Lament for Sheku Bayoh by Hannah Lavery (paperback)

‘It’s not Black Lives Matter. This is Scotland. It’s not the same.’

In the early hours of the morning, thirty-one-year-old Sheku Bayoh set out to walk home from his friend’s place after watching a boxing match. Just hours later, he had lost his life in police custody.

Lament for Sheku Bayoh is a poetic expression of grief for the human behind the headlines and a non-apologetic reflection on racism in Scotland today.

“A painful and beautiful melding of irony and hope…”
The Scotsman

“Lament for Sheku Bayoh repeats verbatim quotes until they sound like poetry…
and loops around the fateful morning like a trauma you can’t stop thinking about.”
The Guardian

‘Timely and necessary’
The Stage 

 

Additional resources:

Playwright Hannah Lavery talks about Lament for Sheku Bayoh as a personal response to a tragedy, an expression of grief for the loss of the human behind the headlines and a non-apologetic reflection on identity and racism in Scotland today.

Gillian Sargent, teacher of English at Grange Academy, Kilmarnock, talks about Lament for Sheku Bayoh and its place within Scottish Literature.