In 2010, Anna Linville began writing down her strange and interesting experiences as a devoted wife and mother of two while her husband served as a defense attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli, Libya. She tries to capture as many memories as she can of the time she spent living and navigating between set mousetraps, with the potential for dangerous encounters lurking in the most mundane of activities and places. I decided.
“It was really overwhelming to be there from the beginning,” said Anna, a former Arabic linguist who now works in Duke University's Rethinking Diplomacy Program. “It was always intense. Going out or going shopping was an ordeal as a woman. We were always being followed. We were always being watched. It was very dangerous. I I was working as a music teacher, but I wasn't actually qualified to do so, so it was stressful. There were many times when I almost broke down. There was so much sensory information that I had to learn. There were so many things I had to do. I almost felt like a baby and sometimes I just wanted to cry.”
The danger was the dictator Muammar Gaddafi, whose tyranny was ever-present and who sought to enhance his reputation as a means of increasing investment in his country from other countries that might have otherwise resisted the temptation. It was despite that.
Even though her husband, Lt. Col. Brian Linville, was on active duty, she also served as a U.S. diplomat, presenting the United States and Americans as positive, respectful visitors and a rich influence. He had a heavy responsibility.
Anna was beginning to find herself drawn to the Tampa Bay music scene, performing in opera and taking vocal lessons, when she received word that Brian would soon be stationed with his family in Libya. Everything will be on hold for at least the next three years.
“What's the music scene like in Libya?” she asked her husband the day he called her with the news.
“Gaddafi burned all the pianos,” Brian replied.
“Great,” Anna replied, and just like that, the curtain came down on Tampa Bay.
More than a decade later, Linville published “Benghazi on Broadway: The Comedy, Tragedy, and Diplomatic Drama of Gaddafi's Libya.'' This work documents everyday experiences immediately before and after the Arab Spring. The book also explores the relationships the Linville family built with their neighbors and staff, especially the knowledge, attitude, style and love of her nanny Amina, who quickly established herself in the hearts of the entire Linville family. Masu.
However, much of the book is about Anna and Brian's decision to join the Tripoli Players. The Tripoli Players are a British amateur theater group known for their risky, tongue-in-cheek creampie-throwing, song-and-dance musicals. A satire targeting the Gaddafi regime and other social issues.
“It was completely ridiculous nonsense, which is probably why we got away with it,” Anna said. “We were just being silly and having fun. But our play was a very thinly veiled portrayal of not just living in society, but our role in it. The role of an expatriate there. role. Everyone was very motivated to bring themselves down.”
In a country where you are never unsupervised and where even your neighbors can't interact in public because of the dangers, the theater became Anna's escape.
“The theater really helped relieve that tension,” she said.
When the Gaddafi regime stopped theater producers from sending actors to produce productions, Anna was encouraged to help found a theater company that became the Tripoli Performing Arts Project. Through her grant, she brought together several local performers to put on a show.
“I helped organize this Broadway revue that we did twice in the basement of the embassy,” Anna recalls. “Then we took it to Benghazi. We went to an Islamic call center in Benghazi and did this for English language students. It was a really interesting and surreal experience.”
Anna and her two children were able to return to the United States each summer to stay with Brian's family in Clemson, South Carolina, but Brian's duties prevented him from returning home to be with his family. I could not do it.
“For him, there was no rest for a tired person, but he grew in a way in that environment,” Anna said. “That's his element. He's very comfortable on the edge. He feels like his senses are coming back to life in a different way, that he's more conscious, that time seems to slow down. That's what I said, and I agree. Time moves really slowly when you're in that kind of environment. The seven years we lived here in Hillsboro went by very quickly.”
The Linville family was able to experience Libya through a kind of IMax lens, where they were able to see the era before, during, and after monumental governance changes. For every terror and atrocity committed by Gaddafi, there was execution order and investment from other countries, even if the decisions were considered questionable or self-serving. But after the tyrant was defeated by a well-meaning player, anarchy moved in and filled the void with chaos. The experience revealed her struggle, which Anna describes as “Benghazi's Broadway.”
“Even when you're trying to help, things can get worse instead of getting better, and you're heading towards tragedy,” she says. “I feel strongly that that is what happened in Libya. We removed Gaddafi, but at the same time the consequences were devastating for the Libyans. They have continued to live in anarchy ever since. It's difficult to make decisions like this. I'm glad I didn't have to make the decision to intervene or not.”
“Broadway in Benghazi'' is a fascinating and complex book that feels like watching three different plays. There are two very important characters in his life who enjoy and sometimes fear what's on stage, but are always at odds with each other. One is the tyrant that resides within each of us, just waiting to be summoned by the right motives. The other is the community, and the care and health of the community is essential to withstand the comings and goings of tyrants.
“I’m so grateful for Hillsboro as a place where I feel like I can finally put down roots and find a community of creative people who want to build a great community together,” said Anna. . “We have to take care of our community, and we have to look at ourselves. There are a lot of problems here that need to be solved.”
“Broadway in Benghazi: The Comedy, Tragedy, and Diplomatic Drama of Gaddafi's Libya” is available in hardcover and paperback at Purple Crow Books, 109 W. King St. in downtown Hillsboro.
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