{"product_id":"brutal-imagination-cornelius-eady-9781636702674","title":"Brutal Imagination: The Play","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"Eady fuses headlines and history with language that is a field holler, a blues shout, a hip hop rap that combusts inside the soul and keep on burning.\" --Bebe Moore Campbell\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis spare and haunting play takes its inspiration from the case of Susan Smith, a white woman who murdered her two young children by strapping them into the back seat of her car and pushing it into a lake. In statements to the police, Smith claimed she had been carjacked by a young Black man. In \u003ci\u003eBrutal Imagination\u003c\/i\u003e, adapted from his National Book Award-finalist poetry cycle, Cornelius Eady conjures this imaginary Black man as Mr. Zero, who appears in order to \"to get things done\" when white people need a scapegoat for the consequences of their own actions. As Smith spins her story into more and more elaborate designs, Mr. Zero begins to rebel against his appointed task, leading Smith (and us) slowly closer to the dark secret at the center of the play.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eBrutal Imagination\u003c\/i\u003e implicates not just the small town of Union, South Carolina, but an entire American racial imaginary in which a white woman's story, no matter how ludicrous, is always believed if it implicates a Black man.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Cornelius Eady\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 1636702678\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781636702674\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Theatre Communications Group\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 09\/29\/2026\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 112\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback","brand":"Cornelius Eady","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":48801352941823,"sku":"9781636702674","price":16.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/brutal-imagination-cornelius-eady-9781636702674","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}