Playwriting in Europe: Mapping Ecosystems and Practices with Fabulamundi

This book explores the different traditions, structures and ecosystems that currently shape, support and regulate artistic practices in the field of playwriting and theatre translation in fifteen different countries in Europe. It was commissioned by the Fabulamundi network of partners from theatre scholar and translator Margherita Laera, who was appointed as research consultant in 2019.

The volume consists of three main parts:

1) an introduction to Fabulamundi’s work on the promotion of playwriting and translation across European languages, focusing on the author’s experience as a theatre translator involved in a Fabulamundi workshop;

2) a country-by-country report, nicknamed Fabulamundi Workbook, which is the result of extensive academic research conducted between 2020 and 2021 to map the different structures and practices of playwriting Austria, France, Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Spain, Poland, Romania, and the UK. The study, based on surveys and interviews with experts, contains a list of key players and covers topics such as funding, commissioning, publishing, cultural attitudes to equality and inclusion, and tips to penetrate each market;

3) a series of six conversations with key experts in the field of playwriting in Serbia & Bosnia, Iceland, Holland, Portugal, Finland, and Turkey.

The aim of this publication is to promote contemporary playwriting in European languages by sharing a mapping exercise, a series of best practices and expert reflections aimed to support the internationalisation of European dramatists’ careers by providing makers, producers, artistic directors and policy-makers with a concrete tool to navigate distant theatre cultures and learn from how other traditions ‘do’ playwriting. A book for industry professionals, it will offer guidance to a new generation of playwrights and organisers, leading to the acquisition of intercultural competences and promoting cross-cultural dialogue.