Tragedy of Theatre in Syria

Originally published on monthly magazine Syria Today in the May issue.

While Syrian theatre is becoming more creative, outlets for innovations are limited.

Insufficient theatre space is hindering the development of the art form, playwrights, directors and producers told Syria Today.

“Writing is an individual activity, yet to create a workshop for a theatre, you need a space to exchange ideas, discuss them and collaborate on turning them into an actual performance,” Abdullah al-Kafri, a Syrian playwright, said.

Such spaces are few, even though there are more than 400 national cultural centres in Syria. Each has a theatre that is, theoretically, allocated for public use. Yet these stages are unsuitable for live performances.

“They are not designed as theatre stages,” Kafri explained. “They might work as a lecture stage or even to screen a movie, but not for a theatre play, which needs the right balance in its stage.”

Breaking in
Competition for space is intensified because well-known theatres prefer to stage international productions backed by famous directors rather than those written and produced by young Syrians, Modar al-Hajj, a 29-year-old playwright, explained.

The National Institute of Theatre and Music (NITM) prefers to work with well-known and established directors than with young people trying to establish their careers.

“Famous directors who manage to get their work on the [NITM] schedule usually like to rely on foreign plays and scripts, rather than take advantage of talented writers in Syria,” Hajj explained. “It is very rare that you see a Syrian production that is based on a Syrian script.”

The fact that the national institute’s schedule for this year has no Syrian-written productions highlights this, he said. All its productions are based on foreign scripts and most were written by the 19th-century Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen.

Hajj and Kafri agreed that this situation is disheartening for young thespians and makes them timid about pursuing new projects.

“We are not experienced in the right way to deal with the paperwork needed to get a stage we want to rent,” Hajj said. “Also, we feel like we are judged even before we show them our art. We feel like they are thinking: ‘Who are you to come and rent a stage here?’ We feel unwanted.”

Alternative spaces
Many private halls and spaces, however, can be used as makeshift theatres when needed. This too presents problems, most significantly the cost of renting and converting the spaces into temporary theatres.

“They are not real theatres,” Hajj said. “They are halls that we need to turn into theatres by installing a stage, a sound system, etc.”

As an officer for Rawafed, the cultural programme of The Syrian Trust for Development, Kafri is working to increase the number of theatres and alternative spaces that young producers can use to stage their works. It also provides support to a small number of individual projects and gives them legal, financial, follow-up, networking and media assistance.

Homs Artistic Space, managed by Samer Ibrahim, is one of the projects supported by Rawafed. Of 165 projects that applied for Rawafed support in 2010, Homs Artistic Space was one of only five that were accepted, Samer Ibrahim, project manager, said. Its goal is to provide a space for young artists in Homs to deliver their work.

“We support multiple art forms including theatre, fine arts, poetry and photography,” he said.

The project was set up to tackle the lack of theatre space in Homs. The main stage, the Culture Centre Theatre, has been under construction since 2005, Ibrahim explained, leaving only one small theatre for all the cultural activities in the city.

The project plans to convert the old train station in Homs into an artistic space, giving young artists a place to present their work.

Innovative solutions
Because some plays are written to be performed in small, intimate environments while others are designed for large spaces, theatre producers in Syria sometimes adapt the spaces to their plays – or sometimes adapt their shows to the spaces available to them.

For instance, Ahmed and Mohammed Malas created a small theatre in their bedroom. They came up with the idea in February 2009 when they could not find affordable space to stage a production. The play was called Melodrama in the Room, and an audience of 15, crammed on the floor, watched the production. The Malas brothers submitted their bedroom to the Guinness World Records to be named the smallest theatre in the world. Since then, they have staged three more plays inside their bedroom and they have made a number of press appearances.

Another solution to the lack of theatre space is to simply go outdoors and perform. The Street Theatre Project began in Syria in 2008.

“It solves the problem of the place, and, also, knowing that this play is taking place in the streets, we managed to connect with the audience on a higher level,” Hajj, who participates in the programme, said. In 2008, Bassam Dawood, an actor, director and co-founder of the Khuta Workshop, directed a street theatre project called Mowkif.

The concept of the show was a play on Arabic words. Mowkif means both a bus stop and a personal stand.

“We created our stage to look like a bus stop, but we meant it to emphasise your stand as a human being towards a number of things in your life,” Dawood explained. The play also served as a vehicle for social commentary by confronting some harsh realities that exist on the street, particularly the lives of street children.

Yet, the project was not without hurdles. The Street Theatre Project has faced problems trying to get governmental permission to perform.

“Street theatre should not be advertised or announced before the show,” Hajj explained. “We should be able to stop somewhere and start performing for the people standing nearby.”

East Winds, West Winds: The original sandstorm

Originally published on Baladna English on May 10th, 2011

Originally published in Cairo 1995, “East Winds, West Winds” is a milestone for both author Mahdi Issa al-Saqr and Iraqi literature in general. The book shines the spotlight on a culture that is foreign to many Arab readers who are used to the trademark style of Egyptian and Syrian novelists.

Compared to the rest of the Arab world, the Iraqi cultural scene is quite neglected; political news about the troubled region usually trumps any cultural news. In April of last year, however the American University of Cairo Press decided to release a translation of “East Winds, West Winds.”

Translated by Paul Starkey, a professor of Arabic at Durham University in the United Kingdom, the novel was released four years after al-Saqr’s death from a terminal illness on 14 March, 2006. The author left behind a great deal of writing, such as “Mogrimoon Tayeboon” (Good Criminals), “Waga’ al-Kytaba” (The Pain of Writing), and “Bayet Ala Nahr Degla” (A House on the Tigris River).

Describing his first impression of the novel, Starkey says, “[I] thought that it was very slow moving, and longer than it needed to be,” though the translator’s first impression changed on further acquaintance with the work.

This novel, written in various narrative modes, including the rare second person, can be considered an autobiography of the author himself, who spent years working in the oil fields of Basra, a southern city in Iraq. Hints of first person and third person narration captures the eyes as well.

“There is also the author’s use of change of perspective,” adds Starkey, “so that while most of the first half of the book is seen through the eyes of Mohamed, the perspective in the second half is more varied, and we see things through the eyes of a number of different characters.”

Set in the 1950s, the novel’s plot follows Mohamed Ahmed, a quite perceptive character, who spends years working under the British in the oil fields. We join him on his trip to the camp where he is to spend years working with different and extreme characters such as Abu Jabbar, Hussein, and Istifan, and fall in and out of love with the traditions and social customs of the British Empire.

Between the basic camp of Iraqis working in the field and the British administration offices, bright with wealth, the author tells stories of love relationships, children born away from their fathers, and people dying suddenly. He takes you on a journey to an unfamiliar world, and manages to bring you back breathless.

Arabic is a descriptive language by nature, but al-Saqr takes it to an extreme. It was occasionally hard to follow the extreme details in the English translation regardless of how effective the translation was.

However, Starkey debates this claim. “What is a ‘descriptive’ language?” the translator wonders, “Is Arabic any more ‘descriptive’ than English? I can’t think that the ‘descriptiveness’ of the writing would pose any particular problem for an English reader in itself, though different English readers (just like different Arab ones) may of course have different reactions to the author’s particular style, or indeed the subject matter.”

After finishing the book, the reader can’t help but connect the events and the clashes of the cultures depicted in the book to current events in the region.

“One can hardly read the novel without thinking of later events,” says the professor, “but on the other hand, I think that it is a mistake to go on pursuing the comparisons too far. It doesn’t do anyone any good to pretend that the situations are a precise parallel, because they’re not.”

Years before the nationalization of the oil companies in the area, which took place in 1972, a sandstorm of emotions, love, and social clashes took place. Two different winds collided. These two winds created a tornado in the land of Iraq, and this book tells the story of that tornado.

About the Author: Mahdi Issa Al-Saqr

Mahdi Issa Al-Saqr, one of Iraq’s most pioneering and prominent authors in the second half of the 20th century, was a prolific writer who published six collections of stories, five novels and a memoir between 1954 and his death in 2006. East Winds, West Winds, published in Cairo in 1998, is a strongly autobiographical novel about an aspiring writer working as a translator for a British company in the oil fields near Basra during the 1950s.

Mohammed is shy and bookish, surviving the sometimes brutal, often surreal, conditions in the Iraqi workers’ camp by reading and by recording the world around him in notes towards a novel. His perspective soars high and looks at his surroundings from a great distance.

East Winds, West Winds is his first published novel in a language other than Arabic; and it attracts the attention of many critics and writers around the world. Waterstones.com, a critic-based website says of the novel that “originally published in Cairo in 1998, this carefully crafted novel represents a welcome addition to a body of literature that has so far received less than the attention it merits by comparison with that of Egypt and the Levant.”

Bab Toma: A legacy of youth

Originally published on Baladna English, on 26th of April 2011

Some think that the hippest spot in Damascus is the beautiful area of Malki, where youngsters, age 15-25, hang out to enjoy their afternoon and long evenings. Yet, some others believe that the hippest spot in Damascus would actually be one of its oldest neighborhoods: Bab Toma. We walked around the old city and talked to people who are enjoying their afternoons and evenings in the hip area of Bab Toma, to give you the reasons why they prefer it.

On the western side of the neighborhood we find the actual Bab Toma, which name basically means Saint Thomas’ Gate. It is the name of the borough of Old Damascus and one of the seven gates of the historical walls of the city. It owns its name to Thomas, one of the twelve apostles of Jesus Christ.

In the 16th century, following the occupation of Antioch and Alexandretta by Turkish troops, the borough of Bab Toma became the seat of the Greek-Orthodox and Greek-Catholic Churches for the Northern Levant (Syria, Lebanon and southern Turkey).

On the eastern side stands Bab Sharki, the eastern gate, or the Gate of the Sun as it was known in Roman times and which dates back to ca. 200 AD. The gate, 26 meters wide, stood over a grand avenue, the Mostakeem Street (the Straight Street), which was to become the main artery in the city. The avenue included a central carriageway for wheeled vehicles and two pedestrian arcaded pavements. Mostakeem Street still connects the eastern gate of the city to the western gate: Bab al-Jabiyah.

Between the two gates, a huge number of bars, cafes and nightspots are settled; some are famous for the old city ambiance; others known for their late night parties and hip feel.  The old streets, with beautiful icons of Jesus and Saint Mary on every corner, are filled usually with twenty-something people hanging out together. Laughter is heard from the café corners where the sound of the argilah and the sweet smell of it are a melody of senses covering the allies.

“I come here to enjoy a lovely night out in this historical space,” Eyad Abbod, 25, says while holding the argilah pipe. He is sitting on a table outside in the late afternoon sun and on the table rests a piece of ‘tawlah’ (backgammon) with its black and white pieces spread around. “This is my friend Hassan, we meet here once a week to play Tawlah and have a cup of tea. It’s the only time I talk about my problems with someone, the only time I feel better about the world. It’s the most fun I have in the whole week.”

Eyad adds that when he is in Bab Toma, he feels that he is in a free place where magic can happen. “The magic of the area is magnificent,” he explains pointing to the old walls around him. “It’s just amazing how much history and love is included in these walls; you feel like you’re hugged by history here.”

Mary, 29, was sitting in a corner of Saif W Shiita café with her friends; on TV some rerun of a football match is screening, and while her friends know the final scores already, they are following the match with open eyes. Mary, however, is busy playing with her iPhone. “I enjoy sitting in this café like no other place in Damascus,” she explains. “I get my beer, sit here and enjoy the free wi-fi and amazing pizza. The place has this warmth to it and doesn’t match any other café in the world for me.”

Mary explains that she has traveled a lot; yet her favorite place in the world remains Bab Toma. “It’s a place that matches no other,” she adds.  “It has enough positive energy to fill me to the max whenever I’m down or blue.”

“I come here for the foreign girls,” says Ali as he goes among his friends, although he ‘dates’ under the nickname Alex. “I see them walking here and I try to pick them up to talk to them. It’s good for my English and I might also be able to find myself some loving friend.”

Alex, 22, is famous among his friends, who were walking with him in Mostakeem Street when this interview was conducted, for being a serial-dater. “He goes on a date with a different girl every two months,” one of Alex’s friends says to the dismay of Alex. Then a love story goes on for a week or two, until they break up and we have to deal with his post-break-up depression until the next girl comes around.”

Alex, whose face turns red, explains that “it’s love; and love is complicated and blind; yet the only place I feel that love is simple and beautiful is when I walk in the streets of Bab Toma.”

Around the corner a busy restaurant appears; Bab al-Shams hosts a dinner party for a group of friends and family celebrating Easter Sunday. There are noises of dishes, spoons and knifes and some Fairouz songs. “Of course we meet in this area,” Sarah, 26, says. “It’s the most spiritual space in the worldly city of Damascus for us. Sitting here, among the historical features of Damascus and near to all that’s beautiful and simple makes you forget your sorrows and feel closer to God.”

Sarah, who refused to let the interview continue unless this reporter joins the family dinner on the table, adds that it has been a beautiful night all in all so far. “I’m planning on leaving the family to their chitchats and going for a walk around with my friends in the old city,” she says. “The night is young and so are we, and no matter how old this area around us is, I still feel like it’s a young bride dancing around happily. It’s the heart of Damascus and it will keep on beating, no matter what.”

With Sarah and her friends, this reporter continued his trip around Downtown area, slowly forgetting the story, the reporting, the feature and the newspaper itself; the old city offered to take us in, and we joyfully accepted the offer.

American artist Jill Rowan presents her body of artwork in Syria

Originally published on Baladna English on April 17th 2011

As a Fulbright scholar, Jill Rowan had the opportunity to develop her art I within the framework of Syrian culture; she was inspired by the pattern of Islamic Syrian art around her, and bit by bit, through her seven months of residency in Syria, she managed to create a body of artwork that is insightful, personal and eye-catching.

The Fulbright Program is an international educational exchange program and is designed to “increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the people of other countries.” With this goal as a starting point, the Fulbright Program has provided almost 300,000 participants—selected for their academic merit and leadership potential — with the opportunity to study, teach, conduct research, exchange ideas and contribute to finding solutions to shared international concerns.

Rowan, a 26-year-old artist, explains that she was sponsored to come to Syria after she proposed a project in which she would create a body of artwork and present it in a Syria gallery. “I’ve always enjoyed the Middle East, and I believe Syria has a wide range of beautiful architecture. I thought that would be very inspiring for me,” the artist says.

The whole idea behind Rowan’s project was to create Syrian-inspired pieces of art to then present them in a Syrian Gallery. In the Mostapha Ali Gallery in the Shaghor Neighborhood in old Damascus, the pieces were placed in one of the rooms; some on the floor and others on the wall.

“It has been extremely interesting to have the opening to present my art work,” the artist explains, “because a lot of the sculptors here in Syria base their art on the human shape. People coming to my opening and seeing how different sculptures have not been based on the human shape was extremely interesting. Everybody wanted to touch my art, which made me feel successful, because as a ceramic artist, you want people to touch your art pieces.”

Patterning, a trend extremely popular in Syria architecture -especially in mosques- seems to be a huge deal to Rowan. The artist has used this method in multiple pieces of her work; she has created different art pieces from different material, but the common theme is the use of colorful stars made of mud and the combination of them to create a certain effect in her art piece.

“Basically, I just go to mosques to see different patterns that I enjoy, and then I manipulate them to suit my project,” the artist explains.

Three pieces of particular interest contain Arabic alphabet characters that look like English alphabet characters;  she has used the Arabic letter ‘waw’  to create the English letter ‘g’, and the Arabic letter ‘meem’ to create the letter ‘a’, and so on. In these three pieces, hanged on the wall to allow the letters to appear among the stars, she wrote the phrases ‘sorry’, ‘please’ and ‘go away’; all made of patterning colorful stars.

“Each piece of mine has its own history,” Rowan adds. “One of them is mostly inspired by my traveling around Syria, seeing that the patterns of stars are very common and this encouraging me to use that. Also, I wanted to use Arabic in it, and to use Arabic letters to write English.”

“The three pieces displaying the phrases ‘sorry’, ‘please’ and ‘go away’ are working together,” the artist adds. “They make sense especially after having used Arabic letters to create them. When I traveled around the Middle East and saw the Arabic script, I saw it as a visually beautiful language. I’m not very good at learning languages and this frustrates me; by using the merger between Arabic and English in my work, I’m trying to frustrate the viewer as well.”

Rowan spent a lot of time working with Syrian sculptors. “While talking to Syrian artists, I tried to help them think more abstractly about art and not so classical,” she explains.