“Waiting for Godot”

In order to support Sarajevo and Bosnia and Herzegovina, several artists and intellectuals traveled to the besieged city, invited by their Bosnian colleagues. The most famous example is Susan Sontag, who first came in April 1993 and then returned some months later to work with actors from Sarajevo on a production of “Waiting for Godot” for the MESS Festival.

“I had spent two weeks there in April, and had come to care intensely about the battered city and what it stands for; some of its citizens had become friends,” Susan Sontag wrote in October 1993. “But I couldn’t again be just a witness: that is, meet and visit, tremble with fear, feel brave, feel depressed, have heart-breaking conversations, grow ever more indignant, lose weight. If I went back, it would be to pitch in and do something.” To direct “Waiting for Godot” came as an evident choice as it reflected the situation of the inhabitants of the besieged city, waiting in vain for a military intervention. The play premiered on August 17, 1993 at the Sarajevo Youth Theatre, and was performed there 21 more times. It was not Susan Sontag’s last stay in Sarajevo and she also organized support for Sarajevo’s artist through the American PEN Centre. In 2009, to honor her commitment, the place in front of Sarajevo’s National Theater was renamed “Theater Square Susan Sontag”.

Several other artists also traveled to Sarajevo multiple times during the war to participate in cultural activities, among them British actress Vanessa Redgrave, Swedish actress Bibi Andersson, puppet theater director Peter Schumann, British composer Nigel Osborne, and French theater director Francois Tanguy.