The first-time novelist “won the award for [her] gripping and touching love story between exiled princeling Patroclus and Achilles, strong, beautiful and the son of a goddess. Miller becomes the fourth consecutive US novelist to win the prize, now in its 17th and final year of being called the Orange prize, following the mobile services company’s decision to end its sponsorship earlier this month.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
Warring Theatrical Styles: Royal Shakespeare Co.’s Greeks To Battle Wooster Group’s Trojans In Troilus
In the two companies’ co-production of Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida, six RSC actors are rehearsing the Greek characters and scenes under the direction of Mark Ravenhill, while Liz LeCompte’s high-tech, experimental New York group prepares the Trojan parts.
Kiev Gets Its First Biennale
Arsenale 2012 “takes place in an old weapons arsenal on a pretty hilltop street that overlooks a sea of apartment blocks typical of cities of former Soviet states. Peace and quiet is broken only by the solemn chime of church bells from the adjacent monastery … Unsurprisingly, the locals are not over the moon about their new neighbour, which aims to attract some 30,000 globetrotting art pilgrims in its debut summer.”
Bill T. Jones To Create New Rite Of Spring
The Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company’s upcoming season, which will also include reconstructions of some of the group’s early works, will feature a new version of the Stravinsky ballet co-created with Anne Bogart’s theater company, SITI.
Ex-Royal Academy Of Music Official Jailed For Embezzlement
“A former finance director at the Royal Academy of Music has been sentenced to 20 months in prison after defrauding the institution of £236,000. Janet Whitehouse, 56, admitted to three counts of fraud, including faking paperwork to boost her pension fund.”
Israeli Authors Band Together To Fight Bookstore Chains Over Discounting
“Over 270 writers, translators and editors” – including Amos Oz, David Grossman and A.B. Yehoshua – “signed a letter to Culture and Sports Minister Limor Livnat, urging her to continue pressing for protection of Israeli authors’ royalties.” Livnat is sending to the Knesset “a bill that would bar retailers from discounting new books for the first 18 months after publication.”
South African President Drops Lawsuit Over Satirical Portrait
“After weeks of confrontation over a controversial painting depicting President Jacob Zuma with genitals exposed, the South African leader and the gallery that had shown the work have settled their legal fight out of court, they announced Wednesday.”
Playing Shakespeare’s Caesar As Idi Amin Or Mobutu
Gregory Doran, director of the RSC’s new Julius Caesar: “Then you look at African history over the past 50 years … The sequence frequently is of leaders coming to power on a wave of popularity, pulling power to themselves in a one-party state, feeling that they have to seize control. Then, that being followed by a military coup which is followed itself by a much worse dictator and then, possibly, civil war. That’s Julius Caesar:you’re describing.”
BBC Radio Host Held In Zimbabwe For Alleged Visa Violations
Petroc Trelawny, a presenter on BBC Radio 3, was arrested last week for allegedly working in Zimbabwe without an employment permit. (He was emceeing a music festival on a volunteer basis.) A judge dropped all charges on Monday, but immigration officials are refusing to return Trelawny’s passport and want to try him for violating the terms of his tourist visa.
Iranian Customs Returns Seized Jackson Pollock Canvas To Tehran Museum
“Mural on Indian Red Ground was seized by the country’s customs service on 11 May after being on loan to Japan. The service said it confiscated the work over money owed by the Ministry of Culture,” which operates the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art.