Multilingual Dramaturgies

Kasia Lech is a scholar, actor, storyteller, dramaturg, puppeteer, and Associate Professor in Global Performance History at the University of Amsterdam, Netherlands. Her research and creative practice explore theatre through practice-based and traditional scholarship and primarily focus on theatre in relation to multilingualism, verse, translation, migration, dramaturgy, and cross-cultural encounters. Kasia is the author of Dramaturgy of Form: Performing Verse in Contemporary Theatre (2021). She performed internationally and co-founded Polish Theatre Ireland, a multilingual theatre company based in Dublin. Kasia is an Executive Director at TheTheatreTimes.com, a global theatre portal which seeks to decolonize theatre criticism. She also co-convenes the Translation Adaptation Dramaturgy working group at the International Federation for Theatre Research.

“This interesting book in Palgrave’s ‘New Dramaturgies’ series examines the work of European theatremakers whose productions are performed in more than one language onstage. ... this work a unique addition to the literature on European theatre.” (The Polish Review, Vol. 70 (1),  April, 2025)

• Chapter1. Multilingual Dramaturgies: Theories, Politics, and European landscape.- Part I: Questions Of Language.- Chapter 2. The Failures of Multilingual Dramaturgies: The blind poet by Needcompany.- Chapter 3. Multisensory, Multilingual Dramaturgy as a Tool for Social Change: Nie Mów Nikomu (Don’t Tell Anyone) by Scena Robocza.-Chapter 4. Dramaturgy of Incomprehensibility and Encounter in Odin Teatret’s The Tree.- Part II: Multilingual Adaptations.- Chapter 5. Multilingual Histories of Europe: Sir David Pountney on The Passenger and Memories of Auschwitz.- Chapter 6. Multilingualism as Mask and Virus: The Dialogue with Tradition in the Theatre of Radosław Rychci.- Chapter 7. Actors as Creators of Multilingual Dramaturgies: Teatro Inverso and Their Transnational Adaptations.- Part III: Local And Trans-Local Tales Of Cities And Their Communities.- Chapter 8. Dramaturging the Multilingual Community: Dramaturg Nina Thunnissen on the Work of Frisian Tryater.- Chapter 9. Multilingualismand Dramaturgy of History and Democracy: the Lithuanian National Theatre’s Žalia pievelė.- Chapter 10. Local and Global Politics in Malmö’s Teater Foratt and Teater JaLaDa.- Part IV:Webbed Dramaturgies.- Chapter 11. Towards Porous Europe: Multilingual Dramaturgies in Rimini Protokoll’s 100% City.- Chapter 12. Towards Aesthetics of Transatlantic Theatre: Multilingualism in SignDance Collective International’s production of Carthage/Cartagena by Caridad Svich.-Chapter 13. Making Europe: How Anne Bérélowitch’s Directorial and Training Practices Open Spaces for New Multilingual Dramaturgies.- Chapter 14. Towards New European Theatre.