Prosper is a fisherman trying to get by in the face of everyday problems: there’s the spectre of the baby his wife desires, the ghost of his dead mistress, his wife’s secret admirer, and the overwhelming lure of the village bar. When a slippery eel salesman arrives in town peddling progress to the rural community, Prosper’s list of problems only increases. Faced with an invasive new species in his lake, his fortunes decline along with the fish population, and Prosper gets a lesson in gift horses and generosity.

A Man A Fish is a part of the 54ology, inspired by events in Burundi.

Donna-Michelle St. Bernard, a.k.a. Belladonna the Blest, is an emcee, playwright, agitator, and practitioner of humanitarian arts. Her main body of work, the 54ology, includes Cake, Sound of the Beast, A Man A Fish, Salome’s Clothes, Gas Girls, Give It Up, The Smell of Horses, Bilguisa Speaks Up, Diggers, Conjugal, Hunt/Peck, and The First Stone. She is a contributor to The Only Good Indian (Jiv Parasram, Tom Arthur Davis/Pandemic Theatre), Forbidden (Afarin Mansouri/Tapestry Opera), and Oubliette (Ivan Barbotin/Tapestry Opera). Other theatre works include Reaching for Starlight, They Say He Fell, and The Final Inquiry. She is co-editor with Yvette Nolan of Refractions: Solo (2014) and Refractions: Scenes (2020) and editor of Indian Act: Residential School Plays (2018), all published with Playwrights Canada Press.

Donna-Michelle St. Bernard's profile page

• Nominated, Governor General's Literary Awards