The Ships Pass Quietly is a stirring drama about Anna Akhmatova who is remembered as perhaps the greatest Russian poet of the 20th Century. After the brilliant success of her first books of poetry Anna was forcibly silenced and condemned as a "half-nun, half-harlot". Her husband was arrested and executed on the false charge of counter-revolutionary conspiracy. Their son Lev was arrested three times and spent many years in prison. All this unfolded against the background of two World Wars, the Great Terror, the Leningrad Blockade and evacuation to Central Asia.