ESRA Shakespeare in Performance Seminar Series
Four hundred and ten years since the author’s worldly demise in the town of his birth, Stratford-upon-Avon, William Shakespeare could not be more alive and intrinsic to our lives. In Craiova, Shakespeare’s other “hometown” since 1994, the International Shakespeare Festival launches its 2026 edition with a new promise and challenge: WILL MATTERS. In the largest Shakespeare Festival in the world, this will take different shapes across the 450 events, 60 venues, and many new initiatives between May 21 and 31.
The Shakespeare in Performance Seminar Series, organised by the European Shakespeare Research Association (ESRA), at its 8th consecutive participation in the Festival, opens its doors and the dialogue on WILL MATTERS with a rich program of activities. It unpacks the brief: WILL MATTERS, both as an exploration of how Shakespeare continues to play a key role today and as the research of Shakespeare matter. It does so by exploring different domains, such as theatre, education, and community; different modes of thought and action, ecological concerns, war and displacement, affect theory, trauma and resilience studies; the recovery of history via the small Shakespeare matters that have miraculously survived political erasure and natural disasters (a document, a photograph, a memory); the building of emotional connections across age, languages, cultures and borders.
As such, the ESRA seminar series directed by Professor Nicoleta Cinpoes (University of Worcester, UK) continues to be a living laboratory for performance criticism and Shakespeare studies with an open-program of talks and workshops. Talks feature: ‘Shakespearean Autopsies: Heiner Muller’s Search for the [Shakespeare] Machine’ with Professor Lawrence Guntner (University of Wolfsburg, Germany), ‘Introducing Shakespeare’s greatest hit: Venus and Adonis (1593), the thinking Elizabethan’s soft porn’ with Professor Michael Dobson (Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham, UK) and ‘The Tempest and the Interplay of Spaces’ with Professor Marta Gibinska (University of Krakow, Poland). The workshops include: ‘Researching, Documenting and Teaching East-Central European Shakespeares: A Cross-Cultural Approach’, led by Professor Boika Sokolova (Notre Dame London Centre, UK) and Professor Kirilka Stavreva (Cornell College, USA) and ‘Applied Shakespeare for Education: Developing Emotional Intelligence and Empathy’, led by Professor Maddalena Pennacchia and drd. Ilaria Diotallevi (Roma Tre University, Italy).
We bring to Craiova International Shakespeare Festival 2026 a promise and challenge of our own: to trace Shakespeare matters and to contribute to the wider debate that Shakespeare matters today more than ever through three new initiatives. This year, the ESRA 40-strong team of specialists from 16 countries will launch:
- Open Stage Conversations, a collaboration with the Shakespeare Core section of the Festival, in which the public meets the theatre makers in a live dialogue;
- Shakespeare’s Apprentice international contest for new playwriting based on Shakespeare and his work, in collaboration with the Shakespeare Hub. The four judges will introduce the ‘battle’ of the four plays that compete live for the Apprentice Award, in which the public will vote.
- Hands-on Shakespeare workshops for the 160 students – from Ukraine, Moldova, Kenya, India, Argentina, Tunisia, Cambodia and South Africa – participating in the Erasmus + Shakespeare collaboration between the University of Craiova and Craiova International Shakespeare Festival.
Nicoleta Cinpoeş, Co-ordonator ESRA Shakespeare in Performance Series
Schedule:
23 May
9.30-10.30: WILL MATTERS & ESRA at the Craiova International Shakespeare Festival
11.00-12.00: II: Fred Abrahamse & Company in conversation with Francesca Rayner and Daniel Somerville
25 May
9.30-12.00: ‘Researching, Documenting and Teaching East-Central European Shakespeares: A Cross-Cultural Approach’ – talks and workshops led by Prof Boika Sokolova (Notre Dame University, London Centre, UK) and Kirilka Stavreva (Cornell College, USA)
26 May
9.30-11.30: ‘Applied Shakespeare for Education: Developing Emotional Intelligence and Empathy’, led by Professor Maddalena Pennacchia and drd. Ilaria Diotallevi (Roma Tre University, Italy).
12.00-13.00: Doctor Honoris Causa of the University of Craiova Ceremony: Philip Parr
27 May
9.30-10.30: ‘Shakespearean Autopsies: Heiner Muller’s Search for the [Shakespeare] Machine’ -- Prof Lawrence Guntner (University of Wolfsburg, Germany)
11.00-12.00: Ryunosuke Kimura, Kakushinhan Theatre Company in conversation with Jessica Chiba
28 May
9.30-10.30: ‘Introducing Shakespeare’s greatest hit: Venus and Adonis (1593), the thinking Elizabethan’s soft porn’ -- Prof Michael Dobson (Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham, UK)
29 May
9.30-10.30: The Tempest and the Interplay of Spaces – Prof. Marta Gibinska (University of Krakow, Poland)
10.30-11.00 Gertrude unpacked: Adrian Săhlean (translator) and Dana Monah (reviewer)
11.15-12.00 WILL MATTERS – What Next? – Prof Nicoleta Cinpoeş (University of Worcester, UK)
30 May
10.00-12.00: WILL MATTERS: Priorities, Proposals, Projects 2026-2028
Workshop with the team
