'The window for change - real change I mean - will close. It's already closing. Very soon it will be shut, and we shan't be able to get it open again.'

1948, Shropshire: the winter is freezing, austerity is biting and Iris Elcock, GP, socialist and Labour Party councillor, is working tirelessly to implement Nye Bevan's National Health Service Act and its revolutionary promise of free healthcare for all.

At home she is a mother, and wife to a fellow GP, an ex-Navy man scarred by the war. But a chance meeting with George Blythe, a local boy who has made it to Hollywood, turns her quiet, certain world upside down.

A story of political and private passions, Lucy Kirkwood's play The Human Body was first performed at the Donmar Warehouse, London, in 2024, directed by Michael Longhurst and Ann Yee, and starring Keeley Hawes and Jack Davenport.

'Kirkwood is the most rewarding dramatist of her generation' Independent

About the Author

Lucy Kirkwood's other plays include Rapture, Maryland, The Welkin, Mosquitoes, The Children, Chimerica (winner of the Olivier Award for Best New Play, the Evening Standard Best Play Award, the Critics' Circle Best New Play Award, and the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize), NSFW and it felt empty when the heart went at first but it is alright now.

Reviews

'A fabulously rich piece of writing'

* Independent *

'Kirkwood's script crackles with unspoken desires, disappointments, yearning and some fantastic humour... deftly weaves bigger politics with the politics of a marriage and affair'

* Guardian *

'Delicate and poignant... has its author's characteristic intelligence and wit, the dialogue crammed with texture and vivacity'

* The Stage *

'Vivid and engrossing... Kirkwood is such a wonderful writer'

* WhatsOnStage *

'The golden age of cinema meets theatre in this thoroughly enjoyable play, sprinkled with cracking comedic one-liners'

* Theatre Weekly *

'A terrific, grown-up and engrossing history play full of Coward-esque dry wit'

* TheatreCat *

'Glorious... an engrossing romance... a theatre-cinema hybrid that blends post-war Hollywood glamour with the British political landscape... a celebration of the founding principles of the NHS and those who campaigned to make it happen... great emotional impact'

* Reviews Hub *

'Potent... blazes with emotion'

* iNews *

'Thrilling... poignant and surprising... Kirkwood crafts a complicated protagonist who's stuck being a woman while her ambition beckons her... compelling and thoroughly riveting'

* Broadway World *

'Ambitious, intelligent and frequently funny... scalpel-sharp'

* London Theatre *

'Pure theatrical magic... mesmerising and moving... I loved every single thing about this gorgeous show... The Human Body is everything I want theatre to be and more'

* All That Dazzles *



Book Information
ISBN 9781839043260
Author Lucy Kirkwood
Format Paperback
Page Count 128
Imprint Nick Hern Books
Publisher Nick Hern Books
Weight(grams) 142g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 129mm * 9mm