From Friday September 22 to Sunday September 24 the Stratford Festival will be hosting a reading series, along with a speaking panel, titled Encountering Ukraine: Readings in Solidarity. Curated by the Director of this season’s Casey and Diana, Ukrainian-Canadian artist/activist Andrew Kushnir and featuring several past and present Festival company members, this reading series of plays-in-translation represents some of the best of Ukraine's theatre and showcases how artists help define and defend the culture of a people.

“The plays in this series, which span over a century of Ukrainian drama, not only embody forms of extraordinary cultural resistance and courage, but they will fill your heart up. They will inspire. They will give you an astonishing and moving gateway into the colours and contours of the Ukrainian spirit.” -Andrew Kushnir, Curator

CASSANDRA: A DRAMATIC POEM

BY LESYA UKRAINKA | TRANSLATED BY NINA MURRAY Lazaridis Hall, Tom Patterson Theatre

Friday, September 22 | 8-10 p.m.

Among Ukraine’s greatest literary figures and feminist activists, Lesya Ukrainka at the age of 13 chose the penname “Ukrainian Woman”. In Cassandra, she spotlights one of the more marginal characters of the Trojan War and offers us a remarkably timely play about fighting for the truth, even when no one believes you.

STEPPING OUT OF THE SHADOW:

UKRAINE KNOWN ON ITS OWN TERMS

Lazaridis Hall, Tom Patterson Theatre

Saturday, September 23 | 10:30 a.m.-NOON

Series curator Andrew Kushnir will lead a dialogue with guests on how Ukraine has been historically impacted by cultural imperialism, how artists have been critical to Ukraine’s fight for independence and freedom, and what solidarity can look like on the cultural front of this war.

SONATA PATHÉTIQUE

BY MYKOLA KULISH I TRANSLATED BY GEORGE S.N. LUCKY AND MOIRA LUCKY

Lazaridis Hall, Tom Patterson Theatre

Saturday, September 23 | 2-5 p.m.

Set in the chaos between Easter 1917 and Easter 1919, Kulish’s sweeping and satirical take on love and revolution is considered by many to be the finest Ukrainian drama of the 20th century. In what may be a first in Western theatre, the play’s dramaturgy carefully mirrors a piece of classical music: Beethoven’s much-loved Piano Sonata No 8.

BAD ROADS

BY NATAL'YA VOROZHBIT | TRANSLATED BY SASHA DUGSDALE Lazaridis Hall, Tom Patterson Theatre

Saturday, September 23 | 8-10 p.m.

An often darkly comic, unsparing and ever-surprising portrait of how women fight to sustain their humanity in times of war, Bad Roads is a seminal work from one of Ukraine’s most brilliant contemporary playwrights. Natal'ya Vorozhbit’s own film adaptation of the play was Ukraine’s submission to the Academy Awards in 2021.

WITNESSING WAR:

UKRAINIAN PLAYS SINCE FEBRUARY 2022

Lazaridis Hall, Tom Patterson Theatre

Sunday, September 24 | 2-5 p.m.

The war in Ukraine has been called the most reported on war of all time and Ukrainian playwrights have been prolific contributors. This closing event features an assemblage of short works written since the full-scale invasion of February 2022–Ukraine’s leading dramatists reaching out to us, as they make sense of a world shattered and reformed.

THE PLAYS INCLUDE:

A Dictionary of Emotions in a Time of War

by Olena Astaseva, translated by John Freedman

What is War?

by Andrii Bondarenko, translated by John Freedman with Natalia Bratus

24 Hours.

By Nina Zakhozhenko, translated by Iana Gudzenko, ed. by Paulien Geerlings. Final edit by John Freedman

Robinson

by Vitaly Chensky, translated by John Freedman

Three Rendezvous

by Natalka Vorozhbyt, translated by John Freedman with Natalia Bratus

Three Attempts To Improve Daily Life

by Maksym Kurochkin, translated by John Freedman with Natalia Bratus

Planting an Apple Tree

by Irina Garets, translated by John Freedman with Natalia Bratus.

www.stratfordfestival.ca