A group of us felt we would help heal the wounds of our community by celebrating its diversity because back then miami was one of the most Diverse Communities in the company, and we would invite everyone under one gigantic tent to celebrate the written word and begin a conversation together. That conversation hasnt stopped for these 33 book fairs. And i for one want to thank doctor petrone who is president of the Largest College in the country with eight campuses. [applause] for never wavering from that vision. In this years fair you will hear from the best writers of poetry, fiction, history, and memoir. And we need the big tent of the book fair. And the power of the written word to express them. We need this more than ever. [applause] the book fair has grown over all the years as well. We have some remarkable sponsors. We are pleased to announce we have a partnership with the charles de Groot Foundation to launch the Miami Book Fair degroot prize, it is the only one in the country and we are lucky enough to have charles de groot and clydette de groot with us to say a few words and introduce tonights session. Charles de groot has an mba from Harvard Business school and worked in finance until founding a Real Estate Company listed on the stock exchange. He served on the board of directors of several for profit and nonprofit organizations and lectures in the national is this schools. Clydette de groot hold a doctorate in psychology in postdoctoral work and neuropsychology and organizational development. And it into an extensive career is director of Behavioral Sciences and Family MedicineResidency Training programs, had an International Consulting business and served on numerous nonprofit boards. Charles de groot and clydette de groot are chairs of the de Groot Foundation which supports literary art, foundation projects, they divide their time between paris and miami and on a personal note, there couldnt be two more nice people in the entire world so please welcome charles de groot and clydette de groot. [applause] thank you very much. When clydette de groot and i and my parents set up the de Groot Foundation, one of the first projects we initiated was a prize for an unpublished novella. We picked a novella because it is a genre that is perfect in this case, societies, a small book and they translate very well into film. All of leonards books have been made into movies. For the last two cycles of the prize we partnered with shakespeare and company, the english bookstore in paris, and in the last competition, we had approximately 600 and wents from around the world and now we are very excited to be partnering with Miamidade College and Miami Book Fair. And extend the reach of the prize as well as create a solid home that is sustainable. We are absolutely thrilled to be working with Mitchell Kaplan and the Wonderful Team that organizes this wonderful book fair that goes on all year long. A prize like this serves an important purpose. And we need to keep supporting, the written word is very important. And it is longer than a short story and shorter than a novel and if we grew up learning about great authors reading novellas like hemingways old man and the sea, and a number of others lots of novellas out there we learned to enjoy or learn about great writers. We are excited about this endeavor. All the details about how the process works and how all of that will be the website on january 1st and we invite all writers to submit your work. [applause] i know you came to listen to clydette de groot and listen to the other guy first. We are thrilled trevor noah is with us. [applause] as most of you know he was born and raised in south africa where he honed his skills as a television host, actor and comedian and moved to the us in 2011. In 2015 he received what i think is the greatest acknowledgment of anybody in his industry, john stuart him to take over the daily show. [applause] and backstage, telling trevor about what an honor that was and he said everybody took a job after john stuart, i was that idiot. The latest issue of vanity fair, he said his greatest heroes are his mother and all single mothers. [applause] the model he lives by is everything is helping you. That is good for all of us to remember in these turbulent times. After president obama was elected bob was appointed regional attorney for the miami district of the us equal Employment Opportunity commission. Federal laws prohibit Workplace Discrimination throughout florida. In the us virgin islands. Prior to joining the eeoc in 2010, he maintained a private civil practice, by representing victims of Workplace Discrimination and other types of civil rights violation. Please join me in welcoming trevor noah and Robert Weisberg. [applause] hello, everyone. Trevor, welcome to miami, welcome to the Miami Book Fair. Thank you for having me and thank you for coming out, everybody. [applause] i really want to congratulate you on writing a phenomenal book. I have been engrossed in it for the last couple weeks and found it poignant, scary, funny and i learned a lot about south africa that i never would have otherwise. I thank you for that. Thank you for being truthful. Thank you. I recognize, i recognize that many of you in this room and your family members shed a lot of tears since last tuesday, and are keenly interested in hearing trevors take on what happened and assure you that with week get to it in our conversation or not there is an opportunity for a question and answer period and you can ask trevor all about that. So trevor, let me start with the title of your book. Born a crime stories from a South African childhood. What did you mean by that . I was born at a time when in south africa under apartheid, my parents werent allowed to be in any shape or form in contact with one another. I grew up during a time we were governed by the laws of miscegenation as they were called, International Relationships were forbidden, the mixing of races were forbidden. Essentially being born from my parents, white swiss man and a black woman from south africa, i was essentially born a crime. The very existence of me was something that was against the law. What my parents had done was breaking the law. Because of that our lives were impacted in the ways we could live as a family under those laws of apartheid. Host you were born in 1984. How did you interact with your black mother and white father . I interacted with them like a child. I was very lucky. My parents did a great job shielding me from the reality of what was going on in the country. I only knew the world i was in and surrounded by people in the same world as i. Ignorance truly was bliss in that regard. I knew i had a father who was white but i didnt know he was a white person, i just knew he was my father. I knew i had a mom who was black but her race meant nothing to me because at the time that was the only way i knew it to be. I thought fathers were white and uncles were black and that is how it worked. So i was truly shielded from the stress of what was happening in the country at the time. It was only as we started transitioning and i started realizing and lucky i was on the cusp of a country achieving democracy and equality before i became a fully functional human being. When you were young could you go to the park with your mother and father and play like other kids were playing. I couldnt be seen in public together. My mother broke many laws by living the way she lived. And rented an apartment in an area that was considered a white area. And that is how we get around, she found ways to circumvent the system, found ways to get around rules she didnt agree with so for me, from the outside, i dont know what it looked like but a lot of people just assumed this black woman was caretaker of this child, and couldnt be with us at all in public. Wouldnt play the role of a father because they would give the game away. That was a limitation. One story i said in the book is when i was really young i used to love running and i still do but i would go with my mom and dad and if we were in public in a park together the only limitation was i couldnt get too close to him, couldnt be seen as his son, i would chase him, and he would run away to protect us. The game is on. I would chase him, and have great memories of running in the park. The only difference is they see it from a different perspective. Host when you visit your grandmother, how frightened they were out in the street. Guest one of the moments i learned, i was writing the book, and write everything from memory. And lost my grandmother and my mom and one that fascinated me is i brought up my entire life as a child who was locked indoors. I was an indoor kid, i loved reading and loved staying indoors and was in my own world. And and and she was afraid the police would take me away, and they would take me, send me and as a grown man, i know how to diverse the situation was. You did not realize why everyone wanted trevor to stay inside. Guest just protecting the world, that is what i thought it was. Host the book, you make repeated references, recognizing, the genius of apartheid, the architect of apartheid built the most advanced system of racial oppression known to man. What about it makes you describe it in that way. Guest it is an insane amount of hard work that went into building such an abominable system. Apartheid was perfect racism. A system designed to oppress the majority. America and south africa share a lot of similarities in terms of racial history, in the present. One place it was different in south africa black people are the majority. How do you oppress the majority . Extremely difficult. How do you make the majority able to stand up and the apartheid government was rarely committed and studied racism all over the world from the dutch, australia, the united states. They found the key is to separate people into the my new shia of the groups, finding ways to convince people they were different even when they were not. They didnt see black as a monolith as it is seen in america. They said we will divide you and your tribes, divide you into shades of your darkness and that is where colored came from. In america if you are biracial person, half black half when you are categorized as black. In south africa they didnt do that. The skill was dividing people up by their language, their culture, their tribe, and creating smaller groups you could hit against each other and have dominion over within the regime. It was really scary and well thought out. I wondered why racists, they are really committed. I wondered why they dont commit to making the world a better place. They are very good at what they do. [applause] you talk about how important language is and was to keeping people separate. How did it play out into the apartheid design . There are different ways, everything from the schooling system in which children were taught in languages that were not there is, certain languages prioritized above others. Language is one of the Biggest Barriers in terms of giving a person an opportunity to switch from one world to another. One thing i grew up realizing was the power of language. If you speak to a man, and speak to his head, speak to a man in his language and the power of language is something i learned over the years, one of the biggest things that divide people and essentially there is nothing there, just miscommunication, just people perceiving a difference based on how you communicate. Language is a tool you could use to divide people and bring them together. I learned in my life every time i learned a new language i gained entry into another world, gained insights into another way of thinking. Probably one of the biggest gifts i got from learning language, i learn as many as i can. It is a constant humility forced on you because when you learn a new language, you have arrogant about it, you have to be a child again, you have to accept your going to be stupid again, you have to accept you cant be superior again because you dont know what superior is in that language. But it is really something, that is why i advocate learn a new language, try to learn a new language because you will be surprised how it activates different parts of your mind and thinking of other people. As you learn new languages did it surprise your fellow countrymen that this colored person would be speaking languages other than africana or english . Definitely. I came from a country where in terms of ranking english and i guess a subset of dutch, those with the two languages, those with the languages you needed. Everything else was considered the riffraff. Everything else was considered to be low, nothing that was to be aspired to. All these tribes in south africa, people who speak their language at home and the language of the colonizers and africans, i found one of the best ways and one of the quickest ways i could connect with people was to try to learn their language. Fellow self africans South Africans and i didnt understand how we were separated until i came to realize language was a great tool that can be used to separate people because fundamentally if you cannot understand a person as stupid as it sounds, you cannot understand a person. So i said out to do that, one of the most amazing things, even for a selfish reason i found i could connect to people and it gave me access to world i never would have had access to. Host compelling stories, there are instances where because of your ability to speak language you are able to maneuver in worlds you might never have otherwise been able to. That is exactly what it is. Host at the same time, south africa has 11 National Languages and that is a leftover. Guest we came from a place where some languages were put above others. Once we achieved democracy the question was what now becomes our official language was because we came from a world where no one wants to put anything below or above another thing, make them all official languages, so we ended up with official languages and it is four five languages in the National Anthem as well which is extremely difficult, but i guess everyone at heart is in the right place. Host your grandmother you spent a lot of time there. I did. Host and for americans a lot of americans associate this with a source of uprisings against apartheid, nelson mandela, you describe it to me in an interesting way. You describe the stark poverty but also you right here is there something magical about it . What i meant was completely what i felt by being in the place, that was the strength of the human being, the ability of the human being to overcome situations that have been designed to impress, soweto is one of those examples, people in from different places, people relocated forcefully taken out of certain areas that were taken away from black people and given to white people and they were forced to live in a new place with almost nothing and yet from that nothing came so many amazing stories, so many amazing ideas, so many amazing leaders, because essentially the one thing i think the apartheid government didnt think about was when they created soweto they created a home base for thought, they created a space where people could exist and galvanize within. What happened with it was one of the birthplaces of the struggle and protests, will the birthplace of south africas identity in terms of politics that emerge because black people were forced to create and send for themselves, this was not promoted by the government and the people who found a way to create micro economies, stores that became resellers of food, people who set up their own auto shops, people created different economies, even Public Transportation that wasnt provided by the government they found ways to formalize an informal system and create that themselves. That was essentially what happened. In trying to keep a group of people separated and helpless and hopeless, what endeded up happening unintentionally is through the resolve of the people, those people became hopeful, powerful and more determined than ever because they became selfreliant and they saw the fruits of their labor and what emerged from that was a fire that couldnt be extinguished by a hateful government. You describe it as having no running [applause] host there wasnt Running Water and peoples homes, there were multiple Family Household that share one toilet, there werent shops. Other than the police force, wasnt police as we know but the swat team. A heavily militarized force. That is the funny thing. The side effect, some people disagree. Many people do agree. When they talk about the moral arc of the universe bending towards justice essentially that was the one thing that came out of soweto. I shared a toilet with four families, we shared a toilet to get our water, we shared a piece of land and essentially what happened was that became the strength of the community. We were not living in a world where we did know our neighbors, we didnt know about a world where we were not talking to people around us or having experienced by ourselves. What in effect happened was the way it was set up the government without realizing it enabled the people to find each other within those spaces. It was terrible and wasnt a great way to live but the unintended consequences was it created community. We were just talking before how much i learned from your book and one thing i learned was thinking swell was an african name only to learn after reading your book it is an acronym for southwest township. That is what i am talking about. The power to reclaim something and take it away from something, it is an african word. Something we proudly claim. It is my home and we say it is the african place that it. Host in 1990, apartheid endeded. Nelson mandela was released. There were no elections to 1994 and i think a great expression in your description in the book is the end of apartheid wasnt like the berlin wall coming crashing down but it was a slow crumbling. What was your life like, you are 6 years old, colored person in south africa as apartheid started to end and get dismantled . I never discount the fact that i am extremely lucky. Where i born a few years earlier i would have been subjected to so much more of the racism in my country. Where i born years later i might not have appreciated the hardship from whence freedom came. Being born at the time i was i was old enough to see the transition, old enough to see democracy take hold and at the same time i was young enough to recover from the effects of people not being afforded that democracy and when apartheid endeded it was a gradual thing, america had a similar history with the abolishment of slavery, it doesnt happen overnight. It is not a paper you sign and people just go okay, guess we were wrong, lets go home. Theres a lot of convincing that has to be done. That is one of the greatest challenges. I speak about that as well. I come to realize it is frustrating especially for people who have been oppressed when you come to realize freedom is just the beginning, freedom is just the beginning of the journey. A lot of the time we think of it as the end and yet it is not. I think of barriers, racial or gender or whatever the barriers are i think of it as when you break the barrier down, people of color achieve equality, women achieve equality. When that happens all that happened is you have been allowed access to climb the mountain. Freedom is just getting there. Now you climb the mountain before you and that is what we came to realize in south africa, this wonderful moment, was really honeymoon period, freedom and the feeling was a special and that is a lot of hard work. The black man, which black man . Now black men can rule but which black men are going to rule . That is an issue because you think it will never end when you are a oppressed. Never going to end and when it ends you find a place where everything was geared to seeking out freedom and it is almost, not all those leaders were geared towards fighting freedom are the same leaders who can move forward once freedom is achieved and that is a tough thing we see in many countries all over the world. A lot of the time the liberators become the oppressors. They take over, free the people and once freedom is achieved there is no longer anything to fight over. So many times we see this, happens in many countries where the liberators stuff their own pockets and enriching themselves and then you are in the same cycle, the face of the top has changed and the label has shifted but doesnt feel anything has moved. Where did you as a colored person fit in as apartheid being dismantled . Guest i was extremely lucky in that my mother always lived as an outsider. To give you an understanding of this for people who may not know. In south africa all the races were broken down. This fewer liberties you were afforded. And as strange as it sounds, because my skin color i was considered a superior race to my own mother. An inferior race to my father. That is what colored means in south africa. So i grew up in a world where i grew up in a black family, living the black experience. What happened was the country wanted to define me as Something Else because of how i looked. My mother on the other hand was a rebel. She had a child from a white man, that tells you everything so essentially i existed in a space where i knew i wasnt defined by the labels set out for me because we never fit in. My family did not match any family around me. There were no white or colored people in my neighborhood where i grew up, so that was something i dont think was allowed to affect me because of the world i grew up in. Something my mom fought against because she didnt believe in being defined the way people wanted to define us. With your ability to speak different languages did you find yourself sitting in or identifying with different groups at different times . Yes. I grew up as an outsider. One of the greatest gifts i feel, it is hard to be an outsider because you feel exactly that. And outsider. You feel you never belong. The most amazing gift you received for being an outsider is it forces perspective on you. You cannot exist in a bubble because you are always in somebody elses bubble. You see someone elses point of view because most of the time you are in their world so language was one of those things which i have to adopt someone elses language and live within it to live in a different community, communicate with people but because of that it shaped me in different ways, gave me access to thoughts and ideas and experiences i never would have had. Host as apartheid is coming down to some coloreds tend to relate more to the white person, the White Community as opposed to the black community remain colored . Definitely. In terms of the way apartheid structured in such a way, dont want to spoil everything the book but the idea was you could convince people and we see this every day. People are convinced the reason they arent achieving is because of another group or another race that is holding them back and we are living through the time where a lot of times a white voice is spreading that message. That is what the government in south africa did. They reached out and said to colored people you are almost white. You are almost there, just a few more shades and you could do it. But unfortunately you still have that little bit of black in use so you never know. If you breed correctly for a few generations, if you marry right you might be able to ascend to a place of being white. It sounds ridiculous but every year in south africa people could be reclassified racially. If you were a colored person whose hair become straight enough in your face became light enough you could be reclassified as a white person and the same could happen inversely if you seem to be getting too dark, too much time in the sun you could be reclassified as a colored person from a white person and they didnt care about your genealogy. It went on appearances because it is ridiculous at the end of the day. The law has to be ridiculous to echo the ridiculousness of the ideas. So what happened was there were people who presented any part of themselves that was connected to what they were told was inferior. People presented the idea they came from a place, an idea or identity who in their minds were holding them back. As opposed to going we need to rise to the level of the white man, rise up to where we belong in society, achieve our inequality, leave them behind and lets try to aspire to get to. Host unmistakably the hero of your book is your mom. It speak loud and clear. I am going to read a passage and ask to comment, what struck me as to how special she was, there were no limitations on where they could do. My white culturally, in the sense of believing that the world was my oyster, that i should speak up for myself, that my ideas thoughts and decisions mattered. My mother showed me what was possible, what amazed me was no one showed her, no one chose her, she did it on her own, found her way through sheer force of will. I was nearly 6 when then della was released before democracy finally came. She was preparing me to live a life of freedom long before we knew freedom would exist. [applause] host can you comment on that . Guest one thing we couldnt deny growing up was we were living in a police state with one of the biggest things we talked about, my grandmother, my aunt, whoever it was, as a black child you had to be twice as good. You knew that you were not afforded the same liberties, you werent allowed to make the same mistakes because there was a system waiting to imprison or kill you so you had to be twice as good, twice as polite, twice as a human being. My mom to a certain extent bucked that trend and that system. That she brought me up as if i would be in a world where i was free to express myself, she brought me up as if i was going to live in a world where i wouldnt be oppressed. It is extremely risky gamble. My mom said speak up, voice your concerns, challenge me as your mother. That is one thing my mom interviewed in me was the idea i could challenge her authority. Dont get me wrong, i was on the end of many spankings from her but i was told i could challenge her because in challenging her we would learn. I tell people i am proud to say i dont know. I dont know most things. What is great about not knowing is the joy of filling in that void or knowing you can learn new things. I dont know why we learn our entire lives and when we become adults, we know now, we are done, we know, and we dont lose there is always something new to learn, and idea we can change. [applause] my mom always encouraged that. Host before we go to questions, one final question for you. This is something that looking at the discussion today, really struck me. You were announced to be the new host of the daily show, the Guardian Newspaper noted in reference to your selection, this is a big achievement not only for south america but the continent. One. 2 billion people in africa. Do you see yourself as a trailblazer for others, south africa and africa, by taking on such a prominent, important position in the us entertainment world . I see myself more as a proud citizen. I consider myself a citizen of the world and once i was afforded the ability to travel, i graciously crossed both hands and embraced it. I always tell people to try to travel. My favorite quote is traveling is the answer to ignorance and i believe it is. [applause] i am proud to go to a country, and the bloodless revolution in south africa, not a perfect country but we managed to find a way to shift power. And freedom is a lot of hard work. I came from an exceptional place. A child of south africa, and so much to learn about africa as a whole. It is not a country which is a surprise to some people. I consider myself an african as much as i do a South African, how many trials and tribulations we have forged together. So i see myself as less a trailblazer and more someone who is writing to heights because of those who rose before me and that is one of the main things my mom said to me. In the book i have it as the biggest thing my mom wanted, every generation should be further forward than the one that came before us. [applause] host questions . [applause] we have time for questions . If you can come to the mike, just line up. As all of you know, trevor noah has a day job. He will be traveling on a tight schedule. We are going to only be able to take a few questions to allow him to make it back. And everyone is lining up. We will do the daily show tomorrow from this spot. [cheers and applause] thank you, i enjoyed hearing you. Thank you. I lead a tour group in 1994 to south africa and we is that its soweto and the children in the will dance, it was very moving. We had a native South African tour guide helping us and he surprised me when he said there were better times during the apartheid because most of us are unemployed and we have been fired from our jobs because they have to give us fair wages. I was thinking it is like in the hebrew bible in exodus when the jews escaped from bondage and slavery from egypt and then started complaining in the desert, we want to go back to slavery. You were speaking about freedom being so difficult. I would like your comments. I heard it more than once from other black South Africans that had better times before. I acknowledge that through a combination of hard work of my parents. I have always been in a position of privilege, not everyone has the same things i do. I do know this. Freedom is hard work. Just because you achieve it does not mean everything is going to be good. Default falls at the feet of those who delivered the promises of liberation. If we look at the stories across the board and we see that in america now. The promises that are made with the politicians. And the anc promises at the time. And and you can enjoy the spoils. And the country was designed with the minority that doesnt make 10 of the population. And schools, once the country is free, and a redistribution of wealth that needs to happen. A lot of systems need to change in order for the change to take effect. When people say to me it was better, i struggled to grapple with the idea that it it is better to be enslaved. The stories of prisoners, because of how hard we make it in society to reintegrate some prisoners would rather stay in. I get food, a bed, i know what my life is, i go to a library and am part of the community and when you set me free i see the world as a prison is the question we should be asking ourselves is not whether it is better under apartheid but how do we create more opportunities not just in south africa to free those people are have access to that freedom. Teach a man to fish, and he will live forever. One thing i always think of is if you dont give them the tools to fish all of that information is useless. The rod is as important as allowing him thank you. [applause] we do have limited time. If you could make it a question, that would be great. [laughter] my name is melissa. I was born and raised in puerto rico and i came here in my early 20s about the time you were born. I didnt know the difference between black and white until i moved to this country. I did not face racism until i moved here and i saw it in a different way. My grandmother was as dark as the ground your shoes are on. Have you ever encountered races demand in this country, what have you done about it . At that moment . Guest i have encountered racism in america. It hasnt shaken me because i come from a place where we have the finest racism in the world. [laughter] you shake me with what you have here. I often find racism in my experience comes fear strangely enough. I see it as a symptom, people can disagree with me but personally i feel racism is the symptom and the cause simmons from many Different Things that a lot of times that racism comes from a fear, those who experienced racism from seeing me or seeing the black man or brown man as a threat to their livelihood, threats to their dominance as a threat to the prominence they were given by their fathers or leaders before who told them this was their land and future. To many people the idea of sharing is the idea of giving it all away and so oftentimes when the addition of the racial incidents have been particularly physical so it is mostly words. I am a Firm Believer in most emotions in the world are a choice we make. The way we respond to that, i smile and send it back. I dont believe you can spoil my day because of something you say by saying that. Most of you will hate me but we have time for two more questions but each of you have a book and in the book it is an email address, send an email to that address, get to trevor. Politicians later on. Your father was white so why did . That is the question i asked my on. Many South Africans did not eve to other countries. They spark a revolution. Others left merely to escape what was happening. I didnt know we could leave, didnt know there was an option. And one day i asked my mom why didnt leave . My dad is with each are you kidding me . My mom said one of the most powerful things to me. Leave and go, im not going to let somebody chase me out of my country. I am going to stay here. It is as simple as that. I didnt leave because i didnt know we could leave. She wasnt going to allow somebody to take what was hers in exchange for an easier life. Last question . I needed. I am nina. I was not fully white, can you experience the same, did you and they were not as dark as they were. The hierarchy that was created, in essence what i found, even when traveling the world, communities, it was not particularly pleasant are more welcoming to outsiders that choose that experience because no one would want to be here, who would judge you, those communities are very welcoming. I never experienced that in african communities. I did experience that in colored communities. It is easier to be an insider than it is to be an outsider as an insider. What i mean by that is it was easier for me to be accepted by black people because it was a quick discussion, you are choosing to be here, choosing to upset me and we move on from here. People saw me as being exactly like them, questions why i wasnt because culturally was not the same. They felt i was rejecting them by being myself. We have to do that all the time in our communities, we have somebody i feel is exactly like us and we shun them because we feel they are living a life different from ours when they are being true to themselves. That is something i didnt experience. [applause] i was standing in the back, someone whispered in my ear. I always like them because they are smart and funny, but he is a beautiful human being. It is remarkable. [applause] i want to thank Robert Weisberg for a remarkable conversation as well, thank you, bob. Asmac sunday, in depth will feature a live feature on the presidency of barack obama. We take your phone calls, sweets and facebook questions, the Panel Includes april lion, White House Correspondent for American Urban Radio Network and author of the presidency in black and white, upclose view of three president s and race in america, Princeton University professor eddie how race enslaved the american soul. The mock trials are held twice a year based on Shakespeare Theater Company production. This is about an hour. [inaudible conversations]. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Shakespeare Theater Company barred Association Winter mock trial. Before we begin the trial, please take time to silence al Electronic Devices that may disrupt this evenings proceedings. Photography and video recording of tonights trial is strictly prohibited. Join me welcoming, stc trustee and chair of the bard association, abby david lowell. [applause] thank you very much much for joining us at Harmon Center for performing arts. One of the home for the Shakespeare Company winter mock trial. We have known as the bard association. Figured out this morning by the way this is special event for us. This is our 25th mock trial. [applause] which dawned on me even in this town that is quite a lot of lawyering. As you know tonights performance and trial is based on the production of romeo juliet presented on the stage, stage across the way, just a few months ago. You know the work well. Made it one of the challenges of doing a trial based on that particular play. It is a famous story about two lovers in a world one in which shakespeare has one of his earliest poetic masterpieces. We follow the two stars, crossed lovers, cataclysmic choices from love at first sight to their tragic end. And after being caught in between the two feuding families , the, the real issue is the one confronting the death, was it necessarily fate or was it somebodys fault . Were those individuals involved responsible to make up their friends and families and those participants of higher powers, could this have been prevented, for somebody to was to blame . We almost has to cancel the night even though such an important event in our repertoire. 100 . Com, that secretary clinton was Funding Campaign from proceeds from a trafficking ring, had following headline. Romeo juliet death a hoax. Another plot to undermine the church. [laughter] you are very much part of this. As well as being the audience you are our collective jury. You will be asked to serve as the final jury vote with the following question, the assuming parents the montagues and cap you lets, pair some league responsibility for causing deaths, who is more legally liable for the deathof