A Prince never learns to take no for an answer. In 510 BC, Roman caesar Tarquin hears of a beautiful noblewoman, Lucrece. He gatecrashes her house, enters her bedchamber, and forces himself upon her. Lucrece eventually commits suicide, inspires a rebellion and becomes the stuff of historical legend. If you didn't know it was a story already, you'd think these characters were dreamed up by William Shakespeare.

In 1594, when England was touched by a bubonic plague, and public spaces such as theatres were closed for business, Shakespeare wrote a 1,855-line narrative poem called The Rape of Lucrece. It's one of his lesser-known works, and only true believers have engaged with it. Like British theatre director Paul Goodwin, artistic director of The Shakespeare Edit, who's been a devotee for more than 50 years. This month, he brings his adaptation to the NCPA, about which he says, "To call it a play is not quite right; to call it a poem is not quite right. It's a piece of theatre." His Lucrece stars actors Kalki Koechlin in the lead, Deepal Doshi as the rapist-prince, and Suruchi Aulakh as the narrator.