Anyone who has delved into the history of the Red River Settlement will have come across the name Sarah Ballenden. Her 1850 trial is one of the most famous in Manitoba legal history. The fact that her name isn’t officially attached to the trial – we know it as Foss v. Pelly – is a reflection of the laws of the day, not of her commitment to the proceedings. “I was the first person to get this business investigated,” Sarah testified in court. “I had determined to proceed in it.” “This business” was defamation. Sarah’s character and reputation were under attack. She was the wife of a Hudson’s Bay Company Chief Factor, a position which in fur trade society traditionally commanded respect. One contemporary observed that the wives of Chief Factors, most of whom were “mixed-blood”, were treated like queens. Sarah, though also of British/Indigenous descent, was not. Why? Was it her personality, her behaviour? Did she bring condemnation upon herself? Or were there other forces at work? This play explores Sarah’s struggle for respect in a world of shifting values, as the great fur trade empire that had ruled the Northwest for two centuries and had shaped her life and the lives of thousands like her limped to a close. Caught in a tidal wave of change whose ramifications are still being felt, Sarah Ballenden is truly an original Canadian heroine.

Maureen Hunter is one of CanadaÂ?s most accomplished playwrights. Her work has been produced extensively on CanadaÂ?s major stages, as well as in Britain and the U.S. and has been nominated for two Governor General*#146;s Awards, two Dora Mavor Moore Awards (Outstanding New Play) and the Elinor and Lou Siminovitch Prize in Theatre. Her plays include Atlantis, premiered in English by Manitoba Theatre Centre/Theatre Calgary in 1996 and in French by Theatre de la Manufacture, Montreal, in 1999, and Transit of Venus, which received its Canadian premiere at MTC in 1992 and in 1993 became the first Canadian play ever staged by the Royal Shakespeare Company of Britain. It received its U.S. premiere in 1998 at the Bershire Festival, Stockbridge, Mass. Other plays include Vinci, Footprints on the Moon, Beautiful Lake Winnipeg, and I Met A Bully on the Hill (coâ??written with Martha Brooks). Maureen lives in Winnipeg, where she is currently at work on a new play, Wild Mouth, set in Saskatchewan in 1917, and a libretto of Transit of Venus for Manitoba Opera.

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