Chris Eldon Lee reviews ‘Eglantyne’, which is at Ludlow Assembly Rooms on Sunday 14th June.
She was a very remarkable woman, Eglantyne Jebb. She was one of Shropshire’s rare breed of indomitable, pioneering, ‘Victorian’ women such as Agnes Hunt and, later, Hilda Murrell who put purpose before self in order to do good for others.
This comes across loud and clear in Anne Chamberlain’s one-woman show, “Eglantyne” which is currently being performed in the county of Jebb’s birth.
It’s a solidly researched show which not only charts her struggle to found the hugely respected international charity ‘Save The Children’, but also unveils a few of her secrets too.
Working with Jebb’s letters, speeches and diaries – and her own inquiries and instincts – Anne Chamberlain presents a measured and somewhat mannered, starched-collar account of this correct, upstanding lady. We learn – almost as if attending a biographical lecture – about her realisation that children all over Europe were starving to death following the punishing political settlements following World War One; and how, after a vision of Jesus, she jolly well did something about it.
The play opens in April 1919 with Jebb being arrested for pamphleting Trafalgar Square – which only sharpens her resolve – and charts her unfaltering drive towards the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, which in turn became the United Nations Convention of today.
It’s an impressive story with tantalising vignettes of the breakthroughs along the way. Her letter to George Bernard Shaw elicited cash and concern. “I have no enemies under the age of 7,” he publicly affirmed.
A hard won audience with the Pope (who, we hear, was running twenty minutes late) resulted in a two and a half hour discussion and 25 thousand pounds of Vatican money; their first donation to a non-Catholic cause.
She campaigned with the Arctic explorer Nansen, suffered undercover press scrutiny, and produced the first ever fund-raising propaganda film – decades before ‘Live Aid’ – which relived 7 million starving Russians
But Anne Chamberlain also lets us peek into Eglantyne’s private life; her shameless passion for her close friend Margaret who she wanted to marry against all the convention of the time; and her unavoidable association with Spiritualism when she starts to hear – and be guided by – her late mentor, Henry Pilkington. The play deals with both issues in an impartial, matter of fact way. I loved the quip that Arthur Conan Doyle – a leading spiritualist of his day – was a near neighbour. It was almost as if she was expecting her visitations.
Anne Chamberlain is a New Zealander who pulls parallels between her own life and Eglantyne’s to anchor her interest. They both grew up on farms and both loved, and lost, soul mates called Marcus. So there’s very much a personal thread to all this too. Chamberlain flips between the two, perhaps over-relying on her natural accent to differentiate.
It’s a fascinating hour or more – a touch studious at times, but full of fascination for those who like to consider themselves to be proud Salopians.
If she were alive today, Eglantyne Jebb would be a prime candidate for the Queen’s Birthday Honours List.