CASSANDRA by Lesia Ukrainka
The Trojan story retold by Ukraine’s pioneering feminist writer, Lesia Ukrainka. Presented by Live Canon and the Ukrainian Institute London in an award-winning new translation by Nina Murray.
Imagine you could see the future, but no one would believe anything you said. This is Cassandra’s fate. Stuck in besieged Troy and knowing exactly how the war will end, Cassandra sees the destruction unfold around her, just as she knew it would.
First published in 1908, Lesia Ukrainka’s poetic drama retells the story of the Trojan war from Cassandra’s perspective. Today, Cassandra continues to speak with uncanny immediacy in the contemporary era of post-truth politics, under the shadow of Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Following the acclaimed premiere in London last autumn, Cassandra toured to Cambridge and Oxford in March 2023, as part of the UK/Ukraine Season of Culture.
Reviews:
- “Nina Murray’s new translation of the classic Ukrainian text couldn’t be more relevant” Euronews
- “At a time where we are witnessing cultural genocide in Ukraine, to have such a beloved and vital part of Ukrainian culture shared with the English-speaking world is truly special.” The Prickle
Production team & partners
Cassandra is presented by the Live Canon ensemble and the Ukrainian Institute London.
The tour of Cassandra to Oxford and Cambridge is part of the UK/Ukraine Season of Culture devised jointly by the British Council and the Ukrainian Institute.
The production was directed by Helen Eastman, whose work has included The Cure at Troy (Delphi International Festival and world tour), Bridgetower (Hackney Empire and UK tour), Fair (Trafalgar Studios) and Bicycle Boy (GDIF and UK tour), and advising on many contemporary productions of Ancient Greek plays, most recently Paradise, by Kae Tempest at the National Theatre.
Nina Murray’s translation of Cassandra won the Ukrainian Institute London’s 2021 Ukrainian Literature in Translation Prize, and the play will soon be published in translation by Harvard University Press. Nina Murray is a Ukrainian-American poet and translator. Her other translation work includes best-selling contemporary Ukrainian writer Oksana Zabuzhko’s The Museum of Abandoned Secrets.
The productions in Oxford and Cambridge were presented in association with Cambridge Ukrainian Studies, Cambridge4Ukraine, APGRD, and the Oxford Society of Ukrainians.
The first production of Cassandra in London in October 2022 was made possible thanks to 132 backers of the production’s crowdfunding campaign, as well as support from the Polish Cultural Institute, the Lithuanian Cultural Institute, the Lithuanian Embassy to the United Kingdom, the Goethe-Institut, the Institut Français and the APGRD.