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This autumn Ny Tid published my text about Lucy Kerbel's book "100 Great Plays for Women". You can find the original article (in Swedish) on Ny Tid's homepage and what follows here is my slightly adapted translation of that text to English. A translation of the interview I did with her is also coming.
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100 GREAT PLAYS FOR
WOMEN BY LUCY KERBEL
The title does, in this
case, say it all. In this book director Lucy Kerbel presents 100 plays, and ten
monologues, for women. It is of course a selection, not an exhaustive list of
all plays ever written through time. In the introduction Kerbel gives an
account of the basis for her selection, and explains that there have been two
criteria that the plays have had to meet to make the cut as it were. First of
all half or more of all the roles should be women, second of all the plays
should have been printed so that they are possible to get hold of for the
general public. Apart from this the selection is naturally also influenced by
Kerbal’s own linguistic background, since she has read plays that are written
in, or have been translated into, English. Towards the end of the introduction
she adds that she has chosen to only include a playwright once, to avoid making
the book a list of play by writers like April
de Angelis, Caryl Chuchill, Sarah Daniels and Bryony Lavery.
The book’s framework is
simple, the plays are presented in alphabetical order according to the playwright’s
last name. Each play gets a spread [?] which begins with a short summery of the
play’s history: when it was first performed; which edition it is available in;
how many roles there are and if doublings are possible; and when it comes to
translations, which translation she recommends. Each play is introduced with a
short synopsis and after that Kerble’s goes into a discussion about the playwright,
the play’s background and history, themes or specific characters in the story,
depending on the play in question.
Kerbel does not hide
the fact that she wants this to be a book that the reader can make practical
use of. In England were drama in schools and youth theatre groups are an
established part of everyday life this book gives teachers and directors an
opportunity to find texts that fit the group they are working with. In the
professional theatres (in Finland as well as England) it is a reminder that it
is not true that “there are no plays with good parts for women” or that plays
that focus on the female experience only deal with women as mothers or
partners. Among the independent theatre groups or individual theatre workers
this book is a source of information about existing plays or an inspiration for
the types of plays that one wants to perform.
It is always possible to
discuss the selection, what has been included and what has been excluded, in
this type of book. Kerbel writes clearly and consciously about the grounds for
the selection and its limitations, and even if the reader might miss a certain
play or wonder why another text has been included in the book there is no doubt
that it is a question of conscious decisions through and through on the part of
the writer.
Personally I came
across both familiar and unfamiliar plays and playwrights in the book, plays
that have been performed in the Swedish language theatre in Finland, and plays
that keep being talked about but so far has not made it as far as onto a stage.
Among the plays are also two Nordic works, Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler and a
dramatization of Märta Tikkanen’s Århundradets kärlekssaga (Love Story of the
Century).
I see no reason to
pretend that I do not think this is a fantastic and inspiring book. Both because
of the content and because of the idea behind to. To choose to take on statement
like “there are no parts for women” and find out to what extent that is
actually true or not, to highlight at least some of the available alternatives
feels like a constructive and refreshing way to participate in the discussion
about equality, in theatre as well as other parts of life. By sticking to the
concrete Kerbal’s book also becomes a contribution to a discussion that needs
to be continually had about how our canon is formed, maintained and changed. I
my view her contribution in the shape of this book leads to the follow up
question, why aren’t the plays that actually do exist performed?
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