Drama Panorama’s text workshop is a format where the members of the organisation can receive valuable expert advice and feedback on their work from their knowledgeable circle of colleagues.

With translations of one contemporary German and one contemporary English play, translated by Anna Galt and Henning Bochert respectively, the participants of this round on 26.06.20 discussed two texts in one session for the first time. And there was another premiere: the text workshop took place digitally as a video conference. Maybe this format was the reason for the unusually high number of participants: six people attended Anna and Henning’s workshop.

In two one and a half hour sections, we were able to ask concrete questions about specific parts of the text and terms that were sometimes in unusual contexts. The result was an extremely precise and open discussion of the solutions found and ideas for different translations. Along with suggestions for making the texts more succinct and syntactic improvements, Anna and Henning were particularly grateful for information about further dimensions of meaning for the terms or parts of the text from their colleagues. As is well known, many eyes see more than two, and the discussion sometimes revealed things we never would have realised ourselves. The participants also got to know their colleagues’ work better in this way, encountered new approaches and techniques and also learned something about new writers and their plays.

Many thanks to our colleagues for their participation and input. We’re happy that the format proved to be so fruitful once again and helped to improve our translations. We look forward to the next text workshops, which any member can organise with their own texts, thus profiting from the expertise we have within the organisation.