Born to Be King

The Man Born to Be King is a play written by the late British author Dorothy Sayers, a friend and contemporary of C.S. Lewis. It was written to be performed over radio. I’m reading it for the first time and enjoying how she portrays the various characters right down to their individual personalities and accents. In England, before public television, people’s accents identified how educated they were along with where they were from. The disciples’ accents were different from the priests and scribes. And the Roman soldiers’ accents were different from their leaders, although all the dialogue was in English. The play includes her stage directions as well so the actors knew when to portray different emotions throughout the scenes. Though no one knows all the details of what happened, reading her play made me thankful again our King Jesus rules with mercy, justice and sacrificial loving care for those he rules, not like this world’s leaders and politicians.