Kondylaki Dimitra – Dramatology
Resume
Dimitra Kondylaki has a PhD in Comparative Literature from the Sorbonne University (Paris IV, 2003), director, playwright and translator. She has taught, among others, “Dramatology of world & European theatre, “Dramaturgical analysis of newer and contemporary texts”, “Theatrical writing” and “Theatrical translation” at the Departments of Theater Studies of the University of Patras, the University of the Peloponnese, the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, as well as in the Postgraduate Programs of the Department of Theater Studies of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens and the Hellenic Open University. Lecturer at the Theatrical Translation Workshop of the French Institute of Greece since 2009, she has been a repertoire consultant to theaters and international organizations from the Athens Epidaurus Festival to the Odéon-Théâtre de l’Europe and the Scène Nationale d’Orléans and has organized numerous events dedicated to contemporary dramaturgy in collaboration with the French Institute, the Institute of the International Theater Institute, the Tannery, etc. Her translations have been staged at the Théâtre de la Ville, the Théâtre de l’Odéon, the Théâtre de l’Atalante in Paris, the Avignon Festival, the Athens Epidaurus Festival, etc. while as a dramatist she has signed or co-signed stage plays with a strong imprint: Marina Tsvetaeva’s Sonetska (2006), Matzi Hatzilazarou, Erase my face and start again (2012-2013), Mikhail Bulgakov’s Black Snow on stage. Costas Filipoglou (2016), Rooms of memory. Wandering in the world of Loula Anagnostaki (Athens Festival, 2018), Spoon River Quartet by Edgar Lee Masters (2020). At the center of her artistic search as well as her research work is the concept of dramaturgy and poetry in playwriting.
Her book “The theatrical Dimitris Dimitriadis: Exploring the possibility of the unexpected” was nominated as “best theater book 2015” by the Union of Greek Theater and Music Critics (Nefeli Publishing). In 2022, the same publishing house will release her study “The language of modern theater in the horizon of literature”.
Course description
Introduction to dramaturgical analysis
First semester of year A
What is a play text? Autonomous poetic work or screenplay? What differentiates it from other literature? What is its relationship with the performance and how can we read it so that it “comes alive”, “rises” from the page, becomes embodied? Starting from representative texts of the newer repertoire, we approach structural elements of playwriting: myth, plot and action, dramatic space and dramatic time, theatrical language, dialogue and monologue, conflict and dramatic character. A priority of the course is to understand how words lead to interpretation, how the very signs of writing – from characters’ words to stage directions, pauses and silences – help us deepen our analysis and shield us against misinterpretation and stereotypes about “meaning”. So a first, practical introduction to the concept of “reading” that illuminates the questions and above all, suggests a way to ask questions, before moving from the text to the stage. During the course, students will have the opportunity to understand these concepts experientially, trying to approach them through the theater rehearsal process.
Second semester of third year
In the second semester, the analysis is specialized in specific schools and dramaturgical currents of the 20th century, from naturalistic and epic theater to the theater of the absurd. Students will learn to identify how the structural elements of the play text differ according to aesthetics and era while at the same time knowing the dominant trends in playwriting today. With this perspective, they will come into contact with leading dramatists of the 20th century, from Maeterlinck to Ionesco and Beckett. The course aims to familiarize with the work of the dramatist and its methodological tools: from the text analysis itself to the research that frames it with the assistance of bibliographic and audiovisual material. The outcome of the course will be the material of a hypothetical theater program, which each student will undertake to create throughout the semester.