Nehad Selaiha reflects on the political underpinnings of cultural encounters at the Silk Road 2004 theatre festival in Mulheim My trip to the Theater an der Ruhr followed hot on the heels of the Cairo International Festival for Experimental Theatre and coincided with the Frankfurt Book Fair where the Arab world was guest of honour this year. The event I was heading for was yet another East-West cultural encounter -- a Middle Eastern-European theatrical landscape staged at the Theater an der Ruhr in Mulheim, Germany. Viewed together, the three events offered interesting points of comparison and triggered a chain of thought centring on cultural dialogue and interchange and their relation to politics, ideology, and the question of identity. The CIFET is a governmental festival which, however much it pretends to independence, has to follow the directives of Egyptian foreign policy and the Ministry of Interior. The indiscriminate ban on Israeli artists, including those who fight for the rights of the Palestinians and a just, peaceful resolution of the conflict, is perhaps understandable in view of the brutal practices of Israeli forces in the occupied territories, the anti-normalisation stand of the majority of Egyptian intellectuals and the general popular feeling in the country. What is not understandable is the ban on Iranian artists. For three years now they have been trying to join the festival and been denied at the last minute by arbitrary orders from up on high. Though Iranian cinema is occasionally hosted in Egyptian film festivals, Iranian theatre troupes remain suspect, as if their mere physical presence would instantaneously ignite an Islamic revolution and topple the regime. The fact that theatre in Iran has been rapidly developing in recent years into a resistance site -- an effective vehicle for protest and opposition, advocating liberalisation and human rights, and opposing extreme right-wing Islamic conservatism -- does not seem to cut any ice with the bureaucrats over here. To see an Iranian theatre troupe in Egypt, it seems we have to wait until relations between the governments of the two countries have improved. Arab troupes, on the other hand, with very few exceptions, are either nominated by their governments or have to be approved by them. They will not be accepted otherwise and this puts them in a false position, branding them as representatives of their regimes, regardless of their work, and invariably generates an aggressive, self-defensive attitude and jingoistic, competitive feelings which colour and, indeed, distort their perception and reception of each other's work. Curiously or, perhaps, significantly, such feelings and attitudes do not come into play where non-Arab works are concerned; these are viewed and judged with a remarkable degree of objectivity and discernment. To put it bluntly, Arabs suspect Arabs, find it difficult to work collectively and collaboratively in official contexts, and tend to put more trust in and work better with foreigners. This could explain, perhaps, why the performances of Arab writers invited as individuals to the Frankfurt affair by the German partners were more forceful and made a better impression than those given by the ones picked by Arab officials and bureaucrats. Nora Amin, for instance, was not a member of the official Egyptian literary delegation, and yet her two poems in English, Arab and Muslim , which take an honest look at both labels in the light of her personal experience and question their implications, had a strong impact on her audience and aroused the interest of publishers. It is also largely the reason why the work of the selection committee for the CIFET contest is always entrusted to Westerners while the head of the international jury is always American or European -- to guard against any suspicion of prejudice or favouritism, says Fawzi Fahmi, the chairman of the festival, defending this policy. The fact that the contest of Les Journées Theatrales de Carthage in Tunisia, which is limited to Arab countries and judged by an all-Arab jury, invariably triggers a lot of ugly bickering and bitter feuds seems to corroborate his argument. Not that the choices of the CIFET foreign selection committee are always unanimously regarded with favour; while Arabs admitted to the contest will feel proud that they have been approved by the superior, Western "other" and hail the committee's objectivity, those excluded will often seek to comfort themselves by dismissing its decisions as politically suspect, serving some secret agenda. I have often written against the CIFET contest not only because occasionally it can put a feather in the cap of an autocratic or totalitarian regime, but also because it unfailingly sours the mood of the event and creates bad blood among artists. However, if there is one good thing that has come out of it over the years, it is that it has pricked many illusions, unmasking the crisis of trust among Arabs, their deep insecurity which can drive them to seek shelter in the past or in some rigid, dogmatic and often belligerent interpretation of their religious creeds, and their painfully ambivalent feelings about themselves, each other and their previous colonial masters. In view of this, the label "Arab culture", this year hosted at Frankfurt, needs to be questioned and rethought. Underlying it is a facile, comforting assumption that deep down all Arabs are basically the same and all possess a single, homogeneous, stable and finished Arab identity. Such an assumption can only lead to stereotypical images and clichés, often borrowed from the Western perception of what constitutes an Arab. This is the trap into which the Arab presentation at Frankfurt (as heavily official and politically framed and stage-managed as the CIFET) fell -- the trap of generalisation which Edward Said has designated in the opening chapter of Orientalism as one of "the features of Orientalist projection: to make out of every observable detail a generalisation and out of every generalisation an immutable law about the Oriental nature, temperament, mentality, custom, or type; and, above all, to transmute living reality into the stuff of texts". One can credibly speak of an Arab world -- meaning a group of geographically neighbouring, multi- ethnic, predominantly Muslim states where the population in each speaks a local version of classical Arabic, thickly interlaced with words, echoes and rhythms which belong to earlier languages, cultures and historical periods. But for the term Arab culture to make any sense at all, it has to be viewed as a plural entity (Arab cultures rather than culture) and understood as an ongoing, dialogic historical process -- a rich composite of heterogeneous elements, shaped and held together by historical forces and pressures and constantly redefined by its internal tensions and relations to other cultural conglomerates -- East- West, North and South. Without recognising this diversity and initiating an inter-Arab dialogue which stresses the differences between the various regions and societies as much as the similarities, it would be difficult to establish an authentic dialogue with other cultures. Indeed, within each Arab society there are diverse cultural groupings or subcultures which the dominant, official culture needs to acknowledge, engage in dialogue with, and accommodate. For if members of the same family cannot talk to each other and accept their differences, how can they hope to communicate with their next-door neighbours or those further afield? Cultural exposure, exchange and dialogue were at the heart of the event in Mulheim. As part of the Silk Road project launched by Roberto Ciulli in 1998 with the aim of forging cultural ties between theatre artists in countries along the ancient trade-route from Europe to China, it was inherently, profoundly political; but, fortunately, unlike the CIFET or Arab presence in Frankfurt, it had no official political framework and steered clear of general cultural labels. Though all the guest performers from the Middle East came from Muslim countries -- Iran, Turkey, Tunisia, Oman and the region of Kurdistan in Northern Iraq -- they were not identified to the public by their religion or lumped together in the publicity notices as representing Islamic culture; rather the festival sought to stress and celebrate the diversity, specificity and richness of their respective cultures, and by so doing hoped to combat the Western stereotypes of Muslim women and men, dispel from the minds of its audience the media association of Islam with terrorism, and help them to see Muslims as real people and individuals. Any German who has attended the Silk Road 2004 festival and watched even a few of its eight guest performances would think twice before dismissing all Arabs or Muslims as terrorists. The Iranians in particular made a wonderful impression and achieved in two nights, with two performances, in terms of correcting the image of their compatriots and culture, what foreign diplomacy cannot hope to achieve in years with an army of politicians and diplomats. , an epic production in the high, declamatory mode, written and directed by Asghar Khalili, drew on history and ancient heroic narratives for material and on the old popular dramatic tradition known as Ta�ziyeh for formal inspiration, scenic design and style of acting. It came across as a passionate cry against war as the river between two neighbouring, warring nations (think of the Arabian Gulf) rapidly filled with human blood, becoming the red water of the title. Though the rulers of the two nations -- a man and a woman -- are in love, they cannot put an end to the blood bath once it starts. The other Iranian production, the Leev Theatre's impressive two-hander, Milbusamet wa Aschk (Kiss You and Tears), written by Mohamed Charmshir and directed by Mohamed Aghebati, was equally politically impelled, but struck a different chord and addressed a different issue. Based on the letters written in prison by the Czech playwright and former President Vaclav Havel to his wife Olga, it focussed on ideological oppression, the plight of nonconformist individuals in totalitarian regimes, and the pain and isolation which political dissention and ideological defiance cause on the personal level, in one's private life and most intimate relations. The play was in Persian; and though I could not understand a word of what was being said, the power and eloquence of the acting and stage images were such that I was deeply moved. The play's blend of horror and humour, savagery and tenderness, emotional truth-to-life and absurdist elements, as well as its ascetic economy and intense concentration seemed to owe much to Havel's own style of writing, particularly in the later plays which have strong autobiographical overtones. That Charmshir's text was able to transcend the language barrier is a credit to director Aghebati, his two talented actors and set and lighting designers. Though the setting of the play is a prison cell, Aghebati quite perversely opts for the least used of stage forms and most difficult for actors and designers -- the traverse, in which the action takes place as if in a passage or corridor between two sections of the audience. Structurally analogous to the mediaeval processional form, as Julian Hilton notes in Performance, this shape is "appropriate to the portrayal of a journey or a quest", which, if we understand "journey" and "quest" literally as physical progression in space, Kiss You and Tears is not. It is only as the play progresses that you begin to perceive the significance of Aghabati's choice of the traverse and the many ironies it creates. The cell which has four walls with no one but the audience sitting on two sides of it tells you that by keeping silent we all become colluders in the crimes of tyranny; and as the ideas of passage and movement implied in the traverse shape clash with the prisoner's immobility and the fact of his incarceration, the paradoxical stage- image sparks off other meanings, suggesting that in totalitarian societies no real progress is possible, that all roads lead to the cell, and that the only movement possible is in and out of it. And yet the quest for freedom and the promise of moving on remain in sight throughout the play, enshrined in the physical reality of the traverse shape and its ancestral processional associations. The choice of the traverse dictates minimal sets and props, and indeed, apart from a white floor, two black trunks, a cleaning pail, two metal plates and two spoons, Aghebati used none. The same minimalist tendency extended to the colour palette of the show, which consisted solely of white, grey and black. Music was also kept to a bare minimum and excerpts from Havel's letters, read in a voice-over, opened and closed the play and punctuated his successive encounters with his persecutors before the final meeting with his wife. The actor who played Havel was convincing and moving, but the real impact of the play depended on the performance of that young, attractive actress who, in a grey trouser-suit, a black shawl and a knitted black cap to cover her hair, played all the other parts in quick succession, wearing the shawl in different ways to indicate the character changes and altering her voice, gait, body language and general demeanour to suit each -- like a chameleon. That a very young actress could display such versatility was truly amazing and evidenced the rich talent resources in Iranian theatre and the seriousness and dedication of its artists. Equally amazing was the boldness of the performance, not only on account of its subject or the degree of physical contact between the actors it allowed, but, more importantly, because in the first catechism scene it represented the priest as a veiled Muslim woman wearing the traditional, black, Iranian veil, thus identifying religious with political oppression and condemning both. In Le Pareti della Solitudine (The Deepest Solitude) from the Teatro Metastasio in Italy, directed by Massimo Luconi, we pondered a different kind of oppression and solitude -- the cultural. Based on a story by Taher Ben Jelloun about the suffering and loneliness of African and Arab immigrants in Europe, the play took the form of a dramatic monologue delivered by a man dragging a big trunk containing all his possessions and memories through what seems like a wasteland littered with lighted human masks in metal tubs. At certain points his words were accompanied by the voice of an African singer-percussionist and the tunes of an Italian clarinetist standing in the shadowy background. And while the music and the sad, nostalgic African songs punctuated the monologue, deepening its pathos, the stage scene superimposed the image of city lights at night on one of a cemetery in a poignant visual metaphor. The poignancy reaches a peak when finally the immigrant lies down on his trunk to die, turning it into a coffin, and draws part of the white drapes at the back over him like a shroud, as if covering himself with clouds or a bit of the sky. But cultural dialogue could also be conducted in music and one of the most interesting items in the festival was a concert entitled "Music along the Silk-Road" by the Golestan Quintet which mixes Western and Eastern instruments and includes players from Italy, Iran and Turkey. Led by Novit Afrouz on the piano, Parvaneh Hosseyni (tar), Ayse Gulec (qanun), Amirahmad Rastbod (kemanche) and Romano Pucci (flute), the ensemble treated us to old, traditional music from the heritage of Turkey and Iran as well as famous favourites by Bach. There was traditional music from Oman as well, magnificently played on an Omani bagpipe by Ragab Khamis Sanad Al-Selim, himself a wonderful dancer and the founder and leader of a folk- dance troupe of four men and four women who accompanied his playing with folkloric courting and wedding dances. Indeed, whenever the guest artists met, in or out of the theatre, before or after the shows, there were always songs -- in Kurdish, Persian, Turkish or Omani Arabic -- bringing people together and proving that real cultural exchange works best on the level of individuals and small groups and away from politicians and governments.
