Joseph ~ A New Verse Musical

SMSmith announces the digital publication (PDF)  of

Joseph: Down in Memphis Town
A Verse Musical in Two Acts

which can be read for free at:

      https://www.zanthymhouse.ca/musicals-plays/joseph-down-in-memphis-town/

Background: JOSEPH almost wrote itself 25 years ago. I began writing it on 25 May 1994 and it was essentially completed about 3 weeks later on 16 June. Of course, Joseph has been tweaked many times over 25 years, especially intensively during January and February 2019 as I prepared it for digital (PDF) publication.

I have always been fascinated by Old Testament stories, probably stemming from some beautifully illustrated Bible stories that our mother would read to us (six children) as she sat in her unique red chair—a chair that sat beside the fireplace in the  craftsman ranch house that our father's grandparents had built (1915-16) on land homesteaded in 1900 in Southern Alberta.

Then as a teenager and young adult, I sought out and bought the following books to learn more about the Old Testament stories:

1. The Book of Jasher. Pub. by J. H. Parry & Company, 1887.
2. The Legends of the Jews, Vols. I-VII. Louis Ginzberg, Trans. by Henrietta Szold, 1968.
3. Josephus: Complete Works. Trans. by William Whiston, 1960.
4. The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Edited by James H. Charlesworth, 1983.

After nearly 25 years of periodic reading and rereading these accounts, the idea for Joseph, A Verse Musical, was born.

The Research Reference pages at 186-195 of the script detail the numerous events that are portrayed in the oft-amusing, yet moving accounts of Joseph's life in Egypt from his arrival at age 17 to his ascension to power and marriage to Asenath at age 30.