Apprehending the Canadian Landscape: A Profile of Playwright Leslie Hamson

• Published in: Canadian Theatre Review
• Main Author: Flather, Patti
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: University of Toronto Press Inc. (UTPress) 1992
• Subjects: Visual Arts and Performing Arts; tlingit; Whitehorse; Yukon
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.3138/ctr.73.011; https://ctr.utpjournals.press/doi/pdf/10.3138/ctr.73.011

Playwright Leslie Hamson is sitting down to discuss her work in her cozy, cluttered Whitehorse home when her telephone rings. She takes the call – it’s someone helping her with spellings of Tlingit Indian words for the final draft of Last Rites. Set mainly in a trapper’s cabin in the Yukon bush, it’s the story of a dying woman coming to terms with the unfinished business in her life. The story had audiences in tears during its five-night run in Whitehorse in June. Produced by Nakai Theatre Ensemble and directed by Montrealer Svetlana Zylin, it was the first Yukon play featured at the new 420-seat Yukon Arts Centre in the Yukon capital.