Pine forests must shudder at Ilan Stavans' very name.
A scholar, fiction writer, literary critic, lexicographer, graphic novelist, public television host and all-around intellectual go-to guy on matters Judaic and Latino, the Amherst College professor has written more than 20 books and edited some 20 others since his arrival in the United States from his native Mexico in 1986. His latest, "Resurrecting Hebrew," recounts how the ancient biblical and liturgical language was reborn in the 20th century as Israel's everyday, secular tongue. As an editor, he is overseeing "The Norton Anthology of Latino Literature," scheduled to be published next year.
https:// www.amherst.edu/people/facstaff/istavans "> www.amherst.edu/people/facstaff/istavans , 47, also is about to unfurl "The Disappearance," his first play in English. Of all the theater companies in the world, he's collaborating with the one that for a quarter-century has harbored a suspicion of stories and held a bedrock aversion to words. Double Edge Theatre Stavans will stage the premiere at on Thursday and Friday.
The 26-year-old Double Edge reflects artistic director Stacy Klein's interest in conjuring dreamlike essences rather than straightforward storytelling. Ensconced communally since 1995 on a farm in Ashfield, Mass., Double Edge has incubated plays in which images, gestures, music and movement typically count more than dialogue. Spoken elements have been adapted from such sources as the poetry of Rilke, the writings of the Polish Jewish Holocaust victim Bruno Schulz and familiar tales. The Skirball shows will be Double Edge's first in California; Klein said the booking resulted from Stavans' contacts and favorable reports on Double Edge that prompted Skirball program director Jordan Peimer to check out a production.
Knowing Stavans' love of Cervantes, Double Edge had invited him last year to its indoor theater-in-a-barn for "The unPossessed," its version of "Don Quixote." The show began with a stack of books being readied for an Inquisitional burning -- with Stavans' memoir, "On Borrowed Words," at the very top.
"I was shocked and delighted at the same time," the writer said from his home in Amherst, where he lives with his wife and their two sons.
