CULTURE MONSTER

Playwright David Hare has been thinking a lot about walls lately. But not just any old plaster job. No, the walls preoccupying his imagination are thick and weighty with political importance. One of them doesn’t exist anymore -- that was in Berlin. The other doesn’t exist yet but will soon -- that will be in the Mideast.

The British scribe will present a double bill of monologues addressing both of these walls as part of a special engagement May 14 to 17 at the Public Theater in New York. “Berlin/Wall” will be directed by Stephen Daldry, who collaborated with Hare on the films “The Hours” and “The Reader.”

Coincidentally (or not), the New York Review of Books just published the second of the two monologues. “Wall: A Monologue” was performed by Hare at the Royal Court Theatre in London in March, and you can read it on the review’s website, www.nybooks.com. (Hey, it’s cheaper than booking an LAX-to-JFK flight.)

The 4,907-word monologue is a highly personal, even subjective account of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Of course, Hare has never been shy about his political leanings (“Stuff Happens,” anyone?). But by the same token, you could never accuse of him of not doing his research. His latest monologue contains the following nuggets about the Israeli wall:

“Varying in width between 30 and 150 meters, this $2 billion combination of trenches, electronic fences, ditches, watchtowers, concrete slabs, checkpoints, patrol roads, and razor coil is priced at around $2 million per kilometer. Some seventy-five acres of greenhouses and twenty-three miles of irrigation pipes have already been destroyed on the Palestinian side. . . . Already, 102,000 trees have been cut down to clear its path.”

-- David Ng