CC Theatre department to present “Dulcitius”

The Clarendon College Theatre Department will present its fall production next week with the one-act Dulcitius.  Performances are Thursday, November 17 at 7 p.m. and Sunday, November 20 at 3 p.m.  Admission is free.

Dulcitius is a medieval play by Hrotsvit of Gandersheim, a 10^th century German nun and the world’s first female playwright. Her plays were never performed in her own time, and the earliest confirmed productions of Hrotsvit’s plays was more than 800 years after her death.

Dulcitius tells the story of three young women who are tried by the Roman emperor, convicted, and martyred for their faith. During the course of the play, a governor and a count attempt to seduce and ridicule the young women, but their efforts to cause the women sin and shame are repelled by divine intervention. Though the women meet an untimely end, the play confirms that their purity is realized, and they remain shining behavioral models for fighting an oppressive regime.

The productions are the work of the fall semester’s Introduction to Theater students and involve two separate casts and crews. The casts and crews include baseball, basketball, softball, and volleyball players; members of the meat and livestock judging teams; members of the rodeo team; nursing students; Clarendon locals; and members of the Clarendon College Theatre Department.