Improv at the Library

Hilarious improv comedy group Do Not Adjust Your Stage are back in Cambridge! This time watch improv inspired by experts from the 600 year old Cambridge University Library inspired by their latest exhibition: Discarded History: the Genizah of Medieval Cairo.

Genizah is a Hebrew word meaning ‘treasury.’ To the Jews living in Medieval Cairo, a Genizah was a safe place to store away any old or unusable text that, because it contained the word of God, was considered too holy to simply throw out.

But when the room was opened in the late 19^th century, scholars discovered not just the expected religious documents, but also the scribblings of everyday lives. Documents concerning love, sex lives, marriages, divorces, business transactions, the uses of magical medicines and unusual aphrodisiacs were unearthed; revealing that the concerns of Egyptian Jews living over 1,000 years ago were not altogether different to our own.

Hear short TED style talks on medieval pre-nups, conditional divorce, the use of magic in medicinal cures and popular aphrodisiac recipes from Dr Melonie Schmierer-Lee and Dr Ben Outhwaite. Then watch on as the group create totally improvised comedy scenes, stories, and characters in response.

With a cash bar serving beer and white wine, and the chance to view the exhibition after-hours.
 

About Do Not Adjust Your Stage

Do Not Adjust Your Stage's Wunderkammer creates improvised comedy theatre inspired from talks by leading academics, curators and all round huge brains on their passions. Part Ted-style talks, part improvised comedy, their show has a residency at London's Natural History Museum. No one show is ever the same. They have played to sell-out audiences in various London venues and the Edinburgh fringe.

About Cambridge University Library

The Cambridge University Library collection, based near the backs in Cambridge, has evolved over 600 years. From four dozen volumes on a handful of subjects to a mammoth accumulation of several million books, maps, manuscripts, journals and digital records it continues to grow. It covers every conceivable aspect of human endeavour – across three thousand years and in over two thousand languages. It’s not only a centre of research and study for the students and academics in Cambridge, nationally and internationally, but also runs exhibitions and events for the public.