conversations in ten questions 32 : Athena Farrokhzad
Organized by GalataPerform and being the first playwriting festival in Turkey, the New Text Festival was held for the tenth time this year between November 1st and 28th, 2021, with a hybrid structure focused on the theme of "Breath", both in the physical space and digitally.
We hosted Athena Farrokhzad in the fourth of our conversations with international playwrights whose plays were translated into Turkish and staged and read at the festival.
Ayşe Draz & Mehmet Kerem Özel
© Carla Orrego Veliz
What is the essence of good play/playwriting in your opinion?
To me, a written play, more than anything, is literature. Therefor, the same quality criterias as other forms of writing can be applied to it: complexity and fierceness of style, a linguistic/existential/political/etc intervention that moves the reader/the world/the history of literature etc.
Do you believe in the transformative power of art? How?
Yes and no. I believe good art addresses the material conditions of life and that a work of art can captivate and thereby operate within the desires of a person and change her from within. But when it comes to political change in a society, I think more rather than organising signs, organizing people is necessary. Social transformation doesn’t begin on a stage, it begins in the streets.
How do you think that the pandemic that we are facing at a global scale did and will transform performing arts?
I leave this blank because I don’t have an answer unfortunately.
Are there any artist whom you can describe as "my master", or any person whom you think influenced your art most? And if there is such an artist or person, who?
Other poets like Bertolt Brecht, Adrienne Rich, Forough Farrokhzad, Sapfo and many more...
When you are working on a piece, what sources inspire you? Do dreams play a role in your works?
More than anything, things that people say. In the history of literature, on the streets, in bed, in the parliaments, in nurseries etc.
When do you decide to give a title to a work you are working on if it already does not have one?
Titles are very important for me. I think a title often makes a work of art possible or necessary. Titles often come early to me, and the rest of the writing process is about understanding what the title means.
Do you believe your works resonate more with your local culture/community or more universally?
I’m not very fond of the distinction between universal and local. The universal consists of many different localities and the other way around. I’m fond of the idea of letting the text show that it is written in a specific time and place, not cover it up.
What are your main concerns when a play of yours is translated into another language?
My main concern with translation is always the musicality of the language which comes before content if one has to choose.
Your play Morals according to Medea takes as reference Medea by Euripides ; can you elaborate on the themes of your play and in what ways it is related to and differs from the Medea by Euripides?
My play begins when Euripides play ends and poses the question: What happens to Medea after the drama is over? It is a dialogue between Medea and the silent yet active character in Euripides play: Morality. It investigates the power and agency of women when it comes to children and the power and agency of Medea when it comes to the history of literature. Medea repeatedly says: Some one has to play the part of Medea and this time it was me.
Which elements surprised you and which elements were just as you expected in the staged reading of your works by the participant artists of the New Text Festival in Istanbul?
The reading was actually quite close to my original vision of the text, with one character playing Medea, one Morality and the stone, which are important in the manuscript, being very present on stage. This was the first time the part of Morality was played by a man, which I think changed the perspective in an interesting way.
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