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In the Year I Met Tom Stoppard

  • Writer: Danielle Dybiec
    Danielle Dybiec
  • 2 days ago
  • 3 min read
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"The unpredictable and the predetermined unfold together to make everything the way it is." ― Tom Stoppard, Arcadia

 

Tom Stoppard is one of the best playwrights of any era, and we've been so lucky to share in his. When I learned he died three days ago, I returned to my memory of meeting him 30 years ago this month, on opening night of the National Theatre's revival of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead starring Simon Russell Beale and Adrian Scarborough. It was the end of my first work/study semester abroad in London, the most transformative and defining period of my life. (I also attended the premiere production of his play Indian Ink that year.) My directing professor wisely told me to keep a journal of the shows I saw in London, and I just pulled it out to see what I wrote about the night I met Tom Stoppard.

 

It was in my last journal entry, written on the last day of 1995. I wrote how I'd seen incredible shows, "the last week especially when I was hooked on theatre like heroin. I experienced things faster in London than my pen could write it all down." (Yes, this was a hand-written journal, in the analog days.) After sharing my euphoria over Fiona Shaw replying to a letter I'd written to her, I wrote, "Opening night of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern at The National - who's sitting three rows behind me? TOM STOPPARD!! I talked to him on the way out of the theatre then was in a trance all night. Back at my flat, I got so disturbed thinking of leaving in a week. In Pittsburgh, you don't just happen to bump into TOM STOPPARD!" This journal is a time capsule of my voracious 21-year-old self realizing how impactful the arts and travel will be in my life. The last lines are, "I got the most out of London I could in four months. And this is only the beginning. What could next year possibly hold? I can't wait!"

 

Eight months later I moved to New York for my MFA degree in Performing Arts Management, and what followed was a career in the arts where I got to personally know many actors and directors from the pages of my journal. And throughout that first time living in London (after backpacking through Europe), my love of travel was omnipresent; most weekends I was on an excursion in England, Scotland, or Ireland. I still remember the vow I made then to myself that travel would always be a part of my life.

 

That's when the spirit and passion behind Nine Muses Travel began. In the year I met Tom Stoppard.


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Nine Muses Travel designs journeys to inspire artists, arts lovers and the culturally curious.

Danielle Dybiec

Founder & President





 

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