In the heart of multicultural Hackney, where the streets pulse with stories from every corner of the globe, Anu Kumar Lazarus walks a path that few dare to tread. She is not just a doctor. She is not just a playwright. She is not just a yoga teacher or dancer. She is all of these, and more—a force of human empathy, imagination, and unwavering purpose. With roots stretching across continents and passions flowing across disciplines, Anu Kumar Lazarus is redefining what it means to heal, connect, and uplift society.
Born into the margins and middle spaces between cultures, Anu Kumar Lazarus has spent over three decades serving the communities of London’s East End as a General Practitioner (GP). Her medical journey, marked by the prestigious qualifications of MRCP, DRCOG, and MRCGP, is one deeply anchored in patient care, equity, and advocacy. But even within the sterile confines of hospitals and clinics, her spirit dances—literally and figuratively.
Anu Kumar Lazarus: Where Medicine Meets Movement
Long before she wore a white coat, Anu trained in movement—contemporary dance, capoeira, and ashtanga yoga were not hobbies but intrinsic expressions of her inner world. That love for rhythm and bodywork would later become an integral part of her healing practice, blending breath, balance, and presence into every interaction.
A certified yoga teacher, Anu brings the ancient wisdom of embodied wellness into her clinical practice. She sees beyond prescriptions—she sees stories. Her patients are not symptoms, they are souls. And every illness, every ailment, every silence carries a narrative waiting to be heard. It is this profound understanding of the human condition that shapes her work—not only in medicine but on stage.
The Art of Transcultural Healing
As Clinical Lead for Patient/Resident Engagement and Equality for the Borough and the City of London, Anu Kumar Lazarus tackles some of the most pressing questions of our time: How do we democratize spaces? How do we create environments where stories from all walks of life are honored, not just heard? How do we design systems where multicultural dialogue flourishes, not flounders?
Her answer? Through storytelling. Not just any storytelling—but the kind that transcends perception, that bends time, that breathes life into history, and brings the invisible into the light.
Anu Kumar Lazarus: ‘A London Lark Rising’: Rewriting Empire with Feet on the Ground
In 2024, Dr. Kumar Lazarus launched a bold, groundbreaking theatrical experience: A London Lark Rising. More than just a play, it’s a walking tour, a live performance, a time machine powered by collective memory and imagination. Supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund and created in collaboration with Lisa Honan CBE, this immersive project leads audiences through the streets of London’s historic Empire sites. It’s here—between cobbled stones and corporate towers—that the ghosts of colonialism come alive.
From Queen Elizabeth I to Emperor Jahangir, from Shakespeare to Robert Clive, the characters in A London Lark Rising challenge our understanding of the British Empire—not as a dusty page in a history book but as a living force that shaped, and continues to shape, modern Britain. The show is theatre in motion, historical reckoning, and cultural intervention rolled into one.
“I made it in the street,” Anu shares. “People don’t always read a lot of history, but this is history in front of their eyes in the locations where the Empire first began. And this is my turf. I’ve grown up around these streets—it doesn’t feel alien to me.”
Stories as Sacred Medicine
Whether in the intimacy of her GP clinic or the expanse of a public theatre, Anu Kumar Lazarus is committed to one thing: listening deeply. She believes stories are the very architecture of our humanity. They can heal.
They can connect. They can liberate. Her 2022 play Freedom, produced by Kali Theatre, was a harrowing, powerful exploration of Yazidi women’s experiences under Daesh. Her earlier piece Waterfall—a poetic reimagining of Hindu myth—captured the sacred, feminist, and timeless. Every production, every script, every spoken word is another heartbeat of her mission.
But storytelling, for Anu, is not just performance. It is a protest. It is presence. It is a declaration of shared humanity.
“I am always in the middle,” she writes. “In the middle of two cultures, in the middle of two disciplines: the arts and the sciences. In the middle of a conservative, professional, wonderful world and a persistent and lively imagination.”
And perhaps that’s exactly where change begins—in the middle. In the friction between worlds. In the space where movement meets medicine. Where history meets the human body. Where silence finally speaks.
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