This should have been a continuation of yesterday's post about peripatetic Australians, but only arrived in today's mail: to wit, an announcement that the Malthouse's production of Optimism, which opens in Melbourne in May, is traveling to the Edinburgh International Festival and the 2010 Sydney Festival. Both festivals and the Sydney Theatre Company are co-producers of the work, an adaptation of Voltaire's Candide which will be directed by Michael Kantor and is written by Tom Wright. Wright's adaptation of Euripides's The Women of Troy was, incidentally, yesterday shortlisted for the NSW Premier's Literary Awards Play Prize. You can find the other shortlistees through the link.