Introduction

Summary

Contemporary Performance Translation opens with a consideration of the impossible but necessary stakes in translating for the stage, taking inspiration from the author’s own collaborations with Argentinian playwrights in translating their work for the English-language stage, with particular attention paid to the ten-play translation project with dramatist Ricardo Monti. The project’s theoretical frame of translationality is developed in conversation with current artistic and critical approaches to contemporary theatre and performance translation. A translational approach to performance translation, precisely because of the complexities brought about by its linguistic, cultural, aesthetic, and technical engagements, has great potential for complicating the often-assumed unidirectional destiny of a given translation and for exposing the dangerous asymmetries contained within the increasing globalization of English. An overview of the four central chapters and conclusion complete the introduction.