A UNIVERSITY of Worcester academic has helped bring the world premiere of a Ukrainian play based on Shakespeare’s Othello to the stage.
Professor of Shakespeare Studies, Nicoleta Cinpoe, in her role as international advisor for the York International Shakespeare Festival, discovered a fragment of the play and tracked down the writer.
That fragment, which was originally written for a competition, was subsequently developed into a full play, which had its world premiere at the Festival.
Codename Othello, by Olga Annenko, a Ukrainian playwright who has lived in France as a refugee since 2022, is inspired by Shakespeare’s Othello and is set in Ukraine during the current conflict, both on the frontline and the home front.
The character of Othello is a soldier in the Ukrainian army and Desdemona, his wife, is back at home.
It focuses particularly on the struggles for those living through wartime, for both the soldiers and their partners back home.
“It’s a very powerful piece,” said Professor Cinpoe.
“It’s a wonderful, humbling opportunity to help the Ukrainian people be heard. It’s my conviction and moral responsibility because I have the privilege to work in peaceful circumstances — unlike Ukrainian people.
“I think it’s my duty of care as an academic, as a citizen who believes in territorial integrity, national sovereignty and freedom of speech to respond when these are under attack anywhere in the world.”
Professor Cinpoe, who has previously brought forward stagings of a Hamlet-influenced Romanian play (2023) and a Turkish Macbeth (2024) at the festival, said when she came across the first scene of the play, which was written in 2020, consisting of just six pages, she tried to track down the writer and the rest of the play using her academic contacts in Ukraine.
Having discovered that was the extent of the play that existed, Professor Cinpoe and Philip Parr, the York Festival’s director, raised the possibility of staging this fragment at the festival, but Ms Annenko offered to complete the work.
The play was finished and translated with only two weeks to spare before it was to be put on stage.
