Diary of a Madman Published Tuesday 28 May 2013 at 10:46 by Susie Wild Based on a short story by Nikolai Gogol, Robert Bowman’s one-man show charts the unravelling of 40-something civil servant Poprishchin in 1830s Russia. Sharpening pencils for His Excellency, he is schoolboy impish when describing the beautiful object of his affection: “Her dress was white like a swan, and when she looked at me it was like the sun shining - I swear it.” Robert Bowman in Diary of a Madman Photo: Katy Stephenson First performed in Chapter in 2011 as a development piece funded by the Arts Council of Wales, Diary of a Madman was created using the Michael Chekhov Technique and sees Poprishchin move down a scale of emotions from naively quixotic through a spat of psychosis giggles - can dogs write? Could this handwriting be described as ‘doggy’? Could he be the next King of Spain? - to a dark and surreal place. Illness meant that Bowman was croaky and performing u...
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