Icarus Publishing Enterprise

Considering that 50% of all books in translation worldwide are from English while only 6% are translated into English, Odin Teatret (Denmark), The Grotowski Institute (Poland) and Theatre Arts Researching the Foundations (Malta) have created Icarus Publishing Enterprise whose purpose is to present in English texts by artists and scholars about the practice and vision of theatre as a laboratory.

Icarus was the name of a schooner that in 1697 sailed from Civitavecchia with a cargo destined for a Venetian merchant resident in the international trading port of Smyrna. Its mythological name was intended paradoxically as a bringer of good luck to ward off shipwrecks. In its hold, the small vessel also carried a luxurious curtain never used before, a few painted scenes and a number of scripts and musical scores from a theatre erected in Rome by Queen Cristina of Sweden and torn down on the order of Pope Clement X.

Similar to that schooner, Icarus Publishing Enterprise wants to ferry into an international dimension writings of theatre artists and scholars who, despite their value, risk a limited circulation because of the language in which they have been written.

We know by experience that theatre studies are effective only if they succeed in piercing the wrappings of academic commonplaces and inspire those wishing to do theatre. In the books that Icarus Publishing Enterprise will translate and publish, in addition to a knowledge of the past, seeds of future occurrences are hidden. Many think that the theatre has no future. This may be so. But one thing is certain: in the future there will surely be something that we are unable to imagine now, but that will be called theatre.

Odin Teatret (Denmark)

The Grotowski Institute (Poland)
Theatre Arts Researching the Foundations (Malta)

Next titles:

Ingemar Lindh: 'Stepping Stones'

Franco Ruffini: 'Theatre and Boxing: The Actor Who Flies'