasek, is sent to school, refuses marriage & all worldly considerations, embarking instead on a priestly career of such piety that it ends in a bishopric of immense wealth and grandeur of the kind that he had studiously worked to avoid all his life.
Meanwhile in Rome, eight centuries earlier, the pagan emperor Constantine is stricken with leprosy, only to be cured by the outlawed Christian pope, Silvester, resulting in the Christian conversion of an empire. Black masses, slain dragons and the Duke of Cornwall goes to war in two further plays.
This new verse translation was rehearsed & performed at St Paul's church, Truro, in February 1986 by a medieval mixture of amateur, professional & student actors.
Myrna Combellack was Academic Secretary at the Institute of Cornish Studies (Univ of Exeter & Cornwall CC) from 1972 to 1990.
