Silvia Napoli, Facebook, May 15 2026

“Actually, I haven’t even finished updating you on last weekend, and we are already into the new one. Time moves fast; festivals and panel discussions overlap. POLIS is always a beautiful name for a festival, especially for a classicist in disguise like me. So, here we are in Ravenna, wrapped in the truly heartwarming hospitality of ErosAntEros. There is no better word to define the staff supporting this edition.


This time, the focus was on Northern European countries, including the Baltic region. There is a massive female presence at all levels within the theatrical and cultural ranks of these countries. Yet, the outcomes of one particular panel were surprising: we listened to a Swedish representative assert that—as any history textbook would confirm—the golden age for women’s rights was the 1970s, during the glorious post-war boom. The era of universal welfare, to be clear. And perhaps there is nothing to be surprised about, given the increasingly evident links between security policies, social welfare, and cultural practices; in the middle, acting as both a bonding agent and a cross-cutting wound, lies the condition of gender. On this note, when asked directly, it turns out that no, there are no advocacy associations among these seven countries quite like our own Amleta—an organization fully committed to demanding greater visibility for women while standing as a bastion against abuses perpetrated against human dignity as a whole. Intellectual commitment and spectacular performance alternate throughout the festival within a truly beautiful sense of community. It is difficult to recount everything about the festival, given that my ‘everything’ is inevitably limited and partial. There are so many moments, so many flashes amidst chatter, exhaustion, visions, rediscovered people, and lost umbrellas that leave their mark gently. Or with barbaric fierceness. We hang suspended between Camilla Parini’s poignant, personal memories of uprooting that strive to become collective, and the alienation of gender, civilization, and posture in Tomšič’s Medea, based on Müller, which redefines the use of the body and nudity on stage—much like we had previously observed with Gallerano.But when writing about POLIS, one cannot leave out, above all, the matinées that later turn into Romagnolo lunches at the Teatro Socjale in Piangipane. A feast for the eyes, the heart, and the palate, sitting at the table with friends from what might be a bubble, but with whom it is so wonderful to exchange impressions and reviews. The story on stage this time is performed by Minasi company—so, thoroughly Italian—but the Baltic region does indeed play a part through the protagonists of the story. As do the cold and the misery of a brazen Bolshevik youth. If you are not familiar with it (though here in the Facebook courtyard some friends have mentioned it), I highly recommend reading up on a story of rare intellectual and emotional intimacy. This is one, but not the only, theme of the lecture-performance centered on the figure of Asja Lacis. Embedded within history with a capital H, and the challenge of rendering it theatrically, lies this affaire between the protagonist and one of the giants of twentieth-century thought (and beyond): Walter Benjamin. The end is tragic and well-known; only five years after the events, Asja would learn from Bertolt Brecht about the self-inflicted death, via 31 morphine pills, of the legendary author of Berlin Childhood  and so much more.


The show is an absolute preview and will need some refining, but it reaffirms—through Politics, Love, and Knowledge, categories so absolute they almost inspire fear—that theatrical practice is truly a sort of transformative leaven capable of shaping relationships, as it did in that famous case. Private only up to a certain point, given the heavy public and political exposure of the subjects involved and of their theatre. I believe we will need to talk about it much more, because these complex times require unprecedented alliances across many different disciplines”.