Agnes of God: A Drama

Solid drama that takes a 'murder mystery' involving a newborn and its conception through all the expected and not so expected paces you'd assume of a convent setting. It didn't quite sell the miraculous turn for me, or rather the desperately held denial of the nun, but the human tragedy was extremely well told and acted. The inclusion of hypnotism says a lot about when the play was authored, and it's very dated in the views on psychology - so you have to take it for what seemed plausible in the 70s.

An audio production of the play. When a baby is found strangled with its own umbilical cord in the room of Agnes a young nun at a local convent, a psychiatrist who is also a lapsed Catholic, is called in to determine whether Agnes is criminally responsible. As the psychiatrist interviews both the Mother Superior and Agnes repeatedly to get to the bottom of what happened that night she will be forced to grapple with issues of faith and the possibility of miracles.

All three actresses in this production are powerhouses and make all of the emotions palpable to the listener. Compelling not only as a mystery but as a character study.

This is a very powerful play about the clash between fact and faith.

Dr. Martha Livingstone is a court appointed psychiatrist sent to discover what happend when an infant born to a young nun is found strangled. Her examination of Sister Agnes and conversations with Mother Miriam spark a debate on miracles and the art of what is possible with faith.

The fascinating confrontation between unbroken faith and atheism; a battle of beliefs which will leave you wanting more.

It considers, or pretends to consider, some of the most basic questions of human morality and treats them on the simple, lightweight and foreseable level of Eleanor H Porter's Pollyana. Agnes of God offers little besides its jury-rigged suspense. Despite all the anguished huffing and puffing, there isn't a single authentic moment in it, and all you're left with in the end is the fading memory of two overscaled characters.