MIT professor’s book digs into the eclectic, textually linked
reading choices of people in medieval London. Was it
coincidence? An era dubbed "the time of silence" -- the years
between 1642 and 1660 in England when Puritan rulers shuttered
theaters -- was also a period of intense interest in
experimental science. Three years ago, MIT students began to
take an in-depth look at this period during a drama, science and
performance seminar taught by professors Janet Sonenberg and
Diana Henderson. Research and other material developed by
students have served as the basis for an unusual play,
premiering Nov. 12 in London, that examines themes of science,
philosophy, creativity and family relations. The Royal
Shakespeare Company's production of "The Tragedy of Thomas
Hobbes," written by Adriano Shaplin and directed by Elizabeth
Freestone, will run through Dec. 6 at Wilton's Music Hall in
what Sonenberg characterizes as a "wild and daring enterprise"
that overturns preconceived notion of what a "science play" is
all a