How a vanishing, pre-internet south London and a chance conversation about a comatose patient inspired Mark Bastin to write To Have and To Hold
For me, To Have and To Hold is the realisation of a long-held ambition. I’d wanted for some time to write a piece which captured the world my parents came from. A working class south London long before the internet, a world of pubs, going to the pictures and meeting people at the local palais. I was also keen to write a love story, but one from the viewpoint of a life lived, as opposed to the heady rush of the first few months or years.
The idea for the play was eventually suggested by my partner’s aunt, who at the time was one of a team of three home-carers looking after an elderly woman who had for some months been in a comatose state. She remarked on how loving the woman’s husband was, how caring, which was ironic in a way given the terrible life she’d led him when she was well. I’m not sure why, but her comment stayed with me. Why was he so caring, I wondered? Was it that he loved her unequivocally? Or, given her many infidelities, did he finally have her all to himself? Was his caring for her in some way a form of revenge?
For me, To Have and To Hold is the realisation of a long-held ambition. I’d wanted for some time to write a piece which captured the world my parents came from. A working class south London long before the internet, a world of pubs, going to the pictures and meeting people at the local palais. I was also keen to write a love story, but one from the viewpoint of a life lived, as opposed to the heady rush of the first few months or years.
The idea for the play was eventually suggested by my partner’s aunt, who at the time was one of a team of three home-carers looking after an elderly woman who had for some months been in a comatose state. She remarked on how loving the woman’s husband was, how caring, which was ironic in a way given the terrible life she’d led him when she was well. I’m not sure why, but her comment stayed with me. Why was he so caring, I wondered? Was it that he loved her unequivocally? Or, given her many infidelities, did he finally have her all to himself? Was his caring for her in some way a form of revenge?