Hakawatis exemplifies Modernist storytelling and theater in one of the most traditional settings of the theater industry (The Shakespeare Globe Theater). The story of Hakawatis takes One Thousand and One Nights and reinvents these traditional stories by placing the power of narrator and narrative in the hands of female writers, directors and actors. 

The production is a story about multiple imprisoned women. These characters use storytelling as not only a means of distraction, but also as a tool that leads to their escape. As a result, these women take back control of their personal life narratives.

As one listens to the women perform their tales, it is easy to forget the context of these women being imprisoned. Just as the characters use storytelling to forget about their dire setting, the audience too easily forgets about the context of the show as well. The show’s meta approach of telling stories within stories, breaking down the various types of story, and questioning the legitimacy of “editing” one’s story all work to ask the audience to evaluate the power of storytelling within their own life. 

Woolf writes in Mrs. Dalloway, “It is a thousand pities never to say what one feels.” Hakawatis gives its female protagonists an opportunity to “say what they feel” through the art of storytelling. Instead of feeling pity for these characters, the audience feels respect for these characters reattaining their agency. 

Following the production, I had the fortune of listing to a Q&A with some of the productions lead creatives, including the director and writer, and I most appreciated their intent to use Shakespeare (whose plays do not feature diverse perspectives) as a means to prop up voices who are not often given a platform to tell their story (in this case, women writers and Arabic stories).