Spotlight | Toms River

Kinh Doanh | women education |

Reliving the Day the Unsinkable Sank

By MICHAEL SOMMERS

Published: April 6, 2012

• Sign In to E-Mail
• Print
• Reprints

AS the Titanic sailed toward its destiny on a Sunday afternoon a century ago this month, passengers in first class listened to the band play fox trots and waltzes as they lunched on egg à l'Argenteuil, prepared with asparagus.

Enlarge This Image

Tim Ireland/Press Association, via Associated Press

LAST DINNER A menu given to the Titanic's first-class passengers on April 14, 1912, the day before the ship went down.

Related

• Arts | New Jersey: Radical to Mundane, and to Radical Again (April 8, 2012)

• Critic's Notebook: 100 Years Later, the Titanic Resurfaces, Repeatedly (April 5, 2012)

• About New York: Titanic Ties in the Race for Mayor (April 6, 2012)

• Times Topic: New Jersey Arts

Connect with NYTMetro

Follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook for news and conversation.

Some of their experiences during the tragic night that followed, the ragtime tunes they heard and even much of the final luncheon menu will be re-created when "100 Years: Titanic Survivors and Their Stories" is staged on April 15, the anniversary of the disaster, at the Arts and Community Center on the campus of Ocean County College in Toms River.

Maggie Worsdale, 52, of Jackson worked for nearly two years on the script about the doomed voyage, in which about 1,500 people perished when the ship struck an iceberg and sank. She used accounts taken from period journals, official inquiries and survivors' memoirs. "I wanted to authentically capture the details," she said.

Ms. Worsdale said she found the "what-ifs" of the disaster compelling. "What if the lookouts had binoculars and saw the iceberg a minute sooner?" she asked. "What if the ship were going slower? What if there had been enough lifeboats for everyone?"

She is the producer of this 90-minute documentary play, in which she also acts, along with her husband, Thomas Worsdale, and James Dyne. The trio performs as the Traveling Literary Theater , founded in 2005, which brings character-driven shows like "Mark Twain's Wonderful Words" to libraries and community centers.

For the Titanic production, the actors, dressed in 1912 fashions, will read aloud the recollections of more than 35 survivors and others, like the captain of the rescue ship, that trace the fatal voyage and its aftermath. A tuxedo-clad, six-piece ensemble led by Dan Levinson, a jazz clarinetist, will play vintage arrangements of hit songs like "Alexander's Ragtime Band" and light classical selections from the era.

Before the performance, 75 people can sample a buffet drawn from the Titanic's last lunch, which is described as an "old school, high-end menu" by William Muller, president of My Restaurant Group, which will cater the meal in the Gallery space upstairs from the 428-seat theater. Conflicting accounts regarding the last song played aboard the Titanic have been finessed by Mr. Levinson, who plans to conclude the program by mingling "Songe d'Automne," a surging waltz of the day, with "Nearer My God to Thee," the hymn that it partly echoes. "We will play them slowly and plaintively, and I think it will be effective," he said.

"It brings tears to my eyes to think how the Titanic's musicians went beyond the call of duty that night," Mr. Levinson said. "They were hired as passengers, not crew, so they were under no contractual obligation to stay. But they chose to remain and keep everyone calm with their music until the end."

"100 Years: Titanic Survivors and Their Stories" will be presented on April 15 at 2 p.m. at Ocean County College in Toms River, preceded by lunch at 11:30 a.m. Tickets: $30 (show), $70 (lunch). (732) 255-0500 or ocean.universitytickets.com.

Theo www.nytimes.com

Malawis President Mutharika Dead at 78

news | women education |

Malawian President Bingu wa Mutharika has died after suffering a heart attack Thursday at his home in the capital, Lilongwe.

Photo: Reuters

When Bingu wu Mutharika was elected president of Malawi in 2004, many believed he would govern as a proxy for Bakili Muluzi, the outgoing president.  Muluzi had handpicked Mutharika to succeed him after he failed in his bid to serve a third term.

But soon after taking office, President Mutharika launched initiatives to combat corruption in the country.  Muluzi was one of those the law enforcement agencies targeted.

The actions earned Mutharika accolades from international donors and anger from Muluzi, leading to the president abandoning the ruling United Democratic Front and forming his own party, the Democratic Progressive Party, or DPP.

The discord led to domestic instability during Mutharika's first term, with parliament often paralyzed and the president under threat of impeachment.  Even so, during those years Mutharika introduced measures that saw Malawi move from chronic food insecurity, becoming a food secure country with surpluses.

In 2009, running with current vice president Joyce Banda, Mutharika won a comfortable victory in the presidential election.

But the president refused to endorse Banda as his party's presidential candidate in 2014, instead opting for his brother, resulting in a dispute that led to him expelling her from the DPP.  Banda formed her own party but continued as vice president.

Mutharika responded to his political difficulties by introducing laws that critics such as Undule Mwakasungure, chairman of Malawi's Human Rights Consultative Committee, said curtailed democratic rights, and stifled dissent and free speech.

"We have seen the government passing undemocratic bills, the government suppressing the freedom of the press, the government threatening human rights defenders, the government suppressing the voice of Malawians," said Mwakasungure.

In the wake of the 2008 global recession, economic growth slowed, causing fuel and foreign exchange shortages that added to anger among Malawians. In July 2011 Malawians took to the streets in protest and the authorities responded harshly, killing 19 when they opened fire on crowds with live ammunition.

Mwakasungure described the police as aggressive.

"The unprofessional conduct of the police; where the police started to push people out of the central [assembly] points while people were still waiting to hear from civil society leaders on what would be the next move, so in that process people became violent, and the police also started throwing tear gas," said Mwakasungure.

In the wake of the deaths, critics said Mutharika failed to grasp the despair of his people, and refused to engage them in discussions about their concerns.

Mutharika, who was born in 1934, had a doctorate in economics and spent many years abroad working for international organizations, including the World Bank. He is survived by his second wife Callista Chapola-Chimombo and four adult children.

Theo www.voanews.com