ITI MAT Multilingual Theatre and Translation Workshop
On 26 March 2022, MAT teamed up with the London-based theatre company Foreign Affairs – which focuses exclusively on theatre in translation – to hold its first in-person event since 2019. Twelve participants spent the day being put through their paces by co-founders Trine Garrett and Camila França, exploring theatre and language through a fun approach rooted in Foreign Affairs’ collaborative way of working with theatre in translation. The day involved creative and engaging exercises aimed at bringing out individual and collective creativity, unlocking the imagination and promoting confidence.
Read what three participants made of the day in their accounts, previously published in the May-June issue of ITI Bulletin, reproduced here with the kind permission of the authors and the ITI Bulletin editor.
Working in the round
Swapping notes
A lively discussion
Playing many parts with the MAT Network
‘All the world’s a stage’, said the whiteboard awaiting us in the huge room where we’d be spending the best part of a fabulous day. And the Multilingual Theatre and Translation workshop, organised by the ITI Media, Arts & Tourism Network (MAT Network) and led by Foreign Affairs, began.
After a few brilliant icebreakers, the main facilitator, Trine Garrett, with the expert support of her colleague Camila França, led us – a bunch of translators at various stages of our careers and with different languages and specialities – into a journey of discovery that centred around the complexities of both theatre in translation and multilingual theatre (in translation). Into the mix were thrown things like page versus stage and gesture; we riffed around the importance of knowing your audience, and the temporary, ever-changing nature of a performance, as well as the implications of producing a text (and a translation) that ultimately is a written-to-be-spoken sort of affair. In the second part, when we were also graced with the presence of two professional actors working with Foreign Affairs, we even got to ‘repurpose’ a scene from Ibsen’s A Doll’s House – working in groups, we were tasked with moving the play into a different time and place – while also making it multilingual. Talk about a challenge and a half!
Testimonials
Adriana Tortoriello
There was a true sense of participation, of a collaborative experience where I’m sure we each went away richer than before and indeed more curious. I for one feel that we’ve only just scratched the surface of an iceberg and I’m definitely up for more. And even if you’re not involved in theatre translation yourself, this is the sort of gym you could take your translator’s brain to any day of the week.
Silvia Ferretti
What a great way to spend a Saturday! The scheduled activities at this workshop took us deep into the world of theatre translation, giving us more and more tools to understand the difficulties of translating in this field. We had the chance to work together to find solutions to linguistic and cultural challenges (some of which still pick my brain when I can’t sleep, believe it or not). It was a great way to reflect on the role of language in theatre (and more broadly in society) without forgetting what it means in terms of identity and how it is linked to emotions and their expression.
Seeing actors at work in a multilingual context on translated material was an unforgettable way to see our work come alive, which rarely happens when working as a translator. It was such a pleasure getting to know so many colleagues in person and to spend a day working and socialising with them. As a graduate translator and interpreter, and also being new to this country, I learned a lot and I look forward to the next brilliant event!
Lydia Smith
After two years of working in near isolation, meeting real people in person for a face-to-face workshop was something of a culture shock – but a very welcome one. Although I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from the day, I felt immediately relaxed upon entering the space and being greeted by Trine. Unlike some of the other participants, I have never translated a play, but I enjoy creative translation and writing (and I love theatre), and I was in search of a boost to inspire my future work.
We started with a fun exercise introducing ourselves and what we’d had for breakfast (some surprising answers!) and then we considered various ways of dealing with multilingualism in theatre, looking at texts in foreign languages we were not necessarily familiar with, texts incorporating a variety of languages and the reasons for using different languages within one production. We discussed how the translation of spoken language is different from working with the written word, particularly when the output will be interpreted by directors and actors and experienced through the prism of a live audience.
In the afternoon, seeing our work interpreted by two fabulous actors from Foreign Affairs gave us a real insight into how just changing a few words or names can completely alter the nature of a scene, and was also the cause of much hilarity! After the session, some of us retired to the pub down the road and continued the lively discussions that came out of the workshop and also shared our varying experiences of the past two years. Many thanks to Charlie Gobbett and Françoise Vignon for organising this interesting, thought-provoking event.