Yun-Cheol Kim[1]
Thanks to the great efforts of our section editors, this fifth issue of Critical Stages is abundant in exciting articles by good writers from all around the world. Offering background on the contents of this issue, the section editors have given their introductions or comments at the beginning of each section. I will continue to employ this formula for future issues, too. I am very pleased and appreciative that for this issue 34 authors from 20 countries have contributed 45 articles from Africa, Asia, all of Europe, and North America, and especially that this time there are so many performance reviews, in which we theatre critics are arguably most interested. Let me express one more point of gratitude: for the Special Topics section Maria Shevtsova has been able to submit at the last moment her interview with Russian director Yuri Lyubimov, one of the theatre world’s most well-known exiles, making the Special Topics section even more special.
As publisher and editor-in-chief of Critical Stages, I have a strong desire that this journal will contribute to making our critical discourses heard in the world theatre community first and foremost. My second, but not lesser desire is to exploit this online space in our worthy fight against the reduction of critical culture in terms of space and impact. I will collect from the editors their ideas for how to carry out this crucially important mission we have taken on, and then implement those ideas through this journal. Such ideas will make a good part of our future Special Topics. We have to fight to recover—and even reinforce—the stature of theatre criticism in this anti-intellectual, post-dramatic era. Regrettably, we are not very free from the accusation, or self-accusation, that the critics have only been standing by and watching while the stature and impact of criticism have been rapidly reduced, without fighting tenaciously and creatively enough to protect our profession and the artistic criteria for theatre productions. We need to get through this difficult time by developing new methods for communicating with our contemporaries: new perceptions, new vocabularies, and new forms that reflect our zeitgeist. We also have to find more up-to-date ways to foster young and new people who have a talent for critique. There may already have been numerous experiments in this vein, and if so, let us share them, their successes or failures, together here in the journal so that our collective wisdom and intelligence might grow.
I do appreciate all the authors and editors of this issue for their great contributions that allow this incredible journal to carry on. Without their passion and sacrifice, Critical Stages would not be possible. I also express my gratitude to Andrew Yim, Yoonji Choi and Yujin Kim, my capable Korean Web Team, who have worked so hard to meet all the instructions and demands from both editors and authors. Please show my Web Team your consideration; any mistakes you may find in this issue are my responsibility. Thank you.
[1] Yun-Cheol Kim is President of IATC; recipient of the Cultural Order of Korea; Dean and professor in the School of Drama, Korean National University of Arts; and editor of The Korean Theatre Journal, a quarterly. Two-time winner of the “Critic of the Year Award,” he has published nine books so far, two of which are anthologies of theatre reviews.
