Annelies Verbeke
’Writing for theatre gives me the opportunity to work together with others – I like making something great together – and see my characters come to life. Every premiere is magic. Also the plays grand me the opportunity to make the different voices in my head find their co-existence in a dynamic, and then when I’m ready I can hear and watch them, with always something extra, brought in by the actors’ ways. I’m grateful Rotterdam based theatre company Wunderbaum asked me in 2009 to write a play for them. It was the first of many times we worked together, and every time was a joy. Meanwhile I know very well which actor or actress I’m writing for and hear and see them in my mind while writing – a process which often makes me chuckle. I have worked with other companies as well and will do so in the future. My plays tend to contain quite a lot of darkly funny arguments, but I think there is tenderness too.’
Annelies Verbeke (Belgium, 1976) is not only prose also successful with writing texts for theater. The acclaimed theater groups Wunderbaum and SKaGeN made special performances of it. She debuted with the international bestseller Sleep! (2003) and received for her novel Thirty Days (2015) the Opzij Literature Prize, the NRC Handelsblad Readers Prize and the F. Bordewijk Prize for best novel of the year. The story collection Hallelujah (2018) was on the shortlist of the ECI Literature Prize and was awarded the J.M.A. Biesheuvel Prize and the Cutting Edge Award.
Author: Annelies Verbeke
Book: HERE WE GO AGAIN
Translated from Dutch: Bojana Budimir
Cover design: Dina Radoman