Dibs

On Friday, Dibs! reported on dozens of new libraries being built in rural Afghanistan. Now the San Francisco Chronicle notes that Afghanis in the town of Herat, freed from years of shariah law, are getting back into the habit of reading … Shakespeare. At a performance recently as hundreds watched, “five women took off their veils. Ripples went through the crowd. Five years ago, under Taliban rule, Herat’s women could scarcely leave their houses.” But now, the Chronicle reports, a troupe of actors was presenting Love’s Labour’s Lost in the Dari language, “suitably filled with witty Dari couplets, humor and heartache…. In the five years that the Taliban ruled Herat, they whitewashed paintings, banned music and dancing,” as bullets flew. In this localized version of the play, “the king of Herat and his three best friends sign a pact to dedicate their lives to study for three years, with little food and sleep and no contact with women. As they sign it, however, they remember that the princess of Kabul is due to arrive that day. Despite their contract, the king and his friends fall in love with the princess and her companions…. During the performance, there are times when the women’s scarves come off their heads, an act that would have been punishable by beating under the Taliban. During the singing and dancing scene, the men hold the women’s hands and go without their shirts, another punishable offense.”