Sharjah 24: Two translated books added by the Arab Theatre Institute (ATI) to the Arab theatre library, carrying influential visions of theatre around the world, within the translation series.
The first 365 pages book is "Performance Aesthetics, A Theory of the Aesthetics of the Show", written by the famous German writer Erika Fischer-Lichte and translated by the Egyptian researcher Dr. Marwa Mahdi Obeido.
Dr. Marwa Mahdi says, in the introduction to the book, that the theory of performance aesthetics depends on dealing with the show as an independent artistic work, and as a special creation that produces an aesthetic experience different from the aesthetic experiences produced by literature. It produces a different aesthetic experience for the creators and the recipients without distinguishing between them, as the spectators stand on an equal footing with the performers in terms of participation, which represents a new starting point from the starting points adopted by Fischer-Litsche, and thus the artist here creates an event, and does not present an artistic work as classical critical theories state.
It is worth noting that Lichte is a German academic thinker and theorist and has had a great impact on the modern theatrical scene, especially in terms of the intertwining and interweaving of culture. As for the translator Mahdi, she is a professor and academic in the field of theatre and performing arts, and a lecturer at the Free University of Berlin.
The second book, translated by the Egyptian artist Dr. Nora Amin, is “The Paradox of the Actor, the Stranger in the Art of the Actor” by Denis Diderot. It is an easy to read profound book, and its theory is formulated in a dialogue style.
Nora Amin says, in her introduction to the book, that “Diderot draws our attention to the duality that the actor lives and creates in order to be able to represent that imaginary other, and from here it seems as if his French text addresses the duality of the artist and the Arab individual if we look at his concept of duality in a more comprehensive social, psychological and cultural way.
In fact, Diderot chose the form of dialogue to present his text in order to emphasise that duality on the one hand, and to connect the reader to the continuity of the theatre – since it is essentially a dialogue – and to open the way for questioning more than answering on the other hand.
Diderot, who died in 1784, was a philosopher and playwright who participated in creating encyclopedias and left behind a theoretical intellectual legacy that is still active in the theatrical scene today.
As for translator, Dr. Nora Amin, she is an author, actress, and theatre director, in addition to being a choreographer. She is the founder of the independent theatre group La Musica in 2000, and a visiting professor at the Faculty of Music at the University of Cologne in Germany.
Ismail Abdullah, Secretary-General of ATI, stated that two important books were translated by creative women Nora Amin and Marwa Mahdi. Diderot and Lichte are influential and transcend the boundaries of time and geography. Diderot gave the art of acting and the actor great theoretical attention, and his theories are still effective and influential today, which is one of the factors that paved the way for the emergence of realism and the art of the actor founded by Stanislavski.
As for Erica Fisher, she did a great job in studying the interweaving of cultures and transcending European centrality, and established a great presence for herself and her books in the Arab region. ATI is proud that two creative women in the Arab theatre translated and presented these two books. Marwa Mahdi and Nora Amin made an important effort in this direction in addition to what they offer in the creative and academic scene.
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