Going Underground

Synopsis

Laura Alcoba was the daughter of members of the Montoneros, a militant left-wing organisation engaged in a bitter and violent conflict with the military government in Argentina in what later came to be called the 'dirty war' of the 1970s.

Her memoir of living through this turbulent time is a powerful and moving account of political upheaval seen thorugh the eyes of a young child, who knows enough to be frightened, but not enough to understand. With her father in prison, she and her mother move into a safe house in the suburbs of Buenos Aires, where they run a rabbit breeding business as a cover for the backroom operation of the Montoneros' clandestine printing press, turning out copies of their revolutionary newspaper for distribution all over the city.

The seven year-old Laura is brought up among secrecy, subterfuge and silence, and learns very early the importance of keeping hr muth shut, and the danger of loose talk or careless behaviour. But there's also love and laughter in the Rabbit House, and a comforting sense of loyalty and friendship - which she only later discovers to have been betrayed most horribly.

Laura Alcoba's story of living through violence and political turbulence is about the Argentina of only thirty years ago, and she speaks for a generation who carry the scars of that time. The emotions she remembers from her childhood are those still felt by children all around the world living on the front line of fear, violence and uncertainty as adults wars rage around them. Laura Alcoba now lives in Paris.

Adult Laura: Saira Todd
Young Laura: Bethan Barke
Mother: Jenny Coverack
Father: Jay Villiers
Grandmother: Merelina Kendall
Grandfather: Rod Beacham
Diana: Lisa Coleman
Engineer: Vincenzo Pellegrino
Chicha: Sonia Elliman
Shopkeeper/Guard: Charlotte Ellis

Producer: Sara Davies

The Rabbit House by Laura Alcoba is translated by Polly McClean and dramatised for radio by Sheila Yeger.