Playwright, novelist and screenwriter from Baku

Ismayil Iman is a playwright, novelist and screenwriter from Baku. His plays have been included among the best at contemporary Russian-language drama festivals such as Lubimovka, First Reading and Remarque, and staged in theatres in Azerbaijan and abroad.

I came to theatre through the page. Writing that could be spoken—and that asked to be heard in a shared space—drew me from prose into plays. Early readings at festivals like Lubimovka and First Reading taught me how text lives when it leaves the desk. A turning point was the commission from UNHCR for “Limbo”: putting displacement and borders on stage in an interactive form at the Azerbaijan Carpet Museum. Since then I have kept one foot in the script and one in the room—curating the Characters festival in Baku and continuing to write for stage and screen. I am interested in work that tests the edge of comfort and care.