WHAT I AM
Songs from a Locked Room
A NEW PLAY WITH SONGS
by Jim Pickles & Eric Angus
Dramaturgy by Guy Retallack & Clemmie Reynolds
EDINBURGH FRINGE 2026
★★★★★ Adventures in Theatreland
★★★★ Theatre Weekly
They locked him away
You’re locked in with him
John Clare. A great poet. Perhaps England’s greatest nature poet
An extraordinary life.
Born into poverty in rural Northamptonshire, Clare spent long hard days labouring in the fields.
Then sudden fame: London, with Coleridge, De Quincey and Lamb.
Then it fell apart. His last 27 years were spent in lunatic asylums, estranged from family and friends.
Throughout everything, he kept writing.
One man. One room. One chance to prove who he is.
“By the time Clare reaches for the words of his poem ‘I Am’, both the man and his work feel vividly alive once More.”
Theatre Weekly
The Play
In this intimate, one-person encounter, John Clare, confined to an asylum and losing certainty about who he is, draws the audience into his room - first as guests, then witnesses and finally collaborators.
A poet. A room. An audience
What begins as a recital gradually fractures, as memory, imagination and the present collide.
The music and videography bring Clare’s strikingly modern voice vividly to life.
The poems surface as thought, resistance and song, opening Clare’s language emotionally as well as intellectually.
“What I Am succeeds because it finds contemporary relevance in a figure too often overlooked by history.”
Theatre Weekly
The Reviews
★★★★★
“A hidden gem at the Fringe”
Adventures in Theatreland
“Loads of funny moments. What an unexpected joy.”
Fringe Fan Johnny
“A moving and highly enjoyable hour of theatre”
★★★★
Theatre Weekly
“this was hands down the best one-man show i’ve ever seen.”
Audience Member, Edinburgh Fringe 2026
The Music
English folk melody collides with electronic textures, beats and sound design - a musical world rooted in Clare’s landscape but unmistakably contemporary.
“The poems are transformed into songs …allowing the force of the words ro resonate with modern audiences.”
Theatre Weekly
Edinburgh 2026 Creative Team
GEORGE MAGUIRE John Clare - Olivier Award winner, ‘Sunny Afternoon’
GUY RETALLACK Director/Dramaturg - National Theatre, Out of Joint
JIM PICKLES Freelance Writer - ‘What I Am’ evolved from ‘John Clare: The Madhouse Sessions
ERIC ANGUS Composer/lmusic production - National Theatre Studio, No 1 UK Tours, Wembley Arena
HUGO DODSWORTH Set/Video designer - Bristol Old Vic, Riverside Studios
RICHARD WILLIAMSON Lighting designer - Rotterdam (West End/Off Broadway), Barbican, Sadlers Wells
JAMES CONNOR Sound designer and operator/Lighting operator - London Fringe
CHRIS CHARLTON ALL photography