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Disrupting the Literary Department

Writer's picture: Matthew ShortMatthew Short

During the Developing Northern Dramaturgies project, I collaborated with two theatre companies and had a meeting with a third. Each one are the only company in their country consistently working and delivering theatre in their minority language. Giron Sámi Teáhter are the only one with a house. Aisling Ghéar have been the resident theatre company in an Irish language cultural centre, and Theatre Gu Leòr rent offices, but not a performance space of their own. In their respective countries, they should really be funded as the national (Irish/Gaelic/Sámi) theatre, Giron certainly have been fighting for that status. As it stands, these companies do not have the same access to funds and resources as most major institutional houses.

 

It is often the institutional houses that have dramaturgs working in a literary department, or alone as a literary manager. This is common in Sweden, and has been in decline in the UK, but with a few strongholds. The literary department here are often known for supporting, discovering, and developing new writing which helps to foster a moving forwards of the dramatic landscape (in theory). As such, these departments hold a lot of power in shaping what makes theatre current and feeding into the development of a future canon. Dramaturgs in this capacity, carry a responsibility, although I would argue this responsibility is greater in Sweden than it is in the UK where our hierarchical systems still maintain a hoarding of influence in the top role of artistic director (or a similar role).

 

In this context, the dramaturg is often a cog in the cycle of defining the narratives of the nation on our country’s stages. Knowing some of the in-house dramaturgs that work across the UK, I am genuinely excited by their perspectives, their perseverance, and their dedication to broadening what sort of stories reach our stages. I worry, however, that these ideas and willingness to support new or different modes of theatre seldom make it to the stages within the national arena. From the outside perspective, the literary department looks bound to the norms and traditions that have pervaded the industry since the 80s. And they are very much bound to the dominant language and the hegemony that its canon already and persists to carry.

 

During the project, our team spoke about and often came back to the idea of disruption. As a decolonial practice, we can see how the literary disruption of magical realism in Latin America reshaped how readers and writers could view the modernist world. The works that utilised this device disrupted the very realities that colonial powers were trying to dictate and present perspectives of alterity on the every day lives of those living under them. As such, dramaturgy should also act as a disruptor in this way, and in turn, could have as big an impact as other literary movements across the world.

 

There have always been spaces and arenas for theatre makers to disrupt and to agitate the norms. However, in recent years, these opportunities seem to be depleting, the economic situation is creating risk-aversion, and the audiences aren’t finding their way back to this “challenging” form of theatre. Work like this may be deemed avant-garde or fringe, but even these fields are changing under the capitalistic system. And, to consider those theatre makers working in a minority language as fringe is an indication that the decolonial work has not been done. This form of theatre should be a part of the everyday fabric of our national, regional, and local theatre worlds. This form of theatre is the expression of those who have been systematically cleared from the land on which our theatres now stand. We share the space with them, and should do so as equals.

 

Ultimately, this work needs to occur in literary departments. It needs to happen at an institutional level with the capacity to set the groundwork for a thriving scene where multiple national languages can shape and determine the landscape of contemporary and future theatre. The disruption needs to be happening inside buildings, and dramaturgs need to be able to have the skills to work with narrative disruption instead of relying on narrative norms. We need to be able to see and understand the world differently to how we are used to, and it may be uncomfortable or difficult, but it is necessary to ensure that we aren’t just regurgitating the a hegemonic heritage over and over across our nation’s stages.

 

And more than this, the decolonial work needs to occur at every level of an institutional theatre. If national funding bodies won’t fund minority language theatre in the same way it funds the dominant language’s theatre, then the houses need to start embedding minority culture and narratives into their daily lives and work to ensure that it is allowed to grow, develop, and flourish. To inspire the next generations of the possibilities of theatre.

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