The Snow Queen

The Snow Queen

A winter’s tale

Shattered Mirror is a cruel work of a malicious troll. In “The Snow Queen” it reflects the surrounding world in such a way as to show only what is bad and ugly. As it shattered, its shards fell to the ground, injuring people and penetrating their hearts and eyes. One of the victims was a boy who was one of the two main characters of H.Ch. Andersen’s tale – Kai. A winter’s tale, however, is only a pretext to face other topics, as the story is based on the metaphor of winter and ice as emotional coldness, emotional insufficiency combined with the blurring of ethical boundaries, the inability to enjoy and affirm life, and overwhelming sadness. Winter, however, like these states, is something immanently inscribed in our experience. That is why the creators pose a question in the performance that is seemingly philosophical, yet close to life – and painful for a child audience: what is the nature of suffering, sadness and evil? At the same time creators try to confront this difficult topic and find a way to tell it in a children’s theater.

How effectively can you resist evil, work through sadness and anger, and find joy? Let’s learn together the way to free ourselves from the harmful effects of the “broken mirror”. The author of the text, inspired by the work of Andersen, and the creator of the performance is Beniamin Bukowski, a young playwright and theater director, winner of several literary competitions, incl. Gdynia Drama Award 2015, whose texts were printed, among others monthly “Dialog”.