During the development of the Mandarin versions of Shakespeare's plays, the Royal Shakespeare Company is inviting companies of actors, directors, and playwrights from China and the UK to work with translators during rehearsal workshops. [Photo: China Plus]

New productions of the William Shakespeare plays Hamlet, Twelfth Night, and The Tempest - and all using Mandarin translations - will be staged in China this year.

The Royal Shakespeare Company has commissioned the new translations as part of its Shakespeare Folio Project. The project aims to make the playwright's work more accessible to Chinese speakers.

China's National Centre for the Performing Arts will put on the new version of The Tempest in Beijing in August.

The Guangzhou Dramatic Arts Centre will open its production of Twelfth Night in Guangzhou in October. And the Li Liuyi Theatre Studio in Beijing will premiere the new translation of Hamlet in December.

During the development of the Mandarin versions of Shakespeare's plays, the Royal Shakespeare Company is inviting companies of actors, directors, and playwrights from China and the UK to work with translators during rehearsal workshops.

Together they unpick clues about meaning, character, and pacing that Shakespeare put into the text, elements that the Company says were sometimes lost in previous translations.

The Royal Shakespeare Company's artistic director Gregory Doran said the new translation process makes for more "actor and audience friendly translations" of Shakespeare's work.