‘A Small and Quiet Light’ – a forgotten heroine of the war  

Very few people know about this courageous South Asian woman, who was betrayed and faced death at the hands of the Nazis in the Second World War 

By Suman Bhuchar
 
THIS PLAY sheds light on Noor-un-Nisa Inayat Khan, a forgotten heroine who resisted fascism and gave her life for freedom.  
  
Written by Stephanie Street, it features actor Priyanga Burford as Noor.  
  
The show premiered at the Chichester Festival Theatre and is currently on at the Orange Tree Theatre Richmond until Saturday (October 24).  
  
The story of Noor-un-Nisa Inayat Khan has continued to fascinate across decades.   
 
She was a mixed heritage multi-lingual woman who became a spy for the Allies and paid with her life. 
  
Noor was recruited as a Special Operations Executive (SOE), radio operator and was executed by the Nazis when they uncovered her identity.  
 
Who was she? What made her tick? These are just two questions the play seeks to address. ‘A Small and Quiet Light’ explores her life and tries to understand what drove her and her actions.  

It begins with her interrogation by a German officer, Vogt at 84 Avenue Foch in October 1943 (this was the notorious headquarters of the German counterintelligence unit in Occupied France and a place where suspected SOE agents were brought for questioning). 
  
The play then intercuts with short scenes across the timeline of her life.  We get glimpses of her childhood, learning the piano, applying make-up, her first love affair. It is as though Noor is seeing her life in flashback while she is being questioned.  
  
The play features a lot of exposition and a lot of biographical information is conveyed. Perhaps that’s necessary due to the fact that she has been overlooked as part of general British War history and it’s only now people are becoming more widely aware of her. 
  
Vogt and Noor engage in civilised conversations, although he is trying to extract information from her, and she is trying to figure out who betrayed her.  
 
The audience is given an idea of the urbane cosmopolitanism of her upbringing – speaking French, enjoying fine coffee. But at the same time, we keep being reminded that she is an ‘outsider’ and of Muslim heritage.  

Noor (also known variously as Babuli – a childhood affectionate name), Nora & Madeleine, comes from an educated Sufi family. Her father is Inayat Khan, a musician and Sufi scholar, and her mother is an American woman Ora Ray Baker.  
  
Noor was born in Moscow on January 1, 1914 but the family left Russia during the First World War apparently thanks to Tolstoy. Noor’s father was based in Moscow and he toured a lot. (Factually speaking they lived in London for a while and then settled in France).   
  
 In ‘A Small and Quiet Light’, the story moves from Avenue Foch to her childhood home in Suresnes (a suburb near Paris) where she lived an idyllic childhood – and after her father died, she took on the responsbility for looking after the family.  
 
Together with her brother (Vilayat) known as ‘Bhai’ (Brother) in this show – they take refuge in England in 1940 when the German troops come to Paris.  

This is where her involvement in war begins but before that she is writing children’s stories, is an accomplished pianist and is a pacifist. The play endeavours to bring out all these aspects. including her death when she is shot at Dachau in 1944, with the words “liberté” on her lips.  

The young Noor/Nora wants to have purpose much influenced by her dad and Sufi philosophy of “Everyone is in one, one is in everything”.  
 

In the intimate space at the Orange Tree Theatre (OTT), the audience sit all around the performance area and the set design by Anna Yates is a square well type structure set with stools with four screens around the auditorium that punch in the date /place where each scene takes. In the right hand corner, there is a small alcove where the young Noor (Kiah Arya) plays the piano. The sound design is by Tingying Dong and the composer is Nicola T Chang.  
 
The casting is gender neutral with fine performances from a cast of seven.  

Bhai is played by Tripti Tripuraneni, Vogt is portayed by Caoilfhionn Dunne. Paksie Vernon is Abba, while Amma is portrayed by Amanda Hadingue. Léa des Garets plays her friend Mams and also another agent, Viennot.  Apart from Noor’s character, all the cast play a range of parts and the whole creative team is female.  
 

It’s a gentle play, atmospheric but Noor still remains something of an enigma. 
 
ACV rating: **** (out of five)  
 
 

All pictures: ©MarcBrenner

Listing
‘A Small and Quiet Light’ by Stephanie Street runs at the Orange Tree Theatre, 1 Clarence Street, Richmond, Surrey TW9 2SA until Saturday (October 24) and is available online over the screen from October 27-30 
 
For further details and ticket information:   
https://orangetreetheatre.co.uk/whats-on/a-small-and-quiet-light/ 
  
https://orangetreetheatre.co.uk/whats-on/a-small-and-quiet-light-on-screen/ 
  
Previously  
https://asianculturevulture.com/noor-second-world-war-spy-heroine-is-rightly-lauded-in-this-wonderful-production-review/ 
This play is the subject of a reading, and part of Tara Theatre’s South Asian Play reading Group session and takes place on October 28,  4pm-6pm and is FREE.

https://taratheatre.com/whats-on/south-asian-play-reading-group-noor-by-azma-dar