The life member of SONTA, Africa’s renown writer, playwright, poet, and winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize for Literature, Professor Wole Soyinka has been awarded a special prize by Premio Europa per il Teatro, organizers of the Europe Theatre Prize.
The special award to Soyinka is the first time a non- European will be recognized by Premio Europa. In a press release issued in Rome on 16th October 2017 the organizers noted that Soyinka was so nominated because his work created the needed “ideal bridge between Europe and Africa. A commitment that must be reconsidered, taking into account the current problematic relation between the Old Continent and Africa”. Soyinka will receive his award on 17th December 2017 in Rome as part of the XVI edition of the Europe Theatre Prize and the XIV edition of the Europe Prize Theatrical Realities.
The ceremony is usually an unconventional occasion to meet and get to know the awarded artists, to attend their pieces and performances, and to take part to follow-up gatherings dealing with their approach to theatre. Contributing to the realization of the event is the Theatre of Rome.
The Prize forms part of the celebrations for the 60th anniversary of the Treaties of Rome and the G7 as a special project of the Minister of Culture, also by the will of the President of the Italian Republic. These celebrations coincide with the 30th anniversary of the Europe Theatre Prize, the first cultural initiative in the field of performing arts promoted by the European Community.
Already the General Secretary Europe Theatre Prize, Alessandro Martinez, has extended invitation to Professors Wole Soyinka and Emmanuel Samu Dandaura to attend the events, which will run from 12th to the 17th December 2017 in Rome. Professor Dandaura was invited to accompany Soyinka to the event in his capacity as global Vice-President of the International Association of Theatre Critics (IATC) and successor of Prof Soyinka as President of the Nigerian national centre of the International Theatre Institute, UNESCO.
SONTA news celebrates this remarkable feat by our own WS-Professor Wole Soyinka.
