Dramaturg

Read an Interview with Dr May-Brit Akerholt on The Subtle Art of Translation  here

Dr May-Brit Akerholt has extensive experiences as translator as well as production dramaturg of classic and contemporary plays. More than 20 of her translations have been produced by leading theatre companies around Australia, and some overseas. Her published translations include several plays by Ibsen and Strindberg; four volumes of plays by Jon Fosse (Oberon Books, London); and Essaysand two novels by Jon Fosse: The Boathouse; Trilogy; and Essays (all by Dalkey Archive Press: UK, US and Ireland). She translated Ibsen on Theatre, a new book of Ibsen’s letters and theatre articles, edited by Professor Frode Helland (The Ibsen Centre at the University of Oslo) and Professor Julie Holledge (The Ibsen Centre, and Flinders University), which will be published by Nick Hern Books, London, in 2018.

A number of her critical articles has been published in various books and journals, including “New Stages: Contemporary Theatre” in Cambridge Companion to Australian Literature, Cambridge, 2000; “’A Glorious, Terrible Life: The Dual Image in Patrick White’s Dramatic Language”, Patrick White Centenary. The Legacy of a Prodigal Son, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2015; “The Revolution of the Human Spirit, or There Must Be Trolls in What I Write” in Adapting Translation for the Stage, Routledge, London, 2017.

Positions include: Tutor in the School of English and Linguistics at Macquarie University; Lecturer in Drama at the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA); Resident Dramaturg at Sydney Theatre Company; Artistic Director of the Australian National Playwrights’ Centre and the National Playwrights’ Conference. Her PhD thesis from the University of Sydney is called The Dramaturgy of Translation.