Ranjit Bolt
Encyclopedia
Ranjit Bolt OBE
(born 1969) is a British playwright and translator. He was born in Manchester
of Anglo-Indian parents and is the nephew of playwright and screen-writer Robert Bolt
. His father is literary critic Sydney Bolt, author of several books including A preface to James Joyce, and his mother has worked as a teacher of English. Bolt was educated at The Perse School
and Oxford University
, and worked as a stockbroker for eight years but "I was desperate to escape, any escape route would have done, and translating turned out to be the one". As well as his plays he has published a novel in verse, Losing it and a verse translation for children of the fables of La Fontaine, The Hare and the Tortoise. He was awarded the OBE in 2003 for services to literature.
Asked about his approach to translating plays, he has said:
Ranjit Bolt has translated many classic plays into English, most of them into verse. Among his works are:
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
(born 1969) is a British playwright and translator. He was born in Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
of Anglo-Indian parents and is the nephew of playwright and screen-writer Robert Bolt
Robert Bolt
Robert Oxton Bolt, CBE was an English playwright and a two-time Oscar winning screenwriter.-Career:He was born in Sale, Cheshire. At Manchester Grammar School his affinity for Sir Thomas More first developed. He attended the University of Manchester, and, after war service, the University of...
. His father is literary critic Sydney Bolt, author of several books including A preface to James Joyce, and his mother has worked as a teacher of English. Bolt was educated at The Perse School
The Perse School
The Perse Upper School is an independent secondary co-educational day school in Cambridge, England. The school was founded in 1615 by Dr Stephen Perse, a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and has existed on several different sites in the city before its present home on Hills...
and Oxford University
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
, and worked as a stockbroker for eight years but "I was desperate to escape, any escape route would have done, and translating turned out to be the one". As well as his plays he has published a novel in verse, Losing it and a verse translation for children of the fables of La Fontaine, The Hare and the Tortoise. He was awarded the OBE in 2003 for services to literature.
Asked about his approach to translating plays, he has said:
Ranjit Bolt has translated many classic plays into English, most of them into verse. Among his works are:
- Understanding Hamlet (notes on Shakespeare's Hamlet)
- The Liar (1989) from Le MenteurLe MenteurThe Liar is a farcical play by Pierre Corneille that was first performed in 1644. It was based on La Verdad Sospechosa by the Spanish-American playwright Juan Ruíz de Alarcón, which was published in 1634.- Summary :...
by Pierre CorneillePierre CorneillePierre Corneille was a French tragedian who was one of the three great seventeenth-century French dramatists, along with Molière and Racine... - The Illusion (1990) from L'Illusion ComiqueL'Illusion ComiqueL'Illusion Comique is a comedic play by Pierre Corneille, written in 1636. In its use of meta-theatricality , it is far ahead of its time. It was first performed at the Hôtel de Bourgogne in 1636 and published in 1639....
by Pierre Corneille - The Real Don Juan (1990) from Don Juan TenorioDon Juan TenorioDon Juan Tenorio: Drama religioso-fantástico en dos partes , is a play written in 1844 by José Zorrilla. It is the more romantic of the two principal Spanish-language literary interpretations of the myth of Don Juan...
by José Zorrilla y MoralJosé Zorrilla y MoralJosé Zorrilla y Moral , was a Spanish Romantic poet and dramatist.He was born in Valladolid to a magistrate in whom Ferdinand VII placed special confidence,... - Tartuffe (1991 and 2002) from the playTartuffeTartuffe is a comedy by Molière. It is one of his most famous plays.-History:Molière wrote Tartuffe in 1664...
by MolièreMolièreJean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature... - Lysistrata (1993) from the playLysistrataLysistrata is one of eleven surviving plays written by Aristophanes. Originally performed in classical Athens in 411 BC, it is a comic account of one woman's extraordinary mission to end The Peloponnesian War...
by AristophanesAristophanesAristophanes , son of Philippus, of the deme Cydathenaus, was a comic playwright of ancient Athens. Eleven of his forty plays survive virtually complete... - The Venetian Twins (1993) from the playThe Venetian TwinsThe Venetian Twins is a 1747 play by Carlo Goldoni, based on Plautus's Menaechmi. Recent productions include one at the Watermill Theatre and a 1993 production directed by Michael Bogdanov for the Royal Shakespeare Company. The play has also been adapted and staged as a 1979 Australian two-act...
by Carlo GoldoniCarlo GoldoniCarlo Osvaldo Goldoni was an Italian playwright and librettist from the Republic of Venice. His works include some of Italy's most famous and best-loved plays. Audiences have admired the plays of Goldoni for their ingenious mix of wit and honesty... - Le Cid (1994) from the playLe CidLe Cid is a tragicomedy written by Pierre Corneille and published in 1636. It is based on the legend of El Cid.The play followed Corneille's first true tragedy, Médée, produced in 1635. An enormous popular success, Corneille's Le Cid was the subject of a heated polemic over the norms of dramatic...
by Pierre Corneille - The Miser (1995) from L'AvareThe MiserL'Avare is a 1668 five-act satirical comedy by French playwright Molière. Its title is usually translated as The Miser when the play is performed in English....
by Molière - The Oedipus Plays (1996)
- The Art of Seduction (1997) from La Double InconstanceLa Double InconstanceLa Double Inconstance is a three-act romantic comedy by French playwright Marivaux. Its title is usually translated into English as The Double Inconsistency. La Double Inconstance was first performed 6 April 1723 by the Comédie Italienne. In this play, a young woman is kidnapped from her lover by...
by Pierre Marivaux - Cyrano de Bergerac (1995) from the playCyrano de Bergerac (play)Cyrano de Bergerac is a play written in 1897 by Edmond Rostand. Although there was a real Cyrano de Bergerac, the play bears very scant resemblance to his life....
by Edmond RostandEdmond RostandEdmond Eugène Alexis Rostand was a French poet and dramatist. He is associated with neo-romanticism, and is best known for his play Cyrano de Bergerac. Rostand's romantic plays provided an alternative to the naturalistic theatre popular during the late nineteenth century... - The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui (2005) from the playThe Resistible Rise of Arturo UiThe Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui is a play by the German dramatist Bertolt Brecht, originally written in 1941...
by Bertolt BrechtBertolt BrechtBertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the... - The Marriage of Figaro (2006) from the playThe Marriage of Figaro (play)The Marriage of Figaro ) is a comedy in five acts, written in 1778 by Pierre Beaumarchais. This play is the second installment in the Figaro Trilogy, preceded by The Barber of Seville and followed by The Guilty Mother. The Barber begins the story with a simple love triangle in which the Count has...
by Pierre BeaumarchaisPierre BeaumarchaisPierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais was a French playwright, watchmaker, inventor, musician, diplomat, fugitive, spy, publisher, arms dealer, satirist, financier, and revolutionary .... - Merry Wives - The Musical (2006) from The Merry Wives of WindsorThe Merry Wives of WindsorThe Merry Wives of Windsor is a comedy by William Shakespeare, first published in 1602, though believed to have been written prior to 1597. It features the fat knight Sir John Falstaff, and is Shakespeare's only play to deal exclusively with contemporary Elizabethan era English middle class life...
by William ShakespeareWilliam ShakespeareWilliam Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"... - Mirandolina (2006) from the play by Carlo Goldoni
- The Grouch (2008) from Le MisanthropeLe MisanthropeThe Misanthrope is a 17th-century comedy of manners in verse written by Molière. It was first performed on 4 June 1666 at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal, Paris by the King's Players....
by Molière
- Waltz of the Toreadors from the playThe Waltz of the ToreadorsThe Waltz of the Toreadors [La Valse des toréadors] is a play by Jean Anouilh.Written in 1951, this farce is set in 1910 France and focuses on General Léon Saint-Pé and his infatuation with Ghislaine, a woman with whom he danced at a garrison ball some 17 years earlier. Because of the General's...
by Jean AnouilhJean AnouilhJean Marie Lucien Pierre Anouilh was a French dramatist whose career spanned five decades. Though his work ranged from high drama to absurdist farce, Anouilh is best known for his 1943 play Antigone, an adaptation of Sophocles' Classical drama, that was seen as an attack on Marshal Pétain's... - Believe it or not from Le Puff by Eugène ScribeEugène ScribeAugustin Eugène Scribe , was a French dramatist and librettist. He is best known for the perfection of the so-called "well-made play" . This dramatic formula was a mainstay of popular theater for over 100 years.-Biography:...
- George Dandin from the playGeorge Dandin ou le Mari confonduGeorge Dandin ou le Mari confondu is a french 1668 comedy by Molière.The play showcases the folly a man commits when he marries a woman of higher rank than his own...
by Molière - Hercules from the work by SenecaSeneca the YoungerLucius Annaeus Seneca was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist, and in one work humorist, of the Silver Age of Latin literature. He was tutor and later advisor to emperor Nero...
- The Idiot from L'Étourdi by Molière
- Scapin from Les Fourberies de ScapinLes Fourberies de ScapinLes Fourberies de Scapin is a three-act comedy by French playwright Molière. The title character Scapin is similar to the archetypical Scapino character. The play was first staged in 1671 in Paris....
by Molière - The School for Wives from the playThe School for WivesThe School for Wives is a theatrical comedy written by the seventeenth century French playwright Molière and considered by some critics to be one of his finest achievements. It was first staged at the Palais Royal theatre on 26 December 1662 for the brother of the King...
by Molière - The Sisterhood from a play by Molière