210x210mm, 230 pages, Paperback, 200 photographs
ISBN: 978-1-914325-01-4 Price: £25.00 Available: Autumn 2022 |
ACTING OUT
Voices from the Theatre in Palestine Jonathan Daitch In the face of the violent and dramatic images of the conflict in Palestine/Israel, Palestinian culture is so little understood that its very existence is often ignored. Yet, there is a thriving culture in Palestine and the many theatres found throughout the country are very much a part of it. They play an important role in Palestinian society, both as vehicles for expressing traditional values and ideals, and as forums for presenting new ideas and new human relationships. In the context of the Israeli occupation, theatre in Palestine also serves to limit cultural distortion and destruction; it provides a means of channelling the frustrations and anger of the Palestinian people, especially youth, into non-violent expressions of personal legitimacy.
Acting Out: Voices from the Theatre in Palestine is a book of texts and photographs presenting most of the professional and semi-professional theatres in Palestine and Palestinian theatres in Israel. Texts based on interviews by Jonathan Daitch in 2015, ’16, and ‘17 of 50 actors, directors, and others directly involved in each of 26 theatres and theatre groups are accompanied by photographs by Daitch and others. This format gives Palestinians involved in the theatre a stage on which to talk about their theatres and their lives in the theatre, and to present in their own words Palestinian culture and theatre to a broad audience. They do this with very powerful and moving personal statements, thus achieving one of the major purposes of this book: to help people to see Palestinian theatre as a creative artistic phenomenon, not only as a militant one. "The theatre has changed me... from a person without a dream, without hope, to a person with hope! A person who believes in impossible things... to believe that there is nothing impossible. This is the change; to have a discipline, begging to improve things. Without becoming discouraged. And theatre has helped me to understand myself. To know my feelings... not only feelings... my soul!" "We are a simple theatre, more mobile than fixed. Ninety percent of our performances are done on school playgrounds or on the street, next to the separation wall. We even work inside the Bedouin caravans. We work under the sun and under the rain. Here we mix theatre with awareness, with psychological support, with drama therapy. Some people will claim that we are not making theatre. Let us say, we are making the theatre of the simple people, the theatre of the oppressed people. This is a source of pride for us." "Being a victim-thinking you are a victim and believing you are a victim-—well, you area victim. You adapt a victim attitude in your life-how you relate to people, how you talk to them, and eventually it becomes a whole culture of people who are victims. So, | do not want to be a victim. | would never want you to come to see our theatre children, and for you to see misery in them. No. My aim is that you come and see children full of life, who are able to change their status quo—who are able to change the future. Because then we are feeding people-misery will not feed people's hope, will not feed people's creativity." |
About the Editor
Born in Boston in 1941 into a Jewish Ashkenazi family, Jonathan Daitch divided his professional career as a teacher first in the US, where he earned a doctorate in education, and then in France, where he has lived for the last 35 years. An avid amateur photographer since the age of 19, photography became a full-time activity when he retired in 2001. In 2007, at the invitation of the Alrowwad Cultural Centre in the Aida refugee camp in Bethlehem, he spent two weeks there helping to set up a darkroom and giving photography classes. This led to working with both the Alrowwad and Yes theatre troupes on tours in France in 2011, 2012, and 2014. It was during the 2014 Yes Theatre tour that the idea for Acting Out: Voices from the Theatre in Palestine was born and developed.
|
