Ride a Blue Horse
Aurand Harris
Paperback
(Anchorage Pr, June 1, 1986)
Play script by Aurand Harris. A wonderfully theatrical play about a boy who is different instead of marbles, he has poems in his pockets. Through him one glimpses every gifted child, and the special needs of every one in his special world. A cultural view of American traditions 1849-1916. Period Costumes. CAST: 17 roles plus extras (5F, 8M, 4+ either) which can be played by as few as 3F, 6M.A comedy, exciting, appealing, touching, and also biographically true of the Indiana boy, James Whitcomb Riley, the famous early American poet. Beginning on his 75th birthday, proclaimed a national day of celebration buy President Woodrow Wilson, the poet recalls his youth--the merry-go-roung at the country fair; the old swimming hole; the painful dunce cap at the cruel village school; the bonfires of Halloween; and unforgettable little Orphan Annie; the Underground Railroad and tehe horror of the Civil War and the medicine show where his poems first won public applause. Brimful of music (background) and spectacle, Ride a Blue Horse shows a gifted child coping with a universal problem that of being different.