Text 1: The week our school play came together, by Kian Morris

An original contemporary blog.

Our first rehearsal took place in the English classroom. We sat around the tables, read the whole play aloud and highlighted every scene in which we appeared. For the next two weeks, we tested each other on our lines at lunchtime. After school, we rehearsed in the hall, where our teacher stopped us whenever an entrance was late and made us repeat it.

Three days before the performance, we were allowed onto the stage. Strips of yellow tape showed us where to stand. This helped because the bright lights made it difficult to see the edge of the stage. A painted doorway caused another problem: it left so little space that two actors collided during an entrance. The stage crew moved it before the dress rehearsal.

I still forgot one of my cues during that final rehearsal, but the actor beside me quietly whispered the first word of my line. On the night itself, every entrance was on time and nobody needed help with their words.

Text 2: Rehearsing for the school entertainment

A newly written diary extract set in 1892, using a nineteenth-century voice.

November 7th. The schoolmaster has chosen six of us to perform a short scene at the winter entertainment. Each afternoon, when lessons are over, we push the desks against the walls and recite our speeches one by one. He corrects us if we speak too quietly and makes us practise our bows.

November 18th. Today we rehearsed in the public room where the entertainment will be held tomorrow. The master drew chalk marks on the floor to show us our places and made us walk through each entrance twice. My borrowed cap kept falling over my eyes, so Mother has sewn a ribbon inside it. Edward forgot the final sentence again. The master says he will stand behind the curtain and prompt us if this happens tomorrow.

November 19th. The room was full, but we remembered every speech. Even Edward reached the end without a word from the master.