'Battles of Fire and Water' brings Alaska history to life
The battles that took place between the Tlingits and Russians in Sitka in the early 19th century were seminal moments in Alaska's history, believes playwright Dave Hunsaker.
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"I believe it's a more important Indian battle than the Little Big Horn in its way," he said of the epic battle of 1804.
The bloody battles of 1802 and 1804 were likely the catalyst of Alaska being sold to the United States in 1867, Hunsaker believes.
"I think you could make a really good argument that if the battles in Sitka hadn't happened, if the Tlingits hadn't basically drawn a line in the sand, it's very possible Russia never would have ceded control of Alaska," he said.
Perseverance Theatre has brought the story to life with the world premiere of Hunsaker's new play "Battles of Fire and Water" which opens at 7:30 p.m. tonight at the Douglas Island theater. The play runs through April 5.
In the early 19th century, the Russian-American Company lost control of its lucrative trading outpost near present day Sitka when the Kiks.adi Clan sacked the Russian fort in 1802 and reclaimed its traditional lands in a vicious battle. The Russians regrouped under the leadership of Governor Alexandr Baranov and came back two years later to try to pacify the Natives and reclaim the region.
"The Russians were imperialistic of course, and their goal was to take over this land because it would be profitable for them," director Laurie McCants said. "The Tlingits relationship to the land is much deeper and spiritual."
The play begins in a Tlingit longhouse after the Russians have returned in 1804 and the story unfolds from the two diametrically opposed cultural views.
"It's a really interesting battle because both sides say they won and in a way they kind of did," McCants said. "Like all history there are always at least two sides to the story."
Hunsaker said he has been interested in the battles of Sitka for many years and was inspired to bring the story to the stage by the recently published book "Anooshi Lingit Aani Ka, Russians in Tlingit America: The Battles of Sitka 1802 and 1804" by Nora and Richard Dauenhauer and Lydia Black. The book is comprised of historical written accounts of the encounter by the Russians as well as oral history accounts by Tlingit storytellers.
The accounts provide opposing cultural views of the battles, but both sides provide similar details of the surrounding events, Hunsaker said.
"The big thing they don't agree on is why it occurred or what it meant," he said. "That just got my imagination all charged up."
The setting of the play goes back and forth between the deck of the Russian naval ship Neva and the Tlingit longhouse, telling each side of the story from different perspectives. The play interweaves the Tlingit, Russian and English languages to tell the shifting perspective and highlighting the different points of view.
"English is kind of the hinge language, so when we need to understand what is happening in one particular camp that is spoken in English," McCants said. "This is definitely a multicultural venture, "Battles of Fire and Water" is, since it's trilingual and tells the story of the battles from both the Russian and Tlingit perspectives."
"There's a lot of storytelling," Hunsaker said. "It's really structured like a Greek tragedy in a way in that characters come on and talk about what happened off stage and what happened two years ago, so it's got a lot of storytelling. To that extent it's a very anecdotal play."
Two dynamic warriors are pitted against each other in the play - the adventurous Russian naval officer Yuri Lisianskii and the noble Tlingit warrior K'alyaan.
Ed Littlefield, who portrays K'alyaan, said the play depicts one of the key turning points in Alaska's history.
"I think (people) just need to hear the story," he said. "It is a play but there's a lot of factual information there."
Ryan Tresser, who portrays Lisianskii, said the play shows a side of the story that historians had ignored for many years.
"I think the play exists to show the Tlingit side of the story and to show a sort of noble history that the Tlingit people have that isn't perhaps as well known as it should be," he said. "It shows them as a people who are struggling and ferocious and fierce and who are ultimately outgunned."
"I think it reveals that these sort of cliché, stereotypical ideas about the encounter between the Russians and the Tlingits are very, very far from the truth," McCants said.
Tresser and Littlefield both said the culture and the history depicted in the play are still very much alive to this day.
"I would just want people to realize that the struggles and the battles that are fought in this play have a direct effect on Southeast Alaska in particular and everyone's life in Southeast Alaska," Tresser said.
McCants said Perseverance Theatre has undertaken a very bold experiment with this production.
"My overall goal is that the audience comes away thinking that what happens in the world is complex and every voice deserves to be heard in the telling of the stories," she said.
• Contact reporter Eric Morrison at 523-2269 or eric.morrison@juneauempire.com.