Poet and essayist Angela Weld Grimke’s Rachel was written in 1916 in response to a call by the NAACP’s Crisis magazine the previous year. Its premiere in 1917 was the first time a play written by a Black woman would be seen in front of an integrated audience. Described as the “first attempt to use the stage for race propaganda in order to enlighten the American people relative to the lamentable condition of the millions of Colored citizens in this free republic" by its original producers, the questions the play grapples with resonate so loudly that it begged to be adapted into the audio format you’re about to experience.