“I’m Talking About Jerusalem”

1960 Wesker, Arnold (1932-2016). “I’m Talking About Jerusalem.” The Wesker Trilogy Chicken Soup with Barley Roots I’m Talking About Jerusalem. Three Plays by Arnold Wesker (London: Jonathan Cape, 1960). U.S. ed. (New York: Random House, 1960), 153-225. Rpt. in The Plays of Arnold Wesker. Volume 1 The Kitchen Chicken Soup with Barley Roots I’m Talking About Jerusalem Chips with Everything (New York: Harper & Row, 1976), 225-297; and in Plays: 1 The Wesker Trilogy Chicken Soup with Barley Roots I’m Talking About Jerusalem London: Methuen, 2001), 159-234, with an Introduction to the trilogy by Wesker on ix-xxvii, but with only one paragraph on I’m Talking About Jerusalem on xxvi. The three plays were first performed as a trilogy at the Royal Court Theatre June 7, June 28, and July 27, 1960 the first two having been first performed in 1958 and 1959 at the Belgrade Theatre in Coventry. He wrote a film script entitled Trilogy, which he says is “a fresh work. The Trilogy revisited. A fourth script rather than an adaption of the three plays” (xxvii). The film has not been made.

Based on the actual experience of Wesker’s sister and brother-in-law, the play describes the attempt to create a small rural community based on socialist ideals.