The Documentary Podcast Folgen

Damon Galgut’s 2021 Booker Prize-winning novel, The Promise, chronicles the slow decline of a white family on a farm outside Pretoria, South Africa, and the ripple effects of a deathbed promise – made but not kept – to give the family’s Black housekeeper ownership of the small house in which she lives. Now, the stage adaptation of The Promise, written by Galgut and director Sylvaine Strike, is being readied to premiere at the Star Theatre, at the Homecoming Centre in Cape Town.But how does a text so praised for its formal inventiveness – the narrative voice shifting from third to first person, and inhabiting multiple interior lives, sometimes within a single paragraph – get translated for the theatre and brought to life?Writer Bongani Kona goes behind the curtain to watch the rehearsal process unfold. We trace Galgut’s journey from the play’s conception, and follow the director and cast as they workshop scenes, experiment with sound and action, and navigate the unusual set design – all in the build-up to opening night. The Promise on stage is directed by Sylvaine Strike with stage adaptation by Damon Galgut and Sylvaine Strike. Original music composition by Charl-Johan Lingenfelder.Presenter: Bongani Kona Produced by Catherine Boulle and Bongani Kona A Falling Tree production for the BBC World Service

The BBC’s Mishal Husain is joined by a panel of guests to discuss what happens when the Israel Gaza war ends. On the panel are Jeremy Bowen, BBC International Editor; Daniel Levy, director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at the European Council on Foreign Relations; Lord Ricketts, former chair of the UK’s intelligence committee under Tony Blair and former national security adviser to David Cameron, former national security advisor and chair of the Joint Intelligence Committee; Ghada Karmi, Palestinian academic and author and joining from Washington Evelyn Farkas, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for President Obama.

The war in the Middle East between Hamas and Israel continues to cost many lives. It is also increasing tensions and anger around the world.Hundreds of thousands of people have taken part in protest marches; there are reports of a rise in Islamophobia and antisemitism in some countries; and an increase in hate crimes.We hear from Muslims and Jews living in the United States and Europe. Some of our Jewish guests say they would feel safer in Israel and the war, than in the country where they currently live.“I don’t order anything, not an Uber, not a taxi, in my real name anymore,” says 20-year-old student Deborah Kogan, who lives in Berlin. “Not because I’m a Jewish activist, but also because my name sounds very Jewish, especially in Germany. So I’m afraid to get recognised as Jewish.”Host James Reynolds also hears about the impact of Islamophobia on three Muslims living in Germany and the United States. They talk of how some people perceive them with suspicion, associate them with Hamas and call them a terrorist.“I’m on a campus that an Arab-Muslim student experienced a hit and run and was told ‘F you and your people’, says Arab American University Lecturer Maytha Alhassen in California. “He was wearing a shirt that said in Arabic, Damascus. So that’s terrifying.”A co-production between the BBC OS team and Boffin Media.